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THE 50TH BOB HOPE CLASSIC HOSTED BY ARNOLD PALMERJanuary 22, 2009Pat PerezLA QUINTA, CALIFORNIA MARK STEVENS: Like to welcome Pat Perez to the interview room with round of 61, of 63. Pat, start out giving some general comment on your first two rounds and the low score that you have stand at right now. PAT PEREZ: Overall I just I played two of the best days I ever have in a row. So I'm hitting my new TaylorMade R9 driver, I'm killing it. And I'm hitting it close, irons are close, the putter's working well. It's really like playing in a dome out there. But you still got to make putts. But I played two unbelievable rounds and I'm very happy where I'm at. Q. 20-under, 124, best 6 hole start in PGA TOUR history. PAT PEREZ: Yeah, and both par 72s. Q. And tied for the lowest of any consecutive 36 holes. What does that mean to a player like you to be in the record book? Or does it mean anything unless you win? PAT PEREZ: It doesn't really mean anything. It's nice. It means you can get hot for two days. I would like to have all kind of records at the end of the week. Three day, four day, five day, you know, trophy, Vegas, booze, all that stuff. That's what I want. So two days is nice, but I would really love to be sitting here late Sunday. So that's the goal. Q. Does this feel particularly good because you know how well you're playing? This is no fluke. This is you playing -- PAT PEREZ: No fluke. It's no fluke. I worked like hell this off season. So this is kind of what I expected when I got here. I've been over here at the Madison Club for a month or so and played like this every day over there. So I figured why the hell not bring it over here. It's just nice. I feel like I can do pretty much anything right now on the course. Q. How did you get hooked up with Madison? PAT PEREZ: Tommy Armour kind of hooked me up with Mike Abbott, and I started working with Mike and then Mike let me start coming out. And then I got to meet Mr. Millman and all of his partners and they said, yeah, we would like to have you, you can come out and use the facilities if you want to. I said great, because it's the best out here. So I just got real lucky to get into that deal. Q. There's a couple guys that hang around over there. PAT PEREZ: Yeah, Tommy, Freddie, Scotty McCarron, yeah, there's a lot. It's pretty good over from. Q. How much time over there? You said in the last month, I mean how much? PAT PEREZ: I spent a couple weeks down at three weeks down in Cabo and I was here for about three weeks, four weeks, I don't know. It's just four weeks. Q. Basically after the wedding and after Cabo you came here? PAT PEREZ: Yeah, I was only home about two weeks in the off season so I was either here or Cabo or home. So. Q. You mentioned yesterday that 30 was the number. Now have you adjusted that number and is that the cut now? PAT PEREZ: The cut's going to be -- what's the cut going to be, 16? 17? I think that I told Tom outside I said I think Scott Walker actually asked me if 40 is in play. And I said if there's no wind, I don't know. That's awful low, but I definitely think it's going to be mid 30s. Q. You mentioned -- PAT PEREZ: Somebody gave you a microphone? Q. You mentioned going to Cabo, your web site said you got married there in December. You attribute these low scores to marriage? PAT PEREZ: Everyone that gets married seems to win. Paul Casey got married the day after me won last week. Gore got married, won. You know, I don't know. Sabbatini, he won. I don't know what it is. I figured I would try it. If not then. (Laughter.) If not, I can always get divorced. No. I'm just kidding. No, I don't know what it is. I think that maybe they look at it like I have, where I got that side over with now so I don't have to worry about what's going on in my life, I know where it's going and it's settled, so now I can just really focus ongoing down the right path to play golf. Q. One of your acquaintances asks me to ask you what happened to a wedding cake. PAT PEREZ: He's not an acquaintance of mine at all. I don't know the guy. Q. No, what happened to the wedding cake, somebody asked me that. PAT PEREZ: We had it planned where or she had it planned, it wasn't me, I was actually pissed because it cost me money to do it. She had the wedding planner plan -- who the hell gets a replica cake to do this anyway. Same cake, both the same price. Lady was walking around the pool, tripped, both fell, cake fell and then she went in the water. And she came out screaming and I'm not kidding it was 7,500 people there, and they were just dead silent. No one moved, no one talked, no nothing. And she is screaming at this poor lady and then it all went crazy, everyone started laughing and I started laughing because I couldn't hold it any more. And then the fireworks show started. And it was a pretty good trick. Pretty good trick. We got everybody with that one. Q. So tell us what the name of your wife is and what it stands for. PAT PEREZ: How the hell did you get a microphone? My wife's name is Athena. And she is the Greek goddess of war. And that holds 100 percent true. (Laughter.) Q. Obviously you say you're hitting, playing as well as ever, do you think this score, do you think you would be in first if everyone was out here this week? PAT PEREZ: No one's ever shot 20 before, so. At any tournament. So I would probably have to say yes. Q. They specifically set the rotation up a little different this year so everybody would get two consecutive days here at PGA West. Now you go away from PGA West. To SilverRock and Bermuda Dunes. Does that mean anything or if the weather stays the same does it just more of the same? PAT PEREZ: I've been -- I shot 61 at Bermuda Dunes, so I'm not afraid of that place. SilverRock, I only played it once, but there's some low scores coming out of there. Pins are right in the middle. Moved some tees up on the par-5s. You can land 747s on those fairways. I'm not really too worried about them. Q. Shooting 61, 63, sounds kind of like sort of a dream of some kind. Can you sort of explain what it feels like to play golf like that? PAT PEREZ: Wow, it's just nice. It's not really a dream, a dream would have been actually shooting in the 50s yesterday like I wanted to. But it's just nice. The course is set up for it, the pin placements aren't the hardest, and the weather's been perfect. Everything has to go into that. Everything has to factor in when you shoot, when everybody's shooting low scores. It's not a mystery. So it's just nice. It's not really a dream, a dream is holding the iron, you know, that's the dream. So I just hope to continue another three days. MARK STEVENS: Go over your birdies real quick. I know there's quite a few of them there. PAT PEREZ: Where do I start? 3. I hit 7-iron, hit it to about 25 feet. Made that one. 4, I had about -- I hit driver, 2-iron just short. Chipped up to about 10 feet and made that one. 5, hit driver, wedge to about eight feet. 7, I can't think of it though. Q. Par-3. In the middle of a big old bunker. PAT PEREZ: Oh, yeah. Right. I hit a little 9-iron to about 15 feet. 8, I hit driver, I had a terrible lie, it rolled through and I kind of chipped out a 5-iron to the left there and chipped up to about four feet. 11, the par-5, no, par-3. Q. It was a long putt. PAT PEREZ: Oh, yeah, it was about 40 feet from the fringe. It was right in the heart. That was nice. 13, par-5, driver, 5-iron just left, just on top of the bunker, chipped up to about eight feet. Made that one. Next hole, driver -- no, 2-iron, 9-iron, to about 20 feet. And the last hole driver, 8-iron, to about a foot and a half. Two feet. Q. Longer putts today I know you've really been pissed about your putting in the past, does how well you're playing otherwise contributing to how well you're putting? PAT PEREZ: None. It's actually the opposite way around. When you putt well you don't have to worry about hitting it three feet every hole. So I can play, I don't have to play at every pin I can play just right or just left. I know can I make it. So when you're putting terrible, you have to, you got to hit it close. And then it puts more pressure, God, I got to hit it close, and if I don't hit it close I know I'm not going to make it anyway, so let's just go. So it's nice just to kind of play just to play. Because you can kind of hit it anywhere and get up-and-down and making a 25-footer and move on, it's nice. So, yeah, it's actually the reverse factor of it. MARK STEVENS: Okay, thank you, Pat. End of FastScripts |
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