Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Critics who have said a safer shot here or there would undoubtedly have won me a few more tournaments are probably correct. Going for the green in two was who I was as a boy - and it's who I remain as a man.
Honestly, people can write anything they want about me and I could care less, but once you start writing stuff about my family, my wife and my daughter and son or my mother-in-law, then you're drawing a line.
There's no question that the galleries still like to see birdies and eagles. If you take them all away, it takes some of the dramatics, the excitement of a golf tournament and we [people] don't want to do that.
Great touch is often written off simply as 'talent,' which is crucial, because a good swing can take a golfer only so far. I've seen thousands of fantastic swings in my day, but that doesn't guarantee anything.
It really is amazing that some days you'll come out and you'll feel like you can beat anyone, and then some days you come out and you've got no confidence in the world, and you can't break an egg with a hammer.
When you get into competition and get under pressure, and get over that ball and are looking at it, and know you have to hit it, it is having that system to depend on to get that ball to where you want it to be.
I started flying because I had a fear of it early on. I figured if I learned to fly, I would understand better what was happening and started taking lessons in the late 1950's, once I had made some money on tour.
I'm not much for sitting around and thinking about the past or talking about the past. What does that accomplish? If I can give young people something to think about, like the future, that's a better use of my time.
You get nit-picked in the media. Stats are always up saying he doesn't drive it straight enough or hit enough greens or whatever it is. Then you have to perform, because if you don't perform, then you're off the Tour.
What other people may find in poetry or art museums, I find in the flight of a good drive: the white ball sailing up into the sky, reaching its apex, falling and finally dropping to the turf, just the way I planned it.
Ever since I bought and started flying an airplane, it's been almost exclusively for business. I love to fly. It's a great joy to me. But rarely do I use it for any kind of pleasure, other than it is a pleasure to fly.
I remember ones I lost [shot]. I remember the ones I won, but I remember the ones I lost, something that I will never forget. Did it ruin me or hurt my career? It taught me about life, how to take the bad with the good.
I feel like there are a lot of positives in my swing. I'm really going to work around the rhythm of my swing, being able to keep my rhythm and being more consistent. Consistency is what I'm looking for, performance-wise.
Frankly, I'm not much for funerals unless it's absolutely an obligation. I don't feel it serves much of a purpose to go and see my friends just lying there, dead. I try to pay my respects to my friends when they're alive.
My dad was the way he was, but he also gave me a motto: never say die. Just to keep pushing and pushing, fighting until the end. He put it in my head that you're always going to fight, and you're always going to beat them.
Golf is deceptively simple and endlessly complicated; it satisfies the soul and frustrates the intellect. It is at the same time rewarding and maddening - and it is without a doubt the greatest game mankind has ever invented.
On the Old Course at St. Andrews: This is the origin of the game, golf in its purest form, and it's still played that way on a course seemingly untouched by time. Every time I play here, it reminds me that this is still a game.
'Golf Digest' had all the old school swings, and my favorite swing, ever, was Nick Faldo's swing. And it had all the greats, Ernie Els and Nick Faldo and all that stuff, and I had the pictures of their swing sequences on my wall.
Swing your swing. Not some idea of a swing. Not a swing you saw on TV. Not that swing you wish you had. No, swing your swing. Capable of greatness. Prized only by you. Perfect in it's imperfection. Swing your swing. I know, I did.
I am very pleased with my synthetic golf green from Southwest Greens. It reacts like a championship golf green, so I can practice my short game whenever I'm at home. I couldn't believe that a synthetic green could be this perfect.
I feel more strongly than ever about this. I would like the professional game freed of golf carts. Golf is a physical game. If we are playing competitive professional golf, we should walk. When I can't walk 18 holes, I'll pack it in.
You know, that's one great thing about the sport we play is you know, whether it's here, whether it's anywhere else we play or whether it's around the world. A lot of the fans, they respect great golf and they want to see great golf.
Most amateurs are so worried about mis-hitting the shot or hitting it off line, they don't make an aggressive move. You'd be surprised how much better your swing will get if you let your natural athletic ability shine. So go after it.
I've played such good golf, and it was hard coming up and it wasn't easy in any matches or any shots. It means a lot. I think hopefully it will mean a lot to New Zealand because I'm the next winner of the U.S. Amateur after Danny Lee.
I don't feel that old, but when I talk to these kids, I do feel old. Because I'm talking about taxes and all this other stuff that is very, very boring. And these guys are talking about music, and I'm like, 'Oh, I remember those days.'
I told my caddie today that I am in the position that I want to be in. That this is what I have been waiting for, to win my tenth victory. I said that I am going to do everything that I can do today and that nothing is going to stop me.
