PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

August 4, 2020

Tony Finau

Harding Park Golf Club

Press Conference

JOHN DEVER: Welcome back to the 2020 PGA Championship at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco. We are pleased to be joined by Tony Finau.

Welcome to your sixth PGA Championship, and going back to last year, you had a couple of top fives in the majors, which would normally be something to build on, except it was 13 months ago since the last major. Is there anything that you picked up last year that you think you can carry over with you to keep that stellar play in the majors?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, I think you just have confidence that you can play, play well and at a high level when it matters. I think coming off last year, I definitely gave myself a chance to win the Masters, which was definitely a highlight of last year, and had a great run at The Open Championship. I think Shane Lowry ran away with that last year, but I was able to play strong on Sunday and have a third-place finish there.

But I think anytime you have a great finish in a major championship, you build that confidence in just the way you carry yourself I think the rest of your career in major championships. Definitely still have good mojo from last year going into this week.

Q. I know these big events mean a lot to you, and you get yourself up for them. What is it about your makeup that it's such a good fit for the bigger events?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, you know, I definitely don't lack energy. I feel like -- this is actually my fourth week in a row playing, but when I got on the grounds here, very energetic and prepared mentally I feel like to take on the task that major championships bring.

As far as my makeup, I feel like I've really grinded my teeth to kind of get to the position I'm at in my game, and I think that holds well for major championships. Pretty much every facet has to be on to contend in a major championship. You only have to be swinging -- you don't only have to be swinging the golf club well, but mentally and emotionally you have to keep yourself in it when you're not at your best to just grind it out, and I feel like I've been that type of player my whole career, and it serves me well in major championships.

Q. Whenever you're away from the golf course, what are some things you do to feel like you're staying productive both during tournament weeks and when you're at home?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, away from the golf course, good question. While I'm home, I actually -- you know, a lot of my time I'm actually spending with my family and my kids away from the game. I still get I think the amount of practice I need to keep me playing at a high level, but most of the time when I'm home, I'm with my family and doing things with my kids.

On the road, I think it's a lot of the same. You know, when I leave the golf course, I'm trying not to think too much about golf and competing. I might watch some Netflix. I'm a pretty avid reader, so I enjoy reading. I used to be a movie watcher before COVID, and not able to do that these days.

I actually try to take myself away from the game because we're so consumed and competing while we're out here. My dad taught me at a young age, when you're away from the golf course, your mind doesn't need to be there anymore. So I was raised that way, and that's kind of the approach I take no matter the situation I'm in; when I leave the golf course, I'm doing other things.

Q. We hear that the rough here will be a factor, but how much of a factor do you think it will be, especially when you're coming in with a wedge, say? How deep does rough have be to to be effective for you guys from shorter range?

TONY FINAU: Well, it's definitely thick enough this week to be a factor. I played the back nine for the first time yesterday, and I think it's about a 50/50 chance as far as the lie. I've had two lies yesterday on Hole 12 that were three feet apart. One I could easily get a 7-iron on and the other one I was just trying to hack out 40, 50 yards. It's almost luck of the draw when you hit it in the rough. I think you're going to see some guys get fortunate and hit it on to the green and I think you'll see some guys hack it out and not hit it anywhere.

The length I think is perfect, perfect length just to have it be tough. Again, I think it's just luck of the draw. I think it's a 50/50 show of having a shot at the green and having to lay up hitting it in the rough here on all these holes.

Q. There's been a lot of discussion over the last couple weeks about your final rounds. Do you feel like you have an issue with your final rounds, and if so, what are you doing to try to deal with that?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, thanks. I think there has been a little talk about that and my ability to finish. It's definitely not anything I shy away from.

You know, but my coach and I have done our homework on my finishes, and I've actually got a great record on Sunday. It seems to be one guy always plays better than I do. That's the luck of the draw; it's been up to this point in my career.

But I keep putting myself in that situation, and I have a proven track record myself of winning golf tournaments, not at the highest level yet, but I look at myself as a closer and as a finisher, and I know through time, I think I'll be able to prove that.

But many tournaments and many instances, as I've looked back, I can't read too much in what others are thinking or are putting in front of me, but you know, doing my own homework on what I can do to get better, and it seems to always be that there's one or two guys on Sunday that play better than I do, and I think that hopefully that luck changes moving forward in my career.

Q. I know how much of a positive person you are, and I'm kind of wondering how you kind of separate the fact that you've been there so much and with the disappointment that you haven't closed these things, or that it hasn't gone your way. I have a follow-up question to this, as well, but that number that's out there, we all live in statistics in the sports world, and your stat right now, stamped on your shoulder is 30 Top 10s since your win, which could either be a badge of honor or something that's of annoyance to you. Where does that fit for you? Where do you see that?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, I think a little bit of both. Definitely a badge of honor just in how consistent I continue to play. A little bit of an annoyance, but mostly because I look at a few of the opportunities I had to play and had the opportunity to kind of shine and wasn't able to do that.

