Trevor Immelman on the Presidents Cup, Ernie Els, and What It Takes to Win on Today’s PGA Tour

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today's episode is with Trevor Immelman. He is a former Masters winner, a former PGA Tour winner, European Tour winner, Sunshine Tour winner. He is the upcoming President's Cup captain as well as a great commentator on TV. So the all world talented Trevor Emmerman joins. We talk about a lot of stuff, you know, current landscape of golf, the President's Cup upcoming, as well as we get into some Sunshine Tour stories from way back in the day and growing up in South Africa with Ernie Els in the generation ahead of you. So this was a really fun podcast. We did not touch on the Masters that might be in a future episode on here or the shotgun start, but thank you so much to Trevor for the time and these stories. Without further ado, here is Trevor Immelman. I'm miss a green. For example, I'm already upset when I find my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset. And when I find my ball in a bright egg Frida egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida Egg, Frida Egg, bright Egg, Frida egg brid egg, Lie.

00:01:09
Speaker 2: I'm about ready to run off of the hump.

00:01:33
Speaker 1: Hey, uh, you were you were at your son's regional this week. How'd it go?

00:01:39
Speaker 2: He struggled a little. He ended up shooting eighty one. He uh, he was four of off to twelve and just finished in a stretch of the Poor guy, I had a couple back to back doubles and so it was a tough finish for him. But it was a cool experience for him to get that. Their team made it all the way to the state championship last year, and he competes quite a bit, so the competition is not something that's going to scare him off. But yeah, just got to keep trying to find a way to get better. Man.

00:02:12
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's Is it harder to play watch your kid or like caddy? I assume you caddied for your brother at some point in your Life's hard? What's the hardest form of golf? Is it watching your kid, caddying for somebody that you care about, or playing your own ball?

00:02:31
Speaker 2: It's playing your own ball by far. It's I mean, for me, that's not even close. I Mean there's so much, there's so much kind of nervousness, uncertainty, anxiety, like the range of emotions when you are playing, and particularly when you're playing for a living, can be seriously intense. When you're caddying, look, it's it's a bit more of an x's and o's and it's up to somebody else they have to pull it off. And then watching my son, interestingly enough, I'm kind of unemotional about it, And partly I think because I understand how tough the sport is and how few people make it to the highest level, that it doesn't really wind me up so much, whereas I watch other parents. Yeah, and like you can see when you're at these junior tournaments that they rarely believe that kid is going to make it to the tour, And I'm just like, oooh, you just got to just take it easy. There's so few that actually make it there. It's great to have that dream, but don't pile too much pressure on them just yet, you know, let them evolve and learn, and most importantly, they have to want it and love it, because it's so tough that if you don't want it and love it as the player, as soon as that adversity comes, it is going to kick you in the mouth and you're probably gonna bail out.

00:03:48
Speaker 1: That's the interesting thing about golf is like kids develop so much differently across the board, and improvement isn't necessarily linear as it is like in other sports. And just trying harder and training harder does it always make you just better?

00:04:06
Speaker 2: Absolutely, that's so accurate. And that's actually one of the let's call it pitfalls or holes that I fell into, is you think you found an issue or a weakness that you can improve on, and you just start investing time and investing time, and if you if you're not working on exactly the right thing, it can actually cost you, as well as the fact that then you bring injuries into play because now you're just out there beating balls endlessly, and there's no doubt that that can wear on your body over the course of a period of time as well, you know, a number of years. And so yeah, that that's one of the real tricky aspects of golf. And every now and every now and then you you run into somebody like a DJ that like they just rarely get it. Eustasen is another one. They have a very keen understanding of how much they need to practice in order to just keep things firing. I mean, DJ knows that he really actually doesn't have to get better. He just has to keep staying at this level right here. You know, how do you find a way to maintain this level and keep it going for a decade or more, which is already done, but let's call it another decade that'll put him into his mid to late forties. He just doesn't need to get that much better. He just needs to keep playing the way he plays.

