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June 29, 2011
NEWTOWN SQUARE, PENNSYLVANIA
Q. Are we going through a swing in this sport right now, a trend that the European golfers are starting to dominate this sport more so than the Americans?
JIM FURYK: Well, right now they're definitely in the top four spots. I would have to look at the World Rankings and I would have to see what the depth is, as well, how many of the top 10 European versus American or how many top 20 versus Americans. There's a lot of other wonderful countries. You've got Australia, South Africa, a lot of wonderful Asian players right now. It is a worldly game, and I think you go back to the late '80s and I think of Nick Faldo, Sandy Lyle, Ian Woosnam, Bernhard Langer, Seve, José MarÃÂa, there was a lot of very good European players, and also in that era you had Greg Norman probably dominating the world.
But the '90s turned around and Tiger came along and Mickelson and they were the best two players in the world for quite a long time. You know, it's how it goes around. It's an ebb and flow. I think we have a lot of good young players that are American, and I think if you look at the under-30s, you look at Hunter Mahan, you look at Nick Watney, Dustin Johnson, Rickie Fowler, I think we've got a lot of wonderful players under the age of 30 in the United States. I'll take those four. I'll give you whoever you want from any other region. You pick four players under 30 from any other region, I'll take my four, and I'll be quite happy with where my money goes.
Q. Playing at a tournament here in an area that's really important to you, just comment on that.
JIM FURYK: Yeah, it's good to be close to home. I grew up in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, not too far down the road, played a lot of junior golf in the Philadelphia section, and I have quite a bit of friends and family. People asked me if that would relax me more. I said, any time you're playing at home you put more pressure on yourself to play well. The U.S. Open at Oakmont a few years back I put a lot of pressure on myself to perform well because it was my home state. You know, that can be good or bad. I think we're always going to put a lot of pressure on ourselves anyway, but it's also comfortable to see a lot of familiar faces in the crowd and know that you have a sense of belonging to this area and the community, and it's good for the sport.
Q. Thoughts on the golf course for this year?
JIM FURYK: I'm excited. It's always in good shape, and it's much softer right now than it was last year from the rain, I guess. But with the high blue skies and it's breezy today, if we get a little bit of that, I think it'll firm up quite well for the weekend. But it's a long, difficult golf course set up pretty hard with the rough, and I like it. I enjoyed coming here last year. It was maybe a little different than I expected, but the players and myself all really enjoyed it and thought it was a great golf course.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports
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