Memorial Tournament 2024: Jack Nicklaus previews course, details changes | Golf Today | Golf Channel

Jack Nicklaus discusses the Memorial Tournament, including event changes, his past experiences and more, as competition commences June 6 at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio. #GolfChannel #PGATour
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Memorial Tournament 2024: Jack Nicklaus previews course, details changes | Golf Today | Golf Channel
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all right let’s get started with this portion of the uh the interview Mr Nicholas uh thanks again for joining us tournament host founder of the tournament great to see you again it’s always a fun session congratulations on the award winners amazing time for you guys um and Anil Thanks For Your sponsorship once again um I guess a lot of the talk so far has been the changes to the 16th hole so maybe we could just have you on that to start with a little bit well we made two changes on the golf course we added a little bit of yard on the front of 17t uh we added five yards to a 5503 yard hole I me I think fourward so if we had so we had to win in your fa Shield I got to play at 495 or 498 not big change uh the 16th hole uh I think may have you probably heard me say this but uh uh I went back and looked at shot Lake after the tournament I really kept sing I these guys are only playing an eight or n under under this green come on guys they got to be able to keep the ball on the green and I went back at shot Lake and shot Lakes had had hit hit the green 35% on Saturday and 28% on Sunday and I’m sitting there and say well you know maybe it’s not shame on them maybe it’s shame on me and so uh I set about trying to figure out what would be the best way to change that hole without ruining it and uh I came up we we came up with moving the te’s about 30 yards right since that no longer was our maintenance area we could move te’s over into that area uh it gave us a little bit more of a downwind hole not so much cross across the water but more down the water and I said well you know that front bunker uh a lot of balls can be brought in from there or we can give I give them the front part of the green so basically I’ve given the players the short of the green and the front part of the green and but I’ve left the last two-thirds of the green uh similar to what it was before very it didn’t change at all and so what that means is that now uh you could go ahead and play a shot and you get the ball into the front part of the green fairly easily uh you probably get it there where you’re going to maybe have a 20 to 30 foot butt for for for birdie uh and that’s that’s okay I think a lot of fellas would have been quite happy last year to walk off there with threee uh but if you want to challenge the hole and challenge challenge a pin position back left or back right or a a middle left uh you’re going to probably have to get the ball a little further into the green and you can leave it short and take the long butt that’s fine or you could challenge it so that’s I wanted to not give the hole away but I also wanted to make it so that uh there really was a bailout all right terrific well this ladies and gentlemen this is your time to ask questions so if you have any please raise your hand and we’ll get you a microphone and um fire away we’ll start with Rob in the front thanks Jack where is uh winning here in 1977 rank in your list of some of your favorite things what it mean what it meant to you what it means to you well 77 was a year that uh you know the second year of the tournament uh I was spent most of my time on the golf course uh picking up papers and cigarette butts and uh uh throwing things and uh I think it was Angelo at the time was cading for me and uh uh he was he ended up with pockets all full and every about four holes he’d have to go dump his pockets out because I keep filling them up again I mean I was more interested in how the tournament was going the cleanliness of the golf course how the how the players enjoyed it how how we were taking care of the players how making making sure that everything was what it should be and you know to do that and all the things I was doing and then win the golf tournament with it I was probably one of the best Feats I’ve ever had in the game of golf I think it’s I rank it probably as high as I guess the only thing I think is higher as GT’s holding one at the gusta in the bar three uh and you don’t know you don’t what I’m talking about and uh the uh because you know it’s a uh it’s it’s tough to to play and be part of running something and you know I don’t run it anymore I mean you know Dan Sullivan his crew and everybody and Jackie’s now is down chairman of the tournament you know I just sit back and sort of you know I’m sort of the figurehead out here doing doing press conferences they hope they hoping I don’t say something bad BR do you have a followup yeah uh followup was a lot of big names yourself included have won this tournament tiger Watson is this a tournament outside the majors that really guys need to win to really fill out that resume well I think it’s a pretty good tournament to win to fill out of resume I don’t think there’s any question about that uh we’ve had a lot of guys that won here the first time went on to win majors and a lot of guys that