THE MEMORIAL TOURNAMENT PRESENTED BY WORKDAY

May 30, 2023

Jack Nicklaus

Muirfield Village

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: We're going to break from tradition. I'm Dan Sullivan, executive director for The Memorial Tournament Presented By Workday, and we wanted to interrupt Jack's annual state of the game press conference by recognizing the Jack Nicklaus Award, which goes to the collegiate -- best Player of the Year on the collegiate ranks within the NCAA.

We're doing that for two reasons: First, we're going to have a new partner apply their name to the award; and second, Jack's going to offer up the name of the recipient for D-I. And we'll do the tradition, as we have for years, on Sunday by bringing all five of the players here. But we're deviating a little bit by offering up the introduction of the recipient today.

But first, Workday's been our partner now for two years, great relationship with Aneel Bhusri, who is the co-founder and co-CEO, and this relationship continues to grow and expand in a lot of different ways and one of those is with Workday applying their name to the Jack Nicklaus Award going forward.

So Aneel, if you want to talk a little bit about Workday's investment in the game.

ANEEL BHUSRI: Yeah, thank you, Dan. First of all, it's great to see everybody and I'm always honored to be sitting next to Jack, one of my heros.

We're just thrilled to be part of the Jack Nicklaus Award. It's the best Division I player voted by the coaches, and I think that's really meaningful, that this is something that comes from the coaches who know their stuff. And there's so many amazing players coming out of D-I golf these days and then ending up on the TOUR and they're great citizens and I'm just delighted that Workday is a part of it with you, Jack.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Aneel. Appreciate it.

Jack, if you wouldn't mind just introducing the name of the recipient this year and just talk a little bit about the award itself.

JACK NICKLAUS: Just D-I?

THE MODERATOR: Yes. And then talk a little bit about the award that started in 1988 and your association with the award.

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, the coaches came to me back at that particular time and said they would like to name the award for the best Player of the Year after me, and I thought that was a great honor. I came as a college player from Ohio State obviously and we didn't have any awards back then. You made your own bogeys and moved on from there.

But now there's several awards that were given for different organizations, but this is -- we consider this the best one because it comes from the coaches themselves. It's kind of neat. I look back and I wish I had a list of the past recipients here, but I can go back to Patrick Rogers, who is playing here. We've got Jon Rahm, who won, played here. Patrick Cantlay. Let's see.

THE MODERATOR: Chris Gotterup, who is in the field this week.

JACK NICKLAUS: Yes, Chris, last year. Chris is in the field this year. And that may be all of them. I don't know. But there may be one other one I've forgotten.

But anyway, I sort of always followed 'em after they won. I remember when Cantlay came here and he was going to qualify for the U.S. Open right here in Columbus, and I looked at him, and the confidence that he exuded it was quite obvious to me that he knew he was going to qualify. And he did.

And then of course Rahm, when Jon came here I followed him. I said, This kid's going to be a good player. And he is. Not too bad. He's not too shabby.

So anyway, we're proud to have -- I'm proud to have my name on an award that these kids get and get 'em started. So if I may, I'll start off and talk about the Division I winner this year, of course is a kid from Texas Tech, Ludvig Aberg. And I don't know much about Ludvig other than he's from Sweden and he's won just probably about half the college tournaments or more that he's played in. So they say that ain't too shabby. It's pretty good. So we're delighted to be able to announce that and we'll have the other ones on Sunday.

THE MODERATOR: We'll have Ludvig here as well as the other recipients. So thank you, Jack. Appreciate it.

Thank you, Aneel.

All right. Mark Williams come on up and we'll take it from there.

MARK WILLIAMS: Well, that was a great announcement, Mr. Nicklaus congratulations.

JACK NICKLAUS: Stay away from me. You almost broke my hand yesterday.

MARK WILLIAMS: My bad. Welcome again. It's always a pleasure to be here with you. It's a privilege for me. Let's just talk about what a great field we've got this week. It might be one of the best fields we've ever had at this tournament.

JACK NICKLAUS: I think it's probably as good a field as we've ever had. We've got a great field. Well, that's what you're going to have. You're going to have a great field here no matter what it is, and we do. We've got -- I don't get into specific names, but they're all here. A couple of guys had -- which I had too back then. I had a wedding or a college graduation, and sometimes you miss that and I understand that, that's good.

But for all intents and purposes all the top players in the world are here. The golf course itself is really good. We haven't had any rain here for I don't know how long. It's been probably about a week or 10 days since you've had rain. The forecast is not to have any rain. We have never had that in Columbus. You know, I've used the phrase many times about that, and I'll use it again, the Columbus weatherman is about 97 percent correct 3 percent of the time.

