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JOHN DEERE CLASSICJuly 15, 2007Jonathan ByrdSILVIS, ILLINOIS JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Jonathan Byrd, congratulations on your third PGA TOUR victory here at the John Deere Classic this week. You jump into the top 25 in the FedExCup points list, and probably more importantly for you, next week you play in the British Open. You got an invitation to the 2008 Masters, as well, so congratulations first and foremost. Maybe some opening comments on a great week and a great finish. JONATHAN BYRD: Thanks. Those are just by-products of winning a golf tournament. You don't think about those things right off. But man, I haven't played in the British yet, and every time I watch it on TV, I just can't wait to get over there. I just love the thought of playing that type of golf. I haven't played The Masters since I think '04, so obviously that's a sweet thought, as well. But just today, just to be able to enjoy today, I said I wanted to go out and play today just for today, so I just enjoyed it and was able to take the challenge and the opportunity and play really well coming down the stretch. Q. You didn't bring your passport, you didn't expect to go? JONATHAN BYRD: No, sir (laughter), to be honest, no. You know, I was supposed to go to the qualifier for the British, missed the cut in Hartford, and pretty much my caddie talked me out of it. He said, hey, why don't we just go to Congressional and play John Deere, Milwaukee, play those weeks, build some confidence. We've got to get some confidence going before the Playoffs start and see if we can get things going back in the right direction. I listened, and I said, you know, I think that's the right plan. I pretty much threw the British out of my mind and said, I'm going to go play these three weeks. I went out and played last week, and you know, played terrible from a score standpoint. I went in and I really worked hard this week. I was out on the range at 7:00 a.m. on Monday morning, which is -- I'm never out there on a Monday morning that early. I was hitting wedges and working on my swing. I had a good practice Monday and felt pretty good all week. Q. What's your caddie's name? JONATHAN BYRD: Mike Hicks. He caddied for Payne Stewart for his career, so he's been out here a long time. Q. Voice of authority, huh? JONATHAN BYRD: Not the final voice of authority, but when you've got a caddie like that who's got a lot of wisdom and a guy I really trust who's really helped my game out a lot. He sure helped me out today. He helped me coming down the stretch just to make quick, good decisions, and he's just a great asset. Q. Were you aware of your position early on the back nine? JONATHAN BYRD: I was. I really didn't look at a leaderboard until walking off 13 green. I walked off going to 14 and saw that I was, I think, three back, and then I saw that he made birdie on 13 to go four up. I had a lot of pressure on myself to hit a good shot off that 14th tee and hit a bad tee shot again, but man, I made a great 20-footer there for birdie and salvaged 3. That was really the putt that kept me in the golf tournament because if I walk off that hole with par, I just felt like I was out of the golf tournament. Q. You said yesterday the fact that you've won twice and that Nathan and Tim had not, that could be a factor in your favor. Do you think it was going down the stretch knowing you've done this before? JONATHAN BYRD: I think that always helps. You hear Tiger say that going into majors, that having won a major, that helps, from experience and just from knowing that you can say you've done it. You can say the same thing for a PGA TOUR event. You know, there's something about being able to come down the stretch and pull it off, and I've done that. You know, might as well say that. Any amount of boost in confidence you can give yourself, you might as well give it to yourself. I said that to myself and I kept saying that to myself all day, and just kept telling myself to give myself some opportunities, and it worked out. Q. Why weren't you making cuts the last four tournaments? JONATHAN BYRD: (Laughing) I think I told everybody yesterday that my good golf was really good and my bad golf was terrible. I made nine birdies last week at Congressional, which is very good on that golf course, and shot 8-over. So when I hit a bad shot, I was hitting foul balls. I wasn't hitting it just right of the fairway or missing it barely in the rough. I was hitting it off the world and making doubles and really struggling when things started to go wrong. This week fortunately the golf course was a lot easier than last week, which made it easier on me. And fortunately my game kind of started coming around. Q. Talk about the success you've had here and how much of a factor that was in thinking you could run Tim down. JONATHAN BYRD: Well, I told myself, I kept telling myself this week and last night especially that I was in the final group here once before playing with Vijay, and I got to watch him win the tournament and just play so aggressive all day. You know, I came out with the mindset that year of just, you know, if it just happens, if things go my way, hey, it'll be fun, maybe I'll have a chance to win. When he came