have uh played the game for a long time and then then finally won here and uh guys like Watson who won late in his career here as well as winning early in his career um you know tiger went all through his career tiger went won five times here uh you know I mean a tournament’s resb is not too bad if we have tiger winning at five times I think I probably answers your question right there okay we’re going to have two or three questions from this corner over here Jack between uh Ohio State being uh in the championship this past week in the NCAA Ohio State what being in the championship in the NCAA this past week and you coming back here this week and and you got to host the team down at your house I believe in February or March um what does it mean to you to see the program doing so well right now and and how have have you been able to to kind of follow what they’re doing well I’m pleased to see the program coach Mosley’s done a nice job with it and uh uh hits the golf course the they got a good golf course to play on practice on uh they’ve got a good golf course uh they you know to to well to develop a golf game uh I think a lot of fellas sort of shy away at times from coming north and I always said I always looked I always looked at college golf one way I says you either went all the way North or All the Way South in between you know they they felt felt like that in the Middle Middle Belt a lot of times they said well the weather’s halfway good enough we’re going to stay there but the guys North figure out that hey it’s not good enough they need to go south and of course the guys South are already South so I never felt any real big disadvantage about coming up here to school I mean highest State’s a great School uh it’s a Columbus is a great town they’ve got a lot of really good golf courses in Columbus Ohio to play golf at uh it’s it’s it’s it’s a great place to come up come and be part of uh I mean obviously I when I was I had you know offers from a lot of schools to play play golf elsewhere and I wanted to go to High because I I love the high State I wanted to be a high State student and I loved I loved going to the football games and basketball games being part of the fraternity life and the and the school life and the things that went on that’s that’s what I wanted to do so uh that was that was important that was just important to me as as playing on the golf team and uh uh but today I think that the guys will concentrate a little bit more on their golf uh as it relates to what it used to be and uh you know I I don’t even remember what your question was but it was something about Ohio State thanks Jack I I answer you okay go to Bob har next Jack a year ago this time it it looked like the tournament was going to move a week later we didn’t know for sure now it has what do you make of the change to the week before the US Open the smaller field obviously a limited cut uh and and do you you expect to have any conversations about that going forward uh well I answer your last question first that’s that’s a uh that’s that’s that that discussion is in process okay uh so you know we we we would prefer the other week however uh we are here this week because a tour asked us to help him out and they said they had a thing that they wanted to do and that the players had asked for and that that that we help it out we said yes uh that we would do that this this week but we said we would review it after this tournament and then uh and we’ll figure out uh uh how we’re going to S on the schedule after that and that I said that discussion is is underway what day to it to what to to being a week later if there is any what what what do you not like about that about it well I mean I I I let’s put it this way uh when I played uh I would rarely play a week before you any major championship so I’m asked to put on be part of putting on a golf tournament in a weekend I would never play I mean that to me is is essential part from my standpoint from a sponsor standpoint uh you know Memorial day has been what where name is and we were around Memorial Day I mean yesterday was normally a very big day Gallery wise for us because it was Memorial day and we had we had maybe a thousand people here yesterday uh the uh uh you know from the sponsor standpoint I think that they get into uh uh the get into uh board meetings and kids graduations and so forth so that’s maybe not as advantageous how we’re going to but that won’t make any different we’re going to have a good tournament this week either way you know in spite of all the the different things and you know as I say we did that as a favor and ask the tour ask us to do that and we said yes uh and so you know we’ve always been a supporter of the tour we supported what we think is we want to try to continue to support what is best for the tour but we also want to support what’s best for the Memorial tournament and so that that that that is to be determined go to Alex missel Alex Jack there’s been a lot of discussion about problems in professional golf I’m sorry there’s a lot of there’s a lot of discussion about problems in professional golf my question to you would be is do you see problems in professional golf and what are they Alex your ask could be you’re out there every day I hey I live in Florida now I’m not I’m not part of the problems of professional golf but you see them uh