So I hope he's a hundred percent correct this time because I like dry golf courses. I think they bring the best in golfers -- brings the best out in a golfer. It forces them to think about how they play, just not rear back and hit it. When I played I didn't like particularly long golf courses when I played. I preferred golf courses where you had to think about what you wanted to play off the tee and think about if you ran through fairways and think about if I put the ball in the rough on this hole, what am I going to have left and can I stop it on the green and what kind of shot am I going to play. I like that. That's basically what we've got this week, and that's good.

MARK WILLIAMS: Terrific. Before we take some questions, I was talking with Chad Mark, your superintendent, a little earlier and just asked what changes were made to the golf course and he mentioned a couple of tees, 16 and 17.

JACK NICKLAUS: Yeah, well, we changed our maintenance area. Chad got tired of the maintenance area, so we built him a new one. (Laughing.) Not exactly quite that way, but that's fine.

But the space behind 17 and 16 tees was our maintenance area. It's now going to be CBS compound for the television. We have a little bit of space to do a few things and I've always felt like the 16th hole was probably -- it went a little better angle, a little bit more to the right, it played a little bit more down the green. By getting the tee there, we actually gained a couple yards, but that's all right. It's downhill. It's probably downhill maybe 14, 15 feet. So it doesn't play as long as the yardage says, but it's a rather imposing shot to sit back on a tee and look down there and say, that little postage stamp is where I'm going to try to hit it from here?

To me, today it's a driver, but not for them today. They will probably have to go all the way back from an 8-iron to a 7-iron. But anyway, it's pretty good.

The 17th hole, when we took the compound away it allowed us to be able to get a little bit more yardage and I kept saying, how in the world can they keep knocking the ball by those two bunkers that are out at about 320 yards. And they did. They just kept knocking it over 'em. Well, it is downhill and it's a little bit downwind, so we added probably -- what did we add, Chad? How many yards did we add?

We added 20 yards to it. So we went back as far as we could go back, back into that area. That makes it a little bit more difficult in carrying those bunkers. Guys will play more to the area where we really want 'em to play, which is short of those two bunkers and into the space at about 100 -- probably 155, 160 yards, I suppose is what it is from there into the green.

So that's really the changes. Everything else is pretty much the same. The rough is not extremely tall. It's been dry and when it's dry you're not going to get a lot of rough. But it's been topped off. Topped it at 4, is that what you topped it at? Topped it at 4 inches last Friday. It won't be touched again. So it's going to grow some. And I promise you there's a little fertilizer out there. So.

I think they will find that the rough, now maybe it won't be as long in places, but it will be pretty thick. That's really more important. Really it's not about getting it in the rough, in my opinion. I don't want guys getting in there and just have to hack it out sideways. That's not what I want. I want them to be able to play a shot and give 'em an opportunity to play to the green. But if you can play to the green, you've got to figure out -- because it's coming out of the rough it shouldn't have spin on it. So you're going to have to figure out how to maneuver the ball in such a way to keep it on the green.

You're supposed to be able to play a shot from the fairway. If you play a good shot from the fairway, a ball played properly will stop, it should stop on any green on the golf course. A ball not played properly should bounce and move through the green. And that's really what the USGA has been trying to do for years with the U.S. Open and it's what I've tried to do here. We just haven't always had the conditions to be able to do that and this year I think we will.

MARK WILLIAMS: Well, it looks magnificent out there and it's a credit to the entire staff. So we'll take some questions.

Q. Back to your own college days, did you have a lot of fun here on, off the course and --

JACK NICKLAUS: What do you mean did I have a lot of fun here?

Q. When you played for Ohio State. Was that just a super enjoyable time or what's your memories of that?

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, when I was back playing for Ohio State I was a college student dating one Barbara Bash, who is in the back of the room there. She changed her name to Nicklaus a few years ago, at almost 63. And I came to Ohio State because I wanted to be part of college life. I was offered scholarships at I don't know how many schools, but I just told 'em, Don't bother. I said, Ohio State doesn't offer scholarships for golf, but it's where I was going to go.

And I probably have told this story before, but I think you get a kick out of it. I won a thousand dollar scholarship, the JC Juniors, between my junior and senior year and then between my senior year and first year of college, I won another thousand dollars for wining the JC Juniors. Two thousand dollars in scholarship money, that took me to the second quarter of my senior year, room, tuition, board, everything you could think of, paid for my fraternity bill, everything. And I had a blast.

