MASTERS TOURNAMENT

April 7, 2023

Jose Maria Olazabal

Quick Quotes

Q. Rough day?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: Well, pretty much like yesterday. The game is off. I struggled with my game, with my irons, pretty much everything. I didn't putt well.

I didn't expect to do great things this week. I knew how my game was before coming here, so pretty much the score reflected, well, the level of golf I'm playing at the moment.

Q. Physically are you okay, though?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: I'm all right, yeah. It's a technical thing, yeah. Or from the neck up, one of the two.

Q. Are you happy enough to keep coming here and playing?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: Well, I know I can play better than this. If I play poorly and I shot 5-over par, I believe that if I play well, I can shoot somewhere around level par. I think that's fair.

Q. Could I ask you about Jon. How significant would it be for him to win here?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: Well, it would be wonderful. Those things sometimes, history is a little funny sometimes. It's the 40th anniversary, actually on Sunday, that would be Seve's birthday. You know, sometimes the stars align, so hopefully he will be able to achieve something really special. Obviously he has the game. He has what he's needed around here. He proved that yesterday, even after he started with a double bogey with four putts on No. 1, managed to put a wonderful score.

The competition is going to be high. Brooks is playing well, so there is a lot of guys that are going to put the pressure there, and you're going to have to be on your "A" game and do great things to win here.

Q. You know what it takes to win here, obviously. What does Jon have that you see that should work here?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: Well, his iron play and his short game is really good, which suits this golf course really well. He favors a fade off the tee, which on some holes might not be ideal, let's put it that way, but at the end of the day, it looks like he feels comfortable around this golf course and with the lines he has to hit, so that's what it takes to win here.

Q. It looks like in the middle of all this confusion in the world of golf, this is kind of a place for healing; do you find this? What was the feeling this week?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: Well, I don't know if this is the place for healing those wounds. From my point of view, they made a decision, they took a different path, a different route, and I respect that. Nothing wrong with that. But having said that, my personal view on it is that once you make a decision like that, you have to take it with all the consequences. I don't think it would be fair for anybody that moved over there to have the right to play either on the PGA TOUR or the DP World Tour. The LIV Tour is a competitive Tour, and it would be difficult to understand from my point of view.

Q. What are your plans with Champions Tour?

JOSÉ MARÍA OLAZÁBAL: Well, the schedule is to play, to go back home for a couple weeks and then come back for Houston and play a few events on the Champions Tour. That's the schedule.