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STANFORD INTERNATIONAL PRO-AMApril 26, 2008Beth BaderAaron TheobaldAVENTURA, FLORIDA ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Couple of introductions. We have Beth Bader, LPGA TOUR pro and Aaron Theobald, her amateur partner from Bloomington, Illinois here this week. They currently lead the team standings in the Stanford International Pro Am, the 54-hole play event for the Pro Am portion of the event. And they have got a 7-stroke lead, although we still got a few teams out there. Do you guys want to talk about the way you played and meeting each other and how this week has been? BETH BADER: Yeah, I'll start. I mean, it was a great pleasure to meet Aaron on the first tee. Looking at him, I can tell he was a little nervous; so I think it was my job to kind of keep him cool and relaxed. He did a great job. You know, it is just a different format, obviously, because we've never played this in tournament competition. So I am just trying to keep myself relaxed and keep him relaxed. I think once we got by those first couple holes on Thursday, we actually could hang it out and have some fun. We did; we had fun the whole time. It was a pleasure playing with him. He is a great player. ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Aaron, do you have any comments? AARON THEOBALD: She definitely kept me calm, and I think we had a good chemistry and kind of played off of each other, too. BETH BADER: Absolutely. ASHLEY CUSHMAN: You had the whole Illinois-Iowa thing going on. BETH BADER: Exactly Midwestern. What do you expect? ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Aaron, you said St. Jude actually gave you a call last week to come down and play in this event. Do you want to talk about that phone call and what that meant to you and the whirlwind you have been on? AARON THEOBALD: It was funny. I was actually going down to Houston to see my aunt and uncle to spend a few days with them. And as we were driving down past Memphis, I get a call from my orthopedic surgeon who replaced my hip, saying he wanted to talk to me. He said it was nothing serious. The first thought that crosses my mind is, "Okay, the surgeon that replaced my hip says nothing serious, okay." I am kind of wondering if we have to pull over in Memphis because we are an hour away. And then they gave me a call a couple hours later and told me what was going on. Sure, definitely, consider me there. ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Beth, just one final thing. I know you do the Susan L. Bader Hope Foundation. That's something you've started to honor of your mother who passed away from pancreatic cancer. Just this year you had the Susan L. Bader Memorial Golf Classic which raised $50,000 for pancreatic cancer research. Does this make this event a little bit more special to you? BETH BADER: Oh, gosh, absolutely. And then hearing Aaron's story and how he's battled what he's battled at such a young age, I mean, it obviously touched me and still touches me. So it was a pleasure playing with him. ASHLEY CUSHMAN: All right. We'll do questions for Beth and Aaron. Q. Beth, have you ever been in a situation like this where you had to play a round even though you had missed the cut and you know you are not going to get paid? But I'm sure you don't mind doing it under these circumstances. Just talk a little bit about that. BETH BADER: Yeah, exactly. Like I said, we've never had this forum before so you didn't quite know what to expect. But, you know, I was fighting hard yesterday. Had a couple bad holes, but I realized it is just not about us right now. So I hung in strong for Aaron and trying to reach putts for him coming in. He played strong coming in. So it was a pleasure staying down here today. And today was about Aaron, and he came through. It was a great day. Q. Aaron, I apologize for the broadness of this question. But for those of us that are still a trifle playing catchup on your story, can you give us the Cliff Note version of what you have gone through and for how long and where golf kind of fit in to your life. AARON THEOBALD: Okay. Let me think. I was diagnosed with leukemia when I was 16. It was the summer in between my sophomore and junior year of high school. I finished up treatment when I was 19. And so during the times in between there, there are plenty of times where my immune system was pretty low so I couldn't go to school so it was kind of nice. Any of those days I couldn't go to school, I could just go out and play golf, so I had a pretty good excuse for that. I was also a baseball player back in high school. After I had my hip replaced, it pretty much took baseball out of the question. So golf has kind of been my crutch for me to fall back on. Q. Which hip? AARON THEOBALD: My right hip. I had it replaced twice. Q. When was the second hip replacement? AARON THEOBALD: It was probably about two years ago, two years ago this coming summer. Q. Three straight days of 18, 18, 18, how do you -- I mean, is it difficult for you physically? AARON THEOBALD: No, not really, I mean, other than the fact I'm still a little out of shape (chuckles). The hip's hoping up fine, though. BETH BADER: You couldn't tell out there. He hit some incredible shots. I had asked him yesterday, I said, "How was the hip doing?" And it was like he never had anything wrong. That's the resiliency of young age as well. He played spectacular. Q. One more about the hip. If you are a baseball player and a golfer, obviously, you have some athletic tendencies. Going through something like that twice, how does it affect your swing, your posture, your stance, if at all? AARON THEOBALD: I pretty much had to relearn my swing after each time because when they are cutting through that much muscle, when you get back on your feet, my backside was pretty much all weak. They try and rebuild the muscles and relearn my swing a couple times. So, yeah, it affected it quite a bit. Q. What do you do for a living? And can you talk about the 18th hole today and your second shot in? AARON THEOBALD: I actually bar tend up at TGI Friday's back in Bloomington, Illinois. And the second shot coming into 18, I intentionally -- BETH BADER: Do you remember it? It could have been a blur, I know. AARON THEOBALD: I intentionally hit 3-wood off the