THE INTERNATIONAL

August 6, 2003

Jack Vickers, Jr.

Wayne White

MODERATOR: We have Jack Vickers with us here and Wayne White from the PGA TOUR, who is telling us about an upcoming event Mr. Vickers is going to be part of.

WAYNE WHITE: Appreciate you having me. I'm actually the director of tournament business affairs at the PGA TOUR, and delighted to be here today, acknowledging a tremendous award here for our good friend Mr. Jack Vickers, the 2003 Ambassador of Golf Award is truly a true achievement in the world of golf, and Mr. Vickers certainly deserves it.

I'm actually here representing the Northern Ohio Golf Charities, and of course, we'll be finding out more about that in two weeks when the actual award will be given to Mr. Vickers there at the World Golf Championships NEC Invitational.

We'd like to offer our congratulations on behalf of Commissioner Finchem and the International Federation of PGA Tours. This certainly recognizes all of the achievements that Mr. Vickers has done over the course of the year, not only in golf but also in charity.

Certainly we have a magnificent facility here with Castle Pines and The INTERNATIONAL Golf Tournament, and most importantly is what he's done for charity in the Denver areas. I'm glad that he can be added to the list of past recipients. This is the 23rd year. The list is basically a list of icons in golf and Mr. Vickers certainly deserves to be among them.

So, Jack, congratulations. On behalf of the Commissioner, well deserved. Look forward to seeing it officially in a couple of weeks.

JACK VICKERS: Thank you, appreciate that. Good morning, gents. Nice to see you all back again and appreciate your presence here. I think we're going to have a good tournament. Buddy tells me, I believe it's 49 from foreign connections, and that's truly a star in our cap here as far as our international flavor and aspect of this tournament, which you know we started off with that in mind, and it's built a lot over the years. This may be the largest foreign contingent we've had. So that's good to hear. I hope it keeps growing in that respect.

I'm a little hoarse this morning. I guess did I too much talking yesterday.

I wanted to mention that really, I take my hat off to you all being here this morning, distinguishing the class in the press from the guys that ran to Vail. I'll catch them tomorrow. (Laughter.)

But I do have several things on my mind, and I can start off with some questions or I can kind of give you a few thoughts what's running in my mind or whatever your preference is.

I'm just going to talk off the cuff here. I've got one thing on my mind in my waning years here that I want to make a mark out of, and I've been doing a lot of talking about it. I'm going to say a few things at Akron, Wayne, so this will be a preliminary.

But I'm very upset about the golf ball and what it's doing to golf.

I think it's a major issue. I think it's a major concern. I want to make it clear that I'm not taking anything out on the manufacturers because that's not my purpose at all. In my book, the manufacturers ought to be thinking and considering the same things that are running through my mind, and I don't think that it's perhaps my role to be trying to run their business, which I'm not, but I'm appalled and surprised that the manufacturers have not thought about this in more depth and what the consequences are of what they are doing. From the standpoint of economics, they are going to sell as many balls no matter what kind of ball it is. We've got a great golf audience in our sport and they are going to -- the same manufacturers are going to make the ball, whether it's a less active ball or a lively ball, however you want to put it, or not.

If you think, if you took our -- I don't know, I don't know how you want to break it out, but say you took what in your mind is the 100 greatest golf courses or you took Golf Digest's s 100 greatest golf courses and you went through that list and saw how many great treasures we have got that are being obliterated by what we are doing. You've got golf course after golf course, and I've belong to a bunch of them over my lifetime and I see a lot of them, and I don't have the list in front of me, but courses like Marion and right here, Cherry Hills, I can go on and on and on with the great tracks that this movement in terms of golf ball -- and I could add equipment, but the equipment is negated if you don't have that lively golf ball.

But that lively golf ball is killing the game of golf. We are suddenly falling into the trap and we are going down the line, and it's become a seven-club game instead of a 14-club game, particularly with the pros.

Now, I want to make it clear I am not advocating that we go change the ball for membership golf. That isn't the point. I'm talking about the championship golf, the professional tour and that's where I'm -- that's where I'm headed. And I think it is sad to say that the USGA has not taken the steps that they should have been taken way prior to this time, and carried their end to stop things. It's their responsibility. They are the ones writing the rules with the R&A and specifying what the equipment is and so on, and they have let this thing go way beyond where they should have.

