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SHRINERS HOSPITALS FOR CHILDREN OPEN

October 4, 2019

Brooks Koepka

Las Vegas, Nevada

Q. You were pretty excited, pretty enthusiastic when we talked to you on Wednesday. How disappointing were the last two days?
BROOKS KOEPKA: Not really disappointing. Everything I've worked on -- I've worked on my wedges, trying to control yardages a lot, and they were spot on all week. And I was just a hair off. Putting, just kind of reverted back to some old things, but that's going to happen. I'm not disappointed. I feel like I was very, very close. This golf course, it can kind of show you you can shoot even par very quickly and you can shoot 7-under. It's just a matter of inches.

Q. Chase is off to a terrific start and he's going to have a chance over the weekend. How excited are you for him?
BROOKS KOEPKA: Yeah, it's obviously a great opportunity for him. It's a big week. You never know what could happen. You come out here and you win and all of a sudden he's got a membership, which would be pretty cool. But I don't think he finished very well, unfortunately. Just needs to stay patient.

This golf course gives you a lot of opportunities to make birdies, and if he can make a bunch of them and no mistakes and kind of keep it clean the way he did the first 27, maybe 30 holes, he's going to have a chance on Sunday.

Q. By any chance would you be here? Are you staying --
BROOKS KOEPKA: Yeah, if he's going to win, I'll stay. If he's going to win, I'll be the first person to congratulate him on 18. I think it would be probably one of the coolest things. You know, there's not many chances you get where your brother can actually be a professional golfer, let alone play in the same tournament, and then if he does win, shoot, that would be a highlight of my year.

Q. Would you mind sharing a little bit about the experience that Chase had this summer? He talked yesterday about how he was kind of down when he came back from the Challenge Tour and he's been a lot happier in recent weeks just being around the family.
BROOKS KOEPKA: Yeah, I had the same spell, but I was doing it when I was winning. That was the only difference. I've been in his shoes. I've been down, ready to leave. When I had I think like a three-shot lead going into Sunday, I didn't even want to play; I was ready to go home. It's different. It's a lot different. I don't think anybody -- there's maybe, what, 10, 15 Americans that have gone over there and done that, so until they actually do it, they don't know what it's like. It's very difficult, the language barrier. You can't find things to do. Here it's easy to go see a movie. It's in your language. There's different things like that where you take for granted just going out to dinner. I've ordered a pepperoni pizza and it came back peppers only, little things like that. Sometimes it can be frustrating, but at the same time, in the long run it'll be -- he'll be a better person for it, he'll be a better golfer, and he'll look back in 10, 15 years -- I'm not even that far removed, and I still think it was the time of my life.

Q. That's your story about the pizza?
BROOKS KOEPKA: Yeah, I've said it before, I don't know where. I've said it a couple times, I think.

Q. How many times did you actually think you were going to get killed when you were in that one --
BROOKS KOEPKA: Yeah, in Kenya? Yeah, I was with George Murray. That was probably one of the scariest things. At the time I couldn't afford to turn on my location services and I did because you turn your data on when you're overseas and your phone bill can go up very quickly. I did it, I was that nervous. I called everybody in my family, I called my agent and told him where I was at, just to make sure that they could somehow track it.

Q. In a quiet moment maybe tonight, what advice will you give Chase for the next two days?
BROOKS KOEPKA: Just keep doing what he's doing. Obviously it's working. I think he got to 10, right? So I don't know, he just needs to stay patient. It's 36 more holes. Anything can happen.

You know, it's interesting because it's kind of a free week for him. He can go out and free wheel it, and -- he was expected to do what I did, I think, to miss the cut, and to make the cut, I don't think anybody really gave him a chance, especially the way he's been playing. So go out there, enjoy it, and try to earn some money and try to earn some status out here. He's heading to Q-school next week. I don't know what he's going to do. Hopefully he can top 10 it or win it.

Q. Will you get the needle from him, and what's it like to get the needle from him?
BROOKS KOEPKA: I mean, I've gotten it before. I mean, I don't think people realize in golf, you can get beat any day. He's kicked my ass the last two days. Props to him. Hey, I was glued to the leaderboard trying to follow the last couple -- the first couple holes of my front nine, trying to see where he was going to finish, what I was at. I was living and dying by it yesterday. I even had The Golf Channel on trying to see if maybe he would get a couple glimpses on there. I was trying to watch. Hopefully this week will be a special week for him.

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