00:05:32
Speaker 1: That's the thing. It's hard to get that though, because the beauty, I think the beauty of golf is that everybody, no matter how good you are, I mean, you want to asters and you feel like you have to get better, and deep deep down, there are days that you probably think you stink. And this is why I say to people all the time, is that's the brilliance. Like if a twenty handicap says to be I stink, I say I stink too. You know, everybody stinks in their own mind at some point. But the you know the reality, I mean, you get to the top ten, top fifteen, top twenty player in the world, really everybody thinks you have to get better. I have to get better. I have to get better, And I mean We've seen so many great players try and get better and get worse. But the reality is what you just said is like you kind of just have to keep going the way you're going.

00:06:22
Speaker 2: I mean, think about if you know Tiger, we have to mold Tiger in two thousand and kept him like that for twenty years, or mold McElroy in you know, twenty twelve, twenty thirteen, twenty fourteen, or speak in twenty fifteen. You know, who knows what those guys would have done. But that's where golf is, man. It's it's like I always see it as it's like a giant pizza, And if you want to be a great player, you've got to be able to have so many different pieces to fit this thing together. You know. It's it's it's power, it's long game, it's being able to have a shot that you own under pressure. It's short game, it's bunker play, it's putting. It's then you start transitioning to the mental side of it and course strategy and not being not choking under pressure, being able to believe in yourself. So many intangibles that are just like cliche, airy fairy words you throw out there. But all this is part of the puzzle that you have to shape together and it's extremely difficult to do because you don't have teammates to rely on, and so it makes it quite tricky because it's just you. And that's why I've always said, whether it be you know, in a saying like this or on TV, for players to have great longevity at a high level in this sport, man, it's to me that is just so mega impressive.

00:08:00
Speaker 1: And doing on my other podcast the Shotguns start doing these like big player deep dives of yesteryear, that was something that kind of like became very clear, was that it's extraordinarily rare for players to have like primes that lasted more than ten years. Like almost every great player you can look at and be like, well, this is the ten years. But then there's a few outliers like Phil would be an outlier, but for the most part, even Tiger there's ten years, almost ten years on the dot ninety seven to two thousand and seven. You know, Faldo's ten years, Like almost everything happened in that ten year span, and I just wonder what it is about ten years. There's like it's almost like a cliff.

00:08:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I hear you but you know when you go to Tiger, he won his first major in ninety seven and then he won to get in twenty nineteen. That's a lot longer than ten years at the highest.

00:08:58
Speaker 1: I'm saying, where you clear peak dominance.

00:09:01
Speaker 2: You know, sure, Phil, Phil is definitely an anomaly. You've got guys like Furik that have kept it at the highest level for a long time. Davis loved it for a long time. Freddie Couples. Now, maybe not winning at the same clip as a guy like Tiger and Phil, but still just to be in the conversation, in the top ten fifteen in the world for more than a decade is so incredible. You have to have so many things go your way and have the right recipe to be able to keep hanging in there and then over and above that, you know, the personal side, you have to keep all of that ticket along because all of us as we get older, we get married, you start having kids, you start changing your life. Maybe things change a little bit for you. Everybody reacts differently to that. There could be other personal issues that you're struggling with. There could be family tragedy, they could be injuries. You know, there's just a whole host of things that could happen to slow somebody down.

00:10:06
Speaker 1: The kid thing, I imagine is hard. You had a kid right in the middle of your playing career. What dimension to that? And I feel like it swings a lot of different ways for a lot of different people. What was your personal experience with that.

00:10:20
Speaker 2: Well, it was an amazing moment actually my son was born.

00:10:24
Speaker 1: It was the Open, right were.

