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U.S. BANK CHAMPIONSHIP IN MILWAUKEEJuly 16, 2008Mark WilsonMILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN DAN BLACKMAN: Mark Wilson, thanks for joining us here at the U. S. Bank Championship. You tied for ninth here last year, pretty strong finish, and back for another year in 2008: Two Top 10s on the season. Maybe some opening comments about your year and about coming back to Milwaukee for the U. S. Bank Championship. MARK WILSON: Yeah. I've been happy with the year so far, started the year out really well on the West Coast, maybe hasn't been great since, but Top 10 at Colonial. And I feel like I'm close, just haven't really shot a lot of low scores, been hanging around par. So I'm happy, happy to be back here at U. S. Bank. I think the scores are going to be a little lower than normal, little less rough and with the heat, the balls are going to be going far and probably be scared to cut the greens down too much, so hopefully find some low ones this week. DAN BLACKMAN: Okay. We'll take some questions. Q. Is there a little different feeling when you're coming back this year? You're secure in your position and pretty much your career is defined at this point, the direction you're headed. You know, in years past you've been kind of borderline where you were headed. MARK WILSON: Yeah. No, there's always something to play for. You know, it's like no matter what level you get to, there's always something else. So I'm eyeing the PGA Championship. I've got two tournaments left before that, and I probably need either like two Top 10s or maybe just a Top 5 here this week and Canada, so I'm kind of eyeing that. And there's always something to play for, so if I do that, I'll be looking at getting a better seat for the Playoffs. It's always something. So I feel a little more comfortable this year, though, that last year I finally had a decent showing where I came in the Sunday with a legitimate chance to win, I had a low round, finished in the Top 10, so I feel a little better about my chances here at Brown Deer and I'm excited for the week. Q. Have you set a goal for yourself for this week or? MARK WILSON: No. I can't really turn the switch on when I'm going to play good or not. I play a lot of tournaments, so if there's a chance. I don't know when I'm going to play well, so we all hope it's this week. My family and friends and myself, I mean if I could pick a tournament to win, this course would be it. But I can't turn a switch on like that. And my game feels good. It doesn't feel great. It feels plenty good enough to win. I worked with my teacher, Doc Suttie, yesterday. And at The Honda he gave me a tip to tee my ball up higher on my driver, and that was the only thing he told me. And it turned things around and I won. So I was looking for a real simple tip yesterday, and we just talked about tempo. I thought that was pretty simple, and hopefully that will be another simple tip that will propel me to the Winner's Circle. Q. Mark, do you think there's going to be a 59 out there tomorrow? Seems like the rough's down, the greens are fast and normal. MARK WILSON: Yeah. Could be. That would be 11- under par. Yeah, that's hard to say. There haven't been very many of those on Tour at all, so I couldn't predict that. But I do see the winning score being probably 20-under, something like that, you know, if the weather stays the same way, with low winds and the heat, where the ball's going to be going far and they can't really cut the greens down. Q. And you were in the area Monday at an event to help high schools and stuff. Can you just talk a little bit about that? MARK WILSON: Yeah. It was just the coach at Hartland Arrowhead, Tom Tallmadge, started an event called Lake Country Charity Invitational, I think it is. And I don't know how many teams, but I would say maybe 25 high school teams, or maybe more than that, played Erin Hills. This is the second year he's had it. Unfortunately they got rained out, but I tried -- it's all about charity with this thing, and the MACC Fund being the big beneficiary from that. And he challenged all the kids to raise money however they could, and the two teams that raised the most money would get to play 18 holes with me at Erin Hills the Monday of the U. S. Bank. So that's what we did. They got rained out, but they still raised $44,000, which I think the year before they raised 39,000. And so Hartland Arrowhead and Kettle Marine High School, we played nine holes together over at Erin Hills Monday. And it was a lot of fun meeting the kids and seeing the new talent coming up in Wisconsin. And I made it just in time. It was kind of a crazy thing. I got a flat tire on Highway 45 on the way up there. I drove in from Chicago. And I was literally I was like 10 minutes from the course, all excited. Okay, I'm going to get -- well, probably 15 minutes from the