from afar you know I I’ve tried to stay out of uh uh what’s going on with the tour and live that’s what you’re asking about no not necessarily not necessarily what else are you asking about because I don’t see any other problems I mean well is that is that what you see as a problem just that well I think that’s I think that’s been a problem and I think they’re working on that too I mean that’s I think that’s in pretty good hands and I think that uh a couple months ago I called Jay about it I said Jay I’m worried a little bit about what’s going on I says don’t tell me because I have a tendency that Alex melli will ask me a question about it I’ll have to lie to him and I don’t want to do that I said tell me are you doing all right or you’re not he says we’re doing fine I said that’s that’s all I need to know so as far as I know the tour is doing fine and and and their problems are going to get worked out how how it is and how they I don’t know the reason why I say it’s not necessarily live in the PJ tour is because there’s discussions about slow play there’s discussions about TV ratings those aren’t those aren’t live PJ tour related there’s something more to it than that I think P TV TV ratings been pretty good lately haven’t they few the last months last few months TV ratings have gone up they’ve been up pretty good from what I the report that I got you know Alex I don’t pay a whole lot of attention of the day-to-day of the tour anymore you know I’m 84 years old I haven’t played the tour in uh when the last time I played even played the Tour Tournament was it was 2005 and really the tour probably 2,000 so you know I’m I’m a few years removed and you know I don’t think that I’m in the middle of of that I’m trying to be in the middle of the Memorial tournament and be involved in that uh and I think that uh there a lot there a lot smarter people and a lot better better people that are better uh versed on what’s going on than I uh as it Rel to to to the problems of the game of golf and I think that it’s in good hands and I I trust them to to solve those problems because I love the game of golf I love to see the game of golf flourish and and grow as we’ve all seen it grow for a long time Doug kind of on that note Jack how how critical do you think it is for the game um to get everybody back together again um you know that’s a question that I don’t know how to answer Doug uh you know you look at it in two ways you could look at two ways one is that you know we’ll have a very successful tournament here at a lot of PGA Tour tournaments we had very successful tournaments uh and have great fields and great players uh I think the live tournaments are have have had you know have have have some good players and they’ve and they compete at the major championships you know I don’t know whether that’s I don’t know that’s imperative that that happened I think it would be better if they all played together more often I do think that uh but uh you know that’s that’s that’s above my pay grade I think to really answer that uh 100% because I don’t I don’t know all the ramifications of it yep how often whether it was you and Arnold or or Lee or or Tom um how often did you guys play the same tournaments each year ballpark uh well I played about 15 to 18 tournaments a year uh I played uh I mean I played obviously I played the four majors I played uh tournaments that I enjoyed playing which were probably another five or six turbet and then I took another B three or four turbet I sort of rotated them around so uh uh when Arnold and Gary and I were playing at tovito or Watson as you as you were talking about I think I don’t think it was very often that we did play all in the same event I mean I think they would all play in the Memorial tournament but uh they uh and they did but uh in all the tours I I think guys have their that have different different places they like to play uh you know I always I always tried to play in tournaments that I thought that are golf courses that uh would lend themselves best to BU talents I was never a good uh guy at shooting 63 every day I was never that was never my fun I never I didn’t enjoy that became a total putting contest I think I’ve told the story did here before but I mean Hartford has always put on a nice tournament they have different golf course now but they used to play at weatherfield and everybody kept saying to me Jack why don’t you play at weatherfield I said well they shoot scores are too low and I’m just not a guy that shoots a lot of low scores and I said well he says you haven’t play I said okay I’ll come next year and play so I went to the weatherfield and played and I shot 68 the first round and I think I was in 17th Place and I shot 67 the second round and I was in 25th place and I shot shot 67 the third round I was in 35th place and I shot 67 the last round and I finished 42nd now you know why I didn’t play Weathersfield and there were a lot of tournaments like that I just never I never really liked to have to shoot those I I lik courses where you had to grind out what you what you know score I like to have to work at it and it’s I just didn’t like putting contests and and and and weatherfield was a nice golf course nothing wrong with weatherfield uh but the uh that that was just that was just my mode I mean I like to go the West coach I like to play Riviera I like to play