|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
THE OPEN CHAMPIONSHIPJuly 16, 2008John DalySOUTHPORT, ENGLAND MIKE BERNOS: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We have with us two-time major champion John Daly. You were here in 1998 at Royal Birkdale, and I believe you arrived yesterday. Have you seen any changes in the course? JOHN DALY: No, I haven't played yet. I'm going to play today. I just hit balls yesterday when I got in. MIKE BERNOS: Is it good to be back? JOHN DALY: It's always good to be back in an Open, especially one you've won. But I heard all the guys talking about how great the golf course is. It's fair, and it's very, very tough. Q. You've not played a great deal this year. What sort of shape do you think your game is in for a challenge of this magnitude? JOHN DALY: You know, I was at home for about the last three or four days, and I probably practised harder than I have in about two years with all the injuries I've had. It's just been very tough to play at all this year because of the injuries and last year. But I feel like I just want to just go out and play. It's an Open. My doctor told me I shouldn't play. I've got tendinitis in my left elbow and I had a cyst in my right hand that was a calcium buildup that we thought was arthritis, and they found just some calcium buildup, and he got that out. So it's just been one thing after another. But it's an Open, it's very special to me, and I told him I'm going to play no matter what. Q. A lot of people have had doctors' advice over the years and have ignored doctors' advice. Are you worried at all about a setback? And is it just coming back because it's an Open and a former champion that's brought you here? JOHN DALY: Yeah, it's pretty much the first time I haven't listened to my doctor in two years. I'm kind of dealing with the pain in the left elbow more than anything now. The rib and shoulder have been great for the last six months, or last two and a half months since I had the surgery. I just open my stance up a little bit. I'm not hitting it quite as far as I know I can. But after practising yesterday, the wind is going to blow anyway, so it's pretty much nothing but three-quarter shots. I won't put so much strain on my elbow. I'm just looking forward to playing. It would be nice to get in a rhythm to play some golf again and play two, three, four weeks in a row like I used to. It's just been very difficult to do that over the last couple years. Q. At the Nelson you were complaining a lot about your putting. I'm curious, over the past couple weeks how much of your practise have been focused on that and where would you say the state of your putting is overall? JOHN DALY: I can't really even judge my game because I haven't really played much, and when I have, it's been -- I've always been a streaky putter. It's either really, really good or it's really, really bad. I'm still one of those guys that I'm not scared to knock it three feet past the hole. I find it I start lagging putts, it gets worse. But I'm going to try the new TaylorMade Spider, the smaller Spider putter this week. I was working with the guys from Adidas TaylorMade yesterday, just something totally different that I'm not accustomed to. I'm not used to seeing anything that big behind the putter face. But it's something different, and maybe it's time I look at something different. We'll just see what happens. One great thing, I remember when I won in '95, it wasn't that I putted really good, it was just I made a lot of two-putts from a lot of long distances. I don't think you have to putt great-great to win an Open, you've just got to putt solid. You've got to make a few five- or six-footers to keep your round going. But it's not something you've got to go out and make every 20-footer. So it's an Open that -- this is a tournament that you've just got to putt decent. If you can get hot, you've seen what Tiger has done in the past and how you can win by six or seven shots if you putt really, really great. Q. I saw the video of you hitting a golf ball off the beer can. I wondered if you had heard from Tim Finchem about that and if he had said anything. When you see something like that take off in terms of popularity amongst ordinary punters, do you regret these things? JOHN DALY: No. I'm playing with Kid Rock in the Pro-Am in Flint. It's a Wednesday Pro-Am. I haven't heard from Tim on that. I didn't see anything wrong with it. I don't know if he did or not. But I haven't talked to him. I don't think he's going to send me a letter or anything from the Tour, so I think he's okay with it. There's just different things you're going to expect when you're playing golf with Kid Rock. He did the tournament a favour. That's only the fifth round of golf he's ever played, and he did that as a favour to the tournament and to me. I begged him last year to play with me, but his fourth and fifth round of golf was the Tuesday before the Wednesday, so he only played three times before he did those two days. He kind of set it down there, and he said, "Why don't you hit it off of that?" What am I going to do, say no to Kid Rock? So I did it. It was all in fun. Q. How do you feel about playing in this sort of very strong wind? Is it going to change the way you play, or do you just -- how much do you have to adapt your normal game? JOHN DALY: Well, the thing about this golf course is that the course kind of doesn't run kind of north and come back south or east and come back west. It's all over the place. The holes go in so many different directions so it's going to be very difficult to judge the wind. So it's just one of those courses that I think -- kind of listening to what some of the players are talking about on the putting green, you've got to hit the fairways, and it's just one of those tournaments the wind is going to blow every day, and the three-quarter shot is just going to have to work. You won't be hitting a lot of full shots into the greens, which I like that. For me right now with the injuries and everything, that's good for me. I can't really go full go at a golf ball anyway. The wind is going to predict pretty much everything we do this week because it's not going to stop, I don't think, for the next four or five days. Q. Given your limited exemption status in the States, could you envision playing