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SONY OPEN IN HAWAII

January 11, 2019

Stewart Cink

Honolulu, Hawaii

Q. Showing a fashion trend here. Showing the sun screen this week.
STEWART CINK: More of a lack of fashion. I did have some skin cancer issues on my nose last year, and when we had a little bit of a break I did a chemotherapy cream, topical kind of thing. I'm just really sensitive to the sun right now. So you have to throw fashion out the window sometimes and look like your protecting yourself.

Q. That's important for spectators, too. Replying. How about replying birdies today. You did it nine times.
STEWART CINK: Yeah, it was a great day out there. Really all facets of the game were firing. Drove it well and hit a lot of good irons. Rolled in a lot of putts from the range that really makes a difference in your score, which is like, say, ten to 20 feet. Had a lot of putts like that and made a lot today.

That's kind of a hallmark of my game over my whole career, is I do have a lot of putts in that range because usually I'm one of the better ball-strikers. When you see them going in the game feels a little bit easy. Felt a little too easy on the second shot on 18. I kind of fell asleep and hit a poor one and cost me a shot.

Q. Talk overall about your game feels this week and playing this golf course.
STEWART CINK: I love coming back to Sony and Waialae every year. It's a fun place to start the year for me. Got narrow fairways, smaller targets, and it feels like a good way to whip yourself into competitive shape really fast.

So I choose to play here every year; have played here a lot of times. As far as this year, I've actually been playing pretty good golf a lot over the off-season. None of it counted except for the father-son.

This is a nice way to sort get back into playing golf when I'm writing the score down and seeing the same things happening I've been seeing at home. I've been pleased with my game and been working hard on it and trying to make some incremental improvements here.

Q. Nine birdies; ties career low round on the PGA TOUR. Proper application of sunblock, which is smart. Inspiring others. What was so in sync for you out there?
STEWART CINK: I think the key to today's round was that I gave myself a lot of the opportunities and that I converted a lot them. Obviously when you shoot a low score you've done a lot of that, but really I put the ball inside 20 feet quite a few times today. I didn't really have any kick-ins, but I made a lot of putts in the 10- to 20-foot range, and even a couple from outside that that were bonuses.

It was kind of textbook for what you have to do to shoot a low score like that.

Q. Changed manufacturers heading into 2019. Coming off a really solid 2018. How optimistic and excited are you about this year?
STEWART CINK: I am really excited. There are a lot of reasons to be excited. First of all, I'm 45 years old and still playing on the PGA TOUR. That's exciting to me. I'm having fun playing out here and continuing to test myself.

I did change manufacturers, although I've been playing Ping equipment since May pretty much through the whole bag. Only thing I had to get into was the putter. It's nice to be welcomed onto the new team out here. I love the guys at Ping. It's a good company and the equipment is working great.

Just been exciting for the last few months to get sort of a handle on where my game was at the end of last year and get ready for this new calendar season to start.

Q. Excellent day. Get some comments on your play.
STEWART CINK: Thank you. Yeah, it was a really good day throughout the whole bag. Hit one really poor shot out there today, and that was that second shot on 18. It was almost too easy of a shot and went to sleep and hit a poor one and put myself in a bad spot.

All in all, really pleased today. Saw the ball leaving out the window where I wanted to on my full shots, and tracking on the line on the greens. The ball went in the hole a lot today.

Q. There was a 59 here just a few years ago. Did that ever cross your mind?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, it kind of did when I was behind the ball on my second shot at 18. I think if I holed that shot out it would've been 59, so I thought about that. Probably took me out of my normal rhythm a little bit maybe. That's just not what you think of on your normal shots. It's a good chance to practice there. Hopefully I'll be there again sometime and I can learn from it.

Q. What would Mo Pickens say to you about getting out of your routine there?
STEWART CINK: I don't know. He would probably fire me. (Laughter.)

Q. And yet, we don't want to dwell on that part. Let's talk about the good things that went on. A lot of good shots.
STEWART CINK: A lot of good shots. You know, when I play at the PNC Father-Son I play really well there. I don't know what it is about that place. Maybe just I'm playing with my son, one or the other, or the course or whatever, but I just always just play really well.

I always thought if I can just translate that kind of golf into stroke play it would be really fun to see what the scorecard reflected. Today was a day like that where I just felt really confident on the tee balls and the iron shots, the math, calculating the type of shot I was going to hit, just seemed to clicked really well. Very rarely today did I have a shot I was in doubt on at all.

Then putting, I can read these greens fairly well most of the time. I'm very comfortable on this grass. Today I started the ball where I wanted to and went in the hole from longer ranges.

Q. You talked about switching putters. Did you switch anything else in the off-season as far as routine?
STEWART CINK: No. Nothing. New golf bag. That's about it. I got a new putter and I've been playing with Ping stuff for a while and this year we just made it official. I'm part of their staff now. But switching to the putter, they've got good putters. Wasn't a big deal at all.

Q. No swing adjustments?
STEWART CINK: No. Nothing. I've been working on the same stuff in my swing probably for like five straight years now. It just doesn't change. I know what works well for me. If I can just do it, it works well. When I don't do it, it doesn't work well.

Q. That makes sense.
STEWART CINK: Yeah. I mean, I know it sounds kind of like stupid is as stupid does, but I like to find things in golf that I can't do too much of a certain move or swing thought or position or whatever that I can't overdo. That way I can just go off it more and more and try to maximize it. And the more the pressure gets on, the more the wind is blowing, the more you got any kind of variables out there, just do more of it. You can't overdo it.

I found a couple of those things that I can do like that.

