Subpar - Webb Simpson Interview: His infamous encounter with the 'Bird Man', remaining successful despite hitting shanks

Episode Date: May 18, 2021

On this week's episode of GOLF's Subpar, seven-time PGA Tour winner Webb Simpson joins former PGA Tour pro Colt Knost and jicky jack legend Drew Stoltz for an exclusive interview at Quail Hollow. The winner of the 2012 U.S. Open talks his infamous encounter with the 'bird man' at the Olympic Club, meeting his wife thanks to a big assist from his dad, and remaining a world class player despite his tendency to hit shanks.

Hello world. Welcome to another week of golf subpar, Coltonosa and Drew Stoltz. Please, I'm coming to you live from the PGA Championship. I'm here at Kiowa Island. I cannot wait to get amongst it out on the ocean course. Yes, I can see that beautiful backdrop you got there. And I got to tell you, dude, I'm looking forward to this week for a lot of reasons. One being that I can't remember in a long time, a PJ championship venue getting as much pub as Kiowa Islands got going into this thing. I mean, I'm reading about it can play over 7,800 yards, the longest major championship venue out there, all these new T-boxes and things like that. And I'm anxious to see. I mean,

it depends on the weather a little bit and the wind, clearly, but like, what's a good score around this place? I legitimately have no idea. I got to, I got to think there's no chance in hell that they're playing at over 7,800 yards any single day out there. I mean, pace of play has got to be six hours out there. If you're putting that thing in the wind and it's 7,800 yards, that would be just a death march. Yeah, I'm very excited to see it. You know, I came here the Monday after the Masters for BJ Championship Media Day. It's got to play a couple of a couple of Colin Moracawa. I played number 11 and number 12, so I know every inch of those two holes. And they asked if I wanted to play the rest of it.

And I said, no, thank you. This place is way too freaking hard. I'm out of here. So I drove around the back nine. And I mean, it's a beast. I'm sure they'll move the T's around and stuff like that. You know, fingers crossed, the weather looks incredible. No rain in the forecast.

You know, high 70s every day, sunshine. So it's going to be all they want, I would imagine. You know, it's not going to play anything like it did in August when Rory McElroy in 2012. You know, they had a lot of rain. It was soft. Didn't quite have the win. He ran away with it by eight shots. Look, it's a major championship. It's going to be an awesome test. Kerry Haig, who sets up the golf forces for the PGA of America. Does an incredible job. He's the best in the business. So I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be a lot of fun. You know, I'm excited to be here. Last week in Dallas, I was back home for the first time in a while.

That was an extremely long week. But man, it was, it was enjoyable. Cachely, obviously got the win, but we are on to the PGA, and it's time to get it going. Yeah, onto the PGA is right. And I was doing radio this morning talking with a couple guys who had gone out and played nine, a couple of them played the back nine. And they were like, man, the wind right now is blowing about as little as I would think it would blow all week. It's like maybe around 10 miles an hour.

He's like, we played number 17 from 238 yards into the wind. And they're like, I was debating between slamming hybrid or chipping a three wood. And I was looking up there. I was like, I don't even know where to bail out. The water's clearly dead. Left is dead. There's nowhere to go. And I'm just like, yeah, I mean, I got to think,

setup wise, like they can do whatever they want with it. Maybe the first two days, you know, they don't make it quite as bad being that, you know, you're going to have a lot of guys out there. You got to get through a cut. But then on the weekend, like you said, no rain. They could probably make it as firm and as fast as they want to get it out there and stretch it as much. I'm like, I'm legit. I honestly think we could, we could see another one of those major championships where we get a single digit under par. I think that if they want to do that, they could absolutely do it. And I hope they do. Here's open. Yeah, no doubt about it. I know you and I both love that. I mean, I think somewhere seven to 10 under bars is an awesome championship.

I think the best players can really separate themselves. But it's going to be a great week. Great golf course. Incredible field. Sleys, I'm making my debut on CBS this week. I can't be more excited. Hopefully, it's not one and done. We'll see what happens.

Hopefully I don't mess it up too bad. But it's going to be a big week. Yes, sir. Congratulations on that. Seeing you getting the nod up to the A team, that's a big deal. It's a perfect opportunity for you to just shamelessly plug all of our shit. I want to see the word subpar. I think anytime someone hits a bad shot, you use the word subpar after it.

I think that would be fitting. Just don't be afraid to do that. That's what all these guys do in your world. They just shamelessly plug all their stuff. So do not even hesitate for a second to just get obnoxious with the amount of name drops you throw out there. I will do my best. But please, I'll tell you what, our guest this week, I kind of like him around this ocean course. It's Pete Dygd golf course.

He tends to play well at those. Webb Simpson, we sat down with him in his hometown of Charlotte. got amongst it. Yeah, dude, I mean, where, where do you not like Webb, especially on these Pete Dye golf courses? But I mean, he's one of those guys that just rarely ever seems to have a bad week. He's kind of point A to point B. There's no superpowers. He's not the world's longest driver. He's not the world's best iron player. He's just really damn good at pretty much everything. And I think these type of golf courses, in my opinion for Webb, like not the shootout type golf courses where PARs out of premium, things like that. Those are the places that I tend to lean

towards Webb more so than anywhere else. Yeah, well, we had a blast sitting down with him and might be the only man on the planet more caffeinated than the sleazy man. Here he is, Webb Simpson on Golf Subpar. We have a major champion and seven-time tour winner with us today. One of the most well-liked guys on the PJ tour, I would say, safe to say. And probably the first guest who's ever shown up Colt with more caffeine than I have. I was going to say, this is incredible. He might be the only man I know that enjoys caffeine more than you.

This is a beautiful thing. We've got three drinks. Walk us, walk us through what we got here. So I love sparkling water, you know, just kind of clean. clears everything out. This is my, this is my ember mug. I'm not trying to do a pitch for ember, but it keeps coffee hot for 60 minutes, okay? Third cup of the day. And then we got water because, you know, you know, it's 845 for the record. 8.45 for the morning. Yeah, but the first kid, we're going to hear our first kid, one of five kids at probably 650. So I know I got to get

my first cup with, you know, silence in the house. How many cups of coffee a day? Four to five. Four to five. It used to be Diet Coke. Used to be Diet Coke, and that count was a lot higher. Give me a count. You know, to be fair, six to ten. Six? It was a killer when I would go to a restaurant at night, and they had good Diet Coke.

Like Outback, I remember, had good Diet Coke. And if I had a good waiter or waitress, and they just kept them coming, I mean, it could be five or six at dinner. What made you stop the Diet Coke? Well, I hired a trainer for the first time in 2010, and he didn't like the, the, Aspartame, you know, in the Diet Coke. So he wanted me to switch to regular Coke if I had a Coke, but I just went ahead and went to sparkling water. I feel like regular Coke would be worse than Diet Coke.

