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GINN CHAMPIONSHIP AT HAMMOCK BEACHMarch 28, 2007Fred FunkPALM COAST, FLORIDA PHIL STAMBAUGH: We are fortunate to have Fred Funk this week playing in the Ginn Championship. Before we get started with the interview, we have sort of a special presentation. Brenda over here won the Daytona Beach Caddie for a Day Promotion and she will be your caddie for the first six holes today. You want to come over here and read the winning entry? FRED FUNK: Only six holes? BRENDA WARD: This is my poem I wrote for you: Fred, the coach, Fred the golfer, you're the most; young pros revere you. Older pros fear you while the fans just love to be near you; being an accurate driver while playing with the best, age doesn't matter, you pass all the tests. Eight PGA TOUR victories and two Champions Tour wins, plus wearing a skirt to take all those Ginns. March 28, a favorite day, PLAYERS Championship came your way. First pro tournament in Orlando; you're the Ginn Championship's toast. PHIL STAMBAUGH: She'll be your caddie for the first six holes. A lot's happened in the first part of the year for you with the big victory in Hawaii on the Champions Tour, and the Mayakoba down in México. Thoughts about this week. FRED FUNK: This week, I came down, I was real excited about the announcement of the Ginn Championship coming so close to home. I had no idea what the golf course was. Actually my caddie came down and did the yardage book for the Conservatory, and after he did that, they announced they were going to switch it because the infrastructure wasn't ready, so they were coming over here. So came back down here and did the books and just called me on the phone and said man, this thing is really good, you're going to love it. So I came down last Saturday and Sunday played just by myself, hit balls and played each hole tried to figure out what to do. There's a lot of what are I think risk/reward type holes out here and some really stout holes that the wind is blowing, depending on which direction, which one is going to play tough and which one is not. Really good layout. Nicklaus did a great job. Condition of the golf course testify nominal, I think you've been hearing that all year and going to continue to hear that all week. I'm real excited. It's a golf course that I think will reward really good play, and that's what I want. I think the best golfer will be identified -- the guy that's playing the best at the end of the week on this golf course is going to identify it. I don't think you can pretend and get away with things on this golf course. PHIL STAMBAUGH: Talk about the first part of your year, it's been quite exciting. FRED FUNK: Yeah, I had a disappointing start when I went to Sony which I love the golf course, missed the cut by one and then Hualalai, unbelievable venue, just had a great time there but I didn't play well. I was kind of on a mission to hopefully reverse that, and I went into Turtle Bay and immediately loved the golf course. Brad Bryant told me last year that the golf course was made for me. I went around on a practice round in the Pro-Ams and just loved it. It turned into an 11-shot win, which I didn't think was going to happen. You don't think you're going to play that well, but I putted extremely well all week, I played solid, I stayed within myself. Just a very special week. And then following that up with the win at Mayakoba was really special, too, because I've been wanting to stay -- really the goal, seeing how long I can stay competitive on the regular tour. And that validated all my reasonings, to me, not that I needed to validate it to anybody, but a lot of people have been asking, why haven't you just committed full-time to the Champions Tour. I said, well, as long as I'm competitive I can stay out on the regular tour. And some people say, well, you can't win out there and I still believe I can win out there, and I think I could win in one of the -- if the golf course is set up properly and I'm playing well; I think I can win any of those given weeks no matter what strength of the field. I feel really good about my game. I feel really good my putting. I turned my putting around the night before Turtle Bay; it's been solid ever since. I just really enjoy being on the golf course, barring the back problems I've been having, which is the other issue. It's been disappointing that part because for the first time I've been physically knocked down in a long time. I've been mentally knocked down a lot but physically I've been pretty good. Back bothered me at Riviera and missed the cut there, but bothered me at Mayakoba Saturday and Sunday, still got through it. And because I was playing really well, I wanted to keep playing and I wanted to go to these difficult setups that Honda had at PGA National, and Innisbrook and Bay Hill and I was really looking forward to playing those. I had to withdraw after one round at Honda and after 25 holes at Innisbrook, I just couldn't go; and pulled out of Bay Hill and rested -- started rehabbing and resting and just trying to do anything I thought I could do to get my back better. And it's a deal where I know it's there now, hopefully I can get through it. It's been an injury where it's a muscle related, as far as we know, and it fatigues out on the back nine and I just can't bend over to address the ball. And when I get to that point, the rotation is fine, it's the bending over part and then I couldn't even bend over to putt. So I've just got to see if I can get through that. Hopefully today will be a good test. I have an outing tomorrow which I have to just stand on a par 3 in Naples tomorrow, so I will not be in the Pro-Am. I would rather be here playing in the Pro-Am and giving it a good test so I