Q. What are they?
STEWART CINK: Why would I say?

Q. I don't know, because I'm asking.
STEWART CINK: You have to ask my coach, because I am not a teacher.

Q. Who is your coach?
STEWART CINK: Mike Lipnick.

For me, since I'm tall, it's a spine angle thing. Most of us tall people, on the down swing we kind of back out of the shot a little bit. For me, the more I can feel like I'm staying in it and in fact get my head down and out more, then that's usually a good thing for my golf ball.

Q. Best two rounds since when?
STEWART CINK: Excuse me?

Q. Your best two rounds since when?
STEWART CINK: I'm not sure I understand.

Q. When is the last time you played two good rounds like that?
STEWART CINK: Oh. Well, PGA. Before that, Hartford, Memphis. Today was a really good round. Yesterday was a pretty lackluster round. Shot 2-Under with two birdies, both on par-5s.

It was solid day, but not very spectacular. Today was a little bit more exciting.

Q. Been a few years since going to the Masters. Have you planned anything on what you're doing between now and April? Are you going to go for a practice round?
STEWART CINK: I've already been for a practice round once. My caddie, Taylor Ford, has never been there. I went in November, early November. It was before St. Simons, before RSM.

Taylor had never been there before and I didn't want him to show up Monday of the Masters having never been there and putting on a bib. It's the kind of place that can overwhelm you quite a bit, so we're going to plan to go back a few more times.

In a way, I'm kind of showing him the way around the course. Usually the caddie is helping the player, but in my I'm helping my caddie get used to being there so he's not completely floored by it when he gets there on Masters Monday.

Q. Did he play or did you just...
STEWART CINK: No. I can't take a guest to play. I can take a guest to not play.

Q. Did you make him carry the bag?
STEWART CINK: He can't.

Q. Just walks?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, just walks. Yeah, you have to have a club caddie. You don't have to play with a member or anything.

Q. Oh, really?
STEWART CINK: I did play nine holes with a member, but you don't have to.

Q. If you won if before maybe it's different.
STEWART CINK: I don't think so. I don't think so. I think maybe if -- Zach told me that if you win you're allowed to bring a guest one day a year, and that's the Sunday before the Masters.

Maybe you can bring three guests, but...

Q. How was it?
STEWART CINK: Totally enjoyed it. Yeah, the fairways were about that tall and they had been watered for about three straight weeks; played very long. Hitting shots from around the greens was almost pointless. Greens were running about maybe nine and a half.

Q. Good day for Taylor.
STEWART CINK: Yeah, because he got to see where to go, where the range is, the caddie hut, where the first tee is, get his orientation down. We'll go back, but we don't have any plans.

Q. After what you went through last year personally with your wife, do you have a different perspective coming out here now?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, I do. I think anybody would have a different perspective. We're still going through it. My wife is not out of the woods, but she's doing great.

But, yeah, definitely I wake up a little bit different every day now knowing what we been through and how it felt. Those memories will never go away. So it does give me quite a different perspective out here on the golf course knowing that golf -- it's really important, but it's not life or death.

I think it took the need factor out of golf a little bit, which has been help for me for my mindset. When you're playing out here because you need to play well, it's not really a healthy way for most of us to perform.

Q. She's in remission now?
STEWART CINK: Yeah, she's in remission.

Q. This has been a three-year battle?
STEWART CINK: It's been almost three years.

Q. When did you find out you got a little something?
STEWART CINK: I had a little something cut off last year, about ten months ago. Just a little place here that was acting funny. Talked to my dermatologist about it and he biopsied it, and sure enough, it had to come out.

The step after the surgery part was this chemotherapy topical cream that you had to put on all your exposed area. You put it on and use it for two weeks. Any areas that have pre-cancerous cells, it just kills them and your skin lights up and you can see all the scales and everything still trying to shed off.

It's about 10% of what it was week and a half ago, bit it's super sensitive to sun right now. I got to keep it covered up. I don't care what it looks like for the time being.

Q. What your wide has gone through, would you say that has been an inspiration to you?
STEWART CINK: It has, yeah. It inspired me when she was in chemo, when I saw her when she was going through the very beginning of her discovery of what she was fighting what she had, I just saw her like really dig deep for something inside that a lot of people would never discover they had inside of them without something like that.

I just kind of saw her do it and thought, Well, if she can dig down like that, then maybe I can dig down a little bit deeper and figure out a little bit more about what I'm doing in golf and make these traveling weeks count a little bit more.

I'm 45. At the time I was 43. The calendar anymore doesn't really tell you that you have to stop being a really competitive golfer. I have plenty of power and I know what it takes to compete and be successful out here.

And so I had to look myself in the mirror, but it inspired me to dig deeper and fight a little bit differently. It had a pretty big impact on my game.

Q. From your perspective, Charles Howell said something the other day that was interesting. He said when he came out here all the really good players were older. Now when you come out here all the really good players are younger. Do you think that's true?
STEWART CINK: Yeah. Well, if you look back at the roster, me and Tiger came out -- our rookie years by definition weren't the same year, because we were back-to-back Rookies of the Year, but we really came out in the same year. He played more tournaments than I did the first year and qualified as a rookie and had two wins.

Q. That was about '97?
STEWART CINK: Yeah. So really we started playing full time the same year. For the first three years he was the only younger player than me. First three years. That put me at 23, 24, 25. There was no younger player besides Tiger Woods than me my first three years.

Q. (No microphone.)
STEWART CINK: Yeah. How many players on the TOUR now 25 and under now? 40? So it has changed. The average has changed a little bit, but really players that are competing, they play a lot more, a lot better against better competition when they're younger now, and they're just more seasoned when they come out here. There is no break-in period anymore like there used to be because you don't need to learn how to -- you just had to almost reinvent the wheel and learn how to play PGA TOUR style golf. Now you just come out here guns blazing.

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