BUICK OPEN

July 29, 2003

Peter Jacobsen

TODD BUDNICK: Why don't you talk about your victory last week at Hartford.

PETER JACOBSEN: I've always loved Hartford. When we would have had from Wethersfield Country Club to the TPC Connecticut back in '84, that was start of the run for so many years with the Greater Hartford Open and Canon, Sammy Davis, Junior as the sponsor. Next year with Buick Championship coming up, it was kind of a home coming for me. My middle daughter, Kristen, was there. She was 2 the last time I won in Hartford. She's now 21, and having her there was very, very special.

But I think that tournament has upgraded itself as much as any tournament on TOUR. They have a fabulous, fabulous facility. The TPC at River Highlands, as it's called now, is a great golf course. The Jaycees do a wonderful job in managing the event and running the field. They have a lot of people there. That's probably one of the top-five highest-attended tournaments on the PGA TOUR, so I felt very comfortable all week.

TODD BUDNICK: It looked like you had a lot of fun. Talk about the banter back and forth between the fans.

PETER JACOBSEN: Well, I feel that we are in the entertainment business as much as a movie theater or a football team; we're selling tickets. The people that pay to come out to watch a tournament, they love the game of golf. Whether you are Peter Jacobsen, Chris Riley, Tiger Woods or any player out here, I think it's our obligation and our responsibility to put on a show, not only with good golf, but any other aspect of your personality, as well. And I've always been a talker; I've always been somebody that likes to interact with the crowd. Not everybody can do that and I don't think everybody should. You've got to find the best way that you can play your best golf, and if that's to stay within yourself, then do that.

For me it's to be a little bit more gregarious, a little bit more outgoing and a little more talkative with the fans and I enjoy that. So I felt very comfortable. I felt like I was part of the family there and have been for -- I think I've played over 20 GHOs, and obviously the last 19 at the TPC up there.

TODD BUDNICK: You're 49. You say you don't think about that on a daily basis, you're a competitor out here and that's what counts, but yet two years ago on the Tour, all the talk was about 20-year-olds and "here they come," a wave of them, yet this year, we have six 40-plus winners.

PETER JACOBSEN: I think that's just an ebb and flow of the game. As anybody knows that plays the game, sometimes your short game gets hot and then it goes way. I think you see a rush of youngsters come on and the other youngsters motivate other youngsters.

I think in this situation with me, I've been so motivated by Craig Stadler's play, Kenny Perry's play. Tom Watson's play, he's been in six majors in a row and the way he's played and handled himself is very impressive. I use that as motivation to rise up my level of play. And it worked.

But don't worry, those young kids, they are not going anywhere. They are just getting older.

Q. Did you think you had another win in you or were you just biding your time till the Champions Tour?

PETER JACOBSEN: I thought I had another win in me, seriously did. I've been working very hard on my game with my swing coach and my short game coach. I've been working very hard. I felt I had another one in me. I might even have a couple more, you never know, before I turn 50.

But the key out here is to not limit yourself with either inexperience or age. I don't think about ages when I tee it up. I won't be thinking about it Thursday when I tee it up. I didn't think about it last week. I know Stadler didn't. Ben Curtis didn't at the British Open. He didn't think, "Oh, my gosh, what am I doing, I'm so inexperienced, I have no chance to win this thing." He didn't think that. I didn't think that coming down the stretch on Sunday, either.

Q. Have you had enough time to think about next year and the year beyond that now? Obviously you've been thinking about the Champions Tour for a while, now does that change at all?

PETER JACOBSEN: I've got my 2004 schedule and I've got both Tours written in those weeks. I'm very excited about going on the Champions Tour in 2004 when I turn 50.

I think the Champions Tour is a very essential part of the PGA TOUR. The Nationwide Tour basically gives you the future of the game. The PGA TOUR is the current stars of the game. But the nostalgia aspect of the Champions Tour is vital to the PGA TOUR because it keeps a lot of players focusing on their game, because there's nothing like getting in contention and winning.

That's why I've worked so hard on my game in the last ten years since -- the last eight years since I won last in '95.

So, yes, I'm very excited about the Champions Tour. And I know Craig Stadler is, as well. I spoke with D.A. Weibring this morning, who is a very good friend of mine who is on the Champions Tour, and he had a very good chance to win last week at the Senior British Open. I'm excited about everything that's going on with the tour. I think the organization is very, very healthy right now.

