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THE MEMORIAL TOURNAMENT PRESENTED BY MORGAN STANLEYJune 3, 2007K.J. ChoiDUBLIN, OHIO JACK NICKLAUS: K.J., do you want to go through your birdies and bogeys? Q. How about your one-putts? Have you ever had a putting round like that that you can recall? K.J. CHOI: You know, it's my fifth time winning on TOUR, so I felt very comfortable, no pressure really, just the fact that it's Jack's tournament just made me feel really comfortable. I think I'm getting used to playing in the bigger tournaments. I've played in a lot of majors, so there wasn't really much pressure for me. JACK NICKLAUS: Give us your birdies. They're probably going to want those. Q. You don't remember? K.J. CHOI: Too many today (laughter). Okay, 1st hole, left side, 15 feet, left to right, and birdie, made it. No. 3, 154, 8-iron and three feet, straight line, made it. No. 6, hit a driver, second shot, 147-yard 8-iron and downhill to 10 feet, made it. 7, second shot, 286, to the front 265, 3-wood on the green. Very impressive today, first time in the stretch down the hill, and two-putt from almost 50 feet. And then No. 8, downhill, 167 yards, 7-iron, and hook lie, 15 feet and made it. No. 9, 3-wood tee shot, and second shot is 165 and a 7-iron, and a cut shot, Jack style, five-yard high cut shot, 10 feet. No. 11, again, Jack style -- JACK NICKLAUS: 30 the front nine? K.J. CHOI: 30. Q. That's Jack style, too. K.J. CHOI: No. 11, left to right, and very ugly shot left to right, and five-yard fade driver. To pin, 247 yards and a 5-wood. And then just over green and chip up three feet and make a birdie. 13th hole, first bogey today, and the light windy, and I looking left to right, and very similar 11th driver hole, left to right and then try, still don't move on the left side cross bunker, and it kick bounce and drop down, chip out and two-putt. 15th hole, great change this year. Great tee shot on the right side corner in the fairway, and pin is at 275 yard 3-wood, and it just hopped in the right side corner and stayed there, and 20 feet, 25 feet, and two-putt birdie. Q. You talked a lot about the birdies, but did you maybe win this tournament with pars, not only the last three, but you had a big one on 10 and one on 5, didn't you? You were in the water on 5, weren't you? K.J. CHOI: Today No. 5 on the par 5, only 260 yards. I'm thinking lay up in the first thing, and then today feel a cut shot on the left side corner of the green, and the five-yard cut shot on the right side stay, easy putt because I try and it can't go, and it go straight, and the back on the left in the water. This week the chip and putt is very well, and I like 60, 70 yards, and six yards to drop and a chip and a one-putt. It's a good feel and a good turning point. Q. How long was the putt? K.J. CHOI: Maybe four feet, hook putt. Today why I make lots of putts is hook putt. My first victory in Japan, on the last hole, big hook putt, 10, 15 putt, and I make a par and win tournament and Asian No. 1 and Jack invited in 1999 to play here. Today ten feet and five feet at the last, hook putt. Today, hook putt, very comfortable. JACK NICKLAUS: The last three pars that you made, that's the ones they're talking about, talk about those three holes. K.J. CHOI: Last hole, 16, my nickname is Mr. One Foot. One time, I don't know, hit it very well, and just one foot short and spin back in the bunker. And today, same thing on the 16th hole. But this week, bunkers are very deep and many practicing in the practice area because I know how much spin, how much higher, and I practiced very well, and today very comfortable in 16 bunker shot, and then four feet and make it. 16 unbelievable second shot in first cut, and it never fluid this week. 187 yard in the pin, and 6-iron hit it. I think 7-iron but together, 6-iron is more safe because in the shorter bunker is a very long bunker shot, it's no good, and on the green and two-putt is okay. But pin high, very good. And then get down and keep going, and then 20 yard longer and a flier. Just one thing, fluff shot and chip down and first bank and stop on the green, only two choice. So my style and skip shot is better, is my choice, skip shot and 15 feet and then make it. Great putt. Then 18, so I'm 16 flier over the green, it's a very tough chip, and then 18 over the green is terrible, very tough chipping shot. I said, "Don't go over the green. Short is okay and bunker shot is very well today." So you do a 5-iron to the green upright and then big hook shot, and the right side the bunker, and five-, ten-yard hook shot. But more windy, the more right to left, and then 20-yard hook shot, big missed shot (smiling). And then very similar 16 bunker shot. I have the open face with 70 degree and a high bunker shot and it stopped quick at three feet and make it. Q. There was a mention in the media