As a matter of fact, last night we had 10 of my fraternity brothers up here at the club last night that were all guys that I went to school with. Can you believe a bunch of 82-, 83-, 84-year-olds having dinner? What did you say? Huh? Huh? Who is that over there? I can't see 'em. It was hysterical. We had a great time.

But I went to Ohio State to really be a student and be a part of what was going on. I was going there to be a pharmacist. My dad was a pharmacist. So I went through three years of pre-pharmacy. My dad talked me out of pharmacy school. He said, You can't use your golf behind a counter. He said, Why don't you switch over to the business college, which I did, and use it for that, use your business degree.

Well, anyway, I played, and as you say, enjoying Ohio State, I learned how to fly fish at Ohio State. Bob Kepler was my golf coach and Kep come to me, and he was a great guy. When I qualified for the Walker Cup my sophomore year I was 19. I had won the TransMiss the year before, so I made the Walker Cup team. I was a little scared to see Kep. I didn't know what he was going to say. He said, Man, man, man, congratulations. You are going to have a great spring.

I said, No, we're going to have a great spring.

He says, No, no, you're going to have a great spring. You're not coming to school. You're going to go play golf.

I said, What do you mean?

He says, You can play next year, the year after. Don't worry about that. I want you to go -- you qualified for the Masters, you qualified for the North/Souths, you qualified to play the British Amateur, the Walker Cup. You're going to have a great spring.

No golf coach today would do that. And that's what he did. So I went and I played golf all spring. And we were on the quarter system then, so I didn't really miss all that much. But anyway, then I came back and played my junior year at Ohio State and we didn't do anything eventful. I ended up losing Big-Ten, second in the Big-Ten, and then I lost in the -- at Broadmoor, actually where I won the U.S. Amateur the year before, I lost the second round of the NCAA that year. And then last year I came will back and we won the Big-Ten at Indiana and the NCAA -- I won the NCAA the individual. We didn't win the team, at Purdue.

But I enjoyed my college. I had a blast. Oh, I started about fly fishing. Kep started me fly fishing and what he would do is he would come out and look at the sky and he would say, Man, this is a beautiful day. It's too nice a day to go play golf. Why don't we get those guys started off the first tee and you and I will slip out the back door and go fishing.

Which is what we did. We'd get the team started and we'd go. He knew I was always going to have my golf game in shape. He wasn't worried about that. So we'd go fishing and we go over to Zanesville and we go trout fishing over there and we'd come back and we would go out and sit down and have a couple of beers together and -- not many coaches sit down with their players and have beers, but we did. We'd catch a few fish, we'd cook the fish, and we had a great time. That was my college life, and it had nothing to do with playing golf. I just went to Ohio State and I just happened to play golf when I went to Ohio State.

Q. The transition from college and college life to the TOUR and being a professional, was that a challenge for you or were you just used to it, it wasn't that big a difference going from one to the other or was it?

JACK NICKLAUS: No, not really. I mean, I had played enough golf. I had started playing -- I started playing tournament golf where I traveled and started playing tours -- my first TOUR tournament I was 18. I played at Firestone and then I played -- that's the only one I played that year. I played the U.S. Open that year.

But then when I was 19, I must have played half as dozen or so. Then 20, the same things. 21. I played a lot of TOUR tournaments when I was there. One of the big TOUR tournaments I played was -- I'll never forget, I played in Milwaukee and I was one shot out of the lead. An amateur hadn't won a TOUR tournament in years. I was really excited about winning it and I called Barbara on a Saturday night and we talked for about 45 minutes and the next day I went out, I didn't win the tournament, but I just realized that I talked to her for 45 minutes on my first wedding anniversary and never mentioned it. I forgot it because I was so excited about playing golf.

But anyway. It cost me, didn't it, Barbara? Yup. I know, it cost me.

But anyway, that was sort of -- so when I transitioned into turning pro, I had been playing enough golf that the only difference was that I was going to be playing for a living and not playing as an amateur.

Q. The TOUR schedule looks a lot different than it did when we were in this room a year ago. I just kind of wanted to get your overall thoughts on it and perhaps Memorial not having a cut next year where that stands?

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, we don't really know. I'm not sure what the schedule's going to actually be. I opened my mouth too soon there at the Honda before they announced anything and they really haven't announced anything, even yet. Incidentally, Jay wasn't very happy with me. And I don't blame him because I did not realize that they hadn't done anything.

But anyway. And they really haven't finalized what's happening here, so out of fairness to Jay, I think I'll just keep my mouth shut. That's hard for me to do, you know that.