Yeah, but the aspartane is what people get. Oh, the aspirin. It's that sneaky ingredient people don't really talk about. Yeah. That's daily-esque, six to ten. Yeah. Would you drink it on the worst while you're playing? Not in a tournament, but here at home I would.

What about now, coffee? Give me a game day routine. Are you got an early tea time? Are you hammering out three or four cups? I'm automatic two before any round. Like if I'm playing early, if I'm playing at 8 o'clock, I'm going to get up early and have some coffee. Like I have to wake up.

This explains why you walk so fast. Yeah, it does. Like every time we played together, I'd be like, all right, see you, well, see you up on the green, because I can't keep up with you. Dude, they're out there, got beta blockers. They're all trying to come down, website. I got to ramp this thing.

I love it. I'm big on that. Oh, that is awesome. Season two with Pauley, my caddy, he kind of mentally decided he was going to try to walk with me. He felt like, you know, we got to do more talking, you know, hang out more. Well, he tried it for about three tournaments, and he was always out of breath, you know, because he's carrying the 40-pound bag, and he just gave up on it.

So we have a lot of conversations with him at my back. Pauli, let's go, we got to go. We've got to go 150, 155, what do we got? Well, let's go back to a little earlier days before your coffee addiction. Yeah. But you attended Wake Forest, Arnold Palmer Golf Scholarship. what was ultimately the choice for Wake Forest and also can you tell us something about your relationship with Arnold Palmer? Yeah, so I actually first met Arnold when I was 16 at the Wake Forest Pro Am and my dad always loved Arnold.

My dad actually played with Arnold a couple times and watched Arnold at Augusta way back when. And so my dad loved him kind of was plugging Wake Forest. My dad went to Chapel Hill. A lot of my family went to Chapel Hill. So that was kind of in the picture. But ultimately what sold it for me was Jerry Haas. I visited unofficially, got to spend some time with him, and I knew he played at a high level, European tour, PJ Tour, and I knew that part of me getting from college golf to professional golf onto the tour was going to be,

I needed someone to be influential as a coach and really helped me away from just the driving range, but how to play the game, how to think. And I kind of landed at Wake because I thought Jerry could get me there. Explain the Arnold Palmer Scholarship to people who aren't familiar with it. Wake Forest has one. It's given out to one guy, correct? Like, how do they choose who gets that? And is that more pressure knowing that, like, hey, my scholarship's got one of the greatest

of all times, name attached to it? Yeah. Honestly, being the Arnold Palmer Scholarship, it put a lot of pressure on me in a way of, I felt like it was such an honor that I needed to show up at Wake and make a big splash in college golf. And I had a rude awakening because I didn't realize you guys probably experienced this. Like, college golfers are really good. I'm, you know, growing up in North Carolina, I'm winning North Carolina tournaments,

occasionally playing some national tournaments, but you show up in college golf. and everybody's really good. I mean, the fifth guy on any team's good at golf. So I put a lot of expectation on myself, and I think it hurt me in my first couple years. But, yeah, the Arnold Palmer basically is in Jerry Haas' hands to give out every few years. I don't know if it's every two, three, or four years,

but it's not an every year thing. He's got to give it to somebody who he thinks could carry that scholarship well. And it put a lot of pressure on me, like I said, but I think I kind of came into my own, junior year and I felt like I was starting to understand how to do this college golf thing because it's unique. You know, there's an individual winner every week and a team winner. And so you want your teammates to play well. But if we're all honest, I want to beat my teammates as you guys did.

But you all want to play well. So it's a weird experience. Did you ever get to play golf with Mr. Palmer? Never played with him. I played in the Arnold Palmer Invitational twice as an am and got to go up in his office each time and talk with him. And he, I mean, it would have been nice of him to shake my hand and say hello. But he told me to sit down and we talked golf. We talked Wake Forest sports and couldn't have been nicer of them. That's so cool. Yeah, that's the guy. Being on the Palmer Scholarship was obviously a huge deal Wake Forest, but also something major happened there. You met your wife Dowd. And you mentioned your dad earlier. I know he played quite a big role in this. Yeah. Can you tell us a little but how he helped out with that.

Well, we tell people we are in an arranged marriage from my dad. So my dad met her at a party about two weeks before I went to school. She's a year older. And he said, hey, my son's coming awake in a couple weeks. He's this dorky golfer. All he does is play golf. He goes, I'm worried about him making friends. He goes, you're so beautiful.

Take him out on campus and just let him walk to class with you so people think he's got a beautiful girlfriend. And he goes, I'll seriously pay you $100 to do it. She said, she's like, hey, Sam, here's the deal. If he's half as good looking as you are, I'll do it for free. Which that grabbed my dad's heart, and he called me. He's like, hey, I met this girl. Dowd, you got to meet her. And I'm like, whatever, Dad.

So I see her the first night I'm at Wake. We're going out a couple parties with the golf team. And I try to get my teammate who had a couple of drinks that night to go ask her, asked this random girl who I saw who looked like the girl my dad described go ask her if her name's doubt well he ends up not making his way over he gets distracted and then I ended up meeting her the next day we started dating and uh here we are that was 17 years ago wow and we got five kids that's incredible what kind of party is your dad at where there's good-looking college shit that's unbelievable say my dad goes with some things but they ain't good-looking college girls at

so we're in Charlotte we're in the south there's a a thing called the debutante ball. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, I know what they are. Yeah, so I guess when a girl's 19, 20, whatever, she makes her debut, and it's this old tradition where the parents kind of send her out to, you know, to date. I mean, it's so, it's such an old tradition, but her friend was doing it and she was there at the party. That is so awesome. A hell of a tradition. So, unlike any other. Thanks to my dad for that.

Yeah, that's one of my favorite stories. I love it. I'll give you a hundred dollars. How much crap did you catch from everybody being like, hey, your dad's got to be the one to broker your dates for you. Otherwise, you got no shot. Well, honestly, like, Dowell tell you, I was texting him like, hey, what do I do? What's my next play? Like, how do I handle this? So he was texting me all the girl advice. And honestly, like, that's how it is for me.

Like, I had no game. And so I told Dowd, I said, Dowd, once we started dating, I said, you realize how confusing women can be, right? and she goes, what do you mean? I said, well, multiple guys wanted to date you and you didn't date them. I acted like I didn't want to date you and you want to date me. And now we're dating. And she laughed. I said, well, I just did whatever my dad said.

He said, play it cool and I played it cool. But he did pay up his bet. When I took her out for our first dinner, he bought it. Beautiful. What a guy. It's just a big game of reverse psychology, these women. Whatever you act like you want, you don't want. That's right.