out on that first hole with the complete mindset, you could tell that, I'm going to win this golf tournament, I'm going to play aggressive, I'm going to fire at every flag and just play aggressive. I got to watch that and I had that mindset today. Unfortunately I wasn't hitting it quite as well as I wanted to. But I kept telling myself that, stay aggressive, we've got to make birdies, we've got to -- we can't play safe. Q. How did you enjoy this course and how does it match up with your game when you're playing well? JONATHAN BYRD: I've played well here in the past, so it matches up with my game. You know, it gives you a little room -- I tend to play well on courses where it just gives you a little bit of room off the tee for error. On a course like BellSouth, I've always played well. I kind of put these two courses as similar golf courses. I think that there's an advantage for long hitters. The par 3s are tough, but it just gives you a little room off the tee and it gives you room to kind of let it go, and I think that's just my game. Q. Did Mike talk you out of the club you wanted to hit on 18, and did that tell you that you might have been either on or have the lead? JONATHAN BYRD: Well, I had 163 yards to the hole, and that's an 8-iron. You know, it was a perfect -- hit an 8-iron 15 feet right of the flag and just kind of let it fall into that back portion of the green. He really felt like it was a 9-iron. Like I said, I wasn't swinging purely, and I hit -- I just whiffed a 9-iron. If I would have hit the 9-iron solid, I would have gotten back to about 20 feet short of the hole, which was what he felt was good enough, give ourselves a 20-footer and that will be a good spot to be. So just him telling me that -- he's an aggressive caddie, wants me to be more aggressive. So when he said that, I knew that par might be enough. Q. You've got a little thing going with Charles Howell. In your own mind do you want to keep pace with him, the only two Americans under 30 to have won multiple titles? JONATHAN BYRD: I've never thought about that (laughing). I think we have different games. He's had more success than I have on certain levels, played on the Presidents Cup team and -- I don't know how to answer that. I don't think about trying to keep pace with really anybody out here, other than maybe my closest friends, you know. You know, some of my closest buddies, we kind of talk back and forth when other guys are playing well. But even those guys, we all have different games and we're all at different stages of our career. All I can do is concentrate on what Jonathan Byrd is doing and not really worry about anything else. Q. Does it mean something to be in that pretty select group? JONATHAN BYRD: Yeah, absolutely. There's a big difference between finishing Top 30 on the Money List and not winning, or having a great career and not winning much. I'd much rather be erratic and miss cuts here and there and win golf tournaments. That makes the job more fun, when you're just -- when you're not winning and just making good checks, this job gets boring. We're out here to win golf tournaments. Q. Going back watching you as early as Thursday when you were playing with Zach and Lucas, you really seemed to have the pace of the greens down from the first round on. Is that accurate? JONATHAN BYRD: Very accurate. I didn't do a lot of putting practice, either, this week. For the most part, I've just been putting well, and I was putting well even last week when I was kind of struggling. For me all week it was just trying to stay aggressive and seeing the ball go in the hole with some pace. That's what I kept telling myself all day long. That's what I was telling myself on 18 because the greens were a little slow the first three days, and you had to hit the ball a little harder. I feel like I was trying to make every putt, and for the most part, my pace was good all week. I don't think I had a three-putt all week. Q. Do you have any idea how and when you're going to get to Scotland? JONATHAN BYRD: (Laughing) no, I don't. I know I'll probably fly out tomorrow night. I've got to get home to St. Simons Island, Georgia, somehow tonight, and kind of get regrouped and pack, and hopefully Polo sent me the fall line of clothes (laughter) already because I know they probably didn't think I was going to be in the British, so I need some warmer clothes. Maybe I'll get a videotape of last year's British at Carnoustie and maybe start watching some stuff on the plane ride over and maybe get a feel for the course that way. Q. Talk about your mindset today. You were talking about having a chance to win yesterday. At 13 when you saw the leaderboard for the first time, were you still thinking win, or had you resigned yourself to being in Tim's wake all day? JONATHAN BYRD: I don't know. I really felt like the way I was swinging at that point, you know, I was like, man, I've got to turn this around somehow. I saw I was three back. You know, I didn't tell myself I didn't have a chance. I knew I was in second place, which I felt like he could make a couple mistakes, I could make some birdies. 