00:10:26
Speaker 2: Two weeks after I won at the Western Open, and we were at the Open and I was obviously feeling pretty good. I just beat Tiger at cogg Hill and was starting to feel comfortable at the highest level in my mid twenties, and I was out playing a practice round with Jeff Ogilvy and Adam Scott at Royal Liverpool is where we were, and we get to the eighteenth hole. It's like a dog leg to the right. We hit our second shots and next thing, my mother has walked onto the green and Adam was like, man, what is your mother doing on the green? And I'm like, ah, this is very unusual. Like my parents are pretty low key. They you know, try and stay out to the side and not not get too involved in anything. And I was like, I have no idea. Anyway, we get up there and she says to me, yeah, Cominita has just gone into labor. I was like what, and so called her immediately and that was it. Flew back home, didn't play that year's Open. In two thousand and six, Tiger went on to win with hitting one driver. I remember, that's the famous one. We're only at one driver. I always say to my son jokingly. I always said to me, are you cost me the British Open? I was playing the best golf of my life. And now now that he's such an avid golfer that loves the game so much, he gets a real good chuckle out of that. So it's kind of a joke that we have together. But yeah, two thousand and six twenty ten were when my kids were born, and for me, it was absolutely something I had to get used to from a standpoint of In order for me to play my best I had to be extremely selfish and single minded and maybe even downright nasty at times. And that was I got to be honest with you. It was a little harder to do once I had Once I had kids. My wife and I were a high school sweetheart, started dating in high school and so she knew exactly what made me tick to what I needed to do to play well. And so she was an amazing asset for me in my career, particularly in the early part, because it didn't bother her when I would, you know, kind of go off into a into a hole and do my own thing for a little while. She just understood that that was what made me play my best golf. But I would say for sure it was a little harder to do once once I had kids. Be that person.

00:13:01
Speaker 1: Well, that's I think that's one of the things I've thought about a lot since I had my kid is just how how golf is such a it's a very selfish game if you want to play golf at a high level, and then the whole you know, kind of the whole part of parenthood is being selfless, you know, So it's kind of a strife there.

00:13:24
Speaker 2: Absolutely, absolutely there is. You know, it's an interesting one because every every athlete that gets to a high level, they understand what their edge is and what makes them good or great or special or whatever the word is. And you know, that's that's one of the beauties of why we love sport too, because you can kind of pick a side. As a fan, you know, you're you're either a Hogan guy who was extremely stoic and calm and and didn't show much emotion, and then you've got a Trevino guy on the other side that was completely opposite and talking to all the fans and and so that's that's just one of the beauties of it is you can as a fan, you can pick the side, pick pick which kind of person you want to support. But as the athlete, it's extremely important to find what that edge is for you so that you can live there. Because there's no doubt. If going back to what we were talking about earlier, if you want to have longevity and you want to be great for a long time, you have to be authentic. You have to be yourself otherwise you're going to get caught out. The level of competition is just far too high.

00:14:38
Speaker 1: I mean, I think that's great advice. Big authentic, be yourself to be at a high level in almost anything in life, because that's that's what's going to make you unique and different from everybody else. Otherwise, if you're just trying to be somebody else, you're not. It's not going to work. Speaking of you know, One of the most impressive things is going down to your Wikipedia page and look look at the runner up at every event that you want. And I think that your first win in two thousand and the Sunshine Tour, you beat out Ernie Els, who obviously you know South African growing up, I imagine Ernie was a little bit older than you, so he kind of was at what everybody was looking up to. And you win in two thousand, your first event on the Sunshine Tour, or you beat him out. Tell me about that event.

00:15:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, that that was a huge moment for me really because I turned pro in the summer of ninety nine, and so you've been one of the top amateurs, but you never quite know how it's going to work out. And I was off to a rough start really. I got to missed out at the second stage of the PGA Tour School. I got to the finals of the European Tour School, so I went there but didn't get my card, and I got my card on the Challenge Tour, which is the secondary tour there in Europe. And so still trying to figure it out really, and you know two thousand that was right in Ernie's prime. Well, he's had such an amazing long career, but in that time was playing some amazing golf.

00:16:17
Speaker 1: And the week the year there is the year he had the three runner ups.

00:16:21
Speaker 2: That's right, that's right. The week before he actually set the scoring record at the ned Bank Challenge. He shot like twenty six under and came in there playing great. Maybe maybe he had too much of a party on the Sunday night. I'll have to ask him about that, but yeah, we played in the final group Saturday and Sunday. And for me, look, he's ten years older than me. And just to try and explain to people, you know, Ernie else is he's our Tiger Woods in South Africa. Like he is. He's just so well known, so popular. Everybody loves him. When you play in South Africa and he's at the tournament, it changes everything. If you get drawn with him. There's just people all over the place. I mean, he is just such a famous and popular athlete down in South Africa. And so there I am. I'm twenty years old. I'm going up against him and kind of hanging there the whole week. Windy conditions, I remember, I remember it quite clearly, very windy at a course called Royal Cape and ended up winning by three, I think, and that was for me a huge moment because I kind of proved to myself like, Okay, this guy is legitimately probably the second best player in the world but behind Tiger Woods. And you've just found a way to hang in there playing with him for the last two days. So maybe I did do the right thing, not going to not going to college and turning pro out of high school.

