WGC NEC INVITATIONAL

August 20, 2002

Rich Beem

TODD BUDNICK: We welcome Rich Beem to his first World Golf Championship event, thanks to his victory at the 2002 PGA Championship on Sunday.

Obviously, it's been a very busy few days for you. Why don't you go through the last few days for us.

RICH BEEM: I wouldn't even know where to begin. Actually, it was my victory at The INTERNATIONAL that got me here. This is just a really big, big extra bonus with the PGA.

Yeah, I got in town on Sunday night, extremely late after doing about four hours worth of interviews and whatnot, which was a blast to do. But I kind of played low-key yesterday. I didn't even come to the golf course. I went back to where I used to work, Magnolia Hi-Fi, to see some old friends. I had to buy my wife a digital camera and that's the only place I could think of.

What else, went to look at exotic cars yesterday and that was fun for a little bit. Nobody wanted to help me because I was wearing shorts and sneakers and a baseball cap and nobody recognized me which was totally fine.

Got my haircut at four o'clock yesterday evening, went over to a friend's house for dinner and crashed pretty early.

TODD BUDNICK: You have not played Sahalee in a tournament, but have you played it before?

RICH BEEM: When I lived up here, no. I dreamed of playing here when I worked up here, but no, I played here in '99, like in October and November of '99 with some friends of mine.

And I love the golf course. The golf course is a little bit on the wet side but right now it's awesome. I played early this morning with Chris Smith and we had a wonderful time out there, and the golf course is just phenomenal. This is just a great, great golf course.

Q. How important is it for you to do well this week coming off this big win last week, last couple of weeks you've played so well, and you're a fan favorite? Is it somewhere that you think you can sustain momentum?

RICH BEEM: I hope so. I'm not going to put any added pressure on me this week to play well just because I've got some friends up here, and some of my family coming over from Idaho -- or I should say my wife's family coming over from Idaho. I'm pretty sure they are going to like me whether I finish dead last or win.

I'm not going to put any extra pressure on myself. I'm just excited to be up here and tee it up. It's a great venue to play. I mean, there's a lot of risk and rewards shots, it seems like, out there. You've got to drive the ball straight here. But I've got no extra pressure because of what the last two weeks -- how I performed there.

Q. How many times did you pull your driver out today?

RICH BEEM: I hit driver almost -- with the exception of a few holes where it's just a really dumb play, I hit an it a lot of places, just to kind of see where it's at and see how far my drivers would go. And after I found out it was probably not the play, I hit what I thought was the right club. But I'll still be pretty aggressive off the tee, as much as I possibly can, because that's the style of golf I like to play. I like to be aggressive off the tee.

Q. Could you go over what went wrong with your game after Kemper, those would years, 2000 and up until I guess towards the end of 2001, and now look ahead to protect against that?

RICH BEEM: Besides lack of practice and dedication to the game -- (laughing.)

Q. What else (Laughter.)

RICH BEEM: My swing, it was just okay back then. It was kind of functional for me, because it wasn't really functional being on the road 30 weeks out of the year. September of 2000, I finally went to my coach, Cameron Doan in Dallas and I said, listen, no more Band-Aids, we have to figure out how to make this thing more functional. We have tried some different things, some have worked and some have not.

We strengthened my grip over the last year and a half to get it, especially like in a pressure situation, my grip would always tend to get a little strong and I would be fearful of hooking it because I like to work the ball left-to-right.

And so, when you get in pressure situations, you want to be as comfortable as you possibly can. You know, my swing isn't really all that different, I guess, on film, but there's just a few small things that I've changed. But for the most part, I'm still very much of a feel player more than anything else. You know, the reason I was so bad at the end of '99 and all of 2000, just because when I went home, I didn't do anything. I just sat on the couch and vegged.

Q. Why?

RICH BEEM: I had actually moved out to Phoenix at that moment in time, and I didn't have anybody to go out there to practice and play with. There's a lot of TOUR players that live out there, but when I come off the road, when I was living in El Paso, all I wanted to do was go out to El Paso Country Club can play with my friends. Not saying that the guys on TOUR are not my friends, but after beating your heads together for weeks at a time, last thing I want to do is say, hey, let's go out and beat each other again.

I just stayed away from the game when I got home, and I don't want to say I lost interest, but I certainly didn't give it my full attention like it needed to be.

