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KITCHENAID SENIOR PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

May 21, 2019

Jeff Sluman

Rochester, New York

JOHN DEVER: Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us here at 2019 KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship. I'm happy to be joined by 1988 PGA champion Jeff Sluman, who is also a Rochester native. So, Jeff, welcome home.

JEFF SLUMAN: Thank you.

JOHN DEVER: I'm guessing that this may have been a week that's been on your calendar for quite a while, and I'm curious what it's like for Jeff Sluman to play in a major championship at Oak Hill Country Club.

JEFF SLUMAN: Well, first of all, I'd like to thank KitchenAid and every other entity that's come here to help this tournament and sponsor it. Rochester supports their professional golf really like no other city that I've seen. People are going to come out. It's going to be a great week.

As I saw in '89, I played in 2003, and 2008 in the Senior PGA Championship and now here. So having four home games in my lifetime for four majors has been amazing, amazing feeling. In '89 I missed the cut by a shot; 2003, I don't think I fared very well, either. But in 2008, I was able to play very well finally here at Oak Hill and had a good chance going into the last day. Jay Haas played great golf to win. But it was truly one of the great, if not -- probably my greatest golf experience was at -- my greatest golf accomplishment would have been winning the PGA in '88. So to play well in front of your hometown folks and friends was just the best feeling in the world. So hopefully I can have some good memories of that and play well this week.

JOHN DEVER: Everyone one here is, of course, focused on this week and this championship, but you're already kind of working on Oak Hill's future, which is going to look like its past. What changes might we see? If you could forecast some of the changes to the golf course that are about to take place later this year that should be in place for the 2023 PGA Championship.

JEFF SLUMAN: (Laughing) They'd better be in place for 2023.

There's going to be three new golf holes out on the golf course. The 5th hole will now be to the right of the 4th hole, and the area when you drive in the entrance at Oak Hill will be cleared out of the trees there. There's a lot of service vehicles in there now. So it will be a par-3 of maybe 175 to 180 yards, raised up. We've got pictures of what Ross actually did on this property a long time ago.

It's almost hard to believe, but the par-3 on that side was near the 7th tee, which is -- you kind of walked across the creek after finishing the 5th hole and then hit back over. So we've got pictures of that. And we're going to make it very, very similar to that. Then you'll go over to the now 6th hole and restore that to its original basic glory.

But we're going to be able to add probably 60 yards on to the original. I think the original 5th hole played at 440 yards, and now it will be 510, which seems like a lot, but you watch these guys play now, it's really not that much for a lot of them certainly. But this hole will be very, very challenging with the creek off the tee. You'll have a little bit of run-up area, because the green will be kind of where the 6th green is now. So it will face obviously the 5th or the fairway as we know it now. But that's where we're going to get the distance from. So it will be the back of 5 tee to the 6th green now.

And we'll rework the green per Ross's notes and the creek will be to the left and kind of scoot out over the backside of that green. So it's going to be a very, very challenging hole on anybody's scale of golf.

The other major change will be the 15th hole will be -- if you want to look up on your iPad or whatever, if you kind of take a look at the 3rd hole from Wannamoisett Country Club in Rhode Island, we're going to put a hole in like that. The pond will be filled in.

And we're going to take this beautiful -- well, the first time I played in Wannamoisett, I was maybe 18 or 19 in the Northeastern Amateur, and I got to this hole, and it was only a wedge, and I immediately said, this is an incredibly difficult shot for just having a wedge or a sand wedge even; 9-iron at the most in your hand.

So we're going to incorporate that look and that feel into the new 15th hole. It will be great for the spectators because they'll feel like they're sitting right on top of the play, right off the edge of that green.

We're going to drop the 15th tee about six feet, which will make anybody hitting over 14, it'll be a much more difficult angle coming up to chip back there. But that hole will still be 175 yards, totally different look. So put Wannamoisett in and look at images, and that's what it's going to look like.

JOHN DEVER: Thanks for the rundown on that. Let's hit the floor for some questions.

Q. Thinking back to '89, your first major here, and I think you were coming off the surgery, your appendix, and being home, you had won in '88, just the way you felt then as a golfer in your career to now, coming home with all you've accomplished and now coming back as a senior, what is the biggest difference when you look back at those two things?
JEFF SLUMAN: I'd say about 300 pounds, first of all. I literally was 126 pounds after the surgery. So I probably shouldn't have even played that week, but there was no way, short of kidnapping me, I wasn't going play. It was a great week. I missed the cut by a shot, which in retrospect probably was a pretty good thing.

But playing with Jack and Lee, the two previous major winners here that week was something very special for me that I'll never forget.

