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WGC CADILLAC CHAMPIONSHIPMarch 6, 2012Hunter MahanMIAMI, FLORIDA LAURA HILL: We welcome Hunter Mahan, just a couple weeks removed from your victory the World Golf Championships Accenture Match Play. Two down, two to go; if you can talk about your mind‑set heading into this week and another WGC. HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, obviously excited about this week. Actually had my best year last year here, so I feel like I'm figuring out the course a little bit and I enjoy playing here. It's a fun golf course to play. Excited to get back out here. I had a week off, and these WGCs are a lot of fun to play. They are the best players in the world and kind of a relaxed week at the same time with only being 70 or so players. So, looking forward to it, and feel like my game is in good order, so I can't wait to get the week started. Q. Your putting at the Match Play was phenomenal. What has clicked in your putting? HUNTER MAHAN: I changed putters to the PING Nome, and I changed the offset on the putter. So I feel like I can aim a little bit better and I feel like I'm just more consistent with that. I just have an identity with my stroke now, how I want to stroke it, what I want to feel and everything. Before I was kind of searchy. When you get to that point where you are just trying to make putts, it's a hard thing to do. So you have to do a lot of little things before that can happen. I just got some confidence with it, and you know, feel good with it now. Q. You're among a few players, old, young, American, European, whose games seem to be really rounding into shape, giving the TOUR a sense of a lot of players playing their very best right now. Does that have an effect on everybody to see when so many players playing seemingly at a very high form, just what kind of trickle down effect does that have? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, I think the game of golf is in a good place. I think there's a lot of great players now. The difference between the No. 1 ranked player and it seems the 20th and 30th ranked player isn't that big anymore. They have had a lot of No. 1s in the last few years, so the game has seemed to grow quite a bit worldwide. A lot of great players from all over the players. I don't know if‑‑ I mean, I think we know a lot more about the game than we used to. I think the education the swing of golf has grown a lot exponentially in the last few years. So I think guys are figuring a lot more things out for themselves and learning a lot more than they used to, and you know, I think that the result of all this is it's pretty tight up at the top. You know, there's so many guys that can win tournaments nowadays, especially in WGCs or majors. It's pretty incredible when you do win an event, because you have to beat so many great players. Q. Did you watch Sunday's goings‑on up at the Honda, and what's your reaction to what transpired that day? HUNTER MAHAN: I watched a little bit, because I saw Tiger was playing good, and then I kind of tuned in and watched that. I saw he made a few putts, so I had to see it for my own eyes. (Laughter). No, it was good. He put a heck of a number up there. It's one of those golf courses where you hit one bad shot, you're going to make double because there's so much water and so many kind of tough shots near the end there. But Rory hung on and played very well. Like I said, I think I only postponed the ceremonial No. 1 for him, and impressive that he did it the week after. Q. There was talk after that tournament of: This is the start of a Tiger/Rory sort of rivalry. Do you buy into that, and do you think rivalries are important in your business? HUNTER MAHAN: I don't think we've had many rivalries in this game. You know, we had kind of Jack and Arnie back in the day, but I think rivalries, there's so many good players nowadays. I mean, Luke Donald has held the No. 1 position for quite a while; Martin Kaymer is a great player; Lee Westwood is a great player; there's a lot of great players. You know, it's good to see Tiger playing better. It's important for the TOUR to see him kind of come back and have that buzz about each week that he plays, and you know, everyone is waiting for that kind of first win on his little come back. So it's hard to say. Is it good? I think it would be great but it's just kind of hard to have two guys in the final‑‑ kind of in that final group every other week or so. So it's going to be difficult and I think it's tough, because there's just so many good players right now that it's hard to single out two guys that are going to be rivals or whatever. Tiger doesn't have a rival. Just look at the record. I mean, there is none. His rival is Jack Nicklaus. It's hard to put anyone up there right now with him. I understand his last few years haven't been his best and everything that's going on, but that guy, he's had numbers that no one has even thought about reaching. So it's good for him to be back where he is, and golf is in a great place with Rory being No. 1 right now and so many guys up there very, very close; and so many guys that has that potential. It's pretty fun to be part of the game. Q. You were talking earlier about your putting; that elusive quality of consistency, is that more of a physical thing or a mental thing? HUNTER MAHAN: It could be a mental thing. I mean, it is‑‑ you play so many tournaments out here and so many rounds of golf; it's easy to kind of get that kind of negative side of your brain a little upset that you're maybe not playing as well as you want to and get frustrated. You know, like any kind of virus that can kind of spread and get into your system; you've got to get that out and you've got to be‑‑ any good player has their head high and walk around with their chest up like they are going to win, like they feel like they are going to win, and they do it every week, and you never see them get down or frustrated. Everybody was talking about how bad Phil was playing earlier in the year and then he almost went back‑to‑back events. Great players never lose confidence in themselves no matter what's going on, and you saw with him, he turned it around extremely quick, and you know, very close to winning back‑to‑back tournaments, because he's a great player and he never lost that confidence, and you know, I think any great player never loses that confidence in themselves. I think sometimes I was getting too down on myself and too frustrated with things, and you can't do that. There's so many good players now that will pass you. You know, a lot of it is attitude, because I do feel like my game physically is a lot better than it used to be. It's more well rounded with the short game and putting, and driving the ball; you put that mental aspect and good iron play and with a decent short game, I can get around the course more consistently in back‑to‑back days. Q. You mentioned how important it is to have Tiger back playing well. This is the 15‑year anniversary of his historic win at the Masters. Just curious, 15 years ago, where were you when you watched it? What impact did that have on your career at all, just to see what he did? HUNTER MAHAN: It was a pretty historic day. I think I was at home watching. I don't know exactly where I was. It's pretty incredible what kind of performance he had at such an early age, because I think he just opened the door for our imaginations to run wild. I remember that interview with Curtis that he had that he told Curtis, I want to win, I'm coming out here to win tournaments. And Curtis was like, well, Top 5s are good, Top‑10s are good. Tiger's, like, well, no, I'm not coming out just to have fun, I want to win. And Curtis was beating on him like, oh, you don't know what you're talking about. And he comes out, and I think he opened up a new role for us that we realized, there's nothing stopping you from winning eight tournaments in a year to win $10million in a year. There's nothing stopping you from doing that. We are stopping ourselves because we are saying Top‑10 is good, that's a good week. And he was saying, well, no, it's not good; I'm better than that. So I don't think that win did much for my career or anything. It didn't motivate me any more, but I think his attitude did and the way he went about his business did, how he took golf‑‑ he had a goal and he still has not achieved it yet and he's still working hard at it. I think it opened doors for us to realize that, you know what, we can do anything in this game if we want to. We are not held to anyone's standard. I don't think Rory was told, you know, Rory, you can't be No. 1 at 23. You can't do that. It's possible. So I think it just allowed to us have some more fun with the game and not be‑‑ we are the only player that's stopping us from exceeding our goals and really doing something great. Q. You mentioned Rory being No. 1, and he had made a statement that that's something he wanted to do, that it was a dream of his and other guys like Jason Day said they wanted to be No. 1. Can you actually set the goal of being No. 1, or is it something that just still sort of happens even though you say that's what you want to be? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, I think it's a mind‑set more than it is anything else, saying that you're just No. 1. I think it's saying, that you know what, I feel like I have the potential to be the best player in the game. There's a lot of hard work and a lot of things that you have to do to do that obviously, but I think it's just a mind‑set that I feel like, you know, as players, we are like, you know, what I have the potential to do this and I want to give myself every opportunity to be best player that I can be. I feel that is No. 1 player in the world. You know, that's a great goal. That's not arrogance or anything like that. That's what everyone wants to do, to say, hey, you know, what I was the No. 1 player in the world and to be No. 1 in anything is pretty special. Q. Do you have that mind‑set, and did beating Rory, who was going for No. 1 at the time, change your mind‑set at all about your process of perhaps getting there; not that it's necessarily a goal but that it's a possibility? HUNTER MAHAN: For sure, I definitely felt that going into the match with him. I was like, you know what, I feel like I'm capable of doing some awesome things, and this is an opportunity for me to kind of go against, you know, the man at the time and try to beat him. I was excited about that. I thought I could. I felt my game was in a great place, and I figured, why not, you know, there's no reason for me to not. I think everybody was picking him to win, but that's the thing is it's not‑‑ you know, they are not going to tell me how good I can be. So why not go out there and try to do something about it. You know, I had a great day and I had a good result. But you could tell the level of Rory's play‑‑ Rory's the calibre of player, he wasn't fazed by that finish at all and went to the Honda and played great. He knows how good of a player he is and what he's capable of. You can see just the way he plays, he has a great confidence about himself and just goes about his business and plays golf. He just has a great way about him when he goes out there and plays. But I definitely felt like, you know, you can do anything you want in this game. It's just up to me to put in the work and have the right mind‑set. Q. If the gap between the No. 1 player and the 20th or 30th