We can stay on your dad for a second because Sam, I had the privilege. and knowing him, but he was too nervous to watch you play golf in person, which always fascinating. He'd be like, obviously, you teed off much later on Sundays than I did. So I'd be in the locker room afterwards, a player dining, and I'm like, are you not going to go watch Webb? And he's like, he's like, no, I can't. I'm too nervous. He was so nervous. I mean, he always was. I mean, my first national tournament, I was 13 years old, the big guy in Houston. And it's just me and him there. And I'm just happy to be in the field. So he didn't need to be nervous, but he's nervous. He can't watch me play. I get to the 18th hole of the first round. The club,

house in the background, they have these windows. You can't see in, but I know he's there. So I just kind of wave. I have no idea if he's there, but I think he's there. So we get done and he's like, hey, how'd you know I was there? And I said, I didn't, but I figured you were watching because you're so nervous. He's like, I was. I mean, my first win in Greensboro, he wouldn't leave player dining until I hit my second shot on the green on the last hole with three shot lead. I was going to say, pretty big lead. He just couldn't do it. Do you think that's how you'll be with your kids if they play? I don't know.

I mean, I'm already a little nervous, you know, like watching them, you know, whatever sport they're playing, but I don't know if I'll get that nervous. I mean, what was funny about my dad, when he could caddy for me and amateur stuff, he would want to do it because he felt like he could say stuff to me. And so we had a fun time in Southern AM and USAM with him caddy. He was still getting nervous, but you mentioned my fast walk earlier. I couldn't keep it with him. So I get it from him.

Oh, yeah, especially if I hit a ball left or right and we might, you know, need some time to find it. would take off. That's awesome. Well, you mentioned, do you think you'll be like that as a father? Do you think you got any little golfers in the flock? We're exposing golf to them now, and they like it. They don't love it.

My son's getting into it a little bit. You know, he's taking a rip at it out here, which I like. But we'll see. Definitely not going to pressure them into it. I want them to kind of get excited like I did. I played basketball until I was 15, but I realized I was really slow, and I couldn't jump and I was a below average shooter so no future. Other than that, no. Other than that, I had a chance. Should have walk on the wake. That is awesome.

Well, before you turn pro though, you and I got to represent Team USA and the Walker Cup over at Royal County down in Ireland. Tell us a little bit like some of your memories from that team and how much fun we had going over there. That was probably my favorite memory of amateur golf, to be honest. I mean, we had talent-wise, we had an amazing team. I think at one point we had eight of us on the PJ tour with tour cards. One guy, he didn't turn pro, Tripp Keeney. And Jonathan Moore was overplaying in Asia. So, I mean, it was a stack team.

I remember a lot of card games. Yes. Swish. Swish. As you call it Canadian Blackjack. Oh, yeah. Canadian. As nervous as my dad was watching me was as nervous as I was playing Swish.

But I loved it. But I was in a minimum. So we played. We all circled up. We played. Buddy Marucci, our captain, obviously, has tons of money. He'll play for anything. And then I like to gamble, Billy Horsh, with Dustin, we're all around.

Webb wanted to play every minute of every day. But the odds could be, he could basically have no chance to lose. $5. Would never go over $5. And if there was any kind of doubling down, like 10, I'm sweating. Like for real, I'm sweating. But no, I remember, honestly, one of my favorite memories was I was in the second to last match maybe.

I can't remember, but I was playing David Horssey, and it was close. We had a pretty good lead going to Sunday. There was tons of their own cheers that morning in Ireland. And you could tell the difference, obviously. We had some cheers, but theirs were a lot louder. And I was, I was nervous because I'm like, man, they're having an unbelievable day.

Then you see scoreboards, a lot of their colors up there. And then on 17, the visual picture I see of the Walker Cup in 07 as Colt knows running down the fairway. Running? With an American flag. And that was like, I got so excited because if he's running down the fairway, I'm still playing a match. What's the one?

Colt running something made you happen. And it was over. And I looked at David. Colts fired up. I'm like, man, it's over. Like, I'm hoping he just shakes my hand because we're tied at the moment, me and David Horsey. And he didn't look too happy.

He wanted to keep going and he ended up beating me. But we won, so that's all that matter. I remember you told that story on your Farity episode. And the first thing Faradie goes, wait, Colt was running. Oh, there goes. Obviously not a big shock, but, man, that was so much fun over there. It was. And I actually got food poisoning Friday night the night before.

I guess we started on Saturday. It's only two days. Always figured it's two days. But I didn't feel great. We're going to get into that. No, we're going to get into it. Just save it. But by the way, the two days of the Walker Cup, I think, I wish they'd make it three.

Yeah. I mean, it's just, I feel like it starts and it's over. It's so fast. And it's such a special. Yeah. You said it took you a couple of years to figure it out in college. It didn't take you long to figure it out in the pros because turn pro in 2008, you come out right out the gates, almost win twice on what's then the nationwide tour.

Then you get to a Q school, cruise through that real quick, and top 10 a couple of times right out the gate on tour. At that point, are you thinking this pro golf is pretty easy? Yeah, honestly, I think I was so naive to it. I didn't know what I was doing or what to expect, and I think that helped. I remember my first tournament with my card was Hawaii, and I finished ninth. and Bill Hoff's buddy of mine said to me, great week, you know, top 10,

and I kind of looked at him like, what do you mean top 10? Because in college golf, a top 10 wasn't a thing. Where on tour, it's a great week. And so that was my first kind of eye-opening experience to realize, man, top 10s, you're doing something right. And so, yeah, I jumped right in. And I had a great first year, second year, kind of the sophomore slump.

I didn't have my card secured until I think it was Vegas. to win Vegas. The Q school application was in going into Vegas. I had a good week and secured the card. Yeah, that was, it was a tougher year, the second year, but definitely learned a lot. You were talking about your rookie year. You come out at Gates, Q school, you get the first two top tens. Then you went into a little slump there. You missed nine of your next 13 cuts. What's the psyche like as a rookie in that situation? Is it easy to start second guessing yourself? Like, man, this might have been a little tougher than I thought. Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think what's so hard as a rookie.

rookie on tours, you're playing these courses for the first time, and you happen to be playing against the best players in the world every week. And so, you know, it's an uphill battle. And I remember that stretch of missing that many cuts. And you do. You second-guess, you doubt, you think about going to see a different swing coach, trying different driver, putter, whatever it is. And I remember, actually, speaking of my dad, I said, you know what, enough's enough. I'm not going to go see this guy or that guy or try this putter. I need to just go back to when I was a kid. So I was living in Riley at the time. I called my dad up. I said, hey, I need you for two days. Let's go to Pinehurst like we used to. And I said, I just want to play for two days straight. You ride with me.

You play if you want, but I'm done like grinding. I just need to play. And he literally just rode with me. He didn't say a whole lot. He gave me a couple games, probably for $2 an assall. And honestly, I left Pinehurst thinking, like, man, I shot a couple good scores, even though it was just with my dad. And I went back. I think my first tournament back might have been Memorial or Memphis. It was kind of in there and made the cut and started playing better. Is that kind of how you are now? Like if things aren't, rarely do you miss cuts anymore, but if things aren't going well, do you go back to the golf course as opposed to the range and start tinkering and things like that, do you prefer to play?