at Pebble Beach I like to play at Dural uh I like to play Bay Hill we always had the PLAYERS Championship uh the Masters uh generally speaking maybe play Colonial uh or and and of course some we come up later years you got it in the mirfield and and you got the Canadian open was always you know was Glenn Abbey a lot because that was my golf course I did so you know those are all challenging golf courses and I like to be challenged and that was that was my fun the fun to me is being challenged and and and playing you know and and and when and I think a lot of guys feel that way they like to be challenged they like to play the best golf courses they like to play the golf courses that uh uh that the other guys want to be challenged at what did you think last year if you watched when couple guys shot 62 at the US Open 10 minutes apart in the first round do you remember that at all I don’t even remember who shot it but Xander and was it Ricky Ricky at that where at La Country Club I probably didn’t watch it but uh the uh good thing huh probably a good thing well no you know I mean I played La Country Club and I have not seen what they redid did I played it 1954 usj Juniors I was 14 years old and and my memory of La Country Club was at uh was Byron Nelson giving a clinic and they had just replaced the irrigation system and the caddy that was shagging the balls for for Byron walk start walking backwards and he never took a step off the irrigation system all the way back that’s what I remember about Country Club I mean I got beaten second round I think Hugh Royer Jr beat me in there and uh the uh uh you know but I don’t remember much about the I know it’s changed dramatically but uh you know guys guys are got pretty good and and you know I used to like the course setups what the USGA did where you had 25 yard Fairways or whatever you had and you had you know three or four inchs of rough and then you had high rough my gosh you there was no mistake you hit it the Fairway or hit it and and are you struggled I like that I like I like greens just like this where you got to send the ball up in the air and bring it down you know like as they say butterfly with sore feet you know you got to be able to play that way that’s what I enjoyed but you know why I enjoyed it because I could do it that’s well that’s right and when and when you could do something that somebody else couldn’t do then you you enjoy competing on that type of a situation that’s competition that’s what that’s what it’s all about anyway all right we’ll come back down the front the r Rob Jack along those same lines you designed and built this course to be a challenge to challenge these guys fairly that said is it surprise you a little bit let me throw some names out Rory Phil draino SP have not won here is that is that a little uh surprising to they still have time well some of them yeah I mean Phil when Phil kept coming here and he kept coming he said I’m coming back I says I said Phil your resume is not going to be complete until you win a mirfield he says I know I I want to win there so I mean guys you know guys like to want to win here I mean Roy Roy will play Roy plays well here Jordan Jordan plays pretty well here who was the other one you mentioned trino Travino uh Lee’s not going to play again but you know Travino was taking it was like trino I always had the argue with Travino and Augusta he said I can’t play this golf course I can’t play it he says you got to hit the ball up in the air too much I said tro you can play any golf course with your talent and he had had tremendous Talent still has a tremendous amount of talent he could play at any golf course he couldn’t convince himself that he could play it I think he had I think he finished fifth and August is the best he finished but you know what a player I mean he was terrific uh I don’t think Lee played that much here we did we we we were pretty much at late latter part of our career that before Lee played and so you know uh there’s some guys that are going to win but uh you know you gave me a very small short list I was going to there’s a lot of a lot of pretty good players that won here that’s my point I think that some you know big names you tiger again won here and yet the Rory didn’t Phil didn’t is there an explanation for that or is that just golf well he’ll win that’s just golf I mean Rory hadn’t won in Augusta either do I think he will absolutely I think he will it’s too good not to do I think he’ll win here yeah should certainly good enough then the noise happened I thought I was good enough to win in Canada and I finished second seven times and never won there Barbara kept sending me back she says I’m G to send you back till you do it right never could do it right all right we’ll go up the back to B again uh Jack as I’m sure you know last summer tiger joined the PJ tour policy board and first I’m just sort of curious if if you were surprised if you’re glad that he’s getting involved and also does it relate in any way to what you did what you were involved in back in the late 60s when the tour split and you know formed a new entity well we were let’s see that was 68 I was 28 years old Arnold was 38 and Arnold and I G long gner Dickinson who was chairman of the board were the three that really broke away from the PGA of America we didn’t have anything against the PGA of America