Now, when you think of the millions and millions of dollars that are invested in these golf courses, I just take this one, for example. The money we got in this golf course, and if we were to come in, and I don't know what the answer is at this point -- I told the Commissioner, a year ago that if you want to play this thing at 10,000 yards, we'll accommodate. That's not the point, though. I happen to be one in a fortunate position where we could probably get 10,000 yards out of it, but that's not the point. The point is that the courses that I'm talking about do not have the room to expand to do that. Consequently, they are just obliterated as far as being competitive in the eyes of competition committees like the National Open, what-have-you, that are National Championships. They are hitting drivers and wedges; you have a hard time thinking where you see a three-shot par 5 anymore. I think that's kind of pathetic.

I think it's taken a lot away from golf and I don't blame the pros. I don't blame the Tour. They are living with this. I would frankly like to see the Tour take some maybe historical -- make some historical moves and make some recommendations and work with the players and see what is the best answer for this thing.

I know things are being done about it now with it. There's a lot of talk about it. I hold in my possession here a couple letters I got from the Ohio Golf Association, which is one of the better ones in the country and it's a big one. I'm going to start pushing for the Florida Golf Association, Southern California and Northern California Golf Associations, I'm going to make every effort I can make to start putting the heat on the USGA in this regard. And I think if we get enough of them, they are going to hear the footsteps.

I just can't really express my feelings at what going on here, but I think a lot of people, and I'm not saying this in a negative way or in an accusation way, but it's a lot of people are just not aware, they are just not, they are asleep, what's going on here? We are going to wake up and we are already seven years or so past where we ought to be. And it just keeps going on and on and on. You all as writers see what the difference is in the yardages every few years, but somebody is always coming out with a better ball or a better piece of equipment to knock it further.

You know, Nicklaus 15 years ago was on this case and nobody was listening, kind of laughing at him, in fact. So I think it's a serious matter and I hope to gather my forces together and really put an effort forth to try to do something about this thing. I know it's being worked on but I think some decisions need to be made. We would screw around with technicalities in the tech end of the equipment and the golf ball and all of that and that can go on and on and on.

We need to make some decisions and say, this is it. Every other sport, everybody plays with the same ball. This is like saying in football: We are going to widen the damn goal post another 40 feet and we are going to make a football that you can kick 100 yards. It's the same analogy, and it would ruin that game and it's going to ruin this one if we don't do something.

I really, truly believe that the word needs to get around. We need to put the heat on and we need to come under some decisions and conclusions which is going to make the game of golf competitive again. The reason they built 1- and 2- and 3-irons is to use them. That was part of the game. You don't see them used at all hardly unless they are off the tee anymore. And I don't know whether you are watching the Hartford tournament on Sunday when I believe it was Ogilvy on one of last holes the last day was in trouble off of his drive and hits a 278-yard 5-iron to the green. Now, how crazy are we getting?

And I've talked to a lot of the players and the players are shaking their head. They can't say a heck of a lot because a lot of them are on the payroll of the manufacturers. But they are thinking the same way, what are we doing to ourselves here?

So, I guess my word today is I probably haven't said all that I could say or we might be here half a day, but I think my word to you all would be to give it a little thought, think about what I have said, and I know some of you have talked about it and thought about it yourselves. I think you need to express yourselves, and not necessarily me, but I think we need to get a roller coaster going on this thing and get something done about it.

Talk is cheap. I'm upset with the USGA because they are governing body that make these rules. We as club members and you as club members cost across the country pay our dues to the USGA. They have a great, big, fat tail, their job and responsibility is what we are talking about right here. I know at one point in time they worried about a lawsuit. But who in the hell cares about a lawsuit if you're right? If you're right, you're right. If you're wrong, you're wrong. And if you're charged with that responsibility and you're accepting everybody's money to be the governing body, then God darn it, act. Quit sitting on your duff.

So that's my message, and I'm going to keep pushing it and I've got some pretty good horsepower to go start turning the cranks, too. So I'm going to -- if I die going down with the subject matter, then so be it but I'm going to find it.