Yeah, I mean, if there's something that needs to get worked on, technically, yeah, I'll go to the range, but I feel like I'm only going to trust it and believe in it if I see it working on the golf course, and if it means something. I'll go on the course by myself to practice but I need somebody to go bet against to really feel like it's in there. Throw a couple fivers on the table. Figure things out. Perfect. I'm in, yeah.

I love that. Well, one thing you tend to do, maybe a little bit more than others on the PGA tour, you hit the occasional Haasel rocket, the shake. I mean, do you think there's been a better world-class player that hits more shanks than you? No. Me neither. I actually, I only know of one other world-class player who hits shanks often. I won't name them.

But you can. I think it's, is he European? Yep. Yeah. Mr. Poulter? Does he put it really good? Yeah. He puts it really good.

Yeah. I've always, I've always had that tendency. I've had some really embarrassing ones. I would say the two worst were 16 at the Masters on Saturday. And I was playing with Zach Johnson, the Penn's front right, up on that shelf. And I tried to hit a hard cut eight iron, which is perfect. recipe for shank for me a hard cut um and the worst part about 16 of augusta hitting the shank is that there's a few thousand people in that hole and so where my ball was i think the number was 42 to the front

and so we got to move these people and there's not really anywhere for them to go so now it's taken forever for them to move and i had no shot i had to chip it in the front bunker um another embarrassing one was eighth hole at rider cup on Sunday at Medina and honestly this is my thought process again it's an eight iron shanked it over there my first thought was tiger is our anchor position and I just hit it towards the fourth tee and he's probably about there and I will never hear the end of this if he sees me walking over to where he is and he had already come through we lose the rider cup and that night after the award ceremony tiger kind of motions for me to come here and and he's like, hey, man, that was a tough day.

And I'm like, yeah. He's like, that wind was all over the place, wasn't it? And I'm like, yeah, it was. And I'm in my mind, I'm like, why is he talking about this right now? And he goes, where'd you have the wind on two, part three? And I don't know what I said. And he goes, where did you guys have it on eight? He goes, we had it straight left to right.

When I got there was more than 20 or 30 and kind of looks at me with that big grin. And I'm just shaking my head. He's like, I heard about it. I heard about it. Yeah. It must have been, well, I'm 50 when you're getting. Yeah. But, I mean, it doesn't seem to bother you, though. Like, you're like, oh, yeah, I mean, that just happens occasionally.

Like, you move on to the next shot and it's done. Yeah, I mean, and Paul, as a good caddy reminds me, my shank, my most frequent shank years are my best years. I had a lot in 12 and won the U.S. Open. I had a lot in 13. You know, had a good year. And so it comes. I think I've hit so many, like you're saying, like, I'm just used to it. It's so funny.

But Kisner tells a funny story that 11, this past two sonys ago, I hit a shank so bad on 11 that I thought it was out of bounds. And this, Kevin still to this day says it's the worst shank he's ever seen anyone hit because it was low and picked up some do. I remember this. I remember somebody sent me your shot tracker. I'm like, whoa boy. I remember this.

So it was in bounds, made four and got out of there. People love it though. You're relatable. They're like, here's Webb Simpson, minus 37 for the week. Oh, there it goes. 42 yards into number 16. Shanks only this close for perfect. I've had one here.

First sold the PGA Championship on Saturday. Six iron straight into the woods. So. You had another beauty at the Ryder Cup, too, which is very interesting. But it wasn't a shank. Pop-up. It's a dead straight three wood, about 195, 200. 170, maybe.

Yeah. Take us through that. because, I mean, obviously the nerves are just insane. They are. Yeah, so I'm hitting the first tee shot of the whole Ryder Cup, and you're obviously so nervous. I mean, I would say the next most nervous is a master's first tee, but there it's like a whole other level.

And honestly, I was really nervous, but I felt good. I mean, it's a three-wood, and the fairway's pretty wide. Well, the funniest part to me was we're playing Rose and Stinson, me and Bubba. So I hit my pop-up right down the middle, about 160, and then Rosie has three wood already before I hit. Rosie goes back to the bag and he pulls out driver. Of course, of course. He wants the biggest thing in his bag.

It wasn't really a driver hole for him, but he just hit it. And I had hybrid in where Bubba hit driver and probably had 100 yards in. What did Bubba say when you popped it up? He just kind of looked to me. He's like, I got you this whole web. Don't worry about it. Is that that new nine would even shining up? That was so embarrassing, you know, being the first whole Rider Cup.

But, I mean, honestly, in that moment, like, you just got to laugh. And you got to realize, like, people are going to talk about it. And it's fine. Like, it's just, like, you said, if I can relate to people, great, you know. I remember you hitting it and you kind of just, like, looked up and then you just bit down and picked up your tea. And nothing like really happened. And then they just showed the ball land. I remember, like, oh, my God.

The camera was, like, panned up by the bunk or whatever it was, like, where the ball was expected to land or whatever. And, like, it was nowhere to be. And then it was, like, zoom back. And it's like, oh, there it is. There's like four paces on the fairway. That was probably the worst part, honestly, was I had to wait on my second shot because all the camera crews from all the different networks, they had to move. They're in my way. They had to come all the way back. So as embarrassing as it was, I'm sitting there waiting for all these people to move back and get out of my way. And there's not a sprinkler head within 100 yards.

Polly's long way. You know what? I'm walking super fast away. I'll handle it. I'll handle it. I'll handle it. I think we got 280. But you mentioned 2012 earlier. Yeah. U.S. Open. Get your first major champion. Obviously, that was an incredible. week at Olympic club. What was it like realizing you became a major champion? And also, we do have to talk about the bird man. The bird man, my good friend. My good friend.

The next 45 minutes on the bird. Yeah. Well, I showed up and my game wasn't in good shape at all. I think I missed the cut in Memorial by eight shots. And so I go in not expecting much. And I had an average first couple of days in 29th place. Play good, Saturday, shoot two under, move all the way up to eighth. And then I think I was 26, never contended a major at all, had no experience there.

So being four back, I think I was fourth or fifth to the last group. So nobody was talking about me. I think that was a good thing because, you know, I'm not really under the spotlight, whereas the other guys were. So I go out, kind of do my own thing. I'm too over early on Sunday, but then make a nice birdie run, birdie in six, seven, eight, and ten. And I kind of realized in that moment, I'm probably right in the middle of it. I look at scoreboards now.

I love looking now. I didn't then, so I didn't really know. But yeah, I think it was, I was shocked. I was pleasantly shocked. But Martin Kimer, kind of his experience at Whistling Strakes, becoming a major champion. I read some of his comments shortly after really helped me because he said he felt like when he became a major champion,

he felt like he had to be a different player. And all of a sudden overnight, he was a different player. And he wish he wouldn't have kind of put that pressure on himself. And so I really took that to heart and I played the next week of the Travelers and I thought, you know what? I won a tournament. Great tournament.