guide that you basically learned how to play the game or started out by reading a lot of Jack's instructions books and watching video. I wonder if you could talk about that. K.J. CHOI: When I was in high school, right around 16 years old, it was one of those Jack Nicklaus's pictorial books that tells you how to swing, a lot of drawings, gives you the fundamentals of golf. Someone gave it to me, my physical education teacher, at that time, gave me the book as a present, and it just basically showed you how to grip, how to do the backswing, follow-through, just a very basic fundamentals of golf, and I just followed that and that really set -- that's how I really got into golf is by reading the book. Thank you, Jack. JACK NICKLAUS: You're entirely welcome. My pleasure (laughter). Q. Why did your physical education teacher give you that book? Was there any reason? Had you been playing at that time? K.J. CHOI: My PE teacher at the time told me that -- I was only 16, 17. He said, "If you become a professional golfer there's a good future ahead of you." It would be a good profession to take on as a job, so that's why I started reading the book and got a feel for what Jack was trying to teach. At the beginning when I tried it the way he told me to do it, it just felt really good. It felt good, so I told myself, this -- if I really got good at it, there could be a bright future. Q. Was the book in Korean or just pictures or do you remember? K.J. CHOI: Korean. Q. Did you read any more of Jack's books after that? K.J. CHOI: Maybe not the first two years. JACK NICKLAUS: They're too hard to read (laughter). Q. The fact that it's Jack's tournament, will that be a bigger deal in your homeland or to you? K.J. CHOI: Definitely it's very meaningful. It's hard to describe in words how meaningful it is. But I just feel very honored and just very happy to be living in the same age, same period, same time as Jack is living and to win his tournament is so meaningful to me. I can only think that this was meant to be. I mean, God planned all this to happen, and I just want to thank God for today. To be able to win this big tournament is very meaningful to me. Q. Will it mean more in your country, too? K.J. CHOI: Yeah. And it also has another meaning for me in that Jack Nicklaus, the image that Jack Nicklaus portrays in Korea is very positive, very clean. He's a very family man, places importance in family, and those are the elements that I place importance in. I think there's a lot of similarity between me and Jack in the sense that I place a lot of importance in my family, too. So that's why this tournament has a special meaning to me. Q. How long did it take you after you read Jack's books to become really good enough to know that you were going to be -- have a chance to be a pro golfer? K.J. CHOI: About three years. Q. I'm wondering when you got the book from the PE teacher, did you know who Jack was already? And then after you read the book, did you kind of follow what he was doing? K.J. CHOI: Yeah, I knew he was famous even when my teacher gave it to me. He just kept emphasizing, "This is a book written by a verrrrry famous golfer, so keep reading it." As I started reading it, I could understand why he was such a great golfer because all the things that were written really started to make sense. Q. Were you nervous the first time when you came over here and you were paired with Jack right away? I don't know how it felt. K.J. CHOI: Yeah, the night before I played with him, Jack had made the cut, and yes, I was nervous. Just the thought of playing with this legend, and to be living in the same era as he is made me nervous. But when I actually started playing with him, he gave me a lot of advice. We talked. He just treated me like his son, treated me very comfortably, and I was able to become more comfortable during the round and it was a very good experience. Q. That was '99? K.J. CHOI: I think so. Q. Third round '99? K.J. CHOI: I think so. JACK NICKLAUS: You could check it, but I think that's correct. It was either the third round or the last round, but I think third round. Q. Jack, you know every inch of turf out here. How difficult was the last putt under those circumstances? JACK NICKLAUS: K.J.'s putt? He had a really tough putt. He had a putt that could do two things. That putt, obviously it should break a lot left, but the tendency of that green, because the property all drains that way, is to hold the putt up, even though it does break left. So it had two features on it that unless you've played here enough -- K.J. has played here enough, he would figure that out. Do you understand what I'm talking about? In other words, the property drains to the east. The hole goes to the east. His putt was breaking to the west. But the east tendency would keep it from breaking really, really sharp, more than it looks, even