JOHN DALY: Any time you win a tournament, you win with your short game. Whether it's chipping or putting, you win tournaments with your short game. I won the British Open with my short game. I won the PGA with my short game. You can't win tournaments if you don't have the short game going.
Q. What are you capable of this year?
JOHN DALY: I don't know. I'm going to enjoy this one and just play it by ear.
Q. You mentioned a minute ago that Jacobsen was telling you that the talent never goes away. Do you consider yourself an underachiever? Do you think you should have won more?
JOHN DALY: I don't feel like I'm an underachiever because I've won two majors. I feel like I should have been in more positions to win. Whether it was like Memphis, I guess it was a couple of years ago, Bob Estes played great. I feel like I should have won that the way I was playing. The problem with my career is I haven't been in those last three or four groups consistently like I said yesterday, like Tiger is, and Davis, and Vijay. They're consistently in the last groups, week in and week after. That's something I'm striving on this year. One of my biggest goals this year was not to shoot over par in a round. Considering the circumstances, the golf course played very difficult and I shot 75 in my round and I still won. I'm not counting that.
Q. Does this change how you're going to approach this year?
JOHN DALY: Well, it's a great feeling knowing I told my wife if I won a tournament I will take her to Hawaii. Being in the Tournament of Champions next year is nice. I'll be able to go there again. It gives me opportunities to get off to good starts for next year, playing in tournaments. If you get off to a good start there, like Ernie Els and Tiger and them do, if they play real well, that's just a boost with a short field. It's a two more year exemption when you win, so I go through 2006 instead of ending it next year. It was very important. A lot of good things can happen out of it. Hopefully I can just stay consistent and stay positive and hopefully do it again.
Q. Will you play more often, do you think, this year?
JOHN DALY: I pretty much I'm not sort of a Vijay Singh, I think he played 28 to 30 events a year. I'm more or less 22, 23. He has one child. When you have four kids, it's tough. I like the schedule I've done in the last few years. It's been consistent. Last year I played myself too hard, playing tournament after tournament after tournament, trying to find something, and I don't want to do that again.
Q. (Inaudible) was there any doubt in your mind tears were going to come? Are you an emotional guy?
JOHN DALY: I'm very emotional, when you deal with the Make a Wish kids that I deal with, and I know they're all happy, I just know they're livid right now, they always say, "Can you win one for us?" And I finally did.
Q. What's your next goal?
JOHN DALY: I don't know if my World Ranking got me down far enough to get into the Masters, at least it's a step. Hopefully if I keep playing good, I'd like to get back into Augusta. I'm looking forward to Riviera. I heard they made changes, made the course a little longer. I'm looking forward to going there, my friend Peschi, and all the guys at Lakeside, hopefully it will be a good week. I'm just going to take each week at a time.
Q. Did you get the cow in the barn?
JOHN DALY: Someone said chicken in the barn today. As long as it's positive, it's fine with me.
Q. (Inaudible)?
JOHN DALY: When it got over the hill and started moving a little right, I really thought it had a chance.
Q. Were you trying to make that putt?
JOHN DALY: I was just trying to get it over the hill. I knew once it got over the hill, if it wasn't going at a real fast speed, it had a chance. I tried to just get it over that hill, and I knew it would trickle down somewhere between six and seven feet, and it just kept on going. I was very happy it did that.
Q. Standing over that shot, what did you think the degree of difficulty? What were you hoping to do? Were you thinking inside of six feet?
JOHN DALY: I knew if I landed where I spotted I spot bunker shots, I try to spot them, especially if I can see the whole green, where I spotted it, I guess it was probably six, seven feet short of the hill, and I hit it right where I wanted to. When I saw it get over the hill and it was kind of trickling, I knew it was going to be pretty good.
Q. You said this was the most important win you've had. Why?
JOHN DALY: Because it's been a long time. It's just been it's been forever since I've won one on U.S. soil, since I've won a tournament. It means more to me because I got to a point there after ten years of not winning anything, thinking you can win again. Every week I step on the first tee hoping to win, thinking I can win, but to finally do it again, it's very, very special.
Q. Put yourself in our shoes for a minute. We've seen you play, we've seen some of the problems. Would you be surprised if you were us that you won this week?
JOHN DALY: It's not really anything for me to say. Everybody goes through ups and downs in life. Mine just happens to be talked about a lot, which I'm very open to it. My weight, I've been struggling with my weight for a long, long time. Doctors told me you have to drink more water on the golf course, otherwise you're going stay dehydrated. I still drink Diet Cokes, but I'm drinking more water.
Everyone goes through problems in life. It's how we deal with them, get through it. But to answer your question, it really isn't any of my business if you're surprised if I won. It's the nicest way I can put it, I guess. Hopefully it's just great that I won again, and if some of you are surprised, that's cool; if you're not, that's cool too.
Q. But in a good way.
JOHN DALY: I know.
Q. I think a lot of people when they watched today were happy and also a little bit shocked.
JOHN DALY: I think it's cool. (Laughter).
Q. Success is going to breed scrutiny in your life again, probably more than it did before.
JOHN DALY: I don't see how it can get any worse, I really don't. How could it get any worse, really?
Q. You said you were open to that, you are open to those questions that are going to come out.
JOHN DALY: Yes. But like I said before, everybody has problems, it's just trying to deal with them in the right way. Some things are necessary I feel in my life that I need to talk about and some things kind of aren't. Like I said, I'm just going to enjoy this win. The hard work has paid off, especially at the end of last year when I won Korea, I got that boost, Callaway, and I played here pretty good the first two weeks. I'll keep working at it.
Q. From a lifestyle standpoint, is there a better place for John Daly?
JOHN DALY: I don't think so. I've got great security around me. I've got great friends that have been with me ever since I can remember, that have stuck with me whether I've played good golf, when I've really messed up, whatever, they've been there for me. A couple of shocker friends that I'll never believe what they did to me last year, but you really find out who your true friends are, and I am a man that has found out who my true friends really are. It's taken a lot of pain, but it's good to have the ones you know you can trust around me. I'm a true believer of the old saying, you can almost count them on your hands, and it's made me aware of what who to look out for, who's trying to get this, who's trying to get that. I have people around me who can kind of answer that for me. It's a great feeling.
Q. How does John Daly celebrate a victory in 2004?
JOHN DALY: I don't know. I'm going to go eat me some food, I know that.
JOE CHEMYCZ: John, thank you.
End of FastScripts.