course -- just about to get off on 45 and hit some big pieces of stone that were in the middle of the freeway, and I got a flat. I fixed the flat and got there, and instead of getting a nice warmup in, I hit five balls and ran to the tee, which was probably fine. It was supposed to be a fun event anyway, so we had a good time. Q. When is the last time you changed a flat tire? MARK WILSON: I think it was '02. I think it was 2002. And so I did it in under I think it was 30 minutes, about 30 minutes. I was pretty pleased with that, being a new car and I didn't know where the jack was, and it was a little quirky. So I think it was '02, it was actually at a Nationwide event, I remember. Q. (Inaudible). MARK WILSON: No, not at all. They probably have a little better equipment than what I had to work with, though. Q. Brown Deer, I would think it should be a good course for you, not just because you grew up here and played it a lot or whatever, but just because the type of course it is. Right or wrong? MARK WILSON: You're definitely right. If this course was anywhere else on the schedule, it would be one I'd play for sure no matter what, and so it's just a bonus that it's here in Milwaukee and I have people cheering for me. And it is, that creek that runs through the course makes everyone lay up on certain holes, even myself, hit 3-wood off the holes, like 4 and 13, and you're laying up on 16 as well with like a 4-iron and it's more just about precision into the greens. And they find very good pin placements. They put them up on ridges, and you gotta really control your spin, and it makes some kind of crazy putts. You're going to have some crazy breaking ten-footers on the course before they put the pins, and if you can visualize it properly, you'll do well. And that's what I like about the game, kind of imagination around the green. Q. For the second year Kelly and Stricker aren't here. That's always kind of been a big attraction here, all the Wisconsin players. I wonder how you feel about it. Obviously they have to do what they have to do, play over there. MARK WILSON: Yeah. You gotta play in a major, for sure. I saw Jerry at John Deere, and I told him I'd hold down the fort for him. I could tell he was sort of disappointed, you know. He was probably sort of excited when he didn't get in and didn't qualify and he was still going to play Milwaukee, and when I saw him and he got in and all of a sudden, he wasn't extraordinarily happy because he was looking forward to playing Milwaukee. You gotta go over and play. I would certainly play if I got into the British Open. Hopefully one of these years I'll play. I would love to play over there. You know, we still have Skip and J. P. and myself, and up-and-comers like Jon Turcott and Woltman. You know, it's not the same, I know. Stricker and Jerry Kelly are the golden boys, but if one of the rest of us can win it, maybe we can overtake 'em. Q. How do you feel about them not being here? Is it less exciting for you or would it be more exciting if they were here? MARK WILSON: No. No. It doesn't bother me either way. I mean, you know, obviously they'd be here if there was no tournament opposite it, but I don't really think twice about them not being here. I mean it's nice to see them. I've played with Stricker quite a bit this year. We've gotten paired, I think, for five different rounds, and we've been playing quite a bit and he's one of the greatest guys to play with. But other than that, no, they certainly bring attention to the tournament, but hopefully I can be a little more flashy and shoot the low scores and bring enough attention for us Wisconsin guys. Q. Mark, I think maybe what Dan is trying to say perhaps -- MARK WILSON: (Laughs). Q. You know, Kenny Perry is here, hottest golfer in the world. MARK WILSON: Right. Q. Is it a valid argument to say why isn't Steve Stricker and Jerry Kelly here? MARK WILSON: No. I mean Kenny made a great point. Correct me with his age. Is he 40 -- okay. I was going to say 48. So he's 47 years old, and like from the areas I've seen, he's like, my goals are different. He's learned what courses are best for him, and he's decided that British Open maybe isn't the right thing for him. He loves Milwaukee. He loves playing here. And I'm only 33, but I've already learned of some courses on Tour that just don't fit my eye real well, and there's something about going to a place that you've never played well at, and you're in a bad mood right off the get-go, right when you get off the plane and you're there, and you're like "what am I doing here." Whereas, when you go to a place where you've had success, you just like the feel of the place. You're in a good mood, you're upbeat and you're having fun. And I'm sure that's what Kenny thinks, I love Brown Deer, I want to go back to Milwaukee. Wouldn't you rather be in a good frame of mind, in a good mood for a week than down in the