Q. Do you have any numbers to indicate how much livelier the ball is today than it was 10 or 15 or 20 years ago?

JACK VICKERS: I don't have those numbers myself. I don't have those numbers but they are readily available. But what I said a little earlier, you know just from the stats, and everybody will acknowledge that, nobody denies it, that the ball is going further each year. We thought we were in a crescendo a couple years ago and the ball is going 25, 30 yards further than it was just a couple of years ago.

So I don't know, I've looked at our golf course here and what it would cost us. I've looked at the total cost, but to get this competitive -- and that is the next question what is competitive? You stretch this out to 10,000 yards, as I said, it's ridiculous because we are one of the very few that could do it, but what does that get us? Where are we going? And even if we could, it would cost millions of dollars to do. And so I'm afraid the players, it has not sunk in yet that one of these days if this thing keeps going the way it's going, it's going to be a pitch-and-putt game and it won't be golf as we know it, or knew it, and nowhere to go.

So, I think we've got to get a great, big, red stop sign out there and grind this thing to a halt and make some-wise decisions. I think the players, they understand this. I think in private, they would acknowledge it. I've talked to probably 20 of them and they all acknowledge it.

But, what are they going to do? They have to be competitive. It's their living and they are not going to say a whole lot right now.

So I think we as leaders in the golf industry have got to speak up. I think the press, I think the USGA, I think the Tour, I think the Tour, we have all got to stand up and be counted and start doing something about it.

Q. Do you have any specifics out here on this golf course what fairway bunkers may have been taken out of play or landing areas have changed with the livelier ball and more technology?

JACK VICKERS: Well, Tom and I were just talking about it in the last couple of days, and you take No. 5, for example, one of our longest, best holes, and when we started this tournament, they were hitting 5-woods, 3-irons, to that green, now they are hitting probably 6-irons, 7-irons, to the green. I can name you hole after hole. For example, I'll always remember No. 12 before we really officially opened. I had a deal out here for the founders and I asked Hale Irwin, and I believe -- I don't remember whether it was Dale Douglass, but Ron Moore, who was with us then, and good players, and I always remember because they hit 3-irons on their second shots on that hole. Now they are hitting wedges. It just goes on and on. I can take you around the golf course.

You know, people here would say, people because of the fact that we are in altitude here, well the ball goes further here and it probably does go further here, so what. The wind blows in Scotland, too if you want to make excuses. Some of the players are making excuses that they don't like to play in altitude and go play in a major. That is a bunch of hogwash. Nicklaus would laugh at that.

But that is the way they feel. I can't change that. They are going to do what they feel. But yes, it's made a tremendous difference on that golf course.

As I said, I haven't had the room -- there are two ways to correct this. You can either go 10,000 yards, or you can fix the ball, or you can bring the fairways in maybe about 20 yards wide and have about a foot of rough out there and that will change a lot of things quick. But is that golf as we know it or want to see it? No.

I think there was a horrible reaction to the British Open this year. Those looked like bowling alleys with mounds in the middle of them with ten yards that they had to hit it in. So, I don't buy that. I mean, I think we've got plenty of great golf courses. Let's don't ruin them by getting greedy or the manufacturers getting greed. That's ridiculous. They are going to make as much money and sell as much equipment either way.

So it's time to wake up and pay attention to what we are doing.

Q. You are a member at Augusta National, if you talk to Hootie Johnson about this, I know he was strongly advocating and hinting that they may -- if they decide to go to a restricted ball that they will just decide to go to it?

JACK VICKERS: You know what, he means what he's saying. They do not have any more room now. They have stretched their deal out the last couple of years and they had to buy a little land that they were fortunate enough to stretch out a couple holes that they did. They bought that, I believe, from the other club.

It's a situation down there where they can't go any further. Hootie has made public statements, but if it keeps on, if this continues, you are going to maybe show up to play at the Masters with the Masters ball.

Wayne, you didn't hear me. We may be doing it here, too.

Anyway, I've said enough about that. I wanted to get my thoughts over and share them with you all and see if we can't get something done about this, and you are a big tool in helping get something done about it. Because, you know, those that are in the presiding positions this, they don't like that heat; especially when it's logical, then they really don't like it.

