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INSPERITY CHAMPIONSHIP PRESENTED BY UNITED HEALTHCAREMay 3, 2012Michael AllenTHE WOODLANDS, TEXAS PHIL STAMBAUGH: We welcome the hottest player on the Champions Tour, Michael Allen. You have 850 Charles Schwab Cup points and you're the leader in that. I know that's one of your goals this year. But talk about coming into Houston and going for a third straight win, which was last done by Fred Couples in 2010 on this tour. Thoughts on coming back to a place you know pretty well. MICHAEL ALLEN: Backing up the first win, it was a team event, so it helped the confidence a little bit. You know, this week, I'm back on my own and it's not an insurance tournament, so I'm a little bummed. It's a tournament that I'm just trying to really get my feet back and keep my feet on the ground and just get rolling and get back to playing. It's interesting having a little bit more media people hearing about what I do a little bit. So I'm just trying to put that aside and looking forward to tomorrow, getting back to the golf course and just get back to playing golf, and I've been doing well and enjoying it a lot. I love playing out here. This is a wonderful golf course, so I look forward to the challenges out there, and hopefully I can keep my mind on that and I should be able to fair pretty well I hope. PHIL STAMBAUGH: Do you think it will play different at all from when we had it here in the fall? MICHAEL ALLEN: The greens look like they have a little more grass on them. Back then they were a little bit drier and not quite as much‑‑ I don't know if they overseed here, they probably don't. The course looks phenomenal. I have not seen the course in better shape really. The fairways are perfect and the greens are beautiful. Looking forward to a great week here. Q. Just talk about the changes made that have led to your success here recently. MICHAEL ALLEN: I think the changes were made quite some time ago. I'm getting better at them. We always have little swing things we're always working on to make my swing better and more consistent. That really has not changed that much. I think‑‑ it's kind of weird. Since I won, it has not been this thinglike when I won the Scottish Open this bolt of lightning hit me. I didn't know really what ‑‑ it was amazing euphoria, I couldn't even sleep that night. But like this has been something that I've been working for for quite a while. And I've been very close to for quite a while. So it been nice to finally beat that last guy or two that I've been losing to every time out here, but it's been kind of interesting. It has not been that euphoric state. It's been a really nice thing, and now that I'm out here, I get a little more attention. Overall it's something that I think has been in the process for quite a while, and maybe now I've eliminated a few bogeys, or I'm going to make a couple more putts here and there and not miss a couple of the short ones that I usually miss periodically; we all do. Maybe that's the change. I don't really know what it is to be honest with you. While obviously I've won the last few weeks, but I guess maybe once you, you get a little more comfortable doing it. To me I've just been out really having a great time doing what I've been working on for quite some time. Q. The stories that have come out recently said that you almost quit the game; does that seem like a long time ago? MICHAEL ALLEN: Yeah, it does. It seems like light years away now. It was so long ago. I went and worked at Winged Footand ‑‑ yeah, it was just terrible. I was always at TOUR School every year, first six, seven years on TOUR here. I was getting the best information I could at the time. You know, I don't think it was great information at the time. I wish I had this now, but that's knowledge, and you're just doing the best you can. Every kid out there on the PGA TOUR is doing the best they can to try to be the best player they can. As you get older, I guess you learn a little more, and so it's kind of one of those things that happen in life that made me better. If I had not really been so bad and quit, you know, tried to do other things, I wouldn't have had the appreciation for what I do do well. When I got back I was able to work harder and differently and make it count better, so I became a better player, which I never really did at that point. Q. Talk about what it would mean to win the third straight here. MICHAEL ALLEN: God, it's hard to put those kind of things into words. I don't really know. You know, I feel like I'm playing good. I don't feel it's something that far‑fetched. If I play well this week, I should be in contention. I should have a chance. You know, once you get a little confidence, too, you start feeling how you can win and maybe it's a little easier to. But I realize the chances are slim, but I'm going to go out and get a good practice in this afternoon and try to be as ready as I can and hopefully at the end of the week I can answer that question for you a little better. Q. You've played lots of good golf over an extended period of time, and now that you're winning, have you thought about what the difference is between winning and not winning? MICHAEL ALLEN: Yeah, I do think a lot. I don't get very far (chuckling). You know, the one thing I would say is I really‑‑ I saw a stat last year that kind of‑‑ I had never seen a stat like that before that was that pertinent. And the No. 1 guy on the PGA TOUR last year was the No. 1 in least bogeys. No.2, Webb Simpson was No.2 in least bogeys. Eight, if not ten guys from the PGA TOUR were least bogeys on the PGA TOUR. So that stat in itself said to me a lot that it's not, oh, the guy that's the best‑ball striker or the best chipper; and that it was the guy that's the most consistent player. He did everything very well and never really got himself in trouble. We all go out there and have times where we are not playing as well and you keep making pars; when you're playing well, not throw that bogey or double‑bogey in there, and those are things that always sidetrack. I think that's the one thing that I've done very well in the last month, even the tournament at Mississippi where I finished second, I had one bogey the whole week and that was actually the easiest hole, I hit one left in the water, downwind, easy par 5, so it was like a double. My birdies are counting right now and I think that's probably the biggest difference. Q. Talk about one of your goals this year was to qualify to play in the U.S. Open, since you were very close to the folks in the Olympic Club; talk about that. MICHAEL ALLEN: Yeah, I'm getting very nervous about that already to be honest. It is something that now that I'm accomplishing some of these goals, certainly a long ways away because we have the biggest part of our season coming up with majors out here. I feel that this is the most important part of the year for us. You know, playing in The Open means a great deal to me. When I quit‑‑ I was going to work after school at Morgan Stanley, and that was when my father came back and said, we've got the U.S. Open at Olympic Club. He said, I can get you back to Morgan Stanley, why don't you go play. So I played a number of Opens but I never played in one in Pebble Beach or Olympic Club, which is kind of why I started. Yeah, that means a great deal to me. I would love to play Des Moines, but I feel it's important for meto get my best chance to get in the tournament. If I go up there and get ready for Lake Merced, of course I know that I feel if I play very well, I can do this. That's kind of my‑‑ that's what I've always wanted to do in golf. I've always wanted to play in the U.S. Open there. And I think it's going to be a wonderful Open. I've been up there at the course and it's just fantastic. So I think it's going to be a phenomenal week and I would just love to be a small part of it. Q. What does it mean to have Nicklaus, Player, Palmer, Trevino play here in the Greats of Golf here on Saturday? MICHAEL ALLEN: To me it's like winning the Legends. It's the oldest tournament out here, and to have these great names and people that made our game popular, I would love to go out and watch and hopefully I'll have the opportunity to do it. I've loved watching those guys since I was a kid and got an autograph from Arnold Palmer. One of the only autographs I got in my life at the '66 Open at Olympic Club. Jack is an icon. And to watch Lee Trevino hit shots is just one of the great things in golf. Watching him spin the ball right or left and what a great personality. And Gary Player is one of the nicest men I've ever met in the game. I've never met any man who has represented the game better, and really all four of them, they are icons of the game and it's a great honor to have these people here. Give Gary a little tap on the shoulder and say, hey, you've got a chance. Q. The effect of the galleries following the groups in the exhibition, what effect do you think that will have on the competition? MICHAEL ALLEN: I can say where all of the galleries are going to be is around those guys (laughing). As it should. Those are the icons of the game and people love to watch them play. We are lucky to be able to come out here and play for a living, especially out here where there's a second opportunity in life. So I hope I can be a part of the gallery. PHIL STAMBAUGH: Michael, thank you very much and good luck this week. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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