Q. Was any of it part that you wanted to be fat and satisfied?

RICH BEEM: I was pretty satisfied. I was kind of living high off of my win, just because everybody was coming up and congratulating me: "Oh, I saw you won the Kemper, that's a great story," and I bought into it a little bit too much. Finally I said I can't live off of that. Even if I don't win another tournament ever again, even though it's my one moment of glory, I still have to make a living, if not I'm going to end up, who knows where. So I had to kind of get back with it a little bit and moving back to New Mexico certainly helped that focus.

Q. Do you have any thoughts on hole No. 6? It's going to play probably as the toughest hole on the course and it's a converted par 5?

RICH BEEM: Yeah, that long one. It's just a really hard hole. Hopefully they won't stick us all the way back. I hit a pretty good drive there and I hit a 4-iron in. It's a pretty narrow hole for being that long, and there's no place to lay up, and if you miss it just a little bit right, you know, you've got that huge tree on the right-hand side blocking you out and if you pull it a little bit you can hit it underneath the tree on the left. So, I mean, it is -- it's definitely going to play the hardest out here that I feel, anyways.

Sometimes I wish, though, that we could just play it as a par 5, because a score is a score, it doesn't matter what relation to par, as far as we are concerned. But sometimes -- I'm not a big fan of changing par 5s into par 4s to begin with. But I'm glad 18 is playing as a par 5 just because I think on Sunday, at least they can put the tees up a little bit and make eagle a possibility so somebody could leapfrog somebody.

I've always liked if a golf course is said to be a par 5 just leave it as a par 5 and accept the fact that some guys are going to make birdies and eagles and no big deal.

Q. What did you hit on it today?

RICH BEEM: Driver and 4-iron.

Q. You said you were satisfied after Kemper and you had a letdown, how do you guard against that now?

RICH BEEM: I think that I've just matured more than anything else. I think basically when I won, I was -- I was a lot more immature off the golf course than anything else and so that kind of crept into my golf, and now I've got a wife who likes to shop at Nordstrom's (laughs). I kind of like the lifestyle.

My caddie is there to help keep me more focused. There's so many changes that have taken place since then. I think in years past, if what would have happened to me at the Open, with that victory, I went home and even though I went home last week or the week of Buick, right before PGA, I had a lot of interviews to do. I socialized an awful lot, entertained a lot of people and it was great. But I could not wait to get out there of so I could go play golf again and get away from all the hoopla. Now it's kind of got back again in the hoopla it looks like.

I just think that I want to play golf well on a daily basis now, whereas in the past it didn't really bother me if I didn't.

Q. Do people ask you if it's been a blur, a dream?

RICH BEEM: A blur? Yeah. How could it not be a dream. I've won the last two times I've teed it up, and I mean, gosh, at the beginning of year, one of my goals was basically just get your card back and then let's go from there. I had three sets of goals, and I've actually now have to make some more goals because I've absolutely bypassed everything before then.

But, yeah, my life has been -- it's certainly taken a turn for the best -- I mean not even better. This is unbelievable to me. I'm riding it right now. I can't wait to get home, though and just kind of hopefully slow everything down just a little bit, with all the media attention and everything like that. It's wonderful, but at the same time, it's overwhelming. I'm not too sure. I need a little time to soak it all in.

Q. In three weeks you've gone from Top 60 money winner to No. 4. Have you thought about money at all in the last few hours?

RICH BEEM: (Laughter.) I think about it every day, but, yeah, I've got a lot of new problems it seems like. I think the IRS is going to enjoy my next quarterly income statement.

So, yes and no. The money is obviously very wonderful. There's so many other nice things that are coming out of them. Unfortunately, most of them are attached to money, but forever I'll be known as a former PGA Champion and there's not a lot of people that can say that. I'm pretty sure I could sell that to Tom Watson and Arnold Palmer for more than a buck.

Q. A name that really means something now.

RICH BEEM: Yeah, sure. (Laughs).

Q. Guys often talk about being in contention taking a lot out of them; do you worry about maybe hitting any physical or mental wall this week?

RICH BEEM: Yeah, I really am. Physically I think I'll be okay as long as I get another decent night's sleep tonight and whatnot. But mentally, I think that's going to be a pretty big hurdle. Hopefully I can get kind of on a little small roll, maybe to begin a round or something like that on Thursday, so I'm not out there grinding it out, because if it gets to the point where I'm really having to grind really hard over every shot -- I mean, the last, especially over the last weekend with the PGA, I was just -- so many emotions go through your body and it just wears you out. I think both physically and mentally.