Q. Jack, are you comfortable without having a title sponsor, financially, in other words?

JACK VICKERS: We are. As you know, we started off The INTERNATIONAL with four sponsors, and that was calculated and planned. That was. I always remember so well because when we started this thing, the fact that we were doing something unique and different, and it got attention and got a lot of conscientious criticism and you name it, you all were around, but we stuck with our guns and this turned out -- I think it vaulted us up the ladder probably 15 years quicker than it would by doing the same thing everybody else is doing.

Always remember, as a result of it, and I think this had something to do with it, that we were doing something different and doing it in a first-class manner. I only went to five companies originally, and out of those five companies, I landed four of them and we were off and running with The INTERNATIONAL.

And then we lost, as you know, we lost three of the four, and I went out and talked to I think it was six companies to replace those three.

So the demand in our case has been pretty darned fortunate. We have had potential sponsors lined up at our front door. Lose one or two, open the door and here they are.

But, in the last couple years with this downturn in the economy, you can ask Wayne how tough it is, Tour fewer was out talking to hundreds of them, potentially, and that's how tough it is. We've still got tournaments in deep trouble out there that are on the edge sponsorship-wise, and I think generally speaking you know pretty well where the weak ones are, where they are. But it's hard. It's really hard. When you think the last October, we lost $9 million worth of sponsorships overnight. I mean, it was about that quick, because without naming names, you know the companies, and some of them are having business problems and some of them are going into bankruptcy. And it just so happened that the cross-section of the companies across the country, not just here, we were hit that hard, and from the end of October until now, we replaced the whole deal. The Tour can't say that, neither can anybody, else and I think that one of the reasons that we were able to do that.

We are one of the unique tournaments in the country where we market our own product, and that includes the television part of it and everything. We have got a superb organization and they did a wonder job, Larry and his group, bringing back the sponsorships in a time period that we had to bring them back and in the amounts of money that we had to go get. But we got the job done. Happy to say that most of our sponsorships are right in this state, too. First Data is now in here, which is the largest corporate company in Colorado now, and they are all solid companies, Great West , it all worked out.

So I am extremely pleased and quite frankly, pretty ecstatic we got the job done. I really didn't think we could get it done and we would still put the tournament on, but I think it would have been a lot tougher economically to do it.

So anyway, I think that that's been tough on everybody in the golf world. I don't make any bones about this. I'll say it in front of Wayne, I've said it in front of the Commissioner. I think we all know it. We've got too much golf out there. We're undermining ourselves in terms of overloading the market. That under cuts potential sponsors, existing sponsors, and there's too much of it out there, in my opinion. I think -- I'm not wishing anybody bad luck or ill will. If we had probably ten less tournaments, 15 less tournaments, we'd probably all be better off. We could sustain our positions better economically speaking, and it's no different than anything else. I was in the gasoline business and if too much gasoline is out there on the market, you can't get much for it. I even had days in protection time in the gasoline market where major companies were paying protection out there to their dealers.

I was running a refinery and the prices got so damned cheap, I cut the refinery back and sent tank wagons down the street and bought from their dealers.

So it was -- this is about the same kind of a situation.

Q. Besides golf balls, there is pace of play, size of field. Solve those for us.

JACK VICKERS: Well, I personally have been fighting for ten years to get Wayne and his cohorts to get me the privilege of cutting the size of the field back here. We are still talking about it. I hope that we can accomplish that job for several reasons. First all and foremost, one of the reasons we'd like to cut back and we'd like to cut back because -- not anything against the players. I'm a guy that always wants to see the underdog come on up. But you can't take care of the world. You've got to run what you think is the best show. And the best show here is not 144 players. It's dangerous. We are lucky as the dickens that somebody hasn't been killed out here in over 18 years and certainly we've had some storms that could have killed somebody easily enough.

I went to a little party less than a week ago out here on the property, and this was for a charity and they had a tent erected. I want to tell you, I took three women to go up there and we got in the house and we never made it to the tent. The damned lightning, it was one of those unusual occurrences in the respect to the severity of it, but I mean that lightning was popping on every side of us and it was hitting the ground, just like fireworks. And I didn't take a step out of the house. I wouldn't move until I kind of moved on. It was an hour and a half and it was something else. I just thought about it the other night. I said, thank God the tournament wasn't on.

But, we've been fortunate. But, you know, I hate to see us press our luck. I hate to see the Tour press our luck. You know we all talked about it many times and it's like a lot of things, something bad has to happen before you take action and I don't like to see that happen. I think we should do something about it. I think it's for everybody's safety, gallery as well as the players.

