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THE MCGLADREY CLASSICNovember 9, 2013Briny BairdSEA ISLAND, GEORGIA THE MODERATOR: We'd like to welcome Briny Baird into the interview room. Also at 10‑under par through 54 holes, tied with Chris Kirk. Briny, if we can get some comments on your day. Nice final shot there into about seven feet for birdie on the last to cap off your round. BRINY BAIRD: Yeah, it was nice. Got off to a good start, which was nice and then kind of hiccupped in the middle and missed a couple of short putts. Could have been worse. I had a bad buried lie, and kind of with the way the week's been going, things like the bad buried lie I ended up hitting it to four feet and making that putt and more times than not you're probably not going to get that buried lie up‑and‑down given the situation with the downhill lie and everything. And it's been that kind of week. Things like that have kind of gone my direction. I've hit good shots at the right time that keep a round going that can save a round and keeps the momentum going. It's amazing what that'll do for your psyche and stuff and how you'll stay up beat. So it's okay to make one bogey in a row, two bogeys in a row. Once you start making three and four, it's really difficult to pick yourself up. So that's kind of the way the week's gone, outside of the first day when I played really well. So the last two days have kind of gone like that. THE MODERATOR: All right. Q. (No microphone)? BRINY BAIRD: 11. THE MODERATOR: Questions? Q. Not to get away from the round, but I haven't seen you in a while. I'm just curious when you went away from‑‑ BRINY BAIRD: Short putter. So this is a long putter, belly putter. It's a‑‑ Q. Split grip? BRINY BAIRD: Yeah, claw maybe, I don't know. Q. But in terms of thestance ‑‑ BRINY BAIRD: That's the short putter has always been with the bad stance, and it's kind of hard with the hat and the collar and all that, it's kind of hard to do all that much crazy stuff. So I figured I'd leave the feet alone. Q. When did you start that? BRINY BAIRD: I putted like this with this putter in Frys when I lost in the playoff. So you know, and it seems like a long time ago, but it's not that long ago for me playing golf right. Q. How would you say that you were able to kind of‑‑ you made a couple bogeys. How were you able to recover from that, I guess, you know, whether you're on the verge of maybe your first win on TOUR? BRINY BAIRD: Like I said, I think that a lot of it has to do with saving momentum. Making the two bogeys in a row, sometimes instead of just hitting a fairway and just hitting a green and just two‑putting, you know, which is what you'd like to do after making a couple bogeys, I put myself in a very bad situation to make a third consecutive bogey which wasn't going to kill my chances or anything, but like I said, the mental psyche to suddenly get that up‑and‑down and to not go from I think I was at 7‑under at the time, not go from 7 to 6 kind of felt like I stole one. And then it's easy to stay focused, and you stay sharp. Your senses stay really good and you're aware of what's going on a lot more. Once you start making those bogeys, it's amazing how bogeys lead to more bogeys, and it's‑‑ that's when it gets hard to pick yourself up and hard, you start doing some funny things, you start not reading the wind correctly and stuff like that. So it was important and it was‑‑ it's probably why I was able to stay in the round. And as far as the finish goes, I'm not not trying to birdie the last three, but I didn't hit every shot perfect, and that's kind of a summation of the week. You don't have to hit it perfect, and my caddie said that on the last hole because I kind of fanned it a little bit and it landed on the front and that's not really where I was trying to land it, and he said, oh, they're not always going to be perfect. And I said, that's true. It's a great way to finish and it putts me in a better position going into tomorrow than if I'd have just finished with pars. That would have made the work tomorrow considerably harder. Q. You talked about this earlier in the week. You've obviously had a chance to win a few of these things before. How do you not let that creep in your mind? Secondly, what is your mindset? BRINY BAIRD: Oh, if I knew what to do tomorrow, shoot, I'd have won plenty of times. I've always said Tiger Woods wasn't 80 PGA TOUR wins physically better than me. There's a mental capacity that's in there. It's just not possible to be 80 PGA TOUR wins better physically, so it's obviously there's some mental in there, more than some. Most. It's mostly mental I would say, actually. So you know, I need to‑‑ I know I can do it. Knowing you can do it and doing it are two different things. I proved a lot to myself at the Frys a couple years ago with the way I played. I did the stuff that you need to do to win golf tournaments. I didn't win, so you can say obviously you didn't do enough to win, but I answered a lot of questions to myself, and that's more important than answering questions to other people. So tomorrow it's the same cliche, it's one shot at a time. It's boring, but that's kind of the way you do it, or at least that's the way I hope you do it. Q. Five holes? BRINY BAIRD: Six. Q. What was the hole that you said that you got the up‑and‑down on? BRINY BAIRD: 11. Q. You spoke about a birdie, birdie to finish. Does that carry over overnight? BRINY BAIRD: I don't know if it really carries over overnight to be honest with you. No, because if I had finished par, par, par and started and think things would be the same. So no, I don't really think so. Q. You looked pretty unhappy on that second shot on 18? BRINY BAIRD: I didn't hit a very good shot. I missed it a little bit. Q. Was it the crowd that let you know that, hey, this could turn out all right? BRINY BAIRD: You could see it. You could see from where we were that it had released up there nicely. And you don't hit them all perfect and you hit some that are really good and the wind doesn't do what it's supposed to do. For the most part they balance out. Q. Shoulder surgery, recovering from that. But professional athlete looking at competition, how hard is that mentally, and were you concerned that you may not get back to playing the standard of golf you're used to? BRINY BAIRD: Without a doubt. For sure. Still not‑‑ you know, I answered‑‑ I've answered questions physically about how‑‑ the shoulders are fine. I've said that from‑‑ I told my caddie that when I was at Frys. I said the shoulders are a non issue. They feel great. It's nice to swing without pain. Yeah, there were times where you wonder if that was it. I never feared that I would not be able to play golf again. There's a fear of you lose a little bit of‑‑ there's an intangible in there. I don't think you were in here the other day when I spoke. There's an intangible as to why certain guys play on the PGA TOUR and other guys that are physically more gifted do not. And there's an intangible in there will that can't be measured by yards or anything like that. The longer you sit, the more I think that intangible starts to become in question, whether you lose something, whether you forget something, stuff like that. So yes, I definitely questioned that. Q. What do you think it's going to take tomorrow? BRINY BAIRD: One less than the next best guy. (Laughs). Weather's supposed to be good. I mean it's hard to say because you got a guy like Two Gloves last year or a couple years ago shooting 60. It's kind of bunched up. You know, guys can shoot 5, 6, 7, 8 under par. So it's really hard to say. It's just a question of who does it. If Chris Kirk goes out tomorrow with a piece of a lead and shoots 6‑under, then obviously it's going to take 6‑under or more. Someone could come from further back and shoot 7 or 8. So there's not a number I'm going to put in my head. 70's not going to get it done. That I do know. So I am going to have to shoot under par tomorrow. There's no question about that. Q. So where you're at right now different than the playoff at Frys going into the final day? BRINY BAIRD: Different in the sense that I'm going to have to play better tomorrow than I did at the Frys. And I don't mean that as in I didn't win at the Frys, but I had a two‑shot lead that day and Bryce ended up shooting a very low score. So I'm only going in tomorrow with a piece of the lead. Q. You were two clear going into the last day? BRINY BAIRD: I believe so. I believe I was two clear of the lead going into the last day. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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