dumps over there where maybe he doesn't feel like he's had past success? So I can see as a player, totally. And I don't know. I haven't read a whole lot if he's getting ripped for it or not, but seems like the media has been on his side and understood his perspective on that. It would be a different story, I'm sure, if, you know, one of the top players in the world did it. Like Tiger Woods, if he decided to play Milwaukee for some reason, I think he would just get ripped for that. So I think it's good what Kenny's doing, but I don't think you should think that Steve Stricker should be playing here for that reason. He had a good British Open last year, and he likes it over there. He's got different goals. He still wants to play well in major championships and win them, so more power to him. Q. Why is MACC Fund so important to you? MARK WILSON: I've had cancer in my family, just a few friends that have experienced it. It's just a disease I don't want to experience that close at hand, and now that I have a child and everything, I'd like to get that cure rate as high as possible. And I just see too many -- I had just a great childhood myself, and I want to see if we can get that for every kid. Q. There's nothing else to it? MARK WILSON: There's nothing else to it. Q. It just seems like you've really picked that as your favorite charity seems like. MARK WILSON: Yeah. I have to give kudos to Eddie Erkmanis, my agent. He's the one that came to me with the idea. He knew John Cary at the MACC Fund, and I didn't really have a charity that I grabbed onto when other players did. And when he came to me with the idea, I thought it was a great idea, and I've grown to like John Cary and the organization and what they're doing. And they're just easy to work with. They're good at event planning, and so if I want to be a part of something, I don't have to hire people to do it. They've got everything in line. I can just put my name to it, and they make it very easy to work with. Q. Can you tell us a little more about changing that tire? What was the hardest part about it? Were you worried about jamming a thumb or anything like that? MARK WILSON: I just think because I was out of practice was probably why it took so long. The worst part was the car that I have, they made a very nice thing in the trunk where they hid all the necessary tools to use, the jack and you know, the wrench to get the lug nuts off and all that. It probably took me 10 minutes to find it. I mean I'm looking in every compartment, and they had built a little storage area for all of it above one of the wheels. And I almost gave up. I should have probably looked at the owner's manual first, but I don't do that. I know how to do it. So that was probably the hardest part, and I made the mistake of pulling the car off too far onto the gravel and I didn't really think about it. So I got the jack going off the gravel, and all I was doing was digging a bigger hole underneath the car. So I had to move the car over to the asphalt, closer to traffic on the freeway, which cars are coming at you at 70 miles an hour, so I didn't want to get too close. But had to move it over, so when I finally did that, it was pretty smooth. Q. Did you have your golf clubs with you? MARK WILSON: I just had my set, and so I thought maybe someone would stop because they saw the big Ping bag laying on the side of the road and maybe think they could get a few dozen balls out of helping me out, but no one stopped. I wasn't cute enough I guess. (Laughs). DAN BLACKMAN: You didn't have shorts on. MARK WILSON: I did have shorts on. That was probably the problem. (Laughs). I had shorts on because I was doing a non-PGA thing, and I could wear shorts. That was probably the problem, Dan. Q. Just a little bit of offbeat questions about the state Am. Obviously you've seen and done wonderful things on the Tour and won a Tour event and played with Tiger Woods and all that stuff, but Marc Lamowsky has made the cut 40 consecutive years at the State Amateur, be 41 if he does it this year, and I just wondered if you could talk about what kind of record that is. It doesn't compare with the stuff you guys do, but what that means to you. MARK WILSON: It just shows that he stayed healthy for that long, and you'd think over 40 years there would be one year maybe where you wake up on the wrong side of the bed and shoot an 80 to start and then you're done. But yeah, he's a great player. And I remember Mark when he beat me at North Shore, how he hung in there, and I'm sure that's why. I thought I had him beat, and he started holding putts and getting up-and-down and hitting some good quality shots coming in, and before I knew it, he was the one holding the trophy. So I think he's the type of guy that never gives up, and that's impressive. DAN BLACKMAN: All right. That's it. End of FastScripts |
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