Physically I think I'll be okay. Mentally, we'll see when that thing comes. I think I'll be able to handle it for one more week. I'm hoping, anyways.

Q. Talk about just the increased media obligations, Letterman and that kind of thing?

RICH BEEM: Yeah, how cool is that. David Letterman, it sounds like it anyways; that I'll probably go on his show next week. He mentioned something and I was the subject of his Top-10 list and I'm doing the today show tomorrow morning. My wife absolutely loves Katie Couric, I guess along with Matt Lauer. (Laughter.)

It's something, obviously I never would have expected, but it's really fun, too, for me to do all these things. I'm pretty giving of my time in most instances but this is fun stuff. This is what guys like me dream of doing some day. Chris Smith was just -- we were playing today and he goes, "Oh, man I really wish I could be there. I want to go to David Letterman." He's a huge Letterman fan. We had a fun time with it today.

Q. What kind of exotic cars were you looking at, which one did you buy?

RICH BEEM: We went up to this place in Bellevue called Park Place Motors and it's all high-end stuff. I didn't buy anything. My wife said I could go buy whatever I felt like.

I'm going to wait for a while. I've got a beautiful Yukon that I've got at the house and I've got a lot of fun stuff in that so it's hard for me to drive two cars at once.

I don't know, personally, I didn't like the salesman very much. He was --

Q. Snobby?

RICH BEEM: Well, when you deal in high-end cars like that and surrounded by that your clientele comes in most of the time dressed in three-piece suits and whatnot; then you get a guy coming in with shorts and beat up sneakers and a fleece pullover and an Atlanta baseball cap on, you're pretty sure that he's not going to buy anything. There's a lot of beautiful cars there, some stuff that I -- you know, looked fun, but nothing I was ready to part with. It wasn't the perfect one.

Q. But along those lines of just the fact of, has it sunk in yet, has there ever been a moment, be it Monday morning or this morning, where you say, "I'm the PGA Champion," and do you look at yourself any differently?

RICH BEEM: No, I don't. We went out there today, Chris and I, and I hit some really poor shots out there. In fact, I think I heard on one hole, I was on No. 2 and I hit a couple of long bunker shots, I used to be pretty good at and my bunker play has never been that stellar. But you hit a couple of long bunker shots that -- I actually skulled 2 or 3-over the green when I hit them and somebody snickered in the crowd, "that guy won the PGA?" I didn't hit it in that many bunkers last week. (Laughter.)

I don't perceive myself any different. I don't think that I'm going to wake up and fully expect to conquer the world in golf.

I think, I feel honestly, I feel like I'm a better player than I ever have been in my life, but at the same time, it's just golf. It's not like I cured cancer or anything like that. This is just a fun game, and I've been very good at it the last month.

Like I said, I'm not going to put any extra pressure on myself to do anything -- if I feel like I can win down the stretch, yeah, I'm going to give it my all. But I still don't tee it up every week expecting to win. I mean, I think I have more of an opportunity now than I ever have in the past, but I don't feel any extra pressure on myself at all.

Q. Verplank was saying out there that he liked what you said about honestly saying that, "I don't believe I can win" and explaining that to the public and you, and he also felt that deep down somewhere in your heart, you had to have believed you could win or else you would not have won.

RICH BEEM: I think when I made the statements that I did, I think that one of the things that was completely overlooked was, you know, when I said I don't expect to win, but nobody ever bothered to ask: "Did you think you can win?"

Q. Did you think you could win?

RICH BEEM: Well, if I didn't think I could, I would have folded like a cheap suit a long time ago.

Yeah, I thought if I got off to a good start on Sunday and hit the ball like I have been hitting it -- and I have putted the ball like I had been putting it, then absolutely. I also expected there to be, I thought the winning score was going to be more like 12-under. I fully expected Tiger to make a charge early in the round. I fully expected Justin to play better. Those things didn't materialize, but my golf game was as good as it has been in the past.

So, I mean, I knew that I was capable of making birdies, I knew that I was capable of doing. I just didn't know what expect of myself as far as the nerves and thing like that. And I said I don't expect to win, nobody asked, well do you think you can win? I would have said: Well, I think I can, but like I said, there's two different answers there. Expecting to is what Tiger does. Tiger expects to win every week. Do I think I can win? Well, sure I think I can, if everything is going in the right direction for me.