Q. Were you working hard on your game just for the Champions Tour --

PETER JACOBSEN: No. I would have worked just as hard as I have if on March 4, 2004 they would have given me a camp chair and a big tall glass of lemonade and a pair of orange shorts and said, "Move down to Florida and retire." I just love the game of golf. I love -- one of the things that has been a great addition to me, a help to me, has been my association with Titleist. And while Eli signed me to a long-term contract four or five years ago -- and for me to have been able to work on my game with all of the experts and the technicians at Titleist down at the Oceanside test facility, the research and development at Titleist, they are on the cutting edge of all of the decisions that's going on in the game of golf right now. They make the best equipment. That has been a great motivation to me to get better, to get better.

I know everybody complains about how the equipment is changing the nature and face of the game. I've yet to meet an amateur who hits it too far. I've yet to meet an amateur who hits it too straight or hits it too close to the hole. The PGA TOUR players are very good: Mickelson, Sergio, Ernie Els, Tiger, these guys are great players. They can do amazing things with a golf ball. They would do the same thing if we were playing persimmon clubs and hickory shafts and gutta percha balls. My love affair with the game goes far beyond this Champions Tour. It basically begins and ends right there, a love the game.

Q. You said how much you enjoy playing Hartford. Is this still special because this is the first tournament you won?

PETER JACOBSEN: I said to my wife when I left home to come out to these two weeks, Hartford and the Buick Open, I said, "You know, these are two of my favorites stops on TOUR because of the communities." I think the most important aspect of the PGA TOUR is the fact that their community -- the community gets behind them and they are so involved in the total aspect of the tournament.

I remember 1980 very, very well, when I made a putt on the last hole to win the tournament, and my four-week old first child was here with me. I held her up and was bouncing around, and then during the check presentation, she threw up all over my back as I held her in my arms. I've got a great picture of that.

Off course, back then everything was black and white. So no color pictures back then.

Q. Do you feel like you can play well here and maybe make it two in a row?

PETER JACOBSEN: Absolutely. No reason I can't. Any time you get playing well and you get on a high, it's just an emotion that can carry you. And I feel great about my game. I'm excited about being back at Warwick Hills a place that I've had great success. When I won in '80, I lost in a playoff the next year to Hale Irwin, and Bobby Clampett and Gil Morgan were in that playoff. Everything seems like it was yesterday. It's hard for me to believe that was 23 years ago, and here we are in the year 2003. But the golf course I know very well. I have great affection for everybody in this community.

I still drive -- I'm staying at the Holiday Inn over there and I still take that drive through Grand Blanc through the main street because it's such a wonderful town. The freeways you can have. I like to go see the town.

Q. What were the last few years like for you when you were not winning? Were you frustrated? What were you going through for those years?

PETER JACOBSEN: Frustrated probably is not the right word. Determined.

I had hip surgery two years ago. The first tournament back from hip surgery was the Greater Hartford Open in 2001. I had played for the last probably four or five years, the end of the 90s, hurt all the time. I thought it was my back, but it was my hip. Fortunately Steve Elkington forced me to go see this doctor that had redone his hip.

From there, it's been a process getting back to the winner's circle but it was nonetheless very rewarding. I was very determined. Golf is a frustrating game. Saying a golfers are frustrated is a redundancy; we are all frustrated. But I never gave up hope. I'm always determined.

Q. You had a blue shirt on that day in 1980.

PETER JACOBSEN: I looked like my son back then.

No, I've been playing very, very solid golf. If you look at my statistics over the last two years, my statistics have been pretty solid, and that's really one of the things you do, for me. You have to look at your game in total: What did you shoot, how did you finish compared to all of the other players. I always break it down, and I look at my putting stats, my bunker stat, driving accuracy, distance, greens in regulation.

And again, as I said earlier about my work with Titleist, we work on every individual aspect of the game. So that is where I really focus, whether it's working with Scotty Cameron on my putting or going down and working with Larry Bobka (ph) on my woods and my irons.

So my stats have been very encouraging. It's just a matter of putting it all together.

Q. Did you ever meet Bob Hope, and do you have any fond memories of him or thoughts on what he did for golf?

PETER JACOBSEN: Yes, I met Bob Hope, played golf with him probably five or six times. I actually won the 1990 Bob Hope Chrysler Classic and played with Bob the following year. I had played with him before but I was in that Celebrity Swing of the Hope where a lot of players try to avoid that. They avoid that as much as possible. That fits right into what I love to do.

So I had a chance to play with Mr. Hope many, many times and I enjoyed him a great deal. I kind of felt it was a little ironic when I heard that he passed away on Sunday, the day that was such a great day for me coming back and winning after not having won for eight years. And to hear that he passed away, there was some irony there for me.

Q. Were you amazed by Ben Curtis being able to go out in his first major and go out against some of the top players in the world and win the British Open?

PETER JACOBSEN: I wasn't amazed. I was very impressed by his focus. I know Ben. He's a great young player. He's not unfamiliar to the international spotlight or the national stage. He's been on many World Championship teams and he's been in competition in majors and the U.S. Amateur championship he competed in many times and had a chance to win there.