14 you might even make eagle. I have the length to get back to that back portion of the green on 17 and have an eagle chance. You never know what's going to happen. I kept telling myself, wait on it, you're going to start swinging better, you're going to start hitting it better. I've had rounds where I've hit it terrible and something clicks and you start puring it. I just kept waiting on that. You just never know what's going to happen. Like I said, the 14 was the turning point, going from four back to three back with that birdie putt, stuff like that. I almost made it on 16. That was my best iron shot of the day. Q. How come you didn't bring your passport? JONATHAN BYRD: I didn't think I was going to the British. Like I said, I haven't been playing well, and -- I don't know, maybe I thought that would be a jinx or something. Q. On 17 did you feel like you had to make eagle there to have a chance at that point? JONATHAN BYRD: No, I didn't think I had to make eagle. I knew he had bogeyed 15, so I felt like if I could birdie -- make sure -- I had to walk off that green with birdie to put the pressure kind of back on him, and I didn't know he had hit -- obviously he hadn't hit his second shot yet, and for sure I didn't think he was going to make bogey there. So I just -- I had a long putt, and that putt can get away from you. If you get it going past that hole with some pace, might go all the way to the fringe, so it was a tough putt. I hit it a hair too soft and left myself a tough seven-, eight-footer there for birdie, and fortunately just trusted my stroke and made a great putt there for birdie. But I knew I had to walk off that green with birdie. Q. Did you watch his last putt, that 60-some-footer on 18? JONATHAN BYRD: I was. Q. What were you thinking when it was rolling toward the hole? JONATHAN BYRD: Well, right when he hit it the announcer said he thought it was a little bit left. I had kind of hit that putt for more the middle of the green and I knew it wasn't going to come back to the right, so I knew once it got to the crest of the hill that it wasn't going toward the hole. He hit a good putt. Q. Are you going to come back and defend this title, even if it's the week before the British next year? JONATHAN BYRD: Absolutely. Q. What do fans in the Quad Cities -- what do you want fans in the Quad Cities to know about Jonathan Byrd? JONATHAN BYRD: Well, in relation to them, that I enjoy coming to this event. I enjoy coming to this town. We were in Washington, D.C., last week. There was a lot going on and a lot of traffic. A great town, July 4th was pretty hectic, and my wife and I came to this week, and they were just thankful that we were coming to -- everything kind of slowed down when we came here. It was just nice to come here. The people are nice, and we found some great restaurants this week. Johnny's Italian Steakhouse, we went to a place called La Flama twice, a Mexican place, and we went to Bass Street Chop House last night and had a great meal. We just enjoy the time, we enjoy the golf course, and enjoy looking at those cornfields. We certainly don't have those in Georgia. I kept telling my wife, I just want to go run out there and go run through them. Q. Did you? JONATHAN BYRD: No (laughter). No surprisingly, they have barbed wire around them. I don't think I needed to be jumping in barbed wire this week. The people are great and they love this tournament, and John Deere is just a great sponsor. Q. What did you feel wasn't quite right with your swing early? JONATHAN BYRD: Well, with my golf swing -- I've got a great golf swing, and when it's off, it's not that far off. But for whatever reason, I feel like I just get a little disconnected on my backswing. I try to match up my arm speed and my body speed going back, and when I get quick going back, my arms get going a little fast and my swing gets a little long, and then you're just kind of playing catch-up, you're just kind of trying to time it right. For the most part this week I felt good about my golf swing. I felt like things were moving together, going back and coming through, and when it got off, I'd just get quick, like most people. It gets a little quick, it gets a little off, and you're trying to feel it back in the right position. When I get off, I hit it right, especially this week. Q. So you were happy with the way you -- obviously you fought it pretty well. JONATHAN BYRD: I fought it well. My caddie kept telling me, you know, we don't have to be perfect to win. He kept telling me that all day. I didn't. I didn't hit it good coming in. I birdied three out of the last five holes. Everything was just a little off, but it was a little off but good enough. The drive on 18, I hit about the same shot I hit yesterday but I just swung more aggressive at it, and I hit it solid enough that it kind of got past that corner. Man, I couldn't have been in a better position coming into that flag. If I would have had to make 3, I was in a pretty good spot. Q. Have you got special plans for that Gator? JONATHAN BYRD: My wife has been -- we live in a pretty good family neighborhood, so people have carts to get around the neighborhood and go to the pool. I'd look pretty darned good in that Gator driving around the neighborhood, I know that. Pretty tough. But we'll see what happens. JOEL SCHUCHMANN: Jonathan Byrd, congratulations. End of FastScripts |
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