But there's two different beliefs. Tiger tees it up every week expecting to win and everybody out there. Just some days, you know -- some days you're the windshield, some days you're the bug, and of late, I've been the windshield.

Q. Have you thought at all, or done the "What If Game"? Do you think you'd be on the Ryder Cup team right now? Do you think you'd be on the Ryder Cup team right now, had it been accumulating through the PGA?

RICH BEEM: Well, I would like to think that the captain would take a very serious look at me and I would be honored if I could play for the Ryder Cup team.

But, I don't know. Look at years past like in '91 when John Daly won, obviously little bit different scenario because he had not accumulated that many points, but winning become to back tournaments in the fashion I had, the captain, he would probably pull me aside and say, are you going to puke on national TV in the Ryder Cup coming down the stretch or are you okay? (Laughter.)

You know, I would hope that if this was a Ryder Cup year or something like that, I would -- I think I'd be given due consideration. But that would be up to the captain to decide.

Q. You might have made it on points?

RICH BEEM: I might have made it on points you're exactly right. Right now, I think I'm like what, third or fourth in the Ryder Cup points. They are just accumulating now, but I've already got a pretty good base going there.

Yeah, I mean, it would be fun.

Q. Just as an aside, the haircut, did you keep the highlights?

RICH BEEM: Actually, they kind of blended it in a little bit more. So it's not quite as blond, which I kind of enjoyed having the Dolly Pardon on top, but she kind of took some of it out of it. When I get it redone again it will be bright and ugly.

Q. Did you really answer the phone at your old store --

RICH BEEM: Yeah, somebody called and I guess like everybody major television show was looking, NBC, ABC all of the people were calling up Magnolia Hi-Fi, and I just happened to be there and that was the first call they got and somebody was looking for somebody who used to work with Rich Beem. And I had worked with some of the guys -- and there's like three different departments: There's the car stereo department, there's the cell phone department and the audio video department. I just kind of as a joke walked over and says: "Yeah, Magnolia Hi-Fi, this is Rich Beem, how can I help you?" They got a pretty good kick out of it.

I was there when a few of the phone calls came in. They got absolutely swamped I guess over the last couple days.

Q. Can you talk about doing a commercial for them?

RICH BEEM: Oh, Mr. Tweed (ph) would have to call me to ask me. I would do something like that for him. We could have to figure out some sort of swap out. They just got bought out by Best Buy; so I don't know what the relationship with that is. There would have to be a lot of variables with that one.

Q. In two tournaments now, you've had two players make a serious run at you at the last minute. Come Sunday, if the circumstances were such that you were leading Tiger, how would you feel going down the last 18? Are you in awe of him?

RICH BEEM: Absolutely how can you not? He hits is long, he hits it straight, he has an unbelievable short game. He makes most of the putts he looks at it seems like, and how can you not be in awe of him?

We have never played together. I look forward to it sometime. I'm sure we'll get paired somewhere down the line.

You know, I think it would be fun. Like I said before, he probably just whacks me up and down, just beats me like an unwanted, red-headed stepchild -- no offense to redheads. I certainly would have fun with it, though. If I played good, who knows.

He's the best player in the world, and you know, it would definitely be interesting, I think.

Q. Some golfers are intimidated by the fact that they are playing with him; would you be?

RICH BEEM: Probably, yeah. I don't think that I would be uncontrollably intimidated. I don't think I would shy away and shoot 80. But I mean if he plays his absolute best, I'm pretty sure I couldn't take him, not unless -- not unless I played my best and I happened to just make everything I look at.

You know, I don't know. I've never played with him coming down the stretch and the funny thing is, I mean, you know, as much as he was making a run at me last week, he was kind of a ways back and so it really wasn't like Valhalla where he and Bob May were just absolutely slugging it out coming down the last nine holes, which was probably some of the best golf you will ever witness.

It was just a little bit different scenario. I just kind of built up such a large lead, you know he just kind of ran out of holes. I'm glad we only have 18 holes in the game because he might have caught me on the 19th.

It's just a little bit different scenario. I would -- I'd like forward to playing with him. It's going to be fun.

