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AT&T CLASSIC

May 14, 2008

Matt Kuchar

DULUTH, GEORGIA

LAURY LIVSEY: We'd like to welcome Matt Kuchar into the interview room today. You had your best finish of '07 here last year, a T3, and you had a tie for third in Mexico, I think, and then you went tied for 7th at Verizon Heritage were your best finishes this year. Last talk about last year here and how you've been playing this year.
MATT KUCHAR: Sure, it was fun to have a good week in the hometown. If I could pick a place certainly after the major events to play well, in Atlanta, my hometown, was an awfully special thing and pretty much got me over the hump to earn my card for this year, so that was awfully rewarding.
I'm in pretty good form this year, just had a blemish last week at TPC; the 17th got the best of me. But awfully excited to be back here at TPC Sugarloaf and looking forward to a good week.

Q. How does this course match up with your game when you're playing well? Does it suit you?
MATT KUCHAR: I think this is a very good test of golf. I think this is one of the underrated courses on TOUR. I definitely enjoy playing here. They've got a few holes that are I think some of the best, and I'm a little vague on the numbers, the par-5, like the 5th hole? Is that the par-5? I think it's one of the best par-5s we play all year. 18 is awfully exciting. And then the following hole, which is, I think, the 6th hole -- I might be wrong, might be the par-5, 4th, and then the par-4, 5th hole, are two of the better golf holes we play on TOUR.
I think a lot of this golf course. It doesn't quite feel like my home course, my home course being Golf Club of Georgia, which I feel like I know intimately. This course I know very well, but I'm not Stewart Cink familiar with this golf course. I do very much enjoy playing here.

Q. This year you're making a lot of cuts and you're hanging in there.
MATT KUCHAR: Yeah, I feel like my game is -- my consistency has improved, and I don't know if I can attribute that to anything. It is nice to play a lot more weekends. It's been certainly a goal of mine to be around a lot more and then get into contention a lot more. I've just been working with a guy by the name of Chris O'Connell for the last two years. That's been going well. He's a Jim Hardy disciple, so I've been doing the one-plane theory. It's been a good fit for me. I've always taken it back flat, and that's kind of what they like.
It was a good fit, and I feel like I'm a believer in it and that it's helped me play more consistently. I feel like I can go out and even on bad days still turn in pretty good numbers.

Q. You've worked with different guys over the years it seems like. Was it just looking for the right --
MATT KUCHAR: Right fit, yeah. That's what it was. I've worked with a lot of different guys, enjoyed working with them, and I feel like with Chris O'Connell I've had a very good bond and buy into the system that they teach, the one-plane system. I think it just is a fit for me. I don't know if it's a fit for everybody. I think it's just finding that right fit and something you can believe in.

Q. Obviously 16 here is not like 16 in Phoenix, but is that a rowdy hole?
MATT KUCHAR: It certainly gets your attention there. It's an awfully difficult hole where the green slopes front to back. But I think it's a fair distance. It's only a 7-iron type of hole, but it's quite difficult. They've got the bleachers surrounding the back side of the green, and I wouldn't put it in comparison to 16 at Phoenix or 17 at Sawgrass, but it has an exciting atmosphere. There's a lot of bad that can happen there (laughing). I don't know if the crowd enjoys the, I guess, troubles that may arise on the 16th hole or just -- I guess it has the opportunity of being a birdie hole as well as a bogey hole, and those are always fun to watch.

Q. Obviously you don't want every hole on the golf course to have that kind of atmosphere surrounding it, but is it nice to have maybe one occasionally where the crowd can be a little bit more free-wheeling?
MATT KUCHAR: Sure, sure. It is exciting. It's exciting to have the buildup. Just exciting to have people out there, people anxious to see golf. You follow it up with 17 is a good hole and then I think 18 is one of the more exciting finishing holes we play all year. It offers so much from the great undulation to the risk of going for that green in two, and then you really have to hit a great shot. Even just making the water, if you go in that back bunker, you're still not looking at an easy up-and-down, you're looking at even a bogey that -- water lurks if you get too far back in that bunker. I think it's just a fantastic finishing hole.

Q. You get it pretty good from the crowd wherever, right, out here, being from Georgia Tech, somebody hollering about that or somebody barking at you?
MATT KUCHAR: Unfortunately I get more barks than I'd care to hear. I don't know why Georgia fans think it's a necessity to bark at anybody else, but I guess it's inbred (laughter). I do enjoy just -- Atlanta has really been great to me. The Georgia Tech connection has been great, but the city of Atlanta, I really feel at home and sure do get a lot of support.

Q. David Duval was in here earlier, and I'm just curious from the standpoint of another TOUR player, have you been struck about how curious his career has been, and do you think he can get it back?
MATT KUCHAR: That is an interesting topic and it is one I stay as curious as you guys to. The game is crazy, to think about a guy that was the No. 1 player in the world and then to now go through the struggles that he has. Sure, I scratch my head, I wonder if he will regain form.
I don't know if it would be easier having been the No. 1 player in the world being as good as he was to get back to that or if it's more difficult now. I certainly would love to see it. I think it would be great to see a guy that has faced the struggles that he has to regain form.
I would have to think having been there that if he gets back in that situation that he would certainly be more comfortable than a guy that has never been there, a guy that is just coming out.
Yeah, we wonder about it. We wish him the best. I don't know if it's a question of desire. I think about whether it's fundamentals; he always had a different swing. Some people really liked it; I thought it was actually a pretty good swing. But he did a lot of different things that you wouldn't say fit into the typical fundamentals of the golf swing. But I thought when he was on, he was as good a ball-striker as there was.
So getting it back, I don't know where you go when you've lost it and you don't have -- most people when you lose touch with your swing you go back to fundamentals, and where did David Duval go back, whose fundamentals who were different than most people's? They just weren't the typical fundamentals, so falling back on that I think would be difficult.
And then the desire. I think he's really in touch with family now. That's been a thing when he was No. 1 really had no concern for family, and now that he has found a family, found love, if the desire is there, I don't know.

Q. I just want to ask you one autograph question. On the weekend there will be a million kids out here when you're coming out of the scoring area. Is that flattering to be asked for an autograph? Is it overwhelming at times, or how do you guys look at it because you have to sign a bunch?
MATT KUCHAR: It's definitely flattering. You especially enjoy doing it for the kids. I try to get them involved a little bit, not to just sign it but ask them if they're doing well, if they're enjoying the day, things like that. You see it make their day, and when you see it make their day, it makes your day.
It's really quite rewarding even after a bad round last week at TPC, I missed the cut and ended up giving a kid a golf ball after the round, and just to watch him run back to his mother and show her, "Look what I got," so excited to have a golf ball with a player's signature on it. You know, it made my day. I had a rotten day, missed the cut, and to do that, to see a kid get so excited, was special. To have that ability just about every week, to make kids' days, is really exciting.

Q. Do people have a lot of trouble in the way you sign your name?
MATT KUCHAR: I do try to make it legible, I certainly do. I've heard the -- I hate looking at flags and going, who in the world is this and how is anybody going to remember. And mine you certainly can tell whose it is. I've just heard other people say Arnold Palmer has taken them aside and said, geez, if you're going to do it, make it legible, let them read it, don't waste anybody's time. To think of the amount of autographs Arnold Palmer signed and that you can read his signature on everything is pretty impressive.
LAURY LIVSEY: Thanks, Matt, appreciate it.

End of FastScripts

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