But I'm not going to try to be anybody different and keep doing what I'm doing. And that really helped. Go back to that Sunday final round because your foreback, like you said, but there's seven guys in front of you, right? At that point in time, and the pressure is not on you so it's kind of a perfect storm.

But at that point, do you have like a target score in your mind for a Sunday? Like, all right, I think if I can get to this, I might have, you kind of have the mercy of the leaders, right? If they go out and put a day together, they're not going to be catchable. But do you have a, I think if I shoot 68, which I think is what you shot the final round, or 67 or whatever, like that'll give me a chance.

Is it like that or? No, that's exactly right. I told my wife, she was out there with me, and I said Dowd, if, you know, if Jim, Fioric or Graham McDowell shoots a good number, if they break par, they're going to win probably. Because I didn't think four or five under was out there at Olympic. It was so firm. Rough was classic U.S. Open Rough. There weren't really many birdie holes. But I said, hey, if I go shoot under par and they don't have a great day, I've got to choose.

chance. And so that was kind of what I was thinking. And you know what's cool? Paul that morning went out and watched golf. And when he got to the range, I said, hey, what holds you watch? He goes, I watched eight, the par three right by the clubhouse, and a little bit on 18. He goes, the weirdest thing was happening on eight. He said he watched four or five groups come through, and everybody but one guy was short of the green on eight, which that day the pin is back left. So they're way short. He's like, I don't understand. He goes, the wind's not blowing much. I don't know what was happening. So sure enough, we get to eight. I'm in between five and six. I want to smash a six. I don't want to go long. And he kind of comes in close and whispers. He's like,

hey, from what I saw earlier, he's like, I think we have to hit five. I'm like, okay. So I hit five, and I hit it good as I can hit it. And it ends up carrying this bunker, the front bunker, by only about three yards. So it barely was enough club. And it went to 20 feet and I made it for birdie. And honestly, that was the difference. I mean, had he not been there, I hate, at that time, I hated, really, taking yardage off of any iron shots. I want to hit it hard. Had he not seen that, I would have been in the front bunker, made par or bogey, and somebody else would have won.

Incredible. Shout out, Paul. Unbelievable. That is awesome. Yeah. Big assist. Yeah. So it's cool.

He gave me a frame picture of me hitting on that hole. So that's a cool, cool story. Yeah. That is awesome. Well, there was another cool story because right after you become champion, you're down there getting the trophy, U.S. Open trophy, being your good friend the Birdman appears. Have you heard any background on this guy?

Like what was your thoughts when this guy walked out? So when he walked out, I'm kind of in the moment. And what's funny is right before he walked out, I'm kind of trying to take the moment in. And what my mind's thinking is, wow, there's a lot of California State Police around the screen. There's 25 of them. And I'm like, right before a Birdman comes out,

that's my thought. And then all of a sudden he breaks through. And I see his hat, that funny hat. And I see it's a blue, it's a red, white, and blue hat. Even though I didn't see the flag on there, I just assume USGA because they're USGA colors. And then he does his bird call. And I was so confused.

I thought maybe this is a USGA or a US Open thing and he missed his cue because he, you know, we're in the middle of an interview. So I'm like all over the place. Like he's with USGA. Why is he doing this? And right at that time, Mike Davis takes him by the shirt. shoulder and I don't think they showed this on TV but that he threw him off the green into the bunker where Jim Fiorek hit his second shot. They definitely did not show that. I saw the shoulder

grab. Birdman took a basically a free dive into the bunker and free bird. And then the cops came pulled him out and I guess you know they didn't arrest them out think they just kind of escorted him out. So it's a it's a great memory because when people think of that US Open the first thing I think about is Birdman. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of a good like it makes it. super memorable. I mean I had to reopen Alcatraz that night. Do you remember the sound that he made? Oh yeah, I remember it. Do you want to give us a little sample? Pacaa! Yeah, that's right there. I remember watching, I was like, who the hell is this? He's had a lot of practice. Yeah, he said, you know, well, though, yeah. What did you say, enjoy the jail cell buddy or something

like that? Enjoy the jail cell, pal. Yeah, yeah. Have you heard from him since? So, he issued an official apology on YouTube to me, but I didn't want him to. I thought I wasn't mad at all. I wasn't mad at all. I thought he added to the experience. And I know he went to a couple other tournaments that summer. I think he went to the open championship. I think he had a little bit more security with him or at least watching him. That was my first, it was going to be my first kind of answer. I was like, how does nobody, I mean, you're around the 72nd green. You mentioned there's so many California State Police, how does a guy just cruise under the ropes? But oh yeah, the guy with the weird hat on you. He probably belongs. Go ahead and do whatever. Go ahead on the green there. Yeah. I don't know

what his initiative was or what he was trying to do but um man he got to he he got past all those cops so good on him he's probably got a massive youtube channel now yeah probably worked out into oh yeah i think he had a big following especially right after that yeah i'll check him out one thing you went to you went to the belly putter very early on and then we got it got banned which i was a belly putter guy yeah um one you made a lot of putts with it i did i did and then it went away my belly got too big and the putter got too short. It's actually just a putter now. But the anchor band was 2016, correct?

Yep. What was that moment like for you? Was it like, oh boy, this is full panic. Here's a method that, you know, I really, it obviously works extremely well. Yeah. And now I have to go learn something new or go back to something that I'm a little uncomfortable with. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I was extremely nervous, fearful. I mean, I started with the belly putter in 2004, my freshman year at and instantly I putted better with it. And so I used this thing for 11 years, and it's a completely different feeling, motion, the way I stand than a short putter. And so when I heard they were going to ban it,

I was nervous. I didn't know if I could put decent with a short putter. One, because it's been so long, but two, the reason I switched to a belly putter is because my putting was so inconsistent. I was super streaky. My good streaks were good. My bad streaks were really bad. And so, Rider Cup in 2014 at Glen Eagles, Paul, after we, we're in the locker room, he says,

hey, we're going to Dunlop Phoenix in two weeks or whatever it was. Let's go to the short putter now. We're not putting great with the belly putter that year. He goes, it would be a good time to change. We'll get a year ahead of this band because technically I didn't have to switch, like you said, until January of 16. So we did that. I used a short putter in Japan for the first time in 11 years and had a rocky, really rocky

2016 or 2015 on the tour didn't play great or hit it great didn't put well at all and so it was hard to go from making team events for a few years in a row to not making it to Atlanta not making team events it was a big adjustment when they banned it did you know immediately that you were going to go to the arm lock no so you even experimented with it I had never even experimented with it and honestly maybe the only guy I saw ever used it was Matt coocher um And I think after enough bad putting rounds, I was willing to do anything. If a shovel made the ball go in the hole, I would have putted with a shovel. That's how desperate I felt like I was.

And it was actually this tournament in 16 where I missed a cut, playing with Phil, and I'm like, I got to try something different. So Saturday of this tournament, I went out to Charlotte Country Club with an arm lock. I had a couple of my garage. And I went out and started putting with it, putted pretty good. and I switch the next week for the players. How long did it take you to feel like you were on par with the way you were with it? Because you were the first guy I ever saw used the belt.

