	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

AT&T BYRON NELSON

May 7, 2019

Beau Hossler

Irving, Texas

JOHN BUSH: We'd like to welcome Beau Hossler into the Interview Room. He's making his third career start at the AT&T Byron Nelson.

Beau, take us back to last year and I know you struggled a little bit in the 3rd round but closed with that 64. Just talk a little bit about playing at Trinity Forest last year and being back again.

BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah. I got a good story about that, actually. I don't remember exactly what I shot on Saturday but I think I was pretty far back. Sunday wasn't going very well.

Started on the back-9. Made the turn. Kind of a lethargic start on our back-9. Sitting on the driveable is it 5, 5 the driveable hole, 4, 5? We got a long wait on the tee.

My caddy says, "If you birdie the last five I'll buy you dinner." That's generous considering he was going to make another 5 grand.

Birdied the last five. That was a nice finish. This is my home course for two years. It actually looks very different than it has in the past and I think it will play nicely. Certainly played long today. Not much roll like last year.

JOHN BUSH: Come in number 128 in the FedExCup standings. I know you still have some work to do the rest of the season. Talk a little bit about your season up to this point.

BEAU HOSSLER: It's been a struggle, to be fair. Haven't hit the ball very well. It's just not been pretty the last four, five months but feel like I'm working on the right things and moving in the right direction. I'm glad to be playing a pretty decent stretch of golf right now. Hopefully we can start seeing a little bit better results.

JOHN BUSH: We'll open it up to questions.

Q. Beau, you kind of touched on this a little bit. I'm curious, how you would categorize the maturity from right now from a year ago.
BEAU HOSSLER: Well, I would say it's difficult to categorize it as a golf course maturing or just simply a difference in weather leading up to the tournament.

Last year when we played it was pretty windy and felt like it was about 150 degrees but it was probably about 95. This year it's, you know, I think it's forecasted some days in the 60s this year.

JOHN BUSH: Low 70s for sure.

BEAU HOSSLER: Which is obviously pleasant. The ball won't be going as far. You saw guys hit drives well over 350 yards last year. I don't see that happening this year unless somehow it really dries out.

Supposedly we'll supposed to get even more rain tomorrow. There were holes last year that I was hitting gosh, wedges and 9 irons. Today I was hitting 5 and 6 irons, getting only 3, 4 yards for roll as opposed to 30, 40 last year.

Strategically they set-up the golf a little bit longer. Seems like we played some tees up a box or two last year. Made a difference on 18. I know on 18 we were up because I hit 9 in there. Today I hit 6-iron.

So, like I said, I don't know if I would say it's a golf course maturing or just weather. It could be a little bit of both. But I think it's nice. The course is in shape. Fairways are pure, greens are certainly in better shape I think this year than last year.

That might be the maturity that you're talking about.

Q. As a member, how many times have you played out here?
BEAU HOSSLER: To be fair, I didn't play all that much. When I get home I'm usually trying to rest up and trying to work on some things. You know, probably 15, 20 times.

But, like I said, when they first opened the golf course it is way different than it is now. Used to be the fairways or the run-up areas were relatively soft but the greens when they first built the course were extremely firm and extremely fast and if you got any kind of weather it got pretty dicey out there as far as stopping the ball around the hole.

The greens are at a very comfortable pace now where they're able to be more flexible in hole locations, probably a little bit more aggressive with hole locations. I think that probably plays into what Ben and Bill wanted as far as when they designed the golf course and what they intended as far as playability in a tournament.

Q. Half the field has not played in this tournament at the Trinity course. If somebody came up to you and asked you how to play this course, what would you say?
BEAU HOSSLER: It's just so weather-dependent. It's truly such a different golf course today than it was last year when we played and not to mention you start getting a north wind which I think we have forecasted one or two of the days versus a south wind, you'll take holes that are normally very birdieable and become difficult pars and vice-versa.