00:17:59
Speaker 1: That's uh. It had to be so cool. I mean, I imagine that the local press in South Africa, not local the country's pressed ate up two twenty year old kid outdueling Ernie Els on the weekend.

00:18:13
Speaker 3: Yeah.

00:18:14
Speaker 2: Look, it was a big story because, like I said, he's so well known, but in South Africa, because I had played so well as a junior as an amateur, people who followed golf had heard of me down there before. So it was two people that were known in the sport. But absolutely a huge shock, a huge upset, so to speak, to be able to be the guy when he's in his prime and he really really is playing some brilliant golf.

00:18:44
Speaker 1: What was the Sunshine Tour like then in like the early two thousands versus you know, kind of what it is today.

00:18:52
Speaker 2: It was kind of similar at we probably had a few more bigger name players that would go down and play there. Look, when I was growing up in South Africa in the late eighties, it used to be a great place to be a fan of golf.

00:19:09
Speaker 3: You know.

00:19:09
Speaker 2: We would get so many young up and coming players come and play the Sunshine Tour. A lot of times we would have them staying with us at our house because these guys were just out of college and university and they were trying to find their way, some of them not quite on the PGA Tour yet. And so for me to be able to go and watch golf and see all these young pros start to find their way was an opportunity for me to learn so much. And then my access to the best players in the world was going to the ned Bank Challenge. We used to call it the Million Dollar back then. I think that might have been the only tournament back then where the winner got a million bucks.

00:19:49
Speaker 1: Everybody went to that.

00:19:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so I would go up there for the week and I'd be able to see players like Corey Paven or Furic, or Aaron Clark's or Ernie's.

00:20:02
Speaker 1: Couples won that a few times too, right.

00:20:06
Speaker 2: We saw a lot of the European players, Sandy Lysle Woosenham daily went down there a lot, and so that was my opportunity, as like a kid who's between ages of let's say ten and sixteen, to rarely see how the best play golf. So those are all the things that you know. You go up there and you just watch, watch, watch, watch, and you're banking all of this information and then you get to go home and try it out and be like, man, I saw them at this shot, I saw them at this bunker shot. This is how they did that. And I was just always really fortunate to be able to have some kind of access to these players, be able to speak to them for a few minutes, maybe ask a question or two, and it lit such a massive fire in my belly to want to be a great player and want to play here in the US. That was really the thing that spurred me on. And then because of the time change, we would get all the PGA Tour events and the majors, you know, between like let's call it ten pm and two three in the morning, and then I would stay up and watch all of that. So that was that was my thing.

00:21:20
Speaker 1: It's interesting to hear you say talk about how important it was to be able to go see the great players. And I wanted to save this for a little bit later, but I wanted to talk a little bit about the President's Cup. And it seems to me, as just somebody that follows the game, that from a top to bottom standpoint, you guys had a ton of very high end talent for number of years, whether it's Ernie or Adam Scott or VJ. But it seems like top to bottom you're more talented than you've ever been. And I'm wondering, you know, with the tour and all the you know, the globalization of golf is particularly in Asia. If that's if you think the best players and Europe going there regularly has had a big impact on on on talent development in those parts of the country.

