U.S. OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP 2021

June 19, 2021

Mike Davis

Jason Gore

Torrey Pines Golf Course

Quick Quotes

Q. What did you shoot?

JASON GORE: I think I shot 6-over, which I'm happy. I might have embarrassed myself, but it wasn't with my golf clubs. The golf course is hard. It's long for an old man.

MIKE DAVIS: If only you knew who set it up.

JASON GORE: I know, I'm going to go right into his office. No, the golf course was fantastic. I haven't touched a club in three weeks, and it was more about just going out and having a good time, stay out of Akshay's way. I think we did a good job with that. His raking skills are phenomenal, by the way, he's got a lot of practice.

MIKE DAVIS: They were a little suspect starting out. Jason is push, push. No, pull. Anyway, you did put me in bunkers.

JASON GORE: It wasn't on purpose, trust me.

Q. When was the last time you caddied?

MIKE DAVIS: I think it was at Chambersburg Country Club when I was 12, 13, 14 years old. This was a treat.

Q. It's a unique perspective for you.

MIKE DAVIS: It is.

Q. On your way out.

MIKE DAVIS: It's interesting because I walked with hundreds of groups officiating, but it's different when you're actually with the player, I mean, right on top of the player. A few times he actually did say, how do you think this is playing? Somebody was in the final group of the 2005 U.S. Open, so he can actually play his ball, Walker Cupper --

JASON GORE: That was a long time ago.

Q. Will you do it again tomorrow?

MIKE DAVIS: No, he's getting a real caddie tomorrow.

JASON GORE: Yeah, he got fired.

Q. Can you tell me how the text went last night when you asked him?

JASON GORE: Yeah, I asked him like, hey, you want to go nine holes. I originally thought 18, and I'm like I'm not going to push the envelope. I thought it would be kind of fun. All of a sudden he texted me last night, he's like, if it's an odd number, I'll go all 18 with you. I'm like perfect, let's do it.

Q. Did you try to find a staff bag?

MIKE DAVIS: I actually asked him, I said, I think you can play as well with eight clubs, but he didn't buy into that.

JASON GORE: I brought my lucky cinderblock collection.

Q. When did you know you'd be the marker?

JASON GORE: It wasn't until the last putt. I was hoping it wasn't until -- oh, gosh, what's the amateur that three-putted the last hole, two-putted the last hole? I wanted to see him in it and just kind of worked out that way. You know, there was a little bit of a scramble, like I was hitting balls last night in the dark just to see where -- it was like a scene from Bryson DeChambeau with not the dramatics nor the implications, but no, it was fun.

I've been out here for three weeks and haven't really touched a club. Just trying to help our team get our championships ready. So it was fun. It was good to stretch it out a little bit and get inside those ropes. It was fun. The golf course is fantastic.

Q. Seems like an easier way to make the weekend of a major?

JASON GORE: Yeah, it is, just back-door it. It was fun because now I'll go back to John Bodenhamer and Jeff Hall and we'll talk about how the golf course played and what's going on and what some of the reactions were. It'll be great to get some real inside feedback and just try to see if we can continue to make our championships better and better.

It was fun. I'll do it tomorrow and won't do it anymore?

Q. What were your observations watching Akshay for 18 holes?

JASON GORE: He hits it really far. He's really good. I mean, 19 years old, to have his kind of demeanor and his personality and just -- he's just so talented. I don't even think he has any idea how talented he is. I hope some day he will. It would be great for the game if he does.

You know, I think he's going to be a heck of a player?

Q. Much interaction with him?

JASON GORE: I was trying to stay out of his way. I want to talk to him. I told him, hey, man, if you want to talk about what's going on, come to my office later. Right now I told him, I said, if you want to tee off first, you tee off first. If you want to finish out, you finish out, and don't bother, I'll scoop it, I don't care. I'm here to just help your flow and just stay out of your way. He's like -- we walked off the 2nd tee, and he's like, just play golf, so we did, and I just acted like I was in there and I hit one up there like this for par on 16 and he like smacked it back and I kind of lost it, started laughing. But you know, just to try to get some crowd reaction.

But no, he's a great kid. It was a fun day. The golf course is just magnificent.

Q. You mentioned the setup (indiscernible) what do you think about the setup is producing that result?

JASON GORE: I think familiarity with the golf course first. You know, they play here every year, so I think they understand what it is. I think the one thing we all talked about, Mike included, John, Jeff and I and Mike and others involved, we want to make sure they know this isn't Farmers, so we wanted to play a U.S. Open -- like I said, they're so familiar with it, but it's just the rough is great, it's what a U.S. Open should be. We got the golf course and it's just -- we got good weather. Everything is in our favor to present a great championship. It's right there. You can make birdies; they're out there. But if you don't hit a proper shot or don't catch it correctly, you're going to be busy, and that's kind of the point of it. You see with the score cards how many circles and squares are on there. You have to just sometimes tempt how aggressive these guys are and how good they are.

No, that golf course is awesome right now.

MIKE DAVIS: It was very similar feedback from '08, though. I think that family really -- yeah, the greens were bumpier in '08, so you'll see more putts made this week, but it was the same reaction back then I recall, same questions.

Q. Did you see anything out there from that perspective, from a setup point of view, like oh, I didn't think about this? I'm not trying to suggest you got something wrong?

JASON GORE: Oh, I thought it was really good. I thought it was really good. I mean, for how far I hit it now, yeah, I thought it was way too long, but that's me. Not for these guys. But no, I thought it was fantastic. I thought it was really, really good. The rough was penal, so you had to hit some good tee shots, and those fairways can get -- under U.S. Open pressure and U.S. Open firmness they can get pretty tight pretty quick. It's really good.

Q. Mike, is this a normal U.S. Open week for you or is it different knowing it's your last one?

MIKE DAVIS: It's actually much different because a typical U.S. Open for me is 20, 25 meetings a day, and because we don't have anybody here, because the industry leaders aren't coming because of COVID, so it's a very quiet week. It's actually a wonderful week for me the last one because I'm not in meetings all the time. I never could have done that at a normal U.S. Open, so that's nice.

JASON GORE: It was an honor to have you on the bag. I learned so much, it was great. His schedule, my schedule, everybody's schedule around this time of year, we don't get to spend much time together. But it was an honor. It was a pleasure.

MIKE DAVIS: If we have as much drama today as we had Saturday in 2008, 50 percent as much, it's going to be a great day.