over here more in the future? Seems like there's still a pretty healthy appetite to see you play on the European circuit. You get plenty of exemption offers, it would appear. JOHN DALY: Yeah, I'm still wanting to concentrate on the States. I'm worried that I may not get as many, but I think if the tournament directors and the sponsors look at how hurt I've been and trying to play -- I told the tournament director in Flint I wasn't feeling very good, I wasn't playing all that bad, but it's just tough to play golf when you're hurt. Physically, mentally, it ruins your confidence, and I've had none for a couple years. It's just always something, you know, ailing or hurting, and golf is something you've got to pretty much use every bone in your body to play, and it makes it very, very tough to, one, get in a rhythm, and two, to get some confidence to do well. It's just been very, very tough to play good golf. But I'm scared to give up those exemptions in case I may not get them again. I'm kind of in a rough spot no matter how you look at it. This is the best I've felt. I got a lot of work done here yesterday here, I got a lot of work done at my business home in Dardanelle, at my golf course where they closed some holes down so I could practise. That's been the first time in a long, long time that I was able to do that and to keep doing it for five, six, seven hours at a time, so it felt good to do that. Q. Is that where you got the tan? JOHN DALY: Yeah, it's pretty hot in Arkansas right now, and I can take my shirt off out there and nobody takes pictures, so it's perfect. Q. I wonder, going back to the tournament director thing, why do you think tournament directors in the States are sort of reluctant at this point to give you as many exemptions as they used to do three, four, five years ago? JOHN DALY: Well, I think, like I said, I'm not playing good, and it's not fair to somebody that is. But I think if they look at the big picture, that I want to play, and it goes back to the ailments, it goes back to being hurt. And I haven't been playing that bad hurt. It's not like I'm shooting really, really bad numbers. I'm one or two putts or one swing away from shooting under par just about every round the way I've played this year. It hasn't been like I've been scoring all that bad. It's just been, you know, one shot that it's either just been a bad swing or it's a three-putt here and there, a couple bad breaks. It's not like I'm that far away even being hurt. I think once I get healthy, I'm hoping that the exemptions will continue. I know I'm pretty much set on three or four events on the West Coast already next year. I'm not really that worried about it because I know when I get healthy I know I can play decent golf. Q. Just to follow up, do you think some of them are starting to have problems with some lifestyle issues that you've had, that they are reluctant to get you into the field? JOHN DALY: Lifestyle issues I think is just -- I haven't really done much to make people -- I think most of that stuff started with Butch Harmon. I think his lies kind of destroyed my life for a little bit, the lies that he said about being at the Hooters tent and all this stuff. I think if he would become a man and talk about some of the stuff he lied about, when we were doing charity work that week when I just missed the cut. I just wish he wouldn't have said the things he did that made you guys write some pretty bad things about me when not really anybody had the facts. That kind of hurt me a little bit. But the Hooters organisation, the people know that the things that we did was for charity, and there was nothing bad about it, wrong about it. I think it was just some rumors that were flying, probably because of my past. My lifestyle has been great. I'm eating too much, but I'm not drinking hardly at all, and I never go out. So where these rumors are coming from, it's just funny to sit back and look at it. I guess that's just the way my life is going to be for a long time because of my past. Q. You talked about the Hooters things and the facts. Tell us your version of what went down on the weekend, on that Saturday that was in the paper, the video. Butch is obviously interpreting what he's seen or read. Give us the play by play on that so we know what you said happened. JOHN DALY: Well, I think it was Thursday, the first round, we got the rain delay in Tampa. We kind of heard some of the people that were walking with me, security, said, well, it's not going to last too long, and I was right by the Hooters tent. So one of the Hooters people came up and said, hey, Coach Gruden is in the tent, go see him. I said, yeah, I'll hang there for a little bit. So it rained and rained and rained, and I'm talking to him and Bruce Allen, who's the generel manager of the Buccaneers, and Peter was complaining about his neck. He's had a neck problem for quite a long time. It got a little cold, and when it was about time to go, I'm sitting there drinking Diet Pepsi, by the way. I knew we had to go back out. Peter says, I can't go. I'm looking around, and I said, Coach, do you want to caddie. We'll probably get four or five holes in before it's dark. It'll be good for the tournament. He said, sure, no problem. That was all there was do it. But then the stories come out that I was drinking in the tent, drunk and stuff on Thursday, and it's a joke. One, I would never do that in a round knowing I've got to go back out. And the Saturday afternoon I missed the cut, Gerald, the tournament director, said, we would like to raise some more money, get you to sell some tickets in the Hooters tent, come on out and maybe we can get some more people and raise some money for the charity. I said, No problem, I missed the cut. Yeah, I had a couple beers, big deal, signed about 1,000 autographs. It was a great day. Next thing I know more bad rumors came out. No matter if you do something good it turns out bad right now. The people that were there knew nothing went on. Yeah, it was great, and we sold a lot of chicken and we made a lot of kids happy and we made a lot of people happy that day. Q. What was the beef with Butch that day? JOHN DALY: Butch said, I guess, told The Golf Channel that I'm just a drunk and it was ridiculous that Coach Gruden caddied for me. He just made up stuff that he didn't