Q. Do you have an opinion on the cut?

JACK NICKLAUS: Oh, on the cut part? I sort of do. I sort of think -- I don't know whether they're going to do that or not. I don't know what they're going to do or how many we're going to end up playing. We really don't know that. But as far as the cut thing, I sort of -- I don't like it, but I do like it, and I'll tell you why I mean that.

As far as playing the golf tournament, to be able to start here instead of 7 o'clock in the morning to start at maybe 9 o'clock in the morning and you play most of the day, I think that's okay. That part's fine. What I probably -- you know, what I like about it is that the other tournaments that are not elevated tournaments get a better field when the TOUR has only 70 players playing. You look at a lot of the tournaments going on right now and you say, well, who is playing in this tournament? And pretty soon you start to see some of those names and that cream comes to the top. They're young guys, they're getting the opportunity to come out of the Korn Ferry Tour to the Regular Tour, and the TOUR to a large degree is another stepping stone for them to the big tournaments.

And they make a name, they learn how to win, they get into more tournaments. So from that standpoint I think actually it's a pretty good program. And how we're going to fit into that and how it's going to work, I don't know how many tournaments they're going to have. What did they have eight this year?

MARK WILLIAMS: Designated events?

JACK NICKLAUS: Elevated tournaments, yeah. They have eight of them this year. How many they are going to have next year, I don't know. I don't think we know that number.

Where we exactly for sure are going to fit on the schedule, I'm not exactly sure either. I think there's a method in the madness, you might say, that I think they know where they're going and what they're trying to do and what they're trying to accomplish. I think that the TOUR usually figures out the best way to get something done and goes about trying not to hurt anybody. I know that one of the things they're concerned about is the tournaments in between elevated events and the major championships and how are they going to fair. I think that you're talking about the 70, I think it does a better job for them. So we'll see.

Q. To follow-up what he was talking about, Tiger at the Masters said he wanted a cut at his event, the Genesis, and he spoke for you saying you wanted a cut as well --

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, that was before I thought about what I thought could be. I don't really care either way.

Q. So you don't care if you have a cut or no?

JACK NICKLAUS: I don't care either way. I mean, there's a reason why they would not and there might be a reason why they would. Obviously from our standpoint here it's a heck of a lot easier to take care of 70 or 80 players, whatever it might be, than it is 120. It's a lot easier on Chad and his staff to prepare the golf course in the morning if you've had any kind of weather or so forth to play at 9 o'clock than 7 o'clock. There's a lot of advantages to not having that.

It's just like playing the weekend. You're playing four days to the weekend. But I liked the cut before because I liked -- we felt like having guys play -- people play all day was nice to have on the golf course, giving some young guys an opportunity to play that might not otherwise get a chance to play.

But as I said, there's two sides to that coin and I think I'm going to leave that to people that are certainly a lot smarter than I am, which would be Jay and those guys.

Q. Building off that, how many times did you sweat out making the cut?

JACK NICKLAUS: Oh, every time that I got close. I didn't miss many cuts. But when I was playing, I probably missed -- from 1962 to '78, let's just say, I probably, maybe, I don't know, half a dozen, I suppose, maybe all I missed. I don't really know how many I missed, but not very many. I don't know, my streak, I had 105 or something like that. I missed the cut -- I think where I missed that I think it was at Pinehurst, actually is where I finally missed my streak. I didn't even think about it, but did I.

But as far as missing the cut? Yeah, when you get down to missing the cut -- look, I'm going to go back to what we were the first year I played. The first year I played you made the cut -- 70 players made the cut, but they only paid 50. And I made money in every tournament I played in my first year. And I had a lot of 'em that I just made the cut.

So here you are, you're playing four rounds of golf, and you're going to make any money. Well, Los Angeles, I made $33 finishing 50th. I shot 64 in the last round in Pensacola to make last money. I think I shot 65 last round in Palm Springs to make maybe last money or close to it. You know, in those days to pick up $250, which is what we were making when we would just make the cut, you know, you wanted that $250. That took care of another week or two of playing golf.

Q. When your tournament started the course played under 7,000 yards --

JACK NICKLAUS: I'm sorry, I missed you.

Q. When the tournament began in the '70s it played under 7,000 yards. This year it's edging close to 7,600. If I told you that back then, would you have believed it, what would your reaction have been?

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, I would hope we wouldn't have to do that. I think that what they're doing with the golf ball, hopefully is a good start. It's going to pull the golf ball back, which is what you're asking about. It's going to probably pull the ball back 14, 15 yards for you know, a McIlroy or a Thomas or one of those guys, and maybe 10 or 12 yards for maybe the average pro.