Like in college, I showed up like, oh, he probably can't put for shit. Right, exactly. He's using the belly putter. He's using the belly putter. Yeah, nobody used the belly putter. I knew you'd never have a career after that. Yeah, exactly. That's what it felt like.

But the arm lock, I putted better for the first year than the short putter. But I was kind of like the end of my belly putter days. It was inconsistent. and I showed up to the players one year later in 2017, Tim Clark's on the putting green. Tim said, how you been putting? Tim and I have the same agent, so I gotten to know Tim a little bit. And I said, man, I'm putting better with the arm lock than short putter,

but I'm still not where I want to be. And he said, you ever tried the claw? And I said, no. And I tried it. It felt very awkward, but I was making a lot of putts. Show up Thursday morning before the round, morning T-time. And Paul goes, which grip are you going with, conventional or claw?

and I laughed. I said, I still don't know yet. I said, you'll see you on the first hole, whatever I go with. Well, I did the claw, and I finished, I think 16th that week, but I think I was top three strokes game putting, which I hadn't sniffed that in years. And so that was my first tournament with four days in a row of good putting, and since then I've been able to, you know, put really well with the claw arm lock.

I mean, can you imagine if you didn't find that method, though? I mean, because it was rough sledding for a while. It was really rough sledding. I mean, I was, I think two years in a row, I was between 185 and 195 and strokes game putting. There's not many below that. No. And you can only rely on good ball striking for so long. I mean, I think I hit it awesome in 2016 stats-wise and didn't come close to making it to Atlanta.

And so, man, I needed something. You mentioned Paul Tesori, your longtime caddy. Y'all have an incredible relationship or very close. I know he helps you with your swing as well. How long have y'all been together? We started in 2011, 10 years. That is incredible. By the way, this is how confident he is in his job because you said, he said, let's get a year

ahead of this anchor band. Maybe one of the only few cats is like, yeah, I'm going to have a job with him a year from now. I keep putting like this, we're both on monster.com. But how much has he meant to you in your career? He's meant so much. I mean, my first year with him was 2011, and I finished 70th on the money list. my rookie year, and then I think, call it 90th, and then with him, I finished second, first year

with Paul. So he made an immediate splash. He credits so much of his kind of golf knowledge to VJ working for VJ for five years as VJ's caddy, and, you know, he was at every practice, and I give Pauly a lot more time off than V. But Paul's forever grateful to Vege for what he learned. So I think what Paul did is he helped me with my golf swing. He helped me with just kind of fundamentals and technique. VJ is so fundamentally driven and his mindset is so simple, which I think surprises people because he practices all day. I think people assume he's working on a million things. Paul said at the end of the day, 95% of what he worked on his golf swing was three things. And so I've kind of adopted that in my golf swing and has helped. But yeah,

Paul is an amazing caddy, an amazing, he's got an amazing eye for just technique in the game. And also a great friend. I mean, we players, give us a hard time, caddies give us a hard time because we room together. I don't think any other player caddy room together. But here's the deal. I'm on the road by myself 20 weeks a year. I want to hang out with somebody. I don't want to go to sit in a hotel room every night. So we room together and we have a blast. That's awesome. Yeah, it's more like a brother. Y'all's is like a more like a brotherhood. There's some cool, like, friendly player catty relationship, but you guys feel more like family. Exactly. And I think that helps our relationship professionally because

there's such a, there's such a common ground of, hey, I'm for you, I want you to get better. So whenever he has hard things to say to me or I have hard things to say to him, we both know that we're after each other's betterment. And so I think that helps both of us because, you know, if he's seen something like golf swing, it might be hard to say like, hey, you've had a couple nice weeks, but we're going to go down the wrong path if we don't fix this. I don't think a normal player-caddy relationship could operate that freely out of fear of, you know, what might have... Ruffling feathers.

Yeah. That's really, really cool. Should we get to the E-9s, least? I got one question. There's only a couple people, I feel like, in the world that can answer this question. We've got to go to 2018 players. Touch on that little cruiser victory you had there. But you go in and find around seven shots up, okay?

That's why I say you're the only guys that can answer this. You have that lead. What's that like for you knowing... I got seven-shot lead. That's pretty nice. But also, if for some reason, especially at Sawgrass where some bad things can happen, if I don't happen to win this thing, this is going down in history. Yeah, all those things go through your mind.

And it doesn't help that my tea time, I think, was like 240 that day or something. And so you're sitting around all day. And obviously, we already talked about I'm 6.30 with coffee. So I'm up all morning. Pacing. Yeah. But it was more uncomfortable than I thought it would be. I mean, seven shots.

you almost feel better at tied or one up because if you lose whatever. Yeah, it's just all downside. Correct. And I remember, you know, the first or the second hole, I three putted for par, Danny Lee birdied on all three, he hit it to a foot and I hit in the left bunker. And so I'm like, you know, if I don't get this ball up and down, we're already down a four-shot lead, which is nothing, as you said, around that golf course. But got it up and down, kind of weathered that beginning and birdied seven.

But then I had kind of a rough stretch. I gogued nine. I made par when I could get home into and I bogey 10 from the middle of the fairway. So I'm got that long walk to 11 and I knew we were going to wait. The guys in front was just teed off. So I kind of had a pep talk with myself. I got a birdie hole here. 12 is a birdie hole. It's drivable. And then obviously 16's a birdie hole. So I kind of told myself, you're fine. Like the guys who are near you only have a couple holes left. Like just buckle down here for a few holes and got. I got my birdie on 11 and 16, and honestly,

I wasn't going to exhale that entire day until the ball's on the green on 17. Because four shot lead, eight shot lead, it doesn't matter because we've seen guys reload, reload. And thankfully, Paul got the number that morning. It was a perfect sandwich. I don't like getting up on that hole hitting like a little chip wedge.

Some guys do, I don't. So I hit a sandwich, landed right in the middle of the green, and I knew it was over. There's no lead. Six, seven, twelve, seventeen, until that thing's dry. Exactly. It's still up in the air. Well, they don't talk about it, never.

No. They don't talk about Bob Tway. Sorry, Bob. You don't really see that many meltdowns there. Yeah, exactly. All right, well, now we're going to get to the E9, nine fun questions. Definitely. For you, you're going to love this. Perfect.

Okay, we asked this to everybody. Movie made about the life of Webb Simpson. You can pick anyone to play you. Who's it going to be? My favorite actor is Denzel Washington. Okay. So I'm picking Denzel. incredible you and gary woodland have both picked him so i didn't think we

yeah yeah we picked him too yeah we've had a few people yeah he's in my favorite movie man on oh good movie yeah great movie i mean has he ever made a bad movie no it's like you on the greens that could be the name of it mine wasn't an actor i picked chris kirk yes that's a good one yeah yeah he's got the beard yeah i normally have the beard yeah and brennan todd throw them all in there and just get who's who like where's walled them all the time yeah i love that all right number two you have a well-earned reputation is one of the nicest guys on the pj tour give me one thing that'll get web simpson matt see you at your worst um well we've touched on already and to be honest if i open my coffee drawer i'm out of coffee no caffeine yeah like that's that's when i got to you got to get in the

car and drive to the store when the first thing i want to do is just sit down and have my coffee So it's happened enough to where it's never going to happen again in my house. That's incredible. That's the one thing that can make it mad. I love that. Okay. Well, let's tell us, I've heard your coffee order. It's rather interesting.

