From the time I won the Kansas City Match Play championship at age 14, I never wanted to be anything but a golfer.
I think my swing's a pretty long swing, so that helps in the sense that it doesn't get too short because of age. As many of the people, many of the golfers do when they get older, their swing gets a little shorter and quicker. I've been able to still...
I didn't learn how to swing a golf club until late in my career. And even though I won all those tournaments, I still struggled with consistency, and I relied on my strengths, which were hitting the ball long and high, and I could chip and putt with ...
It's time for old players like me, old fogies like me, to give it up and let the young players have a chance.
I love the competition, and if I can continue to compete and give myself a chance to win tournaments, I'll still play out here. When that day comes when I can't do that - and that day's coming sometime; I don't know when - I'll hang them up. I enjoy ...
I hope that I've been able to treat people with the respect they've shown me. That's basically the tenet you try to live by. I haven't been successful at it all my life, but that's what I strive for.
Some guys have trouble sleeping the night before an important round. I never have. Invariably, I sleep longer and better, and have more dreams, when I'm in contention and feeling pressure.
My career was one of just taking it step by step. I didn't know how I was gonna fare on the professional circuit when I qualified. I didn't know whether I was gonna make a dime. I didn't know anything but this one thing: I had some dreams, and I was ...
If a course needs to be in great condition to be played effectively, then the design strategy is flawed.
No other game combines the wonder of nature with the discipline of sport in such carefully planned ways. A great golf course both frees and challenges a golfer's mind.
I'm very happy with my life. I am what I am. I don't worry about anything that I can't control. That's a really good lesson in life.
When you come off that last hole and you've just finished a good round of golf, life is good. When you come off that last hole and you messed it up through four or five holes and just played a lousy round of golf, it's just not a very good day. It ju...
The beautiful thing about the game of golf is you can play good golf and compete well into your later years, and you can't do this in basketball or football or baseball. But in golf, it's a longer live sport.
The person I fear most in the last two rounds is myself.
I have a special feeling for Blue Hills CC, where I won perhaps the most important tournament of my life when I was 14 - the Kansas City Match Play Championship. It gave me a dream of becoming a professional golfer.
My father wasn't a hard guy. He was a well-liked guy. He had a lot of compassion about things in life. There were rules, but there was also flexibility within those rules. He didn't push me when it came to golf: he just taught me the right way to pla...
You don't have to go to church to be spiritual, but there are certain times in your life that you know there is a presence of something very spiritual.
I've said many times, 'You learn to win through not liking to lose.' And that's what I mean by learning how to win.
Any time you play in a USGA Championship, if you don't drive the ball on the fairway, you're dead. You're done.
I played team sport as a kid and loved it. I played basketball and football throughout high school into college in the intramurals and I loved it. There was nothing like a team.
