home jobs contact us
Our Clients:
Browse by Sport
Find us on ASAP sports on Facebook ASAP sports on Twitter
ASAP Sports RSS Subscribe to RSS
Click to go to
Asaptext.com
ASAPtext.com
ASAP Sports e-Brochure View our
e-Brochure

BOB HOPE CLASSIC


January 21, 2010


Slugger White


LA QUINTA, CALIFORNIA

SLUGGER WHITE: I went out on the Nicklaus Course, went to the range, and it's just under water. And you can hear it, it hasn't let up since we got here this morning early.
Probably La Quinta is probably the worst of the four. The unfortunate part there is we have got places down there that we can't even pump water to because there's homes on each side.
So it's a mess. I've been coming out here for a long time and I never seen anything like this.
I think that the rainfall last year in the desert on the SilverRock course was 1.2 inches. And that's for the year. So this should get them through about 2015 maybe, so.
But it's, again, it's been a long time and I've never seen it like this.

Q. Originally there was a two-hour delay. Was that just to continue assessing the situation?
SLUGGER WHITE: Correct. Yeah. It's just something we had to do because it was raining, but a two-hour delay, you know, it kept guys from coming out here and kind of getting turned away.
I think the parking lots, people were being turned away, so that gave us a little bit of breathing room, just to assess what was really going to go on, waiting on weather. And that was it.

Q. Obviously multiple course events are much tougher in this regard. To have this as an official tournament you need to get 72 holes in, four days. Is there any concern about the conditions of the golf courses for tomorrow morning going into Friday?
SLUGGER WHITE: Yes.
(Laughter.)
How will they be? We're looking at this to continue to build in. Our weather man Wade Stettner says what we have now is going to intensify starting around 11 o'clock and hopefully he thinks that -- well, no, it doesn't really help much -- but going into nine or 10 o'clock tonight, rain, and hopefully by midnight we'll start seeing some drying out and tomorrow morning we're looking at scattered showers again.
So we have got our, pretty much got our hands full right now until tomorrow morning.

Q. Has a decision been made to definitely go to Monday if you need to go to Monday for either 72 or 90 holes?
SLUGGER WHITE: Monday will be in the mix, yes.

Q. At this point would you, do you anticipate making a decision about Friday later today or will you wait until tomorrow?
SLUGGER WHITE: No, we're going to have to wait until tomorrow morning to see what Mother Nature brings us.
That's pretty much it. I hate to be so vague, but we just have to wait.

Q. Was there any one thing that caused you to say we can't do this or is it just so obvious that it doesn't need to be said?
SLUGGER WHITE: It is very obvious. We just don't have a golf course. We don't have a golf course to play. We would be taking guys up from middle of the fairway in lakes, I mean we got -- in the fourth hole, we have got a foot and a half of water, probably a foot of water in the fairway on the Nicklaus Course.
There's just no place to play. When you take casual water relief you have to take full relief. So we would be up on the cart paths, on the rocks and everything else.
We held off as long as we could to make the decision and it was just trying to make some sense out of it. Like I say, this is going to intensify here probably in the next two hours and get worse.

Q. Have you been on the other two courses, SilverRock and La Quinta, or just get reports?
SLUGGER WHITE: I have not. Yeah. Our staff has been down there and they're looking at it. And they assessed all that.

Q. The golf course that most people maybe were concerned about was SilverRock, given the situation from about five years ago. Have you gotten any report from there that it's any worse than any place else?
SLUGGER WHITE: No, it's probably the best. Talking to the superintendent this morning just a few minutes ago, he said if it stopped raining right now he's looking at just maybe two hours to get ready. Everything else is anywhere from four to six hours to get ready with pumping bunkers, fairways, just trying to find places to play.

Q. What's the forecast beyond tomorrow? Your long-term forecast.
SLUGGER WHITE: Beyond tomorrow? We look good on the weekend. We do look good Saturday and Sunday. If we can get through tomorrow morning, some, I guess by the grace of God, we could get through to the weekend.

Q. If it starts to lighten up later tonight or around midnight what do you guys do between then and tomorrow to try to make the courses playable?
SLUGGER WHITE: The superintendents would all have probably -- they go out like at 3 o'clock in the morning. These guys are out here, I mean it's an effort that is just beyond. They just do everything they possibly can.
So I'm, I would guess three, four in the morning and just do the best they can to move stuff around, move water around, make big puddles out of little ones. So it's quite a task. Our hat's off to them. They really bust their back sides to get everything ready.

End of FastScripts




About ASAP SportsFastScripts ArchiveRecent InterviewsCaptioningUpcoming EventsContact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297