though it does break a lot. It may be confusing, but if that would have been a flat piece of ground on that putt, that putt would have broken a lot more. That's what I'm saying. Q. Michael, I know you've been over with Se Ri and a lot of the female golfers. We never hear stories about how big K.J. is over there. Can he walk down the street without getting mugged? MICHAEL YIM: You can tell he's got a very strong -- appearance-wise, it's not difficult to notice who he is. Q. Do people recognize him? MICHAEL YIM: Yeah, I mean, people will notice him. JACK NICKLAUS: I was there three weeks ago. I promise you, he's very big in Korea. Q. He's very big here now. You were left off or didn't make The Presidents Cup team last time. This puts you, I think, up to No. 7 in the standings. How important was that for you this year to make that team and how much do you think Jack would be glad to see you on that team? K.J. CHOI: It's just an honor for me to have a chance of playing The Presidents Cup again. It's always an honor playing professional golf when a player gets to play in such big tournaments like The Presidents Cup, and I just look very forward to playing against Jack's team again. You know, I worked very hard to win this tournament, and I'm going to keep on grinding so that I do end up making the team. Q. Who gave you the nickname Mr. One Foot? K.J. CHOI: It's me (laughter). Last couple weeks in tournament, you know, against the wind, and just top, one foot short in the bunker, one foot short in the water. There's a lot of occasions where I have fallen one foot short of the green. It could either spin back and go in the bunker or water. Q. Would you go over your save at 14, please? K.J. CHOI: I hit a five-yard fade shot and aimed to the left side of the bunker corner, and then ball, hit it very solid, long ball, but still moving in right to left windy and pushing the left side kick. And then little in the bank side, very -- no stance. Club in my chest and on the side, and just chip out. JACK NICKLAUS: That's 13. He said 14. K.J. CHOI: That's 14. JACK NICKLAUS: 13 is where you make bogey and had to chip it out. K.J. CHOI: You said 13? Q. 14, the little hump where the bunker is. K.J. CHOI: 144 yards at the pin, and usually my 8-iron is a fade shot. Wind blowing right to left in the flag, and I'm just at left side corner aimed to bunker. And a little bit finally hit and just crossing the face, I think so, and then ball left. Just lucky very soft ground and soft -- and the hands soft on the ball when I dropped it. I chipped it in the first cut and the length and the ball through. It was today impossible short of the hole, and two feet short. It was very good touch. I'm very impressed (laughter). JACK NICKLAUS: It was very impressive. That was a very impressive chip. K.J. CHOI: I'm practicing this area, the bunker shot and the chip shot and the first cut every time the ball go over the green and in the first cut on the left side. And then today, oh, yeah, I think ball be okay. JACK NICKLAUS: Incidentally, that was not in my book. Q. Was 14 the hardest up-and-down? Was that harder than the bunker shots? K.J. CHOI: Today, yeah. Today tee shot -- first miss on the tee shot at 14 tee shot, on the left side. On the right side, just bounce in the woods in the water, a little bit left, but wind still right to left, so very tough hole. JACK NICKLAUS: I think if you look at the success of Asian players on the U.S. TOUR and see how many wins there were, I don't think you're going to find anybody that's close to K.J. I think most people would look at that, if you look at the Japanese players, Korean players, Chinese players, south Pacific players. K.J., you've won more than anybody by a lot. K.J. CHOI: Thank you. JACK NICKLAUS: I think that's correct, isn't it? MICHAEL YIM: Yes. Q. When you said you thought this was meant to be, have you ever had that feeling before? K.J. CHOI: You know, interestingly enough, every time I've won on the TOUR, I felt a similar type of feeling; that is, if you're feeling too comfortable all the time, then something is about to go wrong. But if there's a certain amount of tension, there's a certain amount of pressure, not too much, a certain amount, where you're able to deal with it, at one point there's a point where you feel comfortable enough to overcome everything. In each of the five wins that I've had on TOUR, I've felt the same thing. I felt that God was trying to use me to spread his words by winning the tournament, and that's how I felt today. Q. The players shot some really slow scores on your golf course. What's your reaction to that? JACK NICKLAUS: My reaction was that we had four days of no wind, we had four days of really easy conditions, four days of humidity, which means the greens never could firm. If we had one afternoon of 10 or 15 mile an hour wind, the golf course