I certainly would say that the most important thing is to get the ball in play. Seemingly the fescue areas this year are very thick and lush I think from all the rain. Last year they were a little bit more dried out and wispy to where you would have half a chance if you hit in it there; maybe even gone as far as marking some new hazards out there potentially for pace of play because they don't want people looking for their ball in there for so long because it's very thick.

Step one, without a doubt out here, is keep it out of long stuff and keep it in play. The cool thing about the course is like I was telling you that story, you can get on runs out here which is exciting.

There are a lot of birdieable holes but certainly depending on the conditions, there are a lot of holes that you're struggling for par as well.

It's a pretty good mix across the board.

Q. Beau, you had a little bit of history with Tiger when were you an amateur back in 2012, 2013.
Can you kind of shed some light on growing up in this age in what ways he might have influenced you to commit to the sport and then as a professional this last year what it's been like to see him kind of rise back to where he's at now?

BEAU HOSSLER: I just -- it's funny, for me I just grew up, I didn't know anything other than Tiger dominating golf. Seemingly every year for what, I guess 10, 12 year period from the time I was about four years old until the time I was about 15, 16 years old it was like he was the best player in the world and, to be fair, there was no one really even close on a consistent basis at least.

There would be guys that got hot for 8 months at a time but he was either No. 1 or No. 2 in the world for seriously extended period of time.

I think golf kind of had a different feel when he was off the map a little bit struggling with his injuries and whatnot and even when he was playing, clearly he was just a shell of himself. He was playing but he wasn't really playing any kind of golf that we remember him playing ten years ago or 15 years ago.

So, to see that again -- I wasn't at the Masters this year but I watched the weekend and I mean that was probably as inspiring as a sports performance as you can see. Clearly his game was in shape. This year he's obviously played well. Played well last year as well.

But to see that kind of come to fruition, particularly at the Masters, was outstanding and it's not very often that you see guys, Top 5, 10, players in the world losing and genuinely being excited for the guy who won and you saw that obviously Xander and Brooks were very gracious, they both finished 2nd if I'm not mistaken.

I think obviously it's outstanding for our game and seemingly Tiger -- I mean I wasn't out here when he was playing a lot but it seemed like he was a little bit more shut off to obviously everybody but even some of the players, and he's very gracious in all the times that I've been around him and I think it's great for everybody. It's great for him.

Feel like his -- he has an image and a likeness now with the fans that might be as good or better as he's ever had. That's saying something, clearly.

So, I think it's exciting for the sport, I think it's exciting for him but very inspiring for not only golfers but just anybody who has faced some serious difficulty in their life and kind of wondered if they're ever going to get back to whatever they do really well.

I think it just shows you that, you know, as dark as life can be at times, I think it's nice to have reassurance that you can kind of get back to where you need to be. I think it's outstanding.

Q. Beau, you hired a man named Jordan as a caddy here on your bag. Is he still employed?
BEAU HOSSLER: No, he's not, but he was for two and a half years for me. He was one of my best friends.

Q. I caddied with him year, got to know him.
BEAU HOSSLER: Yeah. Yeah.

Q. Beau, with being here, do you feel a home field advantage this week as compared to other weeks on the PGA TOUR?
BEAU HOSSLER: Not really. It's a hard golf course. The scores may not show it. The scores were low last year but I think the golf course set-up last year was intended to not do anything crazy, not make any major mistakes in the first year, particularly because undoubtedly it was a semi-controversial site, not because it's bad, I think it's great, but just different really than anything else we play.

So, I think the golf course was set-up pretty easily. This year, like I said, it seems like the tees are moved a little further back, you're not getting roll. Depending on weather, if it gets windy at all I think -- it might have been 20-under par or something that won last year, wasn't it? 23 under? That's really low.

But I mean I feel comfortable on the golf course but certainly it just changes everyday out here. That's kind of what it's designed to do. It's meant to play different in different conditions. I think that's one of the assets of the golf course.

JOHN BUSH: All right. Anything else? All good. Beau Hossler, best of luck this week.

BEAU HOSSLER: Thank you.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297