The average golfer, if it's bifurcated right now, I think they probably won't take two years before they're going to play the same ball the pros are going to play. And all they got to do is move up 4, 5 yards on the tee because that's the only difference they're going to have. I don't think it's going to be a big deal. The only thing that I've seen is that they keep saying, oh, why do we need to change it? The golf ball -- the game's fine. The problem is is you don't have anyplace to play. They say, well, the golf ball's only increased .82 yards a year. Yeah, that's fine, last 10 years, that's 8.2 yards. What happens the next 40 years if they don't change anything? If they don't change a thing that's about 34 more yards. That's to every tee shot. That's a lot.

So they need to go -- they need to do something and what they have done, as I say, it's a good start. I hope they do something with the golf club to relate to it so that the golf club you have to be a little more precise to play a golf shot instead of just hitting it anywhere on the clubhead.

And if you don't have -- and if you have -- if you're forced to hit it on a spot on the golf club you're going to be a little bit more careful of how you hit the shot. So that will also curb the distance. But you've got -- not everybody's got the ability to go buy property of the next golf course to add to their golf course. We don't have anyplace else to go for any more yardage. 99 percent of the clubs in the country don't have anyplace to go for more yardage. To me, the game of golf, if you're going to play tournament golf, you really want to test the golfer. That's theoretically what the tournament's all about.

And if everybody's playing a driver and a wedge every hole, they never play anymore to a 6- or 7-iron, 5-iron on a par-5. You lose your ability to be able to test your skills.

Did that answer enough of your question?

Q. I think one thing that people never realize about tournament golf, they see the shots being hit and so forth, but the challenge of concentration over 72 holes, I wonder if you could speak to that, how did you develop that skill, which I think obviously people appreciate about you?

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, I think if you think about it every shot means something. Certainly these guys play 72 holes and invariably every year it usually comes down to who pars 18 or birdies 18 or who bogeys 18 to lose it playing 72 holes. So obviously every shot means something. I just sort of worked hard at trying to make sure that I played every shot like it was the most important shot that I was playing. Everybody says, well, what's the hardest shot in golf?

I said, the next one I'm playing.

And it is. You got to make sure that that shot is the one you're going to play well, and so it's difficult for you to make sure that you do it. And I don't know how did I that. I just developed that level of concentration. To me, golf is not -- 18 holes is not 17 and a half, and forget about the other half a hole. I don't like par, par, par, birdie, birdie, par, 8. I don't like that. That's not my favorite because that's what happens when you lose your concentration.

Q. Jon Rahm said this morning that he had been told that his game is perfectly suited for Muirfield and the Memorial. First time he came here didn't make the cut, said, I'm never coming back. Since then --

JACK NICKLAUS: I don't think he said that.

Q. Okay. Well, we'll have to check him.

JACK NICKLAUS: He came back, didn't he?

Q. He did.

JACK NICKLAUS: Okay.

Q. And has since won and then was in position to do it again. Is he always going to be a good bet here?

JACK NICKLAUS: I would think so. I mean, Rahm is a good player. I think that more and more players on the TOUR are playing left-to-right now than they were for a long time. A lot of guys are trying to control the ball a lot more and so obviously it's easier to control the ball left-to-right than it is right-to-left. Particularly when you start to get into a fast golf course, you really don't want the ball doing this (indicating), tumbling over, you want the ball tucked under a little bit so it hits and doesn't run very far.

And Jon Rahm is a strong hitter, he hits it a long way, plays that way. You got a lot of other guys that will play a bit that way that are good players. There's still going to be some that play right-to-left, but that's their natural game and what they play. I just think when you get a hard, fast golf course you really got to control the ball more and when you get a guy -- a situation like that, a guy like Rahm will be -- I mean, this week let's see, it would probably -- conditions would probably eliminate a fair number of the players because they couldn't -- they can't play the fast, hard stuff.

The guys that have played a lot in seaside golf and a lot of the guys who have played a lot of major championship golf, those are the guys that will play well here this week. We've had a lot of first-time winners here. But they have all gone on to be really good players beyond here. So we'll see. I don't know if that really answered your question or not, but I tried.