tee just so I wouldn't be tempted to go for the green. And I pushed the 3-wood right and I cut a big angle there so I took a lot of yards off that second shot. I am walking up to it and I am looking at it and I was thinking, "I think I might be able to actually go for this." The yards were right and the club seemed right when I pulled it out. And I am standing over it and I am still thinking -- I am kind of wanting to bail out and lay up; but I was like, "All right, I think can do this." BETH BADER: I kind of laid up down the fairway just to give him a little bit of a comfort zone that, you know, just if anything would happen, I would be there for him. That's kind of what I tried to do all day, was play solid city golf where he could feel comfortable maybe going at some pins. So my caddie and I walked over to him, and he only had like 175 to carry that bunker and it was downwind. And I kind of looked at him like, basically, "This is your chance, this is your time, this is what it's all about." And he hit the 6-iron and I said "Right at that trash can." He hit it right at that can and it stayed online and it was perfect. I'm glad you pulled it off. AARON THEOBALD: Thanks. BETH BADER: That was definitely the highlight of the week for sure. AARON THEOBALD: That would have been really embarrassing if I put it in the water. BETH BADER: I had your back. I had your back. Q. (No microphone.) BETH BADER: He hit it to like -- AARON THEOBALD: I hit it about 3 or 4 feet. And then my heart was just pounding standing over that putt and I just pushed it a little bit. So I missed that, but I ended up birdieing. Q. What's your handicap? AARON THEOBALD: My handicap is 10. Q. How old are you? AARON THEOBALD: 23. Q. First of all, congratulations that last year looks like your best year. Can you talk about Morgan Pressel and Freeman and all the young stars here. Up until you had your career year, did you ever think of say going for the Pro TOUR? Second question, how many more years do you want to compete? BETH BADER: You know, that's the thing about golf. You can play for so long. And if you stay fairly healthy -- And I have stayed fairly healthy. I have always said to myself, "If it starts to become a drag and you are just not having fun, then it is probably time to hang it up." I have been having fun. Last year, obviously, was a milestone in my career at the age of 34. But, you know, I'm kind of -- I'm not a sprinter. I'm a long distance runner; and I plan on being out here a long time, absolutely. You know, that's what's so crazy about golf. You can be 40 years old and still be out here and be successful and, obviously, there is a lot of ladies here that proved that. So you don't have to be 25, 26 to compete and to be on the top of your game out here. I think I am just coming into my element right now. Q. Aaron, you touched on a little bit earlier, I was wondering if you can go into more detail, when your surgeon gives you a call and says, "It's nothing serious," do you really believe him or do you start having little pangs of anxiety? AARON THEOBALD: No, I didn't believe it at all. I am like, "He found something on an x-ray, I'm going to have to go back. I am going to have to have another surgery." There was a ton of things going through my mind. I didn't think it was going to be anything like this. I thought it was going to be something serious. Q. So when you called him back, what was the start of that conversation like? AARON THEOBALD: Well, they actually called me back a couple hours later because -- I can't remember where we were going through, but I didn't really have any reception. So when they called me back, I asked them what was going on and they told me, like, "Oh, you know, it is nothing serious. We just had an opening for the Pro Am down in Miami and wanted to see if you wanted to play." I was like, "Yeah, sure, Miami, all right." I told them I would have to think about it because I felt bad because I felt like I was kind of like bailing out of my aunt and uncle, but they understood. My grandparents understood. They said you better go to this. ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Now look where you are. Q. Where were you heading? AARON THEOBALD: South side of Houston, Richmond, Texas. Q. The way the tee times are set up today, you have gone out and posted a great score but one of the teams that's chasing you has just tee'd off. What does that make this afternoon like? Do you hang around and watch and wait? Do you try to put it out of your mind and check later? How do you handle this? BETH BADER: I like that we were off early. Wind wasn't terrible, and it is always great to post a good score and let them come chase us. I think we'll have a nice afternoon just relaxing and watching the wind pick up and see what happens. I like our position right now. ASHLEY CUSHMAN: Fort the record, the winning team will take home a handsome prize package that includes a Waterford Crystal trophy, a pair of Audemar watches, prizes from Tiffany & Company, round-trip ticket on American Airlines and a trip to any domestic Fairmont Resort. BETH BADER: All right. Let's go on vacation. Q. I don't want to pry here. But what type of procedures have you had done? Have you had chemo, radiation? AARON THEOBALD: I had chemotherapy. I was lucky, I didn't have to go through radiation. It was all just chemotherapy. Q. (No microphone.) AARON THEOBALD: They probably gave me close to about probably 12 different drugs or so. But, I mean, some of them were pills. A lot of it just was intravenous, stuff like that. It was three years of chemotherapy. Q. Just curious, how often you play golf and where you play? AARON THEOBALD: How often? Let me think. Last year I had to stop playing in about August or so because I started training to bar tend, so I didn't really have much time. So this year, I started playing about a month ago and I've maybe been out seven or eight times before I came down here. BETH BADER: Yeah. Remember, he is in Illinois and the weather hasn't been very good. AARON THEOBALD: Haven't been jumping up and down. One day I could go out and play in shorts and short-sleeve shirt and the next day it is below freezing. Yeah, I try to get out maybe a couple times a week, if I can. End of FastScripts |
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