player is narrowing, why is it so important that Tiger, one player, plays well? HUNTER MAHAN: He, I mean‑‑ you see, he creates a buzz like none other. Because he has 14 majors and 80 wins worldwide. I mean, you know, Rory has had a pretty phenomonal career up to this point. When Tiger was 22, I don't know how many majors or tournaments he won, but he was far superior than Rory, which is crazy to think because Rory has been pretty awesome so far. You know, he moves the needle like no one in the game. I mean, just when he's there and when he's not there, there's a difference, there just is. He was the first; he was the first to kind of show that emotion on the course and to hit amazing shots and to say, you know, I'm out here to win tournaments and I'm not out here to make Top 10s and have a good living. I want to do incredible things and I want to win more majors than Jack. He set it out there and I'm sure, everybody was like, you're crazy for, that none is ever going to beat Jack's record. He's had a pretty good career so far, and he's got a lot more work to do but he just, you know, he moves the needle more than anyone else. Q. If you had turned on the TV Sunday and Tiger had just been having a middling round, what would you have done? Would you have kept watching? HUNTER MAHAN: No, I would have turned it off. (Laughter). Q. Even with Rory being No. 1? HUNTER MAHAN: I would have turned it on SportsCenter. They would have told me what happened. (Laughter) I don't need to watch it. I mean, he's No. 1‑‑ but this week, if he doesn't play great, Luke plays great, I don't know, maybe Luke will go back to one. I don't know. I know how good Rory is; I played him the week before, so I don't need to ‑‑ if he wins, he wins. Looking at the leaderboard, I was like, well, he's the best player there for sure, so I assumed he was going to win. You know, when great players do stuff is when they are supposed to; when you saw that leaderboard with Rory, you're like well, if he's going to be No. 1, he should win, and he did. You know, that's saying something for sure. Q. The tendency that you said you have of getting down on yourself, when did you start turning that around? HUNTER MAHAN: I don't know. I'm still trying to turn it around. (Laughter). It's a process. Because golf, it's personal to me probably more than it should be, because I put so much into it. I've done it since it was nine years old. It's like, you know, what I feel like I should have gotten a good player or got a good bounce or that putter should have lipped in or something like that. It not that way; golf is not out to get me. I don't have bad luck. You know, it just is what it is. I'm trying to just, you know, play golf and enjoy it, try to get as good as I can and leave it at the course and just have fun with it. It's hard to do sometimes, because when your game feels so close to excellence, I felt like I was really close the first few weeks. I felt I was hitting it great. Just couldn't get any putts to fall. I was just kind of‑‑ almost my results for myself and my standards for myself are too high. I wasn't looking at the good stuff I was doing. So I took kind of a step back at the Match Play and realized you know, I'm playing great right now and I just have to let things happen and got on a great run right there and you know, when you let the game kind of unfold for itself, great things can happen. Q. Is there somebody that you work with to try and make sure that you look at the positive and not the negative? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, I work with a guy, Jim Murphy, who just has a very positive energy. It's almost odd. He's unlike any guy I've talked to, just the way he looks at life and stuff. He's just different than most people I've talked to. Q. When did that relationship start? HUNTER MAHAN: I guess January. Q. This year? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah. Q. Is he a Dallas guy? HUNTER MAHAN: No, he's Vancouver‑‑ (pausing) ‑‑ Canada. (Laughter) Canadian. I like Canadians for some reason, I don't know why. Surrounded by them. Q. You mentioned the buzz that Tiger brings to the course and Rory seems to be, judging from the last few weeks, bringing something similar; how much do players like playing with that buzz around the course? How much do you like being in a group with those guys? I mean, is it good, distracting or not or how much do you‑‑ HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, I think guys, we are used to it now with Tiger, especially. Rory definitely creates a buzz, no doubt about it. I don't think it's up to Tiger's level. But you know, like any player, if Kobe Bryant goes to Europe and play, people are going to go flock and watch him play because it's special when he plays and Rory is the same way. He comes to the United States, people are going to come out and watch him play, because he still plays a lot in Europe. But I think we are used to‑‑ I think when Tiger came around, seeing all the cameras and people, some people were shellshocked. I would be, too. It was so different and so different from what guys were probably used to when they were playing out here. I think guys are used to it now. I don't think it really bothers anybody anymore. You just have to accept all that, the cameras and people moving around, and just play golf. I don't think it bothers people anymore, but I'm sure at first, when Tiger came out in the mid 90s, it was just chaos for everybody. Q. I have a couple for you. You were talking about beating yourself up. How much of that was a product of your life being probably 99.9 percent golf before you got married and the aftermath when you've got other distractions and other interests and things like that? Seems like you were kind of very, very maybe one‑dimensional in your life, maybe two years ago where it was all about golf and not much else, fair to say? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, I think it was a lot deeper than that, as a kid and everything, it started from there. I think it had to do a lot with maturity, as well. When you get older, you have‑‑ it's just weird how your interests change as you get older. Things you start maybe noticing a little bit more and just enjoying things a little bit more. You realize there's a lot more to life than just golf and your result on Thursday or the round you shot on Friday; it's like, boy, that just doesn't make sense if that's my happiness whether I make this 10‑footer or not. But it's true. It happens for a lot of guys. You just kind of get stuck into, well, I'm going to be happy if I play good and I'll be upset if I play bad. It's too much pressure. It's too hard to play like that; to live like that or play golf like that. My wife has definitely helped me a lot. She's always happy no matter what; no matter what I shoot or how I play or what's going on. You know, she makes life easy for me, which is a blessing, because it can definitely be‑‑ adding a new person to it can be difficult, a lot of change but it's been pretty seamless and pretty easy. Q. I just wanted to ask you a Masters question about Phil and Tiger since you play with both of those guys a lot as it relates to Augusta. It seems like when those guys show up there, Phil could have missed five cuts in five tournaments, and Tiger showed up there and finished fourth when he was coming off with all of his personal issues that one year. What is it about them or their game or that golf course or whatever magic or MoJo and unique skill‑set that they have that brings out their best in that venue every year. HUNTER MAHAN: I think they know it. Their knowledge for the course is ridiculously high. They know all the nooks and crannies and where all the pins are and they know where to miss the ball; they just know. They just know how to play that golf course. And a good thing is you don't have to drive it great, which works well for both of them, even though Tiger is No. 1 in total driving this year, and that is pretty crazy to think. But like I said, they don't have to‑‑ to play that course, they don't have to hit it great off the tee, they don't have to hit a bunch of irons. They just have to take advantage of the par 5s which they are both extremely good at and they both have good short games where they can get around there and shoot 4‑under, just because they can tear up the par 5s, because they hit it so long. But I think there's a comfort level for both of them. Any player‑‑ you look at any player's history, when they go to a course, and no matter what, just because of their comfort, the first tee, they are just comfortable and they just know they are going to play well. It's a confidence factor and when you know all of the bounces and you know all of the breaks on the greens, it just seems no matter how I hit it I'll still get it on the green somewhere and I'll probably still make the putt. Both super talented guys that have a lot of knowledge about that place. Pretty tough‑‑ if you beat both those guys that week, you are probably going to win that tournament that week or pretty close. Q. I know your schedule has been crazy this year but watching The Honda Classic round unfold, was there a part of you thinking, gosh, I would have liked to have been in there and been in the mix in that, or were you able to just sit back and enjoy it without your inner competitor getting involved? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, I really was happy to be home. I really had no inkling of going or anything like that. PGA TOUR season is a crazy season, especially with that trip to Qatar, made the West Coast a little bit longer. But it was a worthwhile trip. I love the West Coast so much, it's hard to turn down any of those events to add another in Florida. Q. I'd like to ask you about a couple holes on the back side, 13th is the longest par 3 of the golf course; can you just give me your strategy, how you play that hole, what are you looking to do there? HUNTER MAHAN: It's all kind of wind and pin dependent on where if they want to hit it‑‑ if short is better than long or long is better than short. You'd much rather be, you know, for a back pin, for example, today it's very downwind. You'd rather hit it long and kind of chip back into the wind than kind of chip uphill and then downhill and downwind. I mean, like I said, when it gets windy like this, you have to think about where you want to miss the ball or be chipping from or putting from and most of the time you'd rather be chipping into the wind than downwind, because the greens are in good shape and with the grain everything and on them, you know, putting downwind is extremely slick. So anywhere on the green is good. That's kind of the No. 1 goal and from there you just have to play percentages. Q. 15, the match shorter par 3, set up as a birdie hole, does that get you rolling going into the final stretch there? HUNTER MAHAN: Yeah, it's 9‑iron, 8‑iron, 7‑iron, depending on the wind. Yeah, nothing to it really. Hit it on the green and you're going to have probably a pretty good putt for birdie. You just have to watch the wind there from that tee. You kind of get enclosed so you don't really feel the wind as much so it's probably blowing a lot more by the green than it is the tee so you just have to pay attention to that and kind of adjust accordingly. LAURA HILL: Hunter, thanks so much and good luck this week. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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