know what's really coming on Friday. Today will be a really good test because I'm going to walk and hit shots and not use the cart and see if the thing will hold up. But back up the year's been great. It's been a good start, having the win at Turtle Bay and winning on the regular tour has been pretty neat. Q. Will you use cart in competition if you have to Friday? FRED FUNK: If I have to -- well, there's actually a lot of walks, pretty long walks on a few holes out here between the green and the next tee, and I want to see what they are going to do with that. I really don't like the cart rule. I never intended to use the cart except in the Pro-Ams. I don't mind my caddie using the cart but I'll walk. But I don't want to, I think I can actually stay looser actually walking. I don't know whether they are going to have shuttles between these long -- I'm sure they are. Q. If this is NFL team and your coach is speaking, would this be termed a game day decision, whether you're able to play? FRED FUNK: I'm playing. I'm definitely playing. Unless I just can't even move, I'm playing. I tried -- I know it's not disk-related. I know it's a muscle thing. I know I can't hurt it anymore. I can irritate it, but I don't think I can do any damage to anything. As long as I can bend over, I'll play. I'm really frustrated sitting at home and has not really gotten much better. So sitting at home hasn't worked, so I'm going to try to play through it and see what happens. Q. A little interesting issue came up at Bay Hill, Paul Casey and Rocco were paired the first couple of days and actually as it turned out the score put them together all four days, but Paul came in and talked about it was the most enjoyable competitive round he's had in a long time because of how chatty Rocco was, and he was just being Rocco. He was lamenting the fact the guys in his age group don't do that, appear relaxed and chatty during a competitive round. You've been one of those who doesn't mind talking with your playing partner and interacting with fans; do you do that more on the Champions Tour, or are you being the same guy you've always been? FRED FUNK: I play my best when I'm loose and relaxed and interacting with everybody. That's when I'm at my best. It doesn't always happen. Sometimes I get in the game face mode, and usually that's when I'm not playing as well and I'm trying to just stay out of my partner's way and not, you know, not be animated or anything. But I think a lot of that is just from the sports psychologists nowadays, pretty much tell you not to get too high, not to get too low on things that happen out on the golf course and just stay flatlined. I don't like that. I think you should react to -- ideally you should react in a real positive fun way when you do hit a good shot and pat yourself on the back and say, hey, that was fun, I did something really good. I made a birdie instead of: You hit a good shot; well, I was supposed to do that; that was no big deal. Instead we hit bad shots and we get all pissed after because we hit bad shots. Well, we hit a lot of bad shots during the course of a round and course of a tournament, so if you are focused on the negative all the time, and you're beating yourself up, that doesn't show very well either. The sports psychologists really try to -- I think they just tell you to be flatlined, and that's why you don't see too many guys really animated and they just feel like they need to stay at whatever high level they think they need to be in, is being in control of their emotions and not letting out their real personality. Q. Was Paul accurate in his portrayal of his generation of guys? FRED FUNK: I think lot of the younger guys -- although there are guys that are really fun to be around, the real young guys. Sergio is animated, I think Villegas is animated. Tiger is definitely animated when he's hitting a bad shot. (Laughing.) I can't think of some of the other younger guys that are that way but there are a few. There are not that many that are really out there that let their personalities show while they are playing, and a few of the youngest guys are like that. Q. Talking to some of the caddies, they tell me they think this is a long-ball hitter's tournament, do you agree with that? FRED FUNK: Yeah, it's pretty open off the tee. That's typical of a Nicklaus design. He'll give you a lot of room. Just don't miss what he gives you. He puts a lot of emphasis on being on the right place in their second shots. It's more of a second-shot golf course, but it's a big risk/reward -- two of the par 5s that stick out in my mind are 6 and 14. I played over the weekend; we had a little northeast wind, so they are both into the wind and I was still able to reach them. I had to reach them with a 3-wood on 6 and 14 was everything I had. I was hitting six balls out there and taking my best one and going for the green. But I can get there on all of the par 5s under the right conditions. But yeah, I think any other two par 5s I can reach. 