MASTERS TOURNAMENT

April 10, 2025

Denny McCarthy

Quick Quotes

Q. Denny, second Masters. You played well, 1-under. What do you attribute that to?

DENNY MCCARTHY: Yeah, it was pretty tricky. It's pretty amazing how firm the greens can firm up with a couple days here. We got a lot of rain on Monday and it was pretty firm today. Some of them even more so firmer than the others. Wind just swirls a lot here.

Overall pretty happy to be under par for the day, I'd say.

Q. Compared to last Masters, I mean, what would you say, your game, how you come here...

DENNY MCCARTHY: Yeah, I think the more tournament rounds you can get under your belt here, that's always a good thing. I'd say it's been a little more businesslike this time around.

Last year was first Masters, kind of pinch-me moment.

This year my caddie and I came here a couple weeks ago, got a couple rounds in, got some good work in, talked strategy on a lot of holes.

Yeah, the game feels really good. I'd say it's been a little more businesslike with the attitude that I can compete to win the tournament.

Q. How does reading the greens here compare to other venues on TOUR?

DENNY MCCARTHY: I think you just always know that everything is fast going that direction of the property and it's slow coming this way on the property, so if you have a putt going towards that way and it's a right to lefter, it might break a little more than you might think.

And vice versa, if you have a left to righter coming this direction on the property, you know it's going to pull towards that way. It's kind of deceptive.

There's a lot of holes even when the greens are almost pitched at you but it's going that direction and those putts are a little faster, it just kind of tricks your eyes a little bit.

You've just got to be creative on the greens and there's a couple little tidbits of information on the greens, knowing how fast putts are, how much certain putts break, and so just try and use your instincts as best as possible.

Q. Can you be aggressive on putts out here or is it like a different mindset?

DENNY MCCARTHY: Yeah, you can. I mean, Tiger always said, and Rory, they make aggressive swings to conservative targets. I'd say I make aggressive strokes to not look to blow it eight feet by. Just like any tournaments, I'm still trying to make putts with proper speed. If I have an uphill 20-footer I want to hit it with some aggression, but I don't want to leave a four- or five-foot curler down the hill coming back.

I think it just kind of depends on the type of putt you have. Maybe playing a little bit more break and making a nice aggressive stroke and commit to what you've picked line-wise.

Q. What were some of the things you went over that helped you?

DENNY MCCARTHY: Just some angles to some hole locations on par-5s. I'd say that would be the main thing. Just a lot of work around the par-5 greens, and then the greens that you're likely to miss out here, 11 being one of them, spending a lot of time around there. Kind of figuring out if we get in a spot, okay, we might not even want to try and hit the green or take this shot on, where do we want to leave it.

Yeah, I'd say just hitting a lot of chip shots and discussing angles on where we want to leave it on par-5s.

Q. I'm curious, are there any holes out here where you will adjust your tee height one way or the other up or down just based on the hole?

DENNY MCCARTHY: Uh-huh.

Q. Which would those be?

DENNY MCCARTHY: Let me go through it real quick. No. 7 I like to tee it down and hit it a little lower. Today was down off the left for me. I teed my 3-wood down even a little bit lower and hit a chasey 3-wood. If you get driver cutting a little bit with that kind of wind, it's pretty easy to hit it a couple yards in the right rough and then you're kind of blocked out, so trying to get something low and drawing early in that fairway.

8, I'm not trying to bomb it over the bunker or anything. I try and tee it down pretty low, look up the left and hit a little bleedy cut.

9 and 10, I teed it up both pretty high. They lost some trees here on the left on 9. You can see it's pretty thin. So you can look a little more aggressive down the left and tee it up high and take it over some of the trees that used to be there. Same on 10. I teed it up really high and hit a high draw driver today. The tee was all the way back and into the wind.

I just wanted to make sure I got it down there. I didn't want to have a potential leaked 3-wood and leave me really far back, so I teed up driver high and hit a high draw.

Typically for me when I tee it high, I see draw; helps me swing up on it and turn it. And when I tee it low, it naturally helps me hit that squeeze cut.