What they said: Paul Goydos

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JOHN BUSH: Paul Goydos joins us here in the media center at the Crowne Plaza Invitational here at Colonial.

Paul, thanks for coming by for a few minutes. A tremendous showing last week at THE PLAYERS Championship. Let's chat a little bit about that first. Third place and talk a little bit about the final round, excellent play.

PAUL GOYDOS: Yes, I played good. I actually got off to a little bit of a slow start, made a bogey on 5 or so and then nicely rebounded with a birdie on 6. I think that kind calmed me down a little bit. It was kind of a teetering on going in the wrong direction maybe.

I really hung in there and made a good birdie.

I birdied 9, 10 and 11. I generally look at leaderboards, but they're a little fewer and par between on that tournament for whatever reason.

I didn't break out until maybe No. 8. And I looked up and I saw that I started in 10th, 8 under, and I was 8 under and moved to eighth. I was kind of going the other way which kind of surprised me a little bit.

And then birdied 9, 10 and 11, and actually got a chance to moving up in the tournament. Unfortunately bogeyed 13, I didn't hit a very good shot there and played pretty good coming in. Just nothing really good happened. Something good happened to Toms and K.J. and that was kind of the difference.

JOHN BUSH: And now back to Colonial, your 13th start here, I know a golf course that you really like.

PAUL GOYDOS: I think everyone likes it. I don't think there are very many people that don't like playing here. I just got done playing my practice round this morning. The course is in fantastic condition . You usually get good weather here. I think it's one of the best venues we have all year without question.

JOHN BUSH: Pairings, you are playing with Lucas Glover and Hunter Mahan.

PAUL GOYDOS: Really?

JOHN BUSH: You will be the odd man out.

PAUL GOYDOS: I'm older than both of them combined maybe. Good. That's a great pairing. Lucas is obviously playing quite well winning at Wells Fargo. And Hunter has played well for the last three or four years. I'm looked forward to it.

JOHN BUSH: You have to grow the facial hair out, like Arnold Palmer?

PAUL GOYDOS: This right here is five days growth I got going here. I had a goatee when I won it at Bay Hill. Arnold didn't appreciate that too much. You don't want to have facial hair when you win at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Arnold is not a big fan of facial hair. If he asks you to shave, that's what you do. I was so under the radar at that event he didn't know who I was. I walked up on the 18th green. He was like, what are you doing? Who are you? Why are you on my green? Well, I won. You need to shave that stuff off. Okay. Nice to meet you.

JOHN BUSH: Questions?

Q. What has been the secret of your longevity?

PAUL GOYDOS: Well, if you listen to the guys on the morning drive, which I did last week, it's my ability to get a lot out of my game. Now I'm not sure exactly what that means right frankly, because I answered that question. The guy asked me, who gets the most out of his game? I go Tiger Woods. The guy won 71 tournaments, 14 majors. If he is not getting a lot out of his game, my God.

I think the biggest thing to be successful here, I learned a long time ago is know thyself, play your game. You know your strengths and weaknesses and try to stay where you are comfortable playing, and I have been able to do that.

I have had my stretches where I played very well and had long stretches where I haven't.

Understanding what you do well, what you don't do well, what you need to work on, the things that you need to do. It's an individual sport.

You really need to, in my opinion, get the most out of what you can do and the first thing you have to do is an honest evaluation of who you are and what you are capable of doing.

Q. I was going to ask him, you might have answered it, what do you do better now than you did 10 years ago?

PAUL GOYDOS: The first thing, I know myself better than before. I know how I've reacted in being in competition. I know what my strengths are. When I am playing well, I know what to expect. People talked about how you get up on 17 and 18 and then nervous, those are hard shots. But the reality is, the most nervous shots in golf are the ones when you are in contention and you are not playing well. Maybe you are getting by, by making some putts or getting some good breaks, or whatever, and you really don't have your A game. Then the 18th hole at Sawgrass is just mean.

I was in a position, was playing so well I'm nervous. I'm a very nervous player in my opinion. Bu that's nowhere near as nerve wracking as being in contention in a sense with your game really not where you want it to be.

But I think experience, knowing who I am, knowing my game, knowing my strengths, how I played at THE PLAYERS this year finishing third, probably 10 years ago would have been a borderline Top 10 or 15 just because I handled the situation better.

Q. At Colonial what do you see as strengths? Are there holes or aspects of your game?

PAUL GOYDOS: Yes, this is a golf course where again for me I need to keep the ball in play. On this golf course you need to drive your ball in the fairway. That's the first thing you need to do here. The rough this year isn't as high as it's been in other years. The greens are so small and so well bunkered if you don't drive your ball into position, you are probably not going to be very successful here period.