9 is really a stout hole into the wind, or if it switches and 18 becomes into the wind, really, really good hole. I think 7 is a great hole. The par 3s, 88 and 17, 12, all of the par 3s are really good; 3. So it's a really good golf course, but it's more of a second shot golf course and a par 3 golf course and that's typical I think of Nicklaus. Q. Since you have a new caddie this week, what will be your advice for a new caddie if you did have a new caddie this week or maybe to your caddie? FRED FUNK: Caddies know what to do. The professional caddies, they scope out the golf course. They know it. I've done my homework this week. I usually don't come and play too many practice rounds, but being it was so close and I had not really been playing in the last couple of weeks, I wanted to come down here and see it. So I took two days to do it. But with my six-hole or 18-hole caddie today, we'll just go out there and have fun. The big thing today for me on Pro-Am days is make sure the amateurs have a fun time. It's their day, not my day. That's the biggest goal in the Pro-Am is to hopefully have those guys relax and have a good time and not be all uptight like they usually are, at least on the first few holes. Q. You look around, there's a lot of guys who have won majors and THE PLAYERS Championship around here, do you think if the winds does blow a little bit and with the kind of field that this has, could this look like a mini-PLAYERS Championship from the 80s and 90s; the kind of names you see up there, do you think it lends itself to that type of situation possibly? FRED FUNK: Well, I think the golf course itself will end up separating the guys that end up playing the best and not. I think it's really a good enough golf course, tough enough golf course that you need to be playing well. But if the wind comes up, it's really going to create a separation because now you've really got to be playing well. Some of these holes are really tough and they have some run-offs where it makes it very difficult to get up-and-down if you miss the green. Yeah, the guys that are in the field, the guys that have won majors and PLAYERS, like you said they could rise to the top. To me I look at the guys that have always -- that have been good players in the past on the PGA TOUR, and some of the guys who have been No. 1 players, Nick Price, Mark O'Meara, obviously Hale, just go down the list of guys, Raymond and Ben Crenshaw, Tom Watson and all the guys, they know how to play golf; just whether they will play well this week. And on a golf course like this, it's really going to showcase how good your playing, and I think that's what the guys want. Any time the true competitors that are out here, that still really want to compete, they want to have a golf course that's going to identify the guy that's playing well that week and this golf course is going to do it. Q. Is it a hypothetical thing, if the PLAYERS Championship had not changed dates and was last week, could you have -- would your back have permitted you to play last week? FRED FUNK: I wouldn't have been able to play. I would have tried to play but I wouldn't have been able to play last week, especially earlier in the week. Thank goodness because they have it overseeded and the greens were not ready last week. That's the only thing that's not ready out there yet. They probably could have gotten them ready, could have grown them in and then shaved them. I just was out there yesterday and it's in great shape. Q. Are they going to cap the rough at about two inches do you think or do you think they are going to go three with that? FRED FUNK: They said they are going to mow it two and a half to three inches Freddie said, the superintendent. Q. How much is that going to change the characteristic of that tournament if it's a little bit warm and the ground is as firm as they want to get it and the rough is down like that? FRED FUNK: Bermudarough is a totally different animal than rye. I think two-inch bermudarough is equivalent to three- or four-inch rye rough because the ball nestles right down to the bottom. The grass in that bermuda, very seldom does a ball sit up in it and it gets down to the bottom and it's really difficult to dig it out. What's really nice with that is that even if it's real dry, and it's a real dry rough, you can get the club head to go through it with a lot of speed, but you've lost total control of the golf ball. So now it's going to get up there around the greens and probably in some places where you really wish you just laid it up, and that's what I think all of the rough should be. I hate hack-out rough. You can make pars and bogeys all day with rough that's eight inches deep because you're going to just chip it out and hit your wedge on the green but you hit a couple of shots -- now, you've got a good lie, I can go up there to the green but then you hit it in one of those bunkers or roll-out area, now you're making doubles, triples. It's kind of a teaser rough. You see a guy going for the green, yeah, that's great but you see, it's kind of the ideal with Augusta. You hit it in that short little cut, you've lost control of the spin on the ball. You're coming into those greens with no spin and the ball is releasing into places you don't want it to go. Q. Obviously this is new to the Champions Tour to this area and close to home, how important is it to you to be close to Jacksonville and the home of the TOUR? FRED FUNK: I think it's great. I think it's a perfect location for this event. I know they made -- Gary actually had an article over the weekend about how we've had other opportunities and other attempts at having a successful event, and I think coming down here with the growth of Flagler County, the money that Bobby Ginn is putting into the complex and the quality of the golf course, I think the rave reviews that the players are giving it right out of the gate, this separation from THE PLAYERS Championship, it's all good. So I think it's going to -- this should grow into hopefully a really first-class event. I think it will always be a first-class event but it will be accepted by the locals. You're close to Daytona or -- you're further away to Jacksonville but you're closer to Orlando where those people can come over and watch. Daytona and Jacksonville can still come down, and Flagler is growing so fast, you're going to have a lot of people from here. PHIL STAMBAUGH: Fred, we'll let you go. Thank you very much. End of FastScripts |
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