BOB HOPE CHRYSLER CLASSIC

January 16, 2002

Jay Haas

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: Good round today. 9-under par, 63 for Jay Haas. Great round. Why don't you begin with the conditions there at Tamarisk and how you played.

JAY HAAS: All right. Well, as always here, Tamarisk, the course, was in fabulous shape. The greens are beautiful like they are at every other golf course in the desert, it seems like. And it was kind of a magical day for me on the greens. I putted about as well as I've ever putted before. You really need to putt well to shoot low anywhere, but it certainly helps out here because you're usually getting birdie putts, you're usually hitting a lot of greens. And I was on fire on the greens today.

Like I said, the greens are perfect here, and you get them on line, and they seem to go in. I had a few of them on line today, so I made 10 birdies -- actually missed one of my easiest putts today, I had about a 6-footer for par on No. 6, it was my 15th hole. And I kind of gagged that one a little bit. But overall I putted beautifully today, and that was the key to it.

Started on the back 9, and birdied No. 12 from just off the fringe, probably 18 feet, I guess. I hit a sand wedge from the left rough and just rolled off the edge of the green and made that for birdie. At 13 -- I -- I guess you don't want to do that, want to go from 1?

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: You're fine. That's fine.

JAY HAAS: Okay. 13, I hit a 7-iron to about a foot and made that.

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: 17?

JAY HAAS: That was 13, I'm sorry.

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: Your next birdie came on 17.

JAY HAAS: 17, yes. 17, I hit a 9-iron to 12 feet and made it.

18, I hit a 3-wood about 50 feet from the hole, I guess, and 2-putted.

1, I hit just short of the green, and pitched up to about two feet, made that for birdie.

3, I was in the fairway bunker and hit a 5-iron out to 18 feet and made that.

6, I missed the green just to the right -- excuse me, not 6, 4, I missed the green with a 3-iron, second shot just off to the right and pitched to about 12 feet and made that for birdie.

5, I hit a 5-iron to maybe 25 feet, made that for birdie.

6, I hit what I thought was a pretty good 8-iron shot, second shot, and it came up just short on the fringe, and didn't hit a great chip, five or six feet, and hit an easy putt and missed it, it broke off on me. I turned around and hit a sand wedge to about 20 feet on 7 and made that.

And No. 9 was the cap. I hit what I thought was a decent shot and it came up short of this hump, and I -- probably 40 feet up over a hump and down, and made it right in the middle. It would have probably gone six inches by if it didn't go in. It was a perfect putt, right in the center. As you can see, with all the footage there on the greens, it was pretty unbelievable for me on putting.

Q. Are you a better golfer now than when you won this event 14 years ago?

JAY HAAS: I wouldn't say that. I think that the ball goes farther now, and I'm hitting less club into a lot of these greens. But I'd be hard pressed to think that I'm better now than I was in my physical prime, I guess. I'm 48 years old now, and I'm going to have days like this now, but consistently I don't know if I can keep that up.

When guys get on the Senior Tour, and they claim to be playing as good as they've ever played before -- but I don't know if I'll ever say that. I think maybe in competition, it gets maybe not as keen as it gets out here, maybe it makes you think that you're playing better.

I don't know, golf is a funny game. It's not about who's the strongest or fastest or youngest or oldest, or anything like that. It's just about getting the ball in the hole. And occasionally I can do that still.

Q. Jay, it sounds like you've thought a little bit about the Senior Tour. At 48 are you aiming towards that now or are you thinking about still coming out here?

JAY HAAS: I still have some goals out here that I think I can accomplish if I play very well. At the end of 2000, I was disappointed. I had my worst year of my career, and had some second thoughts, and if this was it. And starting in about April or May of this past year, I played consistently for the rest of the year, played very well. I missed a couple cuts, but I was in almost every tournament playing some good rounds. And that's kind of -- the start of this year is kind of a carry-over of that.

I played pretty well last week. I had a bad third round, but I've been hitting the ball pretty well, consistently, and I feel like I still have some goals I can accomplish out here. Obviously in two years I'll be happy if I can play well on the Senior Tour, but I'm not wishing away the two years, I'm still excited about playing a day like today. This is kind of why I'm still playing.