Then you need to be able to control your distances. The greens are small. You may be hitting a short iron, 7, 8, 9 irons, but a 5 yard or 10 yard miss will be problematic on this golf course.

The greens have nooks, and they are small, and they can generally get pretty firm here with the weather.

It's a golf course where you really need to have control of your golf ball.

If I'm playing well that's what I think I do very well. If I'm not playing well, it doesn't matter. I can play anywhere and I'm not going to be successful.

But this is a place where my game, like I said, a big part of success is timing. If my game is where it was last week at Houston, which is a lot longer golf course, I probably wouldn't finish third. I would finish 7th, 8th, 10th or 12th. I had a good game on a course that fit me well. That's part of the deal. Well, why don't you just play the courses that fit you well? There is only like 3. I need to have a full schedule. This is another golf course where I feel if my game is in good shape, and I am making putts, I can have some success at it.

Q. The Kodak Challenge here, I believe you are second or tied for second, Kodak Challenge, the 13th hole this year is a par 3 which I believe you had a hole in one last year; do you want to talk a little bit about that?

PAUL GOYDOS: Yes, the 13th here, especially on Saturday, everybody is wearing pink and it's a big deal, The Kodak Challenge hole, 13 can be it's like their version of 16 at Phoenix. It's loud and inebriated. They actually did the deal where the guys are betting on which caddy are going to step on the green; all of the crazy stuff they like to do. I made a hole in one there on Saturday, with the pink shirt and the crowd going crazy. It was my first hole of one in an official round of golf. I made a couple in practice rounds.

I don't remember it being the Kodak Challenge hole. It was last year. I wasn't anywhere near contention. I think I was over par at some point.

This year, I got off to good start, and I birdied some tough holes. I birdied 18 at Bay Hill; birdied 16 at Honda, whatever. It's kind of a cool thing. I didn't really think much about the Kodak Challenge until I've been doing it. It's a cool thing they've come up with. I'm really impressed. I think it's a great thing. It will be great down the stretch. We'll see how it works out. We have a long ways to go. I think it's a cool thing to do Kodak has come up with. It's good for the tournaments, publicity. And hopefully I will continue to make birdies.

Q. You mentioned your advantage in experience, your bearded playing partners. The question is, is experience an advantage on this course? Secondarily, a guy coming in here in a few minutes here has won here before, and is one of several past champions here on the Champions Tour now that are playing The Colonial, Tom Lehman.

What do you think about the possibility of 50 something golfer possibly winning at this event this week?

PAUL GOYDOS: Well, Corey played last week. There is no question in my mind that 60 year old Tom Watson almost won The Open Championship. He probably played better than everybody else in the field. If he hits a good chip on 18, he's won the Open Championship at 60.

If Tom Lehman, or I think Mark Brooks is playing, and Corey, if one of them were to win this week I wouldn't be even remotely surprised. I think experiences helps. This golf course has a quirkiness to it, again, smaller greens, and they have had success here before.

They are playing here not because they like the course, they like the tournament. They played well here in the past. That's why they are here. Their age is not going to be any kind of deterrent to them being successful, kind of like Freddie did last year starting out on the Senior Tour. I think Tom has played pretty similar as well on the Champion's Tour, this year. I think this is Corey's favorite golf course on TOUR. He's played well the last five or six years, even in the upper 40's. If Corey were to play well here it wouldn't even remotely be a surprise.

Q. Do you tinker a lot or experiment with putters or have you been loyal?

PAUL GOYDOS: I didn't. This year my stats are ridiculously poor. They are have this new stat out called strokes gained putting. I haven't seen it. I was looking through my ShotLink stuff. I have a negative number. That can't be good. I can't believe this is the one time you don't want to be under par. I don't know if you can have a negative. Hopefully I read it wrong.

JOHN BUSH: It means you are giving strokes away.

PAUL GOYDOS: With the putter, that's not good. This year I have tinkered a little bit for whatever reason. I generally don't. I'm a big fan of that. From the ball's perspective, most putters look the same. I have made putts with this particular putter before. There is no reason why I won't in the future. I never looked at the putter being the problem. This year it's been poor. I don't think I'm changing. I don't think it's a better putter, just a different look.

Q. You are not a guy who would go from conventional to the long putter?

PAUL GOYDOS: I was bad, and I hit some putts with a belly putter. It was worse, and long putters. My issues with putting really aren't the length of the putt, it's the length between my ears.