Q. Potentially two questions that you can try to answer. As much as you pay attention to the TOUR, any young players stand out to you, anyone's that you either don't know that well --

JACK NICKLAUS: There's so many of them. I walk through the locker room and I don't know half the players. I'm walking up to tables and introducing myself. He says, oh, I'm a rep. You know? I don't know. And I know a lot of 'em. I introduce myself to 'em. I make sure that they're welcome and know that I love having 'em come here, congratulate 'em on the opportunity to come and qualify to be here. I think they appreciate that. As far as standing out young players, there's a ton of 'em. We have a lot more Asian players than we've had for awhile now on the TOUR that are starting to come in. I think Hideki more or less sort of led that way. Probably have -- what would we have, probably eight or 10 Asian players in the field this week. Is that probably right? About right?

MARK WILLIAMS: Pretty accurate.

JACK NICKLAUS: I think that's great. The more diversity we get the better off we are from that standpoint. I don't know, how do you say it? How do you put -- young, I put -- I mean, I put Rahm as a young player. Cantlay is not that young anymore, but they're all young, as far as I'm concerned. If they had sat at our table last night for dinner they would have all felt very, very young. I mean, give me some names you're thinking about.

Q. Like --

JACK NICKLAUS: How about that? You give me your names.

Q. Cameron Young or --

JACK NICKLAUS: Yeah, now, he would be one that -- you know, he's young. He's only, what, this is his second or third year on TOUR is it? This is his third?

Q. Second.

JACK NICKLAUS: His second full year. Well, he would be one -- he played very well at the British Open last year, that will probably have to think about how he plays when he plays a golf course hard and fast like this. It's going to be a little different for him. Good player. Nice kid. I like Cameron. What's the kid from Australia that I just, Davis?

MARK WILLIAMS: Cam Davis.

JACK NICKLAUS: What is it, Cam Davis? He just introduced himself to me a little while ago and he's been doing pretty well, hasn't he?

MARK WILLIAMS: Presidents Cup last year.

JACK NICKLAUS: Presidents Cup. So you got a lot of 'em, I can't really --

Q. There's too many.

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, there's so many of 'em that are good. But you've got so many of the guys that are just getting close to their prime in their late 20s, early 30s, that are really a lot of really good players there.

Q. Second thing. You mentioned the British Open a minute ago. I'm really curious about '63, was Dallas not the week after Lytham?

JACK NICKLAUS: Um-hum.

Q. What was the bigger judgment for you, going from mid-50s to a hundred temperature or going small ball, regular ball?

JACK NICKLAUS: And a new set of clubs.

Q. I'm sorry, and the new set of clubs.

JACK NICKLAUS: I just did it because that's what we did. I knew that I represented Slazenger overseas and I represented MacGregor in the States. So I switched from the small ball, which is a B-51, then into the - I don't know what they played, 1963, I don't know what the devil I was playing. Who knows what I was playing. I might have been playing a Titleist. I don't know. I don't remember.

From 50 degrees to a hundred degrees, from never having a wet spot on you to having all your clothes wet, intense sun with no wind, from windy conditions, you know, it's just what we did. I don't know why I was able to adjust so easily to it, but I played really well the week before and felt I gave the tournament away, which I did. I was still very much on the top of my game and I went right to Dallas and played well.

Q. I guess I asked, do you get any sense that players are so technical these days, just based on the technology and equipment they have, that they could adjust as easily as you guys had to back then?

JACK NICKLAUS: I don't think we knew what we had. We just had a set of clubs and we changed to this set of clubs. I didn't know whether -- all I knew -- the only thing we had then was they were all D 2 plus for me. They were all the same length, D 2 plus, which is between 2 and 3. My overall weight of my clubs were -- I used the same driver, same 3-wood, same sand wedge and same putter at both tournaments. Only trouble is that my irons were different, 1-iron through 9-iron or pitching wedge. I mean, I don't know whether I finished his question up or not. Did I finish it up?

Q. I think when we look at all-time greats in other sports, when they're at your age, they don't typically have a platform like you do in terms of having a voice in their respective sport really, and I wonder what it means to you that you still kind of have a large say, right? People ask you about rules, people ask but this and that, and having that platform and what else you kind of want to do with that.

JACK NICKLAUS: Well, I think it's your fault. You guys have allowed me to have one. I feel very blessed to still be involved in the game. I had four captaincies in the Presidents Cup and that sort of kept me in for awhile. Then we built the Bear's Club and then I got -- I think I got 30-odd players down at the Bear's Club as members that are all relevant Tour players and I talk to them constantly, see 'em constantly, have lunch with them a lot, talk to 'em a bit. They seem to -- I don't know why they respect an opinion of some old guy like me, but they do.

Jay seems to -- I've got two tournaments that we're involved in, not only here, but the Honda tournament. Well, it's not Honda anymore. We don't know what it's going to be next year yet. And so a couple tournaments for our charities have evolved. We were involved in a variety Play Yellow campaign with the TOUR, which is trying to raise a hundred million dollars. Where are we now, Barbara, about 80 million on it? Pretty close?