Well, what you're referring to is I used to get eight shots over ice, ice in first. Okay. A little bit of cream. Ice in first. Yeah. Why? Why does the ice have to be in first? So the Starbucks baristas tell me, one guy said, hey, if you put the ice in first,

the cold ice will shock the espresso shot and it holds flavor longer, which there's no way that can be true. How do you test this? You don't challenge a Starbucks barista. Exactly. I went with it. I went with it. But I think COVID happened.

Starbucks are shut down. I realize I got to make it at home. So now I have everything at home. I have a pourover kit, kettle, and I travel with it. So I have, I mean, this is coffee 101, but I have the coffee suitcase. It travels with Hulk up. Coffee 101. So every event, I've got my kettle, my grinder, my scale.

Scale. Yeah, measure the beans every morning. Yeah. Okay, how, like what weight are we? This was actually my next question, so just keep going on the coffee. So I go 42 grams per cup, and then the hot water is at 205 degrees and, you know, the slow pour. The whole process takes about eight minutes. So thankfully, we have Hulk of the luggage service on tour, because he's,

He's taking it for me every week. I got to try this coffee at a time. It's like breaking bad in Webb's kitchen. It's like a little meth lab in there. I've wondered sometimes at hotels like, are these people going to think there's something shady going on in here? Cooking meth open it. No, dude, this is just the morning coffee.

And I've got the Kim X Beaker, you know, so that looks a little sketchy. Brings a hazmat suit. Eight minutes to make your coffee each morning. All right, that was actually my next one. So fire two on that one. Oh, that is great. All right. We talked earlier about our Swiss games at the Walker Cup.

You're gambling. Yeah. And you didn't like to play for too much. I mean, you've made over $40 million on tour. What's the biggest bet you've ever made? So my first Presence Cup in Australia, I'm playing in a practice round with Phil and Furik and all the way of the team.

Bubba had played the Ryder Cup in Wales in 2010. And Bubba said, hey, just to let you know, we're probably going to be playing for $1,000 today. And I'm like, what do you mean? I'm like, what if I don't want to? He's like, well, you're playing with Phil. You don't have a choice. he's like, I'm just letting you know.

He's like, I don't want to play for that, but he goes, that's what we're playing for. And so we did. And Bubba and I won, and I said, hey, Bubba, Jim can pay you. I want Phil to pay me because I want to always say that I'm a thousand up on Phil. Never going to bet him again. I love that. You keep that thousand and frame it, put it on the wall. I don't care if you're down to your last nickel.

I have a feeling Phil's largest bet's a little bigger than that. I'm sure. That probably didn't even get him excited. That'll be the answer. What's the smallest amount you've ever played for? The one day I played Webb Simpson for $1,000. Yeah, exactly. All right, I got a fill in from my copy. I just thought of it. Can we confirm that the Birdman actually might not have been just Charlie Hoffman in disguise? Yeah, because then Charlie had the long hair. Yeah, and the Seagull, this is right up in his valley. Yeah, I couldn't see

see Charlie doing that, but maybe, we'll see. But we've never seen Birdman and Charlie in the same place at the same time that's all I'm saying. That's awesome. Next question. All right, you mentioned earlier you got food poison at the Walker Cup and Friday. I might have gotten amongst it, as we said on this show a lot on Sunday night. Who do you think felt worse Monday morning going to the airport mirror you? Definitely you.

And the proof of that is... Yeah, prove it. Proof of that is I woke up Sunday morning feeling a little better. I had like full breakfast. Colt and most of the team, they're kind of getting on the bus last minute. Colt's there. You know, Colt likes to hold court. You know, Colt was, he was always telling stories, making us laugh on the team bus.

Well, Colt's real quiet Monday morning. Kind of cuddled up in his seat. And Colt needs a pit stop. So. The roads in Ireland are a little windy. A little windy, a little bumpy. And Buddy Marucci, our captain, Colt says, Buddy, we got to stop, like right now.

So Colt needed to stop. Colt wasn't feeling great. And we're all just smiling. It's a great victory we just had, and now Colts in the woods in Ireland. Some man's driveway. Just be cooking some random dude's driveway. We all got pictures of it. Sasquatch.

I felt better than have any. Are there photos of this? Apparently, Dustin has a photo. We're going to need to retrieve. I know what the photo looks like. I probably don't have it, but yeah, we need to get it. Good black male material for CBS. And contract negotiation, well, we can release this or you can take what we're off.

I'm finally. We broke a very long streak of losing across the pond, so I was very, very happy. Happy, but yes. So Sunday night, my last memory, because we're all at the dinner, and I'm still not feeling good Sunday night. I got to go up to my room. And so as I'm walking out, I see Colt holding, you know, servers tray of shots. And that's when I said, good night to Colt.

Coles ready to celebrate. So that was my last picture of him Sunday night. Robbie Zawsnick, our team manager, made me a bobblehead doll, me with a red USA cap on and holding a tray of shots. It's fantastic. That's perfect. That was a fun of them weren't sharing the room

We sat next to each other The plane ride home And I mean we were both dead For the week But hey I puked and felt better You're going to have to share facilities That's nice All right next one

This is more of a story Can you tell us the story About how your good friend Bubba Watson helped facilitate Your Caddy's wife Getting a very nice piece of jewelry Oh yeah So we were at the Masters

A few years ago And I guess when Polly was engaged This was that time And Bubba said hey I think it goes that if you can find a palm tree, one palm tree at Augusta, I will buy you, you know, whatever ring you're going to get Michelle. Well, we get to four and obviously there's the only palm in Augusta. And now it really sticks out.

Then there was a lot more shrubs, bamboo around it. Well, Paul finds it. Bubba's mad because he's got to buy the string, but he said he would do it. and he literally bought the ring. I guess it, I don't know if it was an engagement ring or wedding ring, whatever it was, cost a lot of money,

and he paid up. He did. Yeah, he did. Yeah, he bought the ring. I like that. So, we always talk about it on the whole number. Man of his word.

He is. And like when he told me he would come on this podcast and has backed out. It's a lot easier by the ring after you win the tournament too. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. That must have been 12. Yeah, that's what I was cold.

Yeah. Yeah. He had plenty of money to buy it before that, but that helped. Yeah, catching him out a good time. Yeah. They're in a good mood. Here, I'll do it now.