Q. What do you remember about '88 and winning this tournament?

JAY HAAS: Yeah, I do remember. I started at Indian Wells, and had a day like today. I putted very well and I shot 63 and just kind of hung in there the whole week. But I remember the last day shooting 71 and winning the tournament, leading and shooting 71 and winning. Now, if you shoot 671, leading the last day, you might finish about 15th. The scores are so low.

But I remember the same guy caddied for me, Billy Harmon, I'm staying with him this week, he's kind of my teacher and he's on the sack again this year. So we had a ball and had fun. It was a little bit like old times today.

Q. Jay, you mentioned shooting 71 and not -- dropping 15 places nowadays. What are a couple of factors do you think makes these scores so low, not only this week, but on the Tour in general now. Why are the players so much better now than 10 or 12 years ago?

JAY HAAS: I really hesitate to say that the players are better now. I think there are more good players, but I don't know if they're any better. I think if you go down the list of players 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, there was a nucleus of players that were unbelievably great players. I just think there's more really good players now. And you cannot ever back up out here, especially at this tournament. You have to shoot 30-something-under, it's been proven now the last couple of years. And these barriers are continuing to be broken, and the mentality of the player today I think is "Go for broke." "Shoot at the flag."

And 20 years ago it was, "Get in position and maybe we can shoot a good round the last day and the guys will kind of back up a little bit."

But nobody ever seems to back up anymore. You never see a tournament given away almost. Everybody shoots birdies all the way to the finish, especially at this golf tournament. You cannot -- unless you've got a 3- or 4-shot lead with three to go, you better keep birdieing until you finish.

Q. When you're putting like you were today, does it -- when you line up the putt like the 40-footer to go over the hump, are you thinking positively?

JAY HAAS: I was upset with myself for leaving myself this putt. I misjudged the wind, I hit a 7-iron, instead of a 6. I was disappointed that I was going to now have to work for par. And I really felt like if I could get a decent putt out of it, I was going to make it.

I felt comfortable that I was going to hit a good putt, but from that distance, I'm just trying to flow it up there and try to get it within three feet and get par and get out of there, and be happy with 8-under. I don't care if you're 8-under par or even-par, you try to basically 2-putt from that distance.

Again, I felt comfortable over it, but certainly didn't think I was going to make it.

Q. With your putting the last few years, was that one of the things that let you down or has that been one of the strengths?

JAY HAAS: Starting in April of last year, the end of April I spent some time with Stan Utley, he won the Chattanooga Tournament out here a long time ago, and he's playing some BUY.COM events. He played the Tour, I don't know, 8, 10, 12 years, and he gave me some putting tips. And I really should not overlook his advice. He turned me around, really, at that stage.

I played very average and putted poorly the first three months of the year last year, and he gave me some tips and ideas to work on, and it's really -- it's been night and day, been just a total transformation on my putting. My putting stats from last year were the best since, say, '94, '95, when I was on the Ryder Cup team. You would think at 48 I would be getting -- becoming a worse putter. But I'm really confident now. I've putted consistently well for the last seven or eight months, and I have a system that Stan is helping me with. And I believe in that and I think that's part of it.

When you go out to the golf course, if you stick with one idea and one thought process it makes it that much easier.

Q. What is the principle of the golf -- the putting thing that Stan worked with you on?

JAY HAAS: Basically instead of keeping the blade square to the target line the whole way, I'm keeping the blade square to an arc, kind of coming in on the backswing and in on the follow through, as opposed to back straight, straight through. It's taken a lot of the hands out of my stroke, and it's allowed me to roll the ball better, not cut quite so much. And I was cutting a lot, miss-hitting a lot of putts. And there's more to it than that, but basically I'm trying to putt on an arc now instead of on a straight line.

Anymore, I'd have to kill anybody in the room there (laughter.)

JOAN vT ALEXANDER: Thank you very much, Jay, and play well the rest of the week.

End of FastScripts....