The difference between now and then, even though I had won a major at that point, I wasn't -- and I never had been or for a long time overly confident of my ability to play golf. And I guess you could say it was the impostor syndrome. I always every year said, I've got to get better, I've got to work on different things, my game's got to improve or somebody's going to find out I'm really not any good.

That's what kind of drove me. Finally when I got out here on the Champions Tour and people have asked the question and I answer it honestly, when they say when did you know you were going to make it and were a pretty good player, and I said, at about 52 years old. And that's what drove me before that, that I've got to get better every year. Sometimes fear of failure is a good thing to have too.

So that's the difference now. At least I know -- I couldn't have had a 39-year lucky streak, basically. I'm pretty comfortable in my shoes now of what kind of golfer I am and things I've accomplished.

Q. Could you just -- for those of us who aren't local, could you fill us in on anything you've got going in town? You've got a pub or going to have a pub?
JEFF SLUMAN: No (laughing). My brother had one.

Q. You had the golf course, too.
JEFF SLUMAN: Yeah, my brother had a local watering establishment and restaurant very nearby Oak Hill, but he does not own that anymore. He's kind of retired and playing really good golf, and so is his son Trevor, who's on PGA China, who we're very proud of, and hopefully he'll get his Web spot this year.

I don't really have much going on this week, and just going to sit back and really enjoy the week and obviously want to play well and just take it all in. Because realistically this is my last time to play competitively here in Rochester. So I'm going to soak it up. I'm going to have a good time and just enjoy.

Q. Jeff, you've played in every senior major since you turned 50. This week will be your 58th straight start. What's that longevity meant to you over the years?
JEFF SLUMAN: I guess I'm 0 for 57. I would say that's kind of really been the hallmark of what I've done most of my career. I'm an all-in kind of guy, and when I got my card on the Tour, I wanted to play a lot, and I did. I played 700 events on the regular Tour and I'm closing in on 300 here, so a thousand starts is -- very few guys have done it, Jay Haas being one of them, certainly, and Hale. I came out on the Champions Tour and I loved my career on the regular Tour, but I said, this is my tour now and I'm going to support it and I'm going to play as much as I can, and I've basically done that. I skipped very few tournaments in 11 years, and I intend to play the rest of this year, and then you're getting to that age, I'll be 62 in September, kind of take a look at the end of the year and see where I'm at. Maybe I'll back off a little next year, but this year it's -- I'm going to play as much as I can again.

JOHN DEVER: I wanted to ask you a little bit about the golf course here now. What's the difference between Oak Hill in August as we've seen in a few PGA Championships and the field we'll see here this week in May?

JEFF SLUMAN: Well, Jeff Corcoran, the superintendent, has done an unbelievable job. I had heard that we didn't have a very good spring here, a very wet spring and not a lot of growth. The golf course is in perfect shape. I haven't seen many golf courses in better condition than this. The greens are really firm. If we get fortunate and don't have a lot of rain the next couple days, the fairways will firm up. That wind yesterday really dried it out even from yesterday until today.

And the golf course is pretty straightforward. It's right in front of you. But it's just kind of wears you out. You've got to continually hit good shot after good shot. It is playing very long, though. At 62 years old, and a lot of the guys, if it's cold and windy, which I don't believe it will be come tournament time, it makes it more difficult, like it was in 2008. It was very cold and it was a tough week weather-wise.

But this week apparently it's going to be in the 70s, so I think the golf ball should be going a little farther than that. But I still don't imagine you're going to see many scores at all under par for the week. It's just a very difficult golf course to play well on for four straight days.

Q. This is teeing it up for you, but when you walk into this clubhouse, the history just kind of bowls you over. Can you talk about a little bit about the champions' names on the wall and what that means to not only local guys but somebody like Jay who's got his name in there, kind of the history of this golf course?
JEFF SLUMAN: Yeah, obviously started I believe in 1941 with the Times Union Classic, and Hogan came here -- I'm not sure if Hogan or Snead won that one. And then of course Middlecoff won the Open over -- I think Hogan was very close in '56. A guy came out of the blue, nobody had heard of, Lee Trevino in '68, who turned out to be one of the great world-class players of all time and then Jack winning in '80. Just the list of champions are fantastic.

But more than anything, the golf course to me always held up to the current players of that time. And then you go in the clubhouse and the club historian and what they've managed to keep and the story they tell and some of the places in the clubhouse is worthwhile going in to see.

I guess you could kind of sum it up talking to Calcavecchia and a few other guys yesterday, they said, you know, when you come in and you see the entrance to Oak Hill and you look to your left when you're driving in, it just feels right and it feels like this is the way golf courses and venues are supposed to be. And you just kind of get excited about it.

