UBS WARBURG CUP

November 16, 2001

Arnold Palmer

Gary Player

GARY PLAYER: I'll put Bernhard Langer and Frank Nobilo.

ARNOLD PALMER: Okay. I will put Raymond Floyd and Mark Calcavecchia.

ARNOLD PALMER: Okay. My second team will be Mark O'Meara and John Cook.

GARY PLAYER: I'll put Sam Torrance and Ian Woosnam.

GARY PLAYER: I'll put on Nick Faldo and Aoki.

ARNOLD PALMER: In that slot, I'll put Curtis Strange and Tom Watson.

ARNOLD PALMER: My next team is myself and Dana Quigley.

GARY PLAYER: And my team to play them will be myself and Des Smyth.

ARNOLD PALMER: You like success, don't you (Laughter.) You're sort of just gloating in it.

GARY PLAYER: Only at the moment.

GARY PLAYER: Canizares and Stewart Ginn.

ARNOLD PALMER: Okay. You got it. I only have one team left. Hale Irwin and Larry Nelson.

GARY PLAYER: I think when you've had a good day, you've got to go with the flow. It's still a matter of hitting the golf shots. I think our team played so well today, why try and reinvent the wheel? I could get paralysis of analysis. (Laughter). This game has a tendency to make you do that.

ARNOLD PALMER: I assume you enjoyed it. Tell him about it.

GARY PLAYER: I answered the first question. Then it's your turn, then I'll go.

ARNOLD PALMER: No, you go right ahead. I didn't enjoy it at all. (Laughter.)

GARY PLAYER: I've always enjoyed playing against Arnold. We've been playing against each other for all of these years, and I think that we've had great respect for each other. The fact is that you're going to win and you're going to lose, and that's part of the game. But it's been one of the great -- when I sit on my farm one day, it will be one of the great things to discuss the times with all of my twinkie grandchildren, how I played with Nicklaus and Palmer around the world and how much we loved the game and how much we tried to beat each other and we beat each other equally throughout our careers. We always felt, Arnold, Jack and I, we always felt that we could beat each other, and I think that's what made it such a healthy game to, have a great friendship on top of that, I'm very proud of that.

ARNOLD PALMER: Yeah, I didn't enjoy it at all. I'm kidding. Actually, Gary is right with what he said. And certainly, you would not expect me to enjoy getting beat, but I enjoyed playing with he and Mr. Smyth. I will look forward to it tomorrow. I think the American team will come back. I think they will find themselves overnight and be more of a factor tomorrow, and I hope that I can be more of a factor. What Gary says about our relationship is on 100% and I hope that will go on for as long as we live. But that doesn't make losing any easier, and that is something that I will never accept and just lie down and say, "Hey, I like losing," because I don't, not to Gary or to Jack or anyone else. But I think that in the mood and in the spirit of the game, we've had a pretty good relationship for a lot of years, and certainly, we've played a lot of matches and we've had a lot of fun and we've both won and lost.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, I'm not -- you know, my team, they are all veterans. There's not a guy on the team that is still wet behind the ears. They have played all kinds of competitions, they have been on Ryder Cup teams, they have played and won major championships all over the world. So they know what the situation is. Will I give them a little pep talk? Absolutely. I don't need to, that pep talk they are giving themselves right now as we speak. I suppose the only negative thing I could say is that maybe we thought we were a little better than we are and maybe we just realized that we are not as good as we thought we were. Now, we have to come back and prove it and that's the ode of what I will say to my guys.

GARY PLAYER: Having played golf for so long, nothing surprises me in this game. Golf, the best way to describe golf, golf is a puzzle without an answer. The strangest things happen in golf. You just play and accept what happens. I'm in the race horse business, and the lead that we have is just like telling a horse when he's just come out of the gate; you've still got a mile to go. So, really, he's at a lead, yes. Is it an insignificant lead? No. It's still wide open. Nothing surprises me in golf. After all of the things that we've seen in our careers, nothing surprises me.

GARY PLAYER: No, I don't -- I don't think so.

ARNOLD PALMER: I think when we shook hands with him on the 16th green and he smiled. He had a big smile on his face. (Laughter.) I think the Rest of the World Team is a tough team, and I think some of my guys realized it. I certainly knew it when we saw who we were playing against. They are good players. It's not like we -- they have just come into the game. They have won titles around the world.