except that we wanted to run our own business and uh the uh um you know tiger coming on to the board Tiger’s Tiger’s had a lot of experience uh he’s uh been around around long enough he’s not going to play a whole lot more he can still contribute I think it’s great that he he wants to contribute and be part of it I think it’s great that the guys want him to contribute so I’m delighted to see him see him on the board uh and he’ll make a great contribution R we get a microphone to wrong thank you Jack you were talking about us open setups you’ve talked in the past about Pinehurst number two and it your impressions of it how did that influence you as a designer because I think you’ve said it’s among your favorites from a design well I think from a design standpoint I always love number two it’s a it’s a it’s a tree line Golf Course without a tree in play and uh you know it’s it’s it’s it’s the uh not antithesis it’s the uh uh I don’t know what’s huh EP epit of of of of repelling golf I mean Donald Ross liked repelling Gulf that’s quite obvious because everything there if you miss it it off it goes uh now I love Pyers I think I think what uh pictures I’ve seen of it lately looked better I think it looked terrible the last time they played there because they they they just started planting that that rough it was all big clumpy ugly plants and basically it looks to me like they got it backed out into the wire grasses and the things you would know far better than IED 10,000 wi yeah I would say I would think that’s what that that was what should have been there to start with and but I thought that I thought what they did from the irrigation system was they only put a center line irrigation system in and however far it went out is as far as a fairway went out and as the fairways got thin then the ball moved off into the rough and that was that was the beauty of Pinehurst was that the ball if he didn’t hit the Fairway ball would sort of trickle out and keep on going the rough then you had the wire grass and the sand to contend with uh you know I won the north south there in 1959 we had 36hole fi semifinal and a 36 hole final and I played Jean Andrews in the FI in the semi finals or no I take that back I played uh play Andrew in the finals I played Bob cochr in the semifinals I shot 80 I think I shot 81 82 something like that to beat Cochran one up and then I beat and I think I hit like 83 84 to beat St Andrews water two up whatever it was but one of my my point of it was that was Springtime the golf course was hard as a rock the ball would get all the way from it got unbelievably bad lies everywhere and you know it it was just a very you couldn’t recover from any place but that was Pinter that’s what it was and by some of the things they’ve done they tried to restore getting the ball out into the rough getting the ball out into the wire grasses this kind of stuff they didn’t change the greens you know course we had we had we had old poor trivialist probably back then on top of I don’t even B you had big or Bermuda underneath it if they did it was probably common and you know it was not very good conditioned but you know the golf course is nicely conditioned now uh it’s uh I love pter I think it’s I think it’s a I think it’s a wonderful track I think that was the home of Donald Ross to me if I want to remember Donald Ross that’s what I would say I’d go look at Donald Ross okay Doug we’ll take one more I’m sorry this is just on my mind but you’ve played a lot of golf in your career how in the world can you remember losing to Hugh Royer at age 14 at the US Jr I didn’t want to tell you I think it was five and three that’s all I had I don’t remember whether that was right or not but I you know who cares but you know if I throw out a number you say man what a memory whether it’s a truth or not who knows well that’s a great way to wrap it up Mr Nicholas thanks for your time and okay once again for but does everybody got what they need oh we did okay sorry thank you just a really quick question I know you’ll be wearing yellow on Sunday how does it feel to have surpassed your fundraising goal of $100 million for your yellow campaign your play Yellow campaign um this year how do I feel about it yeah how special is that especially for something that’s so well let’s go back so everybody understands what what what we’re doing um play Yellow was started uh by a a young man that uh who who was a son of our Minister barbar’s Minister and when she grew up and he was he he contracted y saroma when he was about nine or 10 years old and his mother asked asked Barbara if I would call him so I called him talked to him developed a relationship ship and I talked to him quite frequently we we didn’t nobody knew much about what we were doing but anyway uh one day I I I uh called him after a tournament I’d won and I said he says Craig Craig said to me he says Jack he says Jack he says do you know why you won today and I said why is that great he says he says I wore my lucky yellow shirt so that’s where it started so I won that tournament we didn’t really say much about it he he passed away at the age 13 1971 and uh 1986 the Masters and I wore yellow quite often then on Sunday for him and I was rumaging through my suitcase in 19886 I found this yellow shirt and I said what do you think Barb she says Craig would love it go for it so I wore