And knowing that pretty much every greet player had teed off here at Oak Hill on that first hole -- I always that was a great vibe to have. Augusta, I mean, all the places that everybody always came to, I thought it was interesting that everybody had their feet on this first tee and stuff like that. I like that kind of stuff and that feel. And I'm sure most of our guys do.

Q. Did that make an impression on the young Jeff Sluman growing up?
JEFF SLUMAN: It did. My father took me out here in '68, so I was 10 years old, and I've told the story a few times, but we parked on the West Course on the fairways, of all things, which now seems very strange, why would you park cars on the fairways. But that's where they came in off Monroe Avenue, and I got out of the car, and my feet hit the fairway, and I said, Dad, these fairways are better than the greens we play on.

And it just made such an impression and then walking up and seeing this beautiful Tudor clubhouse and it was a practice round and the guys were out playing, I saw Nicklaus and Al Geiberger, he was Mr. Peanut Butter at the time, I think. They were all here, Arnold. Of course my dad wanted to see Arnold. And it made quite an impression. I can remember saying, maybe someday I could play a round of golf here. That was a dream at that time to be able to hope that would happen. I've obviously been very fortunate enough to exceed that dream. But this golf course is very special to me.

JOHN DEVER: I want to ask you about Jay Haas, who did nudge you out in '08. He's getting a heck of an honor tomorrow going in the Hill of Fame. Maybe talk about Jay and just your understanding of what that honor means and such.

JEFF SLUMAN: Yeah, Jay is going to get a tree tomorrow in Oak Hill's Hill of Fame. I was fortunate enough to get my own tree two years ago, and I had the ceremony, and I had never seen the ceremony before, mainly because when they had it I was always on the road playing on Tour, and then, of course, I moved away so it made it more difficult.

But it overwhelmed me, the whole ceremony. Emotional for me with my brother there, Craig was there, Craig Harmon, the longtime pro, my only teacher. It was just bigger for me than I thought. And the whole membership shows up to this.

And I was clearly -- I mean, I was very moved about it, but it was bigger than I thought. And I know Jay understands that and he said, I'm kind of choking on this whole speech thing. He said, it was probably a little easier for you being from here to talk about what it meant to you locally and that. But he's a little nervous, which is fun to see. But Jay will knock it out of the park tomorrow, and well deserved. And we won the senior major here and that. I know he's very, very excited about it.

Q. Yesterday speaking with Dudley Hart and he had great things to say about you, and with Joey in this field as well, is there a sense of pride amongst the three of you, the three local guys playing in a home game?
JEFF SLUMAN: Yeah, interestingly enough, on the regular Tour we had a bunch of guys, Wayne Levi from Herkimer, and then of course Mike Hulbert was playing great golf for a long time. He was from Ithaca. And Joey and myself and then Dudley. So upstate New York was very, very well represented on Tour for a long time. And I -- there's no reason or understanding as to why a bunch of players would be able to make it on Tour coming out of here.

But I think we all loved the game and then most of us went south to start playing full-time in college and got a lot better. And it really worked out for all of us. But Joey and I are kind of the last two, and Dudley is a little bit younger than us. He's just, what, 50 -- yeah, I don't think he's 51 yet. It's great to be represented up here with those guys, and we've played against each other and with each other for a long time, so it's always nice to see them.

Q. Do you often find yourself promoting the Rochester area to those people around the country, around the world who may not know anything about it? Second part, talk about some of the golf courses in the area. I know that you grew up playing on Deerfield, which has undergone quite a transformation lately.
JEFF SLUMAN: Yeah, answering first question, you get a lot of people because Rochester was such a corporate headquarters that came here and then went out in different parts of the country, so on the Champions Tour and certainly on the regular Tour, I always got a lot of, Hey, we're from Rochester, we're from Greece, we're from Gates Chili, and stuff like that.

So people went all around the country, and a lot of my playing partners, they'd kind of look up because they wouldn't get those reactions. And I'd tell them Rochester is an unbelievable golf town. There's -- in the professional level, they only hear about Oak Hill. So you tell them there's a bunch of Donald Ross courses, there's great other fun venues, public facilities to play. When they come here I think they understand. I know Rocco and Lee Janzen I think are going over to Monroe tomorrow to play. They heard about Monroe. They're going over there, and they're going to be dazzled by it. There's a lot of beautiful golf courses up there.

And then part two was -- oh, yeah, like I said, there's so many other golf courses. I haven't played or seen Deerfield since the new owners took over. But I know -- I've heard nothing but rave reviews about it. When I'm here in the summer helping with the renovation, I'll have a little bit of time maybe to jump in the car and go over there. But certainly not this week.

JOHN DEVER: Jeff, thanks for your time, and enjoy the week.

JEFF SLUMAN: Thanks guys. Hope to see you late in the week.

JOHN DEVER: Yeah, come back.

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