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HP BYRON NELSON CHAMPIONSHIP

May 19, 2009

Rich Beem

IRVING, TEXAS

DOUG MILNE: Rich, thanks for joining us for a few minutes here at the HP Byron Nelson Championship. We appreciate you taking time. I understand you visited the Cowboys' practice facility, and it's no new news as to the tragedy there. Just talk about your visit there and kind of the initiative that you've taken on.
RICH BEEM: Yeah, after I found out about the incident at the Cowboys' facility, the tragedy, and then finding out about two days later that the young man who was injured, his name is Rich Behm, a little bit different spelling, his last name is B-e-h-m, it kind of threw me for a curve a little bit. I told my wife about it and I couldn't believe it.
So I took the initiative and called up David Yates, my agent, and said, listen, I'd like to set up an account on eBay or something where I can auction off my golf clubs that I play with for the HP Byron Nelson Classic and the Crowne Plaza Colonial and just auction those off and see if we can't make a little money for this young man's foundation.
David then kind of turned the all over to T.R. Reinman, the media director at Gaylord, and he ran with it thankfully, and got the Dallas Cowboys involved, got the PGA TOUR involved, and we've decided now to do Beem Fore Behm. Basically it's going to be donate so many dollars for each birdie that I make. I'm personally donating $100 per birdie that I make for the Behm Foundation for this week's event and next week's event.
And then we have packets for players. Players can donate a dollar amount if they'd like to, if they want to donate per birdie that they make, and then we also have it set up for the fans. We have the Dallas Cowboys Pavilion here where fans can go in who are at the tournament and they can go in there and donate as they see fit, whether it's birdies that I make, birdies that the field makes, kind of whatever they want to do. The sky is kind of the limit on what the fans want to do. And then also have it on pgatour.com, as well.
It's really kind of taken on a life form of its own. It's been an amazing process how it turned out. Callaway Golf, one of my sponsors, has gotten involved. We're going to donate two sets of golf clubs, one winner from the HP Byron Nelson and one from the Crowne Plaza Colonial will win a custom set of golf courses donated by Callaway Golf.
It just kind of took on a life form of its own, and it's pretty amazing. I've got one special friend of mine, my next-door neighbor, who's going to donate $10,000 for every stroke that I finish under par at the event. So if I shoot 10-under par at one event he'll donate $100,000.
With his help and with everybody's help, I think if we get enough fans and enough people out there to support this, I think this will be a home run. Just anything we can do to help out this gentleman. I took a vested interest just because the gentleman had my name. I got some phone calls and some emails and text messages about it and things like that, and I think it's just the nature of most of us TOUR players. I'd say that almost every TOUR player either has some sort of charity that they run, a tournament, or they're involved with one that they help out with.
It's just kind of our nature to do something like this. So I just thought that it might be nice to help out a young man, 33 years old, three children, and I thought it might be a nice deal.
Like I said, what started off as a very innocent program has now turned into something quite extraordinary with the help of T.R. Reinman and the Dallas Cowboys and the PGA TOUR.
DOUG MILNE: Have you had a chance to meet him?
RICH BEEM: I have not. That was really never the goal. The goal was just to basically see what we could do to help out and that. But through some -- I will not have an opportunity this week. Next week I will, if his schedule sees fit. I know he's going through a rehab process, and I can't imagine what he's going through right now. But yeah, he's got to get better himself. I know he's working hard at it.
I spoke to his brother today at the Cowboys' facility, and he was telling me a little bit about his brother and how much kind of a stubborn guy he is, and he's not going to let this thing beat him, which is an amazing thing to hear. Hopefully someday I'll get to meet him, but who knows when the opportunity might arise.

Q. When you first heard this story was it something you were thinking, there's not much difference between this guy and me, he's in his 30s and --
RICH BEEM: Yeah, kind of for the most part. I think what originally kind of sparked it was just basically his name. There's not too many Rich Beems out there. I've met a couple of them, and I know it's a different spelling but still, it's the same genre. It's interesting, three young kids and this and that, and I wanted to do something to help him out, and I wasn't expecting to do a whole lot. But like I said, with the support of the Dallas Cowboys, the PGA TOUR, Callaway and the tournaments, they've really helped out quite a bit, and it's been an amazing process. I'm very fortunate that everybody decided to step up as they have.
A lot of folks are making my job pretty easy. I just have to go make birdies now.

Q. Do you have any particular goal numerically in terms of the number of players or financial goal or anything for the two-week period?
RICH BEEM: I really don't. Like I said, this is much bigger than I ever dreamed about, so I really don't. If the players can help out, obviously that would be fantastic. Obviously the fan support, the fan help and things like that, I know the Dallas Cowboys have gotten involved with it. I think Michael Irvin has been a gentleman that's pledged some money, and certainly Callaway Golf and some of my other sponsors have expressed interest as well as helping out.
It's really kind of expanded a lot more than I ever thought it would. As far as monies being raised, hopefully it'll cost my neighbor a couple hundred thousand or something. That way at least one of us can be making some money over the next two weeks.
Just whatever we can raise is certainly a step in the right direction.

Q. How much pressure does it put on you now to make a lot of birdies?
DOUG MILNE: I've got T.R. to thank for that one. I was just going to come down here and maybe slide under the radar a little and see if we can't get back in the mix of things, but unfortunately I'm going to be front and center it looks like. That's where we all want to be; it's not a big deal. I'm looking forward to getting out there. I'm looking forward to the challenge actually. I think it's going to be fun. I won't really change my game up much, but hopefully we'll zero in a little bit more and make some putts.

Q. How is your game right now?
RICH BEEM: My game is -- the stats might say different. My game is fantastic. I've really been doing some great things on the golf course. I just have been missing it by just a stroke here or a stroke there, it's been frustrating at times, but hell, who hasn't been at this game. We'll see if we can't get through that and make a few more birdies and bogeys this week.
DOUG MILNE: Rich, we appreciate your time and representing what you're doing.

End of FastScripts

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