Yeah. All right, last question. You caddy, Paul Tesori. Very good player. Y'all play a lot of golf together. Has he ever beaten you? Yes. Got to be honest on this podcast.

Yes. He'll listen to this. He beat me at Augusta. He was one up going to 18, and I hit it five feet, and he hit it 20 feet maybe, and he made it. He made Birdie on 18 and beat me by one. What was his reaction? action like um i think he was way more excited on the inside than on the outside i didn't know he beat me at the time but he he he let me know he did and and still this day lets me know that he

beat me well i mean what a place to do it yeah and we played all the way back it was legit what year was that that was probably that was probably 2016 oh okay yeah yeah we had one on the radio and he called him told us that sort like first thing he said i got to tell you the story about me no no so i asked I said, have you ever beat Webb? He goes, I'm so glad you at. How much time do we have right now? We went shot by shot. So on one, I was playing a title for.

Web, we can't thank you enough, my man. This has been awesome. Thank you for having me. Yeah, super fond. And that was Webb Simpson joining us on golf subpar. I know you don't know him very, very well, but obviously he brings some energy with his caffeinated to see. Yeah.

How can you not bring energy when you're slamming three coffees in there, in the system before you even tee it up. I love hearing that. And also, maybe a little conspiracy theory. That possibly could be what leads to his quote-unquote little, you know, shank issue that pops up every now and then. I know it well, it can happen when you got that much, when you got that much juice running through the system.

But I also love this quote. I think it was like, some of my best years are my biggest shank years. He's like, he looks at the shanks like, oh, if I'm shanking it a lot, that means I'm real close to playing good. And those are some of his best years. I thought that was awesome. By far, the best player I've ever known to consistently. shank a ball. But I mean, yeah, if you're going to play your best, when you hit a few shanks,

hey, no problem at all. I love how it just doesn't really seem to bother him at all. I mean, that's just the way Webb is and just lets it roll off his back. But, man, what a great time of this was. And how about the fact that Paul Tesori, 30's 18 at Augusta National to beat Webb for the first time, his caddy. I thought that was a great story. Yeah, every caddy who's a former player deserves to beat their guy at least once. And to do it at Augusta National, that's got to be the pinnacle of all that. But I remember when we had Paul on our radio show, we were talking through that story.

He was like keeping score the entire day. He knew exactly where the match stood. And he's like, I could kind of tell Webb probably wasn't aware of what was going on until the last couple holes. And then I told him what was going on. And Webb proceeded to go like birdie, birdie or whatever to finish it and close it out. But yeah, that's a pretty nice feather to have in the cap for Paul Tesoro to beat Webb at Augusta National.

If you're going to do it anywhere, that's the spot. No doubt about it. I've got to thank him for coming. on with us. But please, we got to give a little shout out to our guys over at Bar School, especially Riggs for what they have done with, you know, the women's collegiate golfers. I thought that was such a cool thing for them to set that tournament up to where these, because, I mean, these girls absolutely got host with what the NCAA did. I thought it was very big of them to step up and put that event. So I just want to give a little tip of the cap to

rigs and the guys at Bar School for doing that awesome event. Yeah, huge props to those guys for getting that done and getting that done so quickly and giving these girls a chance to end their careers, at least with a chance to play and not just going home because there's some rain out there. And also, like, it's almost sad that it takes a group like Barstool Sports, a digital media company to come in and save the day, just like they did with small businesses, right? They raised so much money for small businesses. Like, this isn't their job. This isn't their job to go give girls a chance to play when the NCAA messes up, but they

took it upon themselves to do it. And I think the NCAA looks like a bunch of schmucks after this. I mean, they're known for kind of messing things up. But, yeah, kudos to Riggs and the boys over at Foreplay for getting that set up. pretty cool deal to see them actually do something like that that makes a difference for these girls you know i don't know if you're paying attention but charlie hoffman just made an appearance i just saw him you might want to check don't look at your back right shoulder just wait till afterwards all right well let's get into our picks for this week's pga championship you know we both made

the cut last week at the byron nelson but not our best you know we both went with some pretty big players obviously i went with the huge one in john rom big let down um for his performance And you had Scotty Sheffler. Not our best, but producer Mark, how those standings are looking. Yeah, so nothing crazy for either of you guys, but you did both cross the 3 million threshold for the season. And the lead grew just slightly up to $346,798. All right.

All right. Still tight. There's a massive purse on the line this week. I do have the honor since John Rob nudged out Scottie Sheffler and Slees. I mean, it's a major championship. You got to go with a big time player. This guy, he's won a crooked stick. He's going at TPC Sawgrass, both beat die golf courses.

Last time I played here. He won by eight shots. I know it's a different time of year, but I'm going to go with him. He wanted his last start at Quail Hollow. Roy McElroy is my guy this week. Yeah, as disappointing as it was for both of us to use some big-name guys last week, and it really didn't matter money-wise what was going on that last day. It was an enormous Sunday final round to see who had the honor going in this week.

Because I'm on record. I don't ever want to pick the same guy you pick. that kind of, you know, lessens the significance of the week. So I was like, Scott, I was watching the thing. I was like, Scotty, make a fricking birdie, bro. So anyways, I got nudged out. I had a feeling you were going to go with Rory. That's smart.

Don't overthink it. I think it's the right time to pick Rory. I'm going to go with the guy. I've been saving, waiting for him to catch for him. And I think that time is now. He's the 16 to one betting odds this week. Jordan Speath is who I'm going to go with. I'll give you my logic here.

You tell me if you disagree or agree with this. All right. recent form, last eight events, he's got a win, six top tens. He's only finished outside the top 15 one time, okay? My hope here, Colt, is all this hype around the golf course, how hard it's going to play, things like that, even the best ball strikers in the world, I'm hoping if the wind gets blowing, they make this thing as hard as they say they can. Even the best in the world are missing a bunch of greens.

All of a sudden, the emphasis on the short game becomes a little more important. Who can get up and down, who can scramble, who can make those six, seven-foot par saves. And if it gets into a situation like that, there's nobody better. than Jordan Speeth there. So I'm going to go with Jordan Speeth. There's a few places I was thinking of taking him, but this week at this golf course, I think the harder that it plays,

the more I like Jordan Speath. And shit, I mean, his form is so good right now. Like, what am I, what am I saving him for? You know what I mean?

Six top tens in his last eight. You got to jump on that. Hey, you don't have to convince me. You don't have to say it twice. I heard you the first stab. But yeah, I love him this week.

I already used him at Augusta. I just flew over here with him. So I can't really root against him since he did give me a ride on the bird. Slide that in. There you go. Yeah, it's a great pick. Yeah.

It's a great pick. All right. Here we go. Roy McElroy, Jordan Speeat at this week's PGA. And Sleeze, the hits keep on coming. We have a fun one coming up next week. We got two caddies sitting down with us.

Aaron Cleaner, Gino Bonelli. If you don't know them, you're going to love them after you watch this episode. It is a blast. And that's going to do it for this week's golf subpar. See you next week.