So I wasn't amazed, but I was very impressed by how he handled himself down the stretch.

Q. What do you think are going to the challenges for him?

PETER JACOBSEN: The challenge is going to be to any young players that wins out here is how he handles everything. I think back to when Tiger came out on TOUR and my caddie, my long-time caddie, Mike Callen (ph), Fluff, when Tiger -- I hooked Tiger up with Mike back in '96, and Mike went to work for Tiger because I was taking a month off. One of my children was starting high school, and boom, Tiger burst out on the scene and he won tournaments and he hired Mike full-time, with my blessing obviously.

But I remember talking with Mike and saying, "This will be interesting to see how Tiger handles this early success. And obviously he's handled it with great aplomb and great charm. Tiger is the most charming players out here on the PGA TOUR. That challenge is now to Ben Curtis, and if I were Ben, giving him any advice, I would basically -- I would tell him to take a step back and look at a lot of young players' careers that have won at the same age as he has and try to emulate, try to be like those players. Because obviously Tiger, Ben Crenshaw, Jack Nicklaus, they made the correct decisions at the right time, and there have been other players who won at that stage in their career who did not make the proper decisions.

Q. Are you going to have to tailor your game any different this week, as opposed -- on this course as opposed to what you did last week at the Hartford?

PETER JACOBSEN: No. This has always been an excellent driving golf course. It's tight. It's a short golf course but it's very tight and you have to drive the ball down the middle of every fairway, like we did last week. It's one thing I've learned; it's hard to win out here when you're hitting the ball in the rough. So first and foremost, you've got to put the ball in the fairway.

The greens here probably have a little bit more slope to them. The greens have a little bit more slope. Slope would be this (indicating). Contour would be this. (Indicating). You see a lot of TPCs that have contour. These greens have slope. It's a lot easier to make birdies here at Warwick Hills putting uphill than judging the distance coming down.

I remember last year 3-putting the 10th hole. I think missed the cut by a stroke, and I remember hitting about three feet, four feet above the hole on 10 and 3-putting because I tried to make the birdie putt on Friday, and I think I knocked it 10 or 12 feet by and missed it. Placement on these greens, because of the slope, the dramatic slopes is key.

Q. (Inaudible.)

PETER JACOBSEN: Well, Portland is my hometown where I was born and raised and still live. I know probably everybody in the City of Portland and have always appreciated their support of me. I'm sure they probably get tired of me after a while because I seem to be in the press a lot out there. We do a tournament out there now. I'm sure they are tired of my face. But they just had to deal with me last weekend. I apologize for that. (Laughing).

Q. You spoke about decisions that a young player has to make after he wins. What are some of these things that are important for them to do?

PETER JACOBSEN: In my 27 years, the first and foremost important decision to make is to remember that you're out here to win golf tournaments. You're not out here to sign endorsement deals.

So many times, I see players go jumping for money in directions that they probably shouldn't. There's really one area out here that is essential, and that is with the clubs and the golf ball that you play. A lot of companies, a lot of fabulous companies will make very generous offers to players, but if you're not comfortable with that type of equipment, then you probably shouldn't do the deal. It's a very important thing to remember, is you're out here to win golf tournaments. That's why you started to play golf; that's why you came on the Tour.

Q. You talked about, you gave Titleist a lot of credit for helping you with equipment. Tiger has just put the Titleist driver back in his bag and taken the Nike driver out, what do you think about that?

PETER JACOBSEN: I think a player needs to do whatever they need to do to win. To be at the top of their game, they have to play the best equipment that fits them. There's so many great equipment companies out here that make fine equipment. You just have to match a round peg into a round hole. Sometimes you end up trying to force that square peg into the round hole and it doesn't work. You have to have the courage to be able to make that decision, to make that call.

I know that Tiger has been struggling with many aspects of trying to find a driver. I haven't spoken to him. I probably won't talk to him about it. It's none of my business. But I know that Tiger is the best player in the world and he could probably -- he could probably play using a whisk broom.

Q. Three weeks ago in England, it was kind of weird, went around looking for players who knew anything about Ben, and it was amazing how many didn't know anything about Ben. You say do you know Ben some. Does he have the makeup, from what you know of him, to be successful, to do the things that you think he needs to do? Does he have that kind of mindset to do that?

PETER JACOBSEN: I think does he because he's got that kind of determination. You can tell in the time that I've spent with him and talked with him, he seems very down-to-earth, and every time he speaks, he thinks about it, and I imagine he approaches his golf game and his shots on the golf course the same way. But he's obviously got a great support system of family behind him; that is so important to making those correct decisions, and I have no doubt that he will.

TODD BUDNICK: Thank you very much.

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