But I think throughout the 30 Top-10s I've had, I've had maybe six or seven seconds, and out of those six or seven seconds, I've truly felt like on the back nine, I've only had a grasp of the trophy maybe three or four times, and so a couple playoff -- a couple tough playoff losses in some of those seconds, but again I've kind of done my homework and as I break it down, out of those kind of six chances I feel like in those second places I've had, I think the way I have to look at it and the way I choose to look at it, with that type of consistent play, as long as I'm learning something, it's going to serve me well moving forward.

I put myself in that situation many times and it tells me that I've done it more times really than anybody else on Tour, and the consistency is there. Just keep learning and there's no reason to hang my head when I've played that consistently that often and I know that when I have my good stuff, it's good enough to win and good enough to contend. And again, I think moving forward, I have to have that type of attitude and carry more confidence from that play than taking away anything bad, because I have put myself in that situation often, and it tells me that when I do win again, I'm not going anywhere. I'm not disappearing for a while. I'm at the top of leaderboards quite often, and when I get the job done again in the near future, I think we'll be having a different narrative.

Q. When things do go well for you, you play well on Sunday, which you have, as you said, before, and you get that break, maybe that you might need that you haven't been getting, and say it's at a major championship. Do you have any feel for how much that can propel you in terms of confidence? Because at that point, now you've done it. Do you have any idea where that brings you?

TONY FINAU: I have hopes that it will catapult me into a whole different type of player and a different -- just a different winner, you know, at this level. I've been able to prove to myself again that with all those top finishes, you know, I'm choosing to look at it positively rather than not being able to seal the deal but how consistently I've been able to put myself in position to win; so I do feel like and have the hopes that when it happens again, it will catapult me into a different type of player moving forward. And that, to me, is just more off the success that I've had in the past of consistent play and consistently putting myself with a chance to win.

Q. Just wondering the way the schedule has worked out, you have a lot of majors packed in a short period of time. Is this a chance for someone to change the course of their career if they can get hot over the next few months?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, no question. It seems like guys get hot in strides, and they do go through three or four months of kind of running their course on being the best player, being the hottest player in the world. We've seen that with Jon Rahm. We've seen that with a handful of the top players in the world, and they go through a few months of being the hottest player or the best player in the world and I can definitely see how that can serve somebody well during this time.

With these majors, so condensed as you mentioned, I definitely think that there's going to be a key guy that stands out as the hot player in these next three to four months that will probably be favored in some of these tournaments. Yeah, hopefully that name is me or includes me.

Q. What do you think of the role that the crowds played when you got in the run at Augusta a couple Aprils ago? And you've played in the restart; how much of an adjustment has it been, the energy of the crowds?

TONY FINAU: It has been an adjustment because I do like that type of energy, playing the big events and having the crowd behind you, and just when you have a chance to win having that energy, hearing the noise and hearing the chants and the claps and all that, you kind of feed off that I think as a competitor and as a player.

I definitely miss having the fans out, just to give you that extra rush and energy of major championship golf and just championship golf in general. I look forward to the time when our fans are invited back out to watch and enjoy.

But on a different note, it's cool just to be competing and playing, and although our fans aren't here in person, I know there's millions of fans around the world watching, and in a year where it's been extremely tough for a lot of people, I think it's cool to just through sports we're able to give some relief through live entertainment. That's one of my favorite things about sports, and I'm happy as a sport in golf that we are being proactive and playing and just giving that type of relief to some people that need it.

Q. You were talking about the rough. You've been taking a little more aggressive approach. You didn't say, are you going to continue that approach with this setup? And my other question is about the weather, the cool and the humidity. Have you done some TrackMan work to see how your numbers compare to how they have been in the warmer weather?

TONY FINAU: Yeah, yeah, to answer your first question, I am going to open up a little bit more this week. This golf course allows to you do that. Last week, not so much. But this golf course is a big -- it's a big course. I only played the back nine, but I already saw three or four holes where I can go ahead and give it extra and try and attack this golf course that way.

I think distance is a big key this week, and you know, you mentioned the rough, we talked about the rough. You've got to hit the fairways. But if I am going to miss a fairway, I want to miss it as far up as I can to give myself a chance to still hit the green.

So I've talked in the past about cranking it up a little bit, and I have done that in the last few weeks. Didn't do that that much last week, but this course allows me to kind of open up and do that, so I will.

To answer your second question, I have the Foresight Sport GCQuad, which is a similar thing to TrackMan. I think it's going to be extremely important. I had it with me yesterday out on the golf course. It's crazy how short the golf ball goes here in northern California. I played Olympic Club quite a few times growing up, San Francisco Country Club. I don't think the ball travels shorter anywhere in the world than here in northern California. There's definitely a part in that this week that we're going to have to adjust for, and I'll definitely be doing my homework on that these next couple days.

JOHN DEVER: Thank you so much for spending some time with us in the media hub and best of luck this week, sir.