PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

May 19, 2022

Webb Simpson

Southern Hills Country Club

Flash Quotes

JOHN DEVER: Welcome back to the 2022 PGA Championship here at Southern Hills Golf Club, Tulsa, Oklahoma. We are with Webb Simpson, who opened with a 1-under 69 today. Webb, that's a pretty clean scorecard. You have to like kind of what you put forth today and put yourself in a pretty darned good position really.

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, I was really happy with today's round. I feel like I hit one bad shot today and that was on 9. My tee ball went right. My other bogey on 11, I hit a good shot, my ball went too far, ended up making bogey on 11.

Yeah, for the form I've shown this year, every week I show up, I think we've got something and I don't perform the way I want. But I will say that today felt like the golf that I know how to play. It didn't feel abnormal. I wasn't surprised. But I'm very thankful to get off to a good start in a really tough condition day.

Q. You played your best golf it looks like in the afternoon, your last six, seven holes as the conditions got worse and worse.

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, it did, it got really tough. But you've got to keep your ball kind of right in front of you, keep it low enough to where the wind doesn't do a lot. I like that. I like flighting my ball.

Yeah, I hit a lot of fairways, especially the first kind of 12 holes, and then missed a couple. But yeah, it was tough. I thought anything par or better this afternoon would be a great score.

Q. Can I ask about the iron switch, how long you've been considering it, and maybe what led to doing it? And also what it's like being out of blades when you've played blades your whole life?

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, I've had a couple of short stints with non-blades in my career but not many.

I haven't been hitting my irons great. Approach to the green is typically a strength for me; this year it's been a weakness, and I've struggled out of the rough. I keep getting told that these the irons I'm playing are better out of the rough, better with distance control, better with mis-hits, and so I guess I was being stubborn but finally listened and I really like them.

They're not a whole lot different than mine the way they look, but we've had good results with them so far.

Q. What kind of test has it been on you personally just to keep working hard at it and not seeing the results you're used to seeing?

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, it's hard. These stretches are really, I think, the hardest part of what we do. My dad taught me early on, I'm never going to not work hard. I have to work hard on my psyche, I guess, just for my mind. I can't imagine laying down in my bed at night thinking I'm getting lazy. I'm going to work hard.

The hard part is having the passion and the excitement and enthusiasm to go out there and grind. When you're playing well, when you're shooting 65s every week, practice is easy and it's fun. But when you're shooting 71, 72, practice is hard.

There's been long days, and obviously I'm not there yet, but yeah, I'm really thankful to see form in a major on a tough day, and I think the work is paying off.

Q. This place where you have to play from the short grass and you need to be good around the greens, I've got to think that's a pretty good fit.

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, I grew up -- at Wake Forest we played Old Town, which is Perry Maxwell, so there's a lot of similarities. Obviously this one is a lot harder, a lot longer, a lot more penal. But I do, I like chipping off these kind of old-school Bermuda fairways, bumping it when you have to.

That's what Paul said to me, you know, he saw the course before I got here, that I was going to like it around the greens, but it certainly is tough.

Q. Webb, your last birdie on the 16th, putt from distance, 40, 45 feet, somewhere in there, got to make you feel pretty good at the end of the day, right?

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, that was a perfect scenario read. I had right edge, my caddie had left edge. I went straight, and it went right in the middle. Good teamwork there.

Q. Just curious back on the irons, how long have you been considering the change and what was the thing that put you over the top to make the change, especially the week of a major?

WEBB SIMPSON: Yeah, honestly I hadn't considered it that much at all. Paul mentioned it at Wells Fargo after that first round or maybe after I missed the cut on Friday. Then he came to Charlotte last Wednesday and we were doing some testing, and we were seeing some crazy numbers out of the rough with my blades.

Thankfully I live on the golf course, so we drove to my garage, picked up this other set -- honestly I didn't know if I had this other set still. I don't know if Titleist will like this or not, but if I don't use a set I give it to a friend. I'm trying to spread the word for Titleist, you know. So I might have given to a friend, but I see them in there, we bring them out, and all the numbers we tested were way better.

So I still wasn't certain that I was going to put them in this week so I have both, but yeah, the biggest thing for me is when I look down I want to make sure it looks good, and then after that all I care about is the numbers and how it's going to perform out of the rough, and so far they've passed the test.