really know the facts were straight, and by putting it out all over the world and not talking to me, I mean, it's kind of ridiculous. Real men just don't do that. Q. You used the words about Butch being a man and talking to you. I wonder if you have approached him about the episode and talked to him about what he said and if you have any desire to do so. JOHN DALY: I tried talking to him on the phone at the Byron Nelson and he said he'd retract what he said and he never did. The Golf Channel, or whoever it was, he denied ever talking to them. I don't know what his problem is, but he needs to stay as far away from me as he possibly can. Q. To follow up on the question about tournament directors, a lot of people come out to see you looking for great golf, and sometimes, and this is his words, sometimes they get a train wreck. When you hear that sort of stuff said by tournament directors, does that bother you personally? JOHN DALY: Yeah, it does, but the train wreck, meaning that the golf may be bad. But other than that, that's all it's been. But like I said before, it hasn't really been -- I'm not looking at my game and saying it's really been that bad. The scores haven't been great, but they haven't been horrific. They haven't been horrible, just one round in Memphis. Other than that, I've been really close. Out here you make the cut on the bubble there's chances you can still win the golf tournament. I'm not concerned about what was said about that, I'm more concerned about getting healthy. And when I do get some exemptions being able to give it 100 percent instead of 80. The only reason that other 20 percent is not there is because I've been hurt. It's just the way life is. I've never doubted the elders that told me when you turn 40 you're going to see some ailments in your body that you're not going to like and you're not going to believe it. But I'm looking at a guy like Kenny Perry and look what he's done. He's given hope to the 40 and overs. I'm not too concerned about that. People believe what they want to believe. I know what's going on in my life, and it's hilarious to watch what some people are writing about it, just making up things. It's really funny. Q. When you have to sort out the truth from the fiction, do you ever regret being the wild thing rather than a quiet thing? JOHN DALY: No, y'all made that up. I don't know, maybe in South Africa somebody nicknamed me the wild thing. I always look at that as maybe some of the drives I hit (laughing). No, I'm not worried about it. Q. The last time you were here you played an amazing gig in the area, at the Cabin Club. Are you planning a repeat performance on Sunday night and your memories of that night? JOHN DALY: That was a great day. The book just came out over here, and that was fun. When you look at the brick wall of all the people that have played there, and for a golfer coming there to play two or three songs, I get my name on the brick and on the famous t-shirt. What a great place. To see all the legendary musicians that have played there is phenomenal. You know, that was really a great, great night. I'll remember that for the rest of my life, too. Q. Will you play there again? JOHN DALY: No, I think those kind of days might be over for me. It was just kind of fun. Music is a hobby of mine anyway. It's just fun to collect and hang out and sit down with those guys and maybe they can teach me a thing or two. No, I want to stick to golf and just keep playing golf. Q. A few years ago you expressed some concerns about whether there was drug taking in the sport. Are you one of the people who's particularly welcomed the fact that we now have a testing programme, and do you think it's going to be good to show that the game is perhaps clean and that it will help the cause as far as the Olympics goes? JOHN DALY: Yeah, it didn't matter to me one way or another. All they're going to get out of me is nicotine and caffeine. I'm not too worried about it. I think it was probably time. The sad thing for us is there's so much stuff that's legal, you go into a GNC store, that is legal for young kids to take, but we've got to look at the labels and stuff. Like I'm really going to go in a GNC store anyway (laughter), but there's so many things that are on our list that kids are taking now that our government approves but yet our drug programme doesn't approve, and that's something the guys who are going to those stores and looking for things that are legal and that are good, on the label -- a lot of the stuff on the label we can't take. So it's kind of tough. We've got to sort of call our doctors or call somebody, call the Tour if this is okay to take. I know it's all on our list, but some of those words you can't pronounce. But I think it's probably good. It's about time, and I'll probably almost guarantee 100 percent of us are clean. It's not a sport that a lot of guys that I've seen ever do anything wrong or do drugs or anything. It's something that I don't think any of the players are really too worried about it. It's just -- hopefully they do it at times when we're in a better mood after our rounds. Hopefully they catch us on a good day, not a bad day, but it's a good thing.. Q. You've tried your hand at golf course design. What do you think you bring to the business of golf course design and how do you see that part of your career developing in the future? JOHN DALY: I'm working on a course just outside of Joplin, Missouri, right now. It's going to be called Eagle Creek. It's fun. I love doing it. It's going to be the first golf course probably we're going to see that's over 8,000 yards long. The good thing is for me where the game is going, the golf courses are going to get longer and longer and longer, and it's good for me because I've always liked to play long golf courses. I'm going to try and make golf courses where you almost have to hit driver on all the par-5s and par-4s, unless the land just doesn't permit it. I enjoy doing golf courses. I want to do a lot more of them. I think it's really neat to have John Daly signature courses. Most of mine are going to be either semi pro or open to the public, which is what I like. I think it's a really good fit for me to do more golf courses. MIKE BERNOS: Thank you very much. End of FastScripts |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|