would have been totally different. They didn't put any water, I don't think, all week on the golf course. You find that when you don't have -- when you have those conditions, the guys will shoot very low. I expected there to be a lot of low scores and bunched the way they were. It made for an exciting tournament because we had 15 players with nine holes to go that had an opportunity to win. It could have been anybody in that thing. K.J., of course he shot the great front nine and then he followed it up with a good back nine, so that was what happened. I always feel like a good golf course can be shot. I always look at Pebble Beach. Pebble Beach, if the conditions are windless at Pebble Beach, you can shoot Pebble Beach very low. If conditions with windy at Pebble Beach, it's tough. When wind comes up here and dries this course out, it's tough. But we didn't have that. It is what it is. Q. Earlier in the week you talked about the growth of golf in international players. You had pretty much an international scoreboard here. What are your thoughts about that? Are we seeing what we will see in the future? JACK NICKLAUS: All I can say is I think Gary Player will have a lot of choices for The Presidents Cup. I think it's very typical. The game is a global game now. You have another young Korean boy that's playing very well, Anthony Kim, who's done very, very well this year. You know, you've got more of the Japanese players that are playing here, we're now having some Chinese players starting to play. You're getting more players from Asia, but you're obviously getting all the European players, you've got South American players, you've got the South African players, the Australians. The game is a global game, and there's a lot more people outside the United States than inside the United States. Q. That was my next question. What does this mean to the United States? JACK NICKLAUS: Well, we keep playing the United States against the rest of the world. Maybe we ought to play east versus west. They don't understand what I'm saying. We ought to divide this up a little differently, maybe the Americas as a team because it's going to continue to go that way as the game grows internationally. That's not to say that we're not going to have good golfers in the United States, but we're going to have good golfers everywhere else in the world that want to keep, and that's great for the game frankly. I think it's terrific. I have no objection to that whatsoever. I think to see our leaderboard in week and to see that we had I don't know how many Aussies coming down the stretch, but we had a bunch of them. Australasian, when you put it all together, was a pretty tough deal this week. They all played well, everybody did. But I think you're going to continue to see that trend in the game. Q. Maybe you could get Gary to switch captaincies with you. JACK NICKLAUS: I'm quite happy. We've been pretty lucky the last two, only one stroke difference. We may struggle in Montreal, but that's okay. Q. You experimented again a little bit differently with the bunkers this year, and I just wanted to get a quick assessment of how it played out for you, for the field. JACK NICKLAUS: I need to look and see what happened statistic-wise and so forth versus last year and see what happened. You know, I don't think the fairway bunkers -- the greenside bunkers are a big deal. The only thing that's a big deal are fairway bunkers. If you've got a little bit more furrowing in the fairway bunker, that's tough, big deal. Greenside not much difference, is it? K.J. CHOI: No, tough, too. Still tough. JACK NICKLAUS: But it also brings out the best in a bunker player. K.J. is a terrific bunker player. Last year Carl Pettersson avoided -- had one fairway bunker all week, so he did very well last year. Q. Well, Carl mentioned that he didn't play the same way as he did last year. He didn't fear them as much, so his strategy changed as much back to maybe -- JACK NICKLAUS: Maybe he should have done it the other way. Well, I need to assess it, okay? I don't want to answer that question until I can find out where we're going. For one time I won't shoot from my hip, how's that? Q. K.J., what are your plans between now and the U.S. Open, and what do you know about Oakmont Country Club? K.J. CHOI: I planned to take the week off, but I'm going to head down there on Friday and try to get a look at the course. I know a member there, just walk around, play a few practice rounds. All I've heard so far is that it's very, very difficult, and that's -- I'll just have to find out how difficult it is. JACK NICKLAUS: K.J., this (indicating a fade shot) works very well at Oakmont. He'll do very well at Oakmont. K.J. is a high-ball hitter, a left to right player, and I think it favors both of those. K.J. CHOI: Thank you.
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