I started when I was three, and on some courses they wouldn't let me play because they said I was too little. They wouldn't accept that a child could play. So my parents had to argue at times with some people at golf courses so I could.
I've worked so hard, I've won a lot in my junior career, did great things in my amateur career, was 6-0 in match play in NCAAs, won NCAAs two years in a row, got third individually one year, and now I have three wins out here on the PGA Tour.
I have had a love affair with Wake Forest since my undergraduate days, but I didn't realize until many years later what I had truly learned at Wake Forest, both in and out of the classroom, about the meaning of a productive and meaningful life.
I've stated my position, and that is we do not need a contraption to play the game of golf. I would hope that we'd play under one set of rules, and those rules would include a ban on the long putter hooked to the body in some way, shape or form.
To me, wearing glasses is no pleasure, but once I conceded that I simply couldn't properly judge distance without them, I began to experiment. I tried glasses and found them uncomfortable. I switched to contact lenses, and they also bothered me.
I've heard people say putting is 50 percent technique and 50 percent mental. I really believe it is 50 percent technique and 90 percent positive thinking, see, but that adds up to 140 percent, which is why nobody is 100 percent sure how to putt.
The vertigo is a difficult thing: it just comes and goes whenever it pleases. I wasn't expecting it. I've had it before, and there have been years between stretches, and unfortunately it happened at the U.S. Open, and that knocked me off my feet.
It is not a dreamlike state, but the somehow insulated state, that a great musician achieves in a great performance. He's aware of where he is and what he's doing, but his mind is on the playing of the instrument with an internal sense of rightness.
Phil [Mickelson] has done a great job. He's a great player and he's conducted himself very well through the years. He's been a good ambassador for the game. He hasn't won in a while, but he still has time, and it wouldn't surprise me if he won again.
I find myself getting associated with a lot of younger people in the game. I still enjoy playing with them, and I think they still enjoy playing with me. As long as I can stay competitive and have fun doing what I'm doing, I guess I'll keep doing it.
I've stated my position, and that is that we do not need a contraption to play the game of golf. I would hope that we'd play under one set of rules, and those rules would include a ban on the long putter hooked to the body in some way, shape or form.
I'm proud to partner with organizations that place an emphasis on and share my interest in giving back to the community. RBC has a rich history of doing this through their sponsorship of golf and the extensive ambassadorial program they have in place.
I grew up in poverty on the edge of a golf course. I saw how people lived on the other side of the tracks, the upper crust and the WASPs at the country club. We had chickens and pigs in our yards. We butchered every year. I'll never forget those things.
As I get older, my body isn't bulletproof, and it's starting to break down. And I'm still young, so it's something that I have to maintain, something that I have to work extra, extra hard, just as hard as my golf game, I have to work on my body as well.
I don't feel like I'm out of my element or anything like that. I'm very comfortable where I'm at. I enjoy being in this position, and actually it feels like I haven't really been away from it. I feel very comfortable out there from the first tee onwards.
It's great to have a lot of support; people recognizing what you're doing out there and identifying with you in whatever way they see fit is a great fit, I think, and for me it's neat, for people to want to come to the golf course and watch me play golf.
As a kid growing up in Latrobe, PA, I could dream about being an Olympian like Jesse Owens or Johnny Weissmuller. I could also dream about being a great golfer like Bobby Jones or Byron Nelson. But the idea of being an Olympic golfer never occurred to me.
I know what tournaments I'm going to be in, and I know that I don't have to qualify for pretty much anything. That's a huge relief. But I don't really set that many goals, I just want to have fun out there and enjoy what I do. When a win comes, a win comes.
Everyone gets surprised because neither one of my parents play golf. Like I said in my speech, my aunt and uncle really love golf, and we visited them, and she gave me two clubs. Like people think when they don't know who my dad is, they think he's my coach.
If you buy a book on golf instruction buy the thinnest book you can find. The thinner the book, chances are the easier and more elementary the instruction. It can do one of two things: help you more or hurt you less. Both are good compared to the alternative.
I've never been more motivated to be No. 1 in the world. I've never been more motivated to try to extend that lead from one to two. All the hard work that I've put into my game right now has paid off, but I've got to keep working hard to win as much as I can.
I am very proud of what I have done since I turned professional. It's been great to become the first teenager to win three times, to have played in some Majors and the Masters, and to have twice broken into the world's top 50 and stayed there for a bit of time.
I don't think that golf has a place for two sets of rules. I think one of the reasons that the game has progressed in the way that it has over the years is the fact that the amateurs and the pros all play the same game, and they play under the same set of rules.
I played a lot of baseball growing up, and I always hit better if I kept moving before the pitch instead of standing still in the batter's box. I think a waggle does the same thing in the golf swing. It keeps you relaxed and gets your body ready to hit the ball.