Yeah. So we're pretty close to that. I mean, I've stayed involved, and I've kept up to date pretty much on what goes on. I don't know every young player, but that's -- I think that's -- I will. I'll get to know them all as time goes on. And I'm a very blessed person to be in that position. I think it's -- I'm very -- I guess I'm very lucky that you guys will even sit here and want to talk to me. I don't know.

Q. Back to Jon Rahm for just a second. He has a very distinctive swing. I'm just wondering, as you came up when you played, were there guys that had swings that you really admired and were there guys that you wondered how they could hit the ball with the swing they had?

JACK NICKLAUS: Oh, absolutely. You know, they had -- I go back to Jack Grout, who taught me how to play, and Jack Grout, when I was young, in my teens, he sent me to Bob Toski, Byron Nelson, and Claude Harmon. And I came back and they all -- Toski was taught pretty much the way Grout was taught. Nelson was, slid his hips a lot and was a lot different and bounced a lot up and down. Claude Harmon was over here where you see some of the guys today. You see Rahm and Collin Morikawa is there and Spieth's a bit there. And what he said to me, he says, when I said, Gee, Grout, how in the world can you play golf like that? And he says, Jack, he says, I just wanted you to know that there are many, many different ways to play the game of golf and I think you ought to understand what they are. And how you, whether you want to accept any of 'em or not doesn't make any difference, it's just you should know. I said, Well I think it was a pretty good lesson for me. So I watched the guys play on TOUR. I mean, as far as swings go, Sam Snead, rhythm and position and everything was just, it was, he was the best. Hogan, learning how to control the ball, how he learned how to eliminate hitting a hook and how he, the grip that he put himself in, the position he put himself in at the top of the swing and the way he moved through the ball was phenomenal. Nelson was, did -- I played once or twice with Byron, but Byron, you know, even with the action that he had, he knew what he was doing with it. It was really, it was fun to watch.

Then along came Arnold and Arnold was a bit, a little bit like this (indicating.) And of course what, when Arnold was winning, Arnold never hit a fairway. He hit it all over the place. And how Arnold got his name and reputation was how he recovered from where he hit it. As Arnold got older, Arnold got a little bit more in here (indicating.) And Arnold became as good a driver as there was on TOUR. And then he couldn't putt. Because he was an unbelievable putter when he was playing. But, and now I always looked at guys that -- Dow Finsterwald was -- and I compared him with Arnold when they were playing. And I said, Finsterwald will play a lot longer than Arnold because he set his hands underneath the club. Well, once I start -- well, that was a kid saying that. And I said, Well -- but as I go got older I realized that Arnold was strong and Dow wasn't as physically strong. And that there were others that had learned those other ways of playing the golf and so they figured out -- I mean, Arnold played golf all his life. And he, but he had been strong all his life. Jon Rahm is strong so he'll be able to play that way all his life. Let's see, oh, I can't remember what you asked me.

Q. Who had a swing that was --

JACK NICKLAUS: Oh, yeah, Snead and Hogan, Nelson, let's see, Palmer, Gary Player first time I saw Gary Player, 1958, he was playing the second shot into the 9th green at Southern Hills. And he was 22 years old at the time. And I saw he played his shot and sitting here like this, hitting the shot like this. I said, We'll never have to worry about him. And next time I saw him, hands was underneath the club. Changed his game totally. Because Gary's not a big guy. And he had, and even though he physically worked out and so forth, his strength would not last him for his career unless he made that change.

Other people can, other people can do that. They can get away with it. Jon Rahm will be able to get away with it long beyond when he wants to play golf. I mean, Rahm, if you look at Rahm, Rahm being a bit shut here, but his body is so quick and through the ball and he's so strong holding on through the ball that he'll play well for a long time. Other guys may not.

But swings are, look at the swings out here today. Let's see, I mean, Justin Thomas has got a gorgeous action. Rory McIlroy's got a beautiful, beautiful natural action. Uses all parts of his body. Rory's not a big guy, but he knows how to use every part of his body. And, you know, some guys don't have to, some guys do. And as I say, as Jack Grout said, there's many different ways to play the game.

Q. Curious, Rory is coming up on nine years without a major and is still relatively in prime in terms of his age. What do you make of that, what do you see? I was going to ask you what advice you would give him, but he would have to ask for that.