The other thing with 144 players, it takes us, with this golf course and terrain, and I think we are one of the best on the Tour as far as equipment and manpower and getting them off the golf course and getting them back out there, but it takes two and a half hours with that 144 players to turn it around. It takes two and a half -- it's taken three hours on occasion. So what happens? Well, it depends on the time of the day, but most of the time it's usually out here late in the afternoon.

So the result is the players have got to come back at 6:00 in the morning and finish off their round. They don't like it. I don't like it. It degrades from the quality of our golf tournament, and I think we ought to do something about it.

I'd like to have the best damned golf tournament out there on the Tour and whatever that takes in the way of tweaking it, I'm ready, but when I see something that's bothering me like this has been, and has been, you all have heard it before, we need to do something about it. So that's where I am.

Q. What's the ideal size of field in your mind?

JACK VICKERS: Well, I think we could give the Tour the maximum benefit of the doubt and give ourselves the benefit of the doubt on the minimum room that we need to get people out and back and reach a safety factor that we can live with, I think it's somewhere in the 115, 117 players, somewhere in that range. And I would take the 144 in a minute if we could cure the problems that we've got, that we deal with, but we can't. We've tried it for 18 years now.

Once we get over to Saturday and Sunday, we're okay after the cuts. And before, you remember going back, we had the daily cuts, so we didn't have the problem.

Q. You mentioned when you were talking about the ball and altitude and some of the players who decided they did not want to play here with the altitude because of the major next week, could you expand on that a little bit more and what do you think people are thinking along those lines?

JACK VICKERS: Well, I don't know, maybe you ought to call a shrink in here and he can probably tell you. It's something that runs through their heads, some of them, because of the ball going further and the altitude is going to affect how they play next week or the week after, I guess. If you can add and subtract, I have a hard time swallowing the fact that somebody can't add and subtract. They pretty quickly know what the differentiations are here.

I always remember Nicklaus, it took him about three seconds to calculate out here altitude and that a 7-iron in Palm Beach was different from the 7-iron out here, and by this many yards, and he had it down pat. So I don't know why the others can't do the same thing.

I grant that you can't come in here cold and just maybe play your best golf for the first time that you do it, but it doesn't take but a couple rounds to get onto it. I've played all over the world. Of course, I don't hit it like they do, but there was a time when I could hit it.

We have always -- I think one of the worst things we have done in golf, we took all of the sprinkler heads and marked the golf course all up so nobody could use that for distance any longer. It used to be an integral part of the golf game. I can see some of those old timers of the past, some of them are great stars, with the exact yardage marked on the sprinkler head, it does speed up play, no question about that. But at times, you know, and just thinking of championship golf of the past, one of the integral parts of it was you and your caddie and figuring out the distances.

Q. Pace of play on the Tour, it seems it's taking forever for a threesome to play golf course anymore, what's going on and can that be fixed?

JACK VICKERS: Well, I don't think I should speak to that. That's I think a rules and administrative problem. I know it's been a problem from time to time, but if you look at it across the board generally, Wayne could speak to it better than I. But I think it's been improved from where it was, and I know they have worked hard to keep the pace of play going, including slapping the penalties on them, and that's about the best that you can do, I think. Sooner or later, they will get the message.

Q. Does too many players in the field have anything to do with that?

JACK VICKERS: It doesn't help it.

Q. (Inaudible.)

JACK VICKERS: Well, yes, there's been plenty said and manufacturers are well aware. It was a good article in Sports Illustrated, I guess about a year ago covered eight or ten pages, coming from different sides, different viewpoints. And they were -- think they had concerns about this issue and they decided they wanted to speak about it and they did. I respect them for doing it. They stepped up when nobody else was stepping up, and got the ball rolling on it.

But at the same time, and with respect to them they took a chance because a lot of these manufacturers have been big advertisers. So I would take my hat off to them. But the manufacturers did get -- reading that same article. They were opposite the position that I'm waving the flag on and I think that it kind of is a ridiculous article. I don't think they have got a good argument other than their pocketbook, and I don't frankly think that if they think if they are going to lose the market, because of making a proper adjustment on the manufacturing side, then I would love to have their job, I would do damned well.

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