Q. A lot of athletes, people who become more famous or famous have actually missed the days when nobody knew who they were --

RICH BEEM: I'm pretty sure I'm going to get away with nobody knowing who I am. It's going to take a little while, but I'm not a highly visible figure and whatnot. But, yeah, you're right. Like today, sometimes signing all the autographs, it was great, don't get me wrong it was wonderful, but I'm sure there will become a time where, oh, I just want to go home.

Q. Is Sahalee like any other course that you see on TOUR?

RICH BEEM: Actually, no. It's really not. I mean, it's got a lot of character to it with how the golf course is cut out of the trees. But no, we don't play anything like this. This is kind of very unique. Even the one up in Castle Pines -- Castle Pines is actually like the one we play at Reno, more than anything else, but we don't play anything where it's cut in trees.

I think the only one that is played, but it's a U.S. Open course, would be the Olympic Club. I think that golf course reminds me of this one just a little bit, just the way it's cut through the trees and all of the big huge, overhanging trees and whatnot. I would say it's similar to Olympic, but this one might be a little bit tougher, just because it gets so narrow. Like the second shot on 11 is -- oh, you can hardly fit anything through there.

Q. Do you still have the same caddie you had back at the Kemper?

RICH BEEM: No. Steve DuPlannis (ph) is now working over in Europe for a guy. I've got a new guy I've had for two years, Bill Heim.

Q. Just curious, because of the book that you guys had together, can you talk about that?

RICH BEEM: I don't really enjoy talking about the book because it was something that I was involved in as far as the story goes but I don't receive any benefits directly from the book; so it's not like I go out and promote it.

I'll give you just the facts. The book is called Blood, Sweat and Tees, written by Alan Shipnuck, and I never even received a free copy of it. So that's about all I have to say about that. If you want it, you'll probably have to go buy it.

Q. It's in the Top-10 now --

RICH BEEM: I heard it went from like 250 to No. 6 or something like that. I guess somebody is making a lot more money off it, so good for them.

Q. It seemed like your father had a lot of influence -- he said, one of the quotes was that your dad was going to get you ready for whatever came up, just by playing; he was pretty hard on you growing up as a golfer?

RICH BEEM: Somebody asked me that question earlier and actually, no, he wasn't that hard on me growing up. I mean, I actually played baseball and soccer and skateboarded in high school more than I played golf.

I was always pretty good at it but he never really -- he never really pushed me to go out and play golf. He always wanted me to, but it's not like something he pushed me to do.

In college, he kind of probably got a lot more involved and pushed me a little bit, but just as every good son, every time the father pushes a little bit, the son kind of takes a step away. He's always been very supportive of my golf game. I can't say he ever pushed me too hard, or else I would not be sitting here right now.

Q. Was it the country club games that helped you?

RICH BEEM: They helped me out a lot because when you are out there playing golf when you don't have all that much money in your pocket and you're playing for some uncomfortable numbers every once in a while, yeah, you've got to either sink or swim and I didn't feel like drowning, so.

Q. By all accounts, you were not a very good assistant pro. Was that because you wanted to play golf or were you just not a very good teacher?

RICH BEEM: I would not say I'm an exceptional teacher. I know some of the basics about what makes a good teacher and I had a few of the qualities but not enough. I mean, patience being the biggest quality to become a good teacher; you have to have a lot of patience.

Even to be in the golf business, I guess I probably could have been an assistant pro in a spot like up in Seattle or something like that where there's not a lot of good weather. I mean most of the times -- down in El Paso, I mean it's perfect weather like 300 days out of the year, so to sit in a pro shop just looking outside, it's just like a little kid in the candy store, "I want, I want." I wanted to go play all the time. I didn't have that opportunity.

Other factors made me not such a good assistant pro. I wasn't very good, I guess, the big word for me is "multi-tasking." I couldn't do like three jobs at once. You give me one thing to do, I can do that very well, but if you give me three or four different things to do at once, I'd screw them all up.

Q. I'm curious, why you didn't ask for proceeds when the book was written?

RICH BEEM: I did. I thought that something more was going to come out of it and I was misled. Mr. Shipnuck will probably tell you a different story, but I was misled.

Q. Contract ever signed?

RICH BEEM: No, that wasn't. There was an agreement -- I thought there was more of a verbal agreement, and it never materialized.

TODD BUDNICK: All right. Well, thank you for your time today, Rich. Congratulations again and good luck.

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