JACK NICKLAUS: I was just with Rory just a few minutes ago. But I don't know really know what to make of it. Because he's very confident. He works very hard at it. He's a good student of the game. He practices a lot. I don't know whether his is a constant lack of being able to keep that concentration for the whole thing or not, because sometimes he is the par, par, par, double, 8. He does that sometimes. And I said, Why, Rory? Why does that happen? And he doesn't, he doesn't, he doesn't know. Nobody, when you're doing it, you don't know. You try to think about why you do it, but you don't. I mean, he is, as far as talent, he's as talented a player as there is in the game of golf. Why he hasn't won in nine years? Kind of a mystery to a lot of people because he is so good.

Q. I think you played '67 U.S. Open to '70 British --

JACK NICKLAUS: What's that?

Q. -- without winning a major. Is that right?

JACK NICKLAUS: Who did what?

Q. You --

JACK NICKLAUS: I can't hear you, what you're talking about.

Q. When you won, I think you went about two and a half years without winning a major.

JACK NICKLAUS: Oh, from '67 to '70.

Q. And you had some other things going on with your dad, if I'm not mistaken.

JACK NICKLAUS: Well I just, I got complacent, I got lazy.

Q. Does it ever get in your head when you go --

JACK NICKLAUS: No, I mean, I didn't think a whole lot -- I finished second several times in there. I was playing all right, but I wasn't -- I would say I was having too much fun. We had three kids by then and fun with my kids. And I practiced a little bit, but I didn't practice like I probably should have practiced. But I don't think -- I never did -- golf is the number two thing to me. My family was by far number one. And that was the first thing I wanted to do and be part of. For me to play golf was -- golf's a game. A game that I actually, I got decent at, but it was, you know, it was something though that didn't dominate my life. And so, but I played from '67 through or '70 where I won -- oh, I mean, I won quite a few tournaments in there, I finished second in some majors, but I didn't win majors. Finally my dad passed away in February of 1970 at a pretty young age of 56 and I sort of thought about it, I says, You know, my dad sort of lived through me. And that's what he, that's what he did, that's what he loved is going to golf and watching me win. And I said says, I don't think I gave him a fair shake the last couple of years. So I sort of focused myself to go back to work and try to work a little harder at it. And I got -- and as a result I ended up winning the British Open that year and then I won, you know, a lot of tournaments after that.

But I think it's a matter of -- we all go through periods. Rory may be going through a little bit of that period of the -- he's going to wake up one morning and say -- what's he, Rory, about 33 or 34 now 34 -- wake up one morning and he says, Hey, I better, you know, get on the stick here and start winning some more majors, because he's certainly going to win some more. I can't believe that he's not. And sometimes we all have to focus, focus on what we have to do and so forth and to get there. Once I won in 1980, I sort of -- I won the Open and the PGA and I sort of was done playing golf. My kids were starting to play high school sports and I was having more fun doing that. I won at Colonial and I won at Memorial, but that's the only two tournaments I won in that six-year span there. And I didn't deserve to win. I didn't work at it. And then I caught lightning in a bottle in '86 and won the Masters. And I prepared reasonable that spring, not like I usually do, but I prepared reasonably. But I just all of a sudden started making a few putts and doing things and I remembered how to play. And I think that action, I think Rory has played enough he'll remember how to play when he gets himself back in contention again. I wouldn't be surprised if he turned around -- I mean, he came to me in, I don't know what year it was when he shot 80 at Augusta and he came to me out here on the practice range and we talked after and I says, I said to him, I said, Rory. I said, What in the world? I said, Did you, did you learn anything from what you did? And he said, I think so, but I'm not sure. He said, I think so. I said, Well, I hope you did, because you're going to need to apply it here in a couple weeks at the U.S. Open. So he went off to Congressional and then what did he win by, 10 shots or nine shots. Eight shots? Wins by eight shots. So I dropped him a note after, because I didn't see him and I said, Well, I says, more important, I says, you obviously learned something from Augusta, but more important, did you learn anything from why you won. It's one thing to learning of why you lose, but it's also important to learn why you won. You put the two, those two things together and if you understand 'em both firmly then you're going to win a lot of golf tournaments. So Rory was really good about that, that time in his life. And so you know, he'll, he's still going to win a lot of tournaments.

MARK WILLIAMS: Well, maybe he'll be the winner this week Mr. Nicklaus.

JACK NICKLAUS: It would be great, I would love to have him win. Any of those young guys that are good players that want to win and play well, go get it.

MARK WILLIAMS: We appreciates the time always and it's always a pleasure.

JACK NICKLAUS: Okay, Mark. Thanks, y'all.