yellow shirt on Sunday in ‘ 86 of course I won then then I end up having to tell the story then the story came out and and then then to to progress on further we start doing some yellow uh play yellow things which were ribbons and things that we had at several of the tournaments and uh then Children’s miral Network came to Barbara and me and said that we’d like to raise $100 million over the next five years through the game of golf I says how can we do that I said well the best place to do that is to start with a PGA Tour so we got we sat down with Jay and and Jay and his people and we and we said look this is they said this is what they want to do there were there’s 180 uh children’s miricle Network hospitals the money would be raised in each community that uh uh that it was raised in so there’s a tournament children’s B Network hospitals and the money would stay in that Community as it does here in Columbus Ohio or as it did in in Miami at uh Nicholas Children’s Hospital we’re both uh children Bic Hospital Nationwide here and so we started on this program and we we passed uh after about three and a half years we passed about 130 mil and so I don’t know what level we’re at now we’re 130 million plus I think we’re probably in the by now by the fourth year of our Campa campaign are we not am I correct that’s right we are in the fourth year of the campaign so we’ve done very well we’ll not stop here we’ll continue to raise money and uh you know this one little boy’s Legacy a v a shirt lives on terrific answer I think we have another question lined up on the other side of the room hey Jack my name is Remington I’m actually not a golfer and uh I don’t really know much about the game but I do know your name and maybe a few others but I just uh after all these years um that you’ve been playing the game what would you say is your favorite part of the game of golf my favorite part of the game yeah the game of golf isn’t isn’t isn’t a part there are many many parts of the game and from playing playing the game people often asked me what’s my favorite shot that I play I said it’s the one I’m playing yeah right now that’s always been if you don’t have if you don’t if that’s not your favorite shot when you’re playing it then you better work on it till it becomes your favorite shot and uh uh the uh you know I mean I love I I love what the game of golf does for people I mean these young men here growing up in the game of golf they’re going to come out and represent their area they’ve grown up around adults they’ve learned how to how to handle handle handle how they’ve learned how to handle adults and they’ve learned how to grow up and and learn they’ve learned the courtesies of the game there’s a lot of things within the game of golf that are so good first tea has been fantastic uh first te is uh you taught the lessons of Life say so many kids uh I think it’s it’s it’s unbelievable what they’ve done uh we see uh uh you know the golf courses that are being done the the communities that are having tournaments not no different than the Memorial tournament or uh Valla when I went to vahalla the first time Dwight game the the gentleman who did the golf course said Jack someday I want to have the PGA Championship here that’s my goal at least had what five of them so he’s done pretty well I heard you say earlier you like the challenge of it oh that’s all yeah that’s all part of it yeah I mean there’s a challenge to everything you do in life and if you don’t like if you don’t like challenges go someplace else because golf’s got a bunch of them and that’s good I mean all from what what the what they’re trying to get me to help explain about what’s going on in the game a lot of them I don’t understand and I don’t think that I’m I’m I’m should be involved to be part of those those changes I’m I’m well past that Memorial Tournament the golf course here the people that we’re dealing with things that we’re doing I’m I’m well versed on that but I don’t think that I don’t think that I’m in a position to be versatile in the other part I don’t think I’m not in the middle of it anymore so uh but I I mean I love the game of golf it’s given me the opportunity you know I would be sitting here if I missed missed about about 10 five foot putts I wouldn’t be sitting here nothing none of this would ever happen so I was blessed to be able to do that and I was blessed to be able to take what I did and what I learned and put it to better use all right we’ll just take one more question from MK in the back hey Jack um last year your award winner was lud oberg yep he’s had quite a year and I was wondering what what you thought about his his last 12 months when I think about it pretty good he I love watching him play tele on television I haven’t seen him play in person and but uh what a what a player he just came right out and uh showed the world who he was and uh I’m very very happy for him first time I met him was here yesterday and um but he’s uh he’s he’s one of our award winners and one one we’re very proud of Jack did he ask you any questions like these young men did here that were really excellent questions did he ask me any yeah no no he did not yet I I hope he does someday maybe I can help him with it all right well okay we appreciate your time thank you again thank you all very much I hope you all have a good week thank you thanks Mr