00:22:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no doubt about it. And you know a lot of things, A lot of thanks I think also goes to players like Ernie else who would always find time and ways to be able to get over there and play in the biggest tournaments, go down to Australia, go and play in Asia. Tiger Woods did the same. I didn't see as much as Phil Mickelson. He would stay Stateside a bit more. But those are the players that really, you know, the global players, let's call it Faldos Norman back in the day. You know, those are the guys that really went out there and traveled to all corners of the globe, made sure that everybody got a little piece of it. There's no doubt that those are the kinds of things. Gary players the original right, but there's no there's no doubt that those kinds of things is what spurs growth. In my mind, if you want anything to be so sustainable, you have to start it from the grassroots level. You know. Those are the kinds of things that can get things going. Allow kids like the situation I explained with myself, to be able to watch the best and then you get some kind of businessman or a bunch of business people corporations to jump in and start to invest. That's to me when I think magic can happen. We're starting to see it in South Africa now. We have a very prominent businessman down there by the name of you Hunt Rupert and probably fifteen years ago he started the South African Golf Development board, and he hired a couple of high level coaches and just started gave these guys an opportunity to spot talent all over South Africa. And then once you've spotted talent, allow them the opportunity to compete and get good coaching and get proper gear and equipment. And we're starting to see the fruits of that now with all of these youngsters that are coming out of South Africa. The Australians have had that for the longest period as well, with all their different sports science institutes and golf federation down there. You've got to be able to start it at the grassroots and then allow these players to develop and then move through. The only tricky part for us just you know, we're kind of switching, switching back and forth there getting back to the international team. And I actually said this on the broadcast when some Jay won at Shriners a few weeks ago. The tricky part for us as international players is you've got to be able to get used to traveling all the way to the US and getting out of your comfort zone and trying to become world number one nowhere near anything or the culture that you grew up in, and so that is the tricky part that players need to try and manage if they want to stay over here for the longest period of time and have longevity. You know, a lot of players we serve with the European guys, they go back and forth, the South Africans go back and forth, the Aussies go back and forth, and at the end of your career, you know, a lot of that stuff can catch up with you. So so that's the tricky part is trying to manage that for the international guys.

00:25:16
Speaker 1: Would Garrett Higo be an example of one of those young players that came up through the South African system.

00:25:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, Higo. Mee Nabo is another one. He's the guy that hits it so far, and there's a bunch of other juniors that are coming through. There's a lot of talent being spotted and developed very well down there right now, so I anticipate. Look, the tricky part is always financed because you look at these some of these countries economies like South Africa for instance, with the exchange rate and with not all of these players have the ability to be able to get out of South Africa and compete against the other top juniors and players around the world. So you try and match all of that together and be able to give these kids the right support to where they can go out there and start to really realize, Man, actually I am special. I do have what it takes. I can compete with the best in the US or at the British Amateur or the British Boys or stuff like that. And then that just gives them that extra motivation to keep going, keep doing what they're doing.

00:26:27
Speaker 1: With the President's Cup, obviously the Ryder Cup, you got US and Europe, and you've got one continent effectively of players for Europe. And you know generally they grew up on the European Tour or the PGA Tour, right, And you guys, historically, whether it was when you were playing or when you're now in a captain role, you have players from three or four different continents. The three different continents, right, I'm not very good at this stuff, but geography, but the you have players from three or four different continent, you have different languages, Like, how much is that a challenge and has it become something that's become easier over the last few years, or you know, is there is that a real challenge for for President's Cup the international team.

00:27:15
Speaker 2: Yeah, it sure is. I would say it's it's our biggest hurdle. It's our biggest hurdle. The last President's Cup, we had players that represented eight different regions of the world. And when you start to melt together all those languages and cultures and and and try to understand that it is it's a huge aspect of us coming together as a team. And I think it's something that we weren't always very good at, but in the last few Cups we've started to get better at it and started to understand ways that we that we really can get better at it. And I thought Ernie did a magnificent job down in Australia managing all of that, and and I've just tried to carry on from there and also hear from the players, understand understand their thoughts and feelings under and and really you've got to take the time and effort to understand the different cultures and be able to take yourself out of your comfort zone to be able to get in there and really learn some of these things so that all of these players can get to that week and you know, just fall into their natural routines, be themselves and play. So yeah, that's that's for sure our biggest turtles, something that we focus a lot on.

00:28:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, what what are some things that that Ernie did differently that you're continuing to do and maybe building on.

00:28:44
Speaker 2: Well, I can't tell you all of our secrets. I ask it was a good try. The first thing he did that that I thought was really impactful was, you know, for the longest time, we just used to play under some kind of flag that the PGA Tour had made up. It was a blue flag with a bunch of gold diamonds.

00:29:10
Speaker 1: I remember that from.

00:29:13
Speaker 2: Represented or It looked kind of like a European flag, but the stars were just in a different place. Never really meant anything to us. None of us really even knew where it came from. And Ernie decided that we had to find something that we knew was ours, and so he designed a logo for us that has particular meaning to it, and he explained that to us more than a year ahead of the tournament and explained how it was designed and what it means, and the players really brought into that. That was one thing that I thought was really cool. We finally had something that was ours, you know, all these players that are coming together from different parts of the globe. Now now we have one logo, one flag that we can play under for that week. And that was that was a bit more impactful than maybe some people realize.

00:30:12
Speaker 1: Ernie made those comments after about about doing things our wey can you shed any light you know? Obviously everybody speculated on it is it is it more of just having a little bit more autonomy as a team than you know, everything being tied together. What you know, can you shed any light on what those comments meant?

00:30:30
Speaker 2: Well, look, with the Ryder Cup, it turns into a real natural rivalry because they have the PGA of America that looks after the US team, and then you have the European Tour and the British PGA, I believe it is who have co ownership of that team or and and so that's how they run things. They don't share stuff with each other. They do their own thing, their their own entity. And with the Presidents Cup that is obviously different. And so that's what Ernie was referencing is, hey, how can we take control of our own team, make all the decisions that revolve around our own team so that we can do things the way we want to do it.

00:31:17
Speaker 1: That's uh, that's good. That's that's great to do. So for internationals, you know, you want to you want to be different. I'm kind of I kind of lean more towards ruick for the opposition of America and in these because I always like rooting for underdogs, and I genuinely I enjoy a lot of a lot of the international players. So uh with uh with that, you know, everybody obviously zeros in on your You're making picks, obviously of captain's picks, and you're you know, picking who's going out during the week, and you're you know, strategizing that. But like it seems like your job as the captain is very busy outside of that, Like what are you doing now and in the weeks leading up to the Cup?

00:32:01
Speaker 2: So what we're doing now is just making sure all the bits and bobs are taken care of for these guys. We've gone and done the site visits, We've checked out the hotel.

00:32:14
Speaker 1: Seems like they've shut down Charlotte for you guys.

00:32:18
Speaker 2: I think they heard Davis was coming into town. I mean, he's he's the North Carolina Boys. So I was just riding on his coattails. It was pretty fun.

00:32:26
Speaker 1: Writing cards down the street. Yeah.

00:32:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we had a good few days, spent a lot of time together. He's just a fantastic human being. Davis Low. I've always been a huge fan of his. But yeah, got to see the golf course, understand exactly where the team rooms and cabins are going to be, hotel, how all of that's going to work with transportation, and you know, now we're just in a process of making sure. You know, how do you how do you want the uniforms to look do you want do you want stripes? Do you not want stripes? Do you want chicks? Do you want? How big do you want the logos to be? Where do you want the logos to be? Just different things like that.

00:33:12
Speaker 1: You know, if you want any advice, I'm available.

00:33:17
Speaker 2: You're available to give me. Are you like a fashionista?

00:33:20
Speaker 1: No? Colorblind? So you know I'm very useless to that department, but.

00:33:26
Speaker 2: I want no advice from you.

00:33:28
Speaker 1: Then how do you do the food? My wife, with all the people, all the different do you try and like, you know, give people different foods of the you know, foods of the team, so you know you have Japanese food one night Korean food one night, you know, you know, you could have some what's the stuff that ass eat the trump on the bobby it's the it's like the spread or something. I can't Yes, veggie might, that's right.

00:33:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, we have in South Africa as well. The Ausies and the South Africans eat actually very similar foods, so we don't have any problems there. But yeah, you've got to see what our food buffet line looks like. Man, it's it's it's uh, it's a lot of work in preparation, making sure that everybody is taken care of and that they're all getting the food that they want and that they like to eat. It's it's something that is extremely important as you start to understand your personnel and the cultures and and the stuff that they they like to do and how they want to prep So it's it's a huge part of it making sure that all of that is taken care of. How you want the team cabins to look, how you want the team rooms at the hotel to look. There's there's a few more moving parts than probably what I even realized going into this.

00:34:51
Speaker 1: Yeah, I imagine, so you know, put a bow on this obviously everybody knows the big names. Who are a few, you know, players that maybe American fans haven't heard of necessarily that you've got your eye on, that you know, may not be this President's Cup team, but could be on future ones.

00:35:11
Speaker 2: Well, we saw a guy when last week in Bermuda, Lucas Herbert. He's up and coming, for sure. I wouldn't be surprised if he makes his way onto this team. He said, three big wins here in the last twelve months or so, he go. That we saw when on the PGA Tour last year, This kid Ninaba. I'm really high on him.

00:35:32
Speaker 1: I mean to a certain extent, like a guy like Nienabers interesting for a team format because he's got such a dominant skill that that you know, with his length, you know that you could see him being an asset in some way, right, Like it's not necessarily who's who's the best overall player. You know, you could see where certain players' skills could lend themselves well the different formats and different pairings.

00:35:58
Speaker 2: Right, And it's understanding how you can match that person to the golf course and what's going to be asked of the player at that golf course, you know, big henters headers have generally done well at Coyle Hollow. I don't anticipate too much rough. That seems to be the way the American teams have wanted to set their venues up is not pretty much no rough out there, So there's going to be space to give it a rip. And also for me as as a golf fan and somebody who who is interested in this kind of stuff, I'd love to see him at some point paired up against Bryson and just see, you know, how does Bryson react when he's got a guy that's out there hitting it further than and what's he going to do? How is this going to end up over the course of a nine hole stretch? You know, are these two just going to be bombing at four hundred yards out there? What's going to happen, particularly with the way the routing is going to be changed for the President's Cup. Really from the seventh hole, which is the Part five, and you've got the drive will eight and then you switch over, you're going to have a couple of Part fives and drivable Part four's all in and amongst that green mile there, there's going to be a lot of opportunity to rarely play aggressive, and so will a player like that that has power to burn? Is that guy going to be an advantage? It's more than likely that he is. And so these are the kinds of things that you try to weigh up as well as for me, I'm going to have eight qualifiers and then four picks. So how do you make those four picks to where they complement the other eight and are then able to rarely slide in well from an ultimate shot and a four ball setup. So, you know, these are the reasons why you have people much smarter than me running the numbers and making sure that everything checks out. Gut fill is important, but at the end of the day, a lot of times, you know, you need little evidence behind that as well. So we'll be taking all of that into account.

00:38:05
Speaker 1: It's I would say that in a way, the international your player pool has you know, a little bit more characteristics towards the US. Like you guys, you have a lot of power players. So it's interesting because like you know, you say short, rough like and they you know, I think that's the US's best trait, you know, outside of having a very talented team top to bottom, you know, in depth, but like they they're powerful team, and we saw it at Whistling Straight, so they they really took it to the Americans on the par fives and the short part four, or the Europeans on the par fives and the short part fourth. But then you look at some a lot of the you know, up and coming international players, and then the long time international players they're they're long players. They've got Adam Scott and Louis who don't hit it short. But then a lot of the younger guys are long hitters, like you know, perfect example would be like Mito Pereira or or Nieman or some jam Yeah.

00:39:03
Speaker 2: Absolutely, I don't think even Herbert. He cracks it out there for Telly. He's picked up a ton of distance. He right now is in fifteenth spot Vegas. He's an eleventh right now. He hits it a mile mido like you said.

00:39:19
Speaker 1: And Abe's the tidiest player in the world.

00:39:23
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's fantastic, man. I'm such a huge fan of his. He plays with such a lovable chip on his shoulder. It's so much fun to watch. You can like every time he goes out there, it's almost like he feels like he's got something to prove, and everything about his demeanor and the way he dresses and the way he conducts himself and the attitude with which he plays. He's He's a huge part of our team moving forward. He's extremely popular in the team room with all of the guys, and I think now that he's got one of these President's Cups under his belt, he's just going to get more and more important to us down the road. Particularly what I mean, how well the guy's playing, becoming one of the best players in the world. So but yeah, you look at our team, the way it's starting to stack up, it's very young, just like the US team, Im Smith, Louis, you know, Louis and Adam. Of the two old guys, Abe is in his twenties, a Deck Eastly in his twenties, Van Royan is young. Connors Mito Lucas sewar Kim is still in his twenties. So yeah, we're going to be a young team, just just like last time when we were the youngest team in President's Cup history, we had seven rookies. So yeah, you got guys like Nieman that on the outside looking in right now, obviously we have a long way to go.

00:40:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, Abe answers ascension into like you know, if people would never guess the guy's a top twenty player, but his ascension up there's ben one of the bow are undercovered pro golf over the last couple of years because you know, it's just amazing how he's turned himself into, you know, one of the best players, one of the most consistent players in the world too.

00:41:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you're right. He was flying under the radar really until that President's come Yeah. I think in twenty nineteen he really did play great. He got to beat out there by Tiger and the singles.

00:41:21
Speaker 1: He played good though that that was a great match.

00:41:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's still you're right, he did play well and he was really I know the score there is three and two, but he was he was one down after because I was walking with him. He was one down after thirteen and then Tiger made a couple of birdies there to close him out in the end. But he held him close for a little while and played great during the week. I think that week gave him a lot of confidence to kick on from there.

00:41:49
Speaker 1: Did you feel like you had a big home course advantage at Royal Melbourne and you know, with with a familiarity of quil Hollow. Do you feel like there isn't as much of a home course advantage this year around for the US.

00:42:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree with both of those. I think we felt like we had a home course advantage for a couple of reasons. Ernie had played so much there over the years along with Adam Scott, that those guys were rarely able to shepherd these youngsters, the seven rookies around that golf course, and the practice rounds rarely show them all the areas that you can use to your advantage and the little humps and bumps that you can use to feed the ball back toward the hole. So, okay, you can go at the flag and like a bit of a crazy play, you're going to have to pull off a miraculous shot to get it close, and if you just miss it, you screwed, basically. Or you can play, you know, thirty five feet out to the right and you can use this bank to feed it to twenty five feet and give yourself a putt. And it took us a few days to get that into these guys brands, particularly a player like some Jam, one of the most aggressive players I've ever scene play the guy because he hits the ball so well and so accurately, he cannot understand why he would never aim at the flag. Like for him, it's like, I'm gonna hit it there? What am I in the way for? It? From it for? And so you know, to spend a little extra time with him. Those guys rarely trusted earning with all of that, and that's why I think Ernie was the right captain at the right time, because he has such a great presence about him and it's such a legend that those youngsters that were on the team, they just they like hung on every word and so it worked out perfectly, and so we felt, yeah, we felt like we had a little bit of an advantage. Maybe the majority of the US team had not seen that course before and we're dealing with jet lag on top of that.

00:43:46
Speaker 1: It seemed like it seemed like that advantage was really you had like a real stark advantage, and it kind of was like it dwindled every every passing round of that President's Cup, which was, honestly, I think maybe in the last two years one of the three or four most enjoyable tournaments to watch that and you know, like God, that was an amazing tournament, but it seems like so.

00:44:10
Speaker 2: Enjoyable for us on Sunday.

00:44:12
Speaker 1: But I was gonna ask, like, you know, obviously internationals have one, is it like kind of like one of those like it sucks we lost, but you know, a momentum builder even though they it was a lost.

00:44:26
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no doubt it was a momentum builder. We feel like we have a platform of which to try and at least build onto now and we you know, we have a structure and a plan that we believe in, and so yeah, I think that was huge for us. It was. It was. It was brutally difficult to accept that Sunday afternoon. And all credit to the Americans the way they played and the way they fought and the way they pulled through in the end. And who knows, maybe that was even the cat the list for that golf that we saw at Whistling Straights. I mean, those guys realized exactly how strong they are and how tough they are in team competition if they can all pull it together at the same time, and they did on that Sunday, and they did it the Ryder Cup and they I mean, they're Damn good, damn good. We've got a huge mountain to climb. But imagine, imagine having the opportunity to try and beat the best team in the world. I mean, that's what all of us dream of. That's what all of us dream of, is to have that shot. And Coil Hollow is going to be a great venue. I've always been a fan of the golf course. The events that we've played there on the tour are always so well supported by the fans, and just hearing the numbers of ticket sales and corporate involvement already, it is going to be massive right.

00:45:54
Speaker 1: Time of year or two there, Like is that like an August PGA, Charlie, It's you know, having it in September it will be a lot better.

00:46:03
Speaker 2: It's going to be massive. It's going to be something that players, i think will remember, kind of like very hard to compare to the Ryder Cup that's been around for so long and is it really transcends our sport the Ryder Cup, and people who aren't golf fans will still watch some of that. But you know, you think back to the Righter Cup in Paris and that first tea and that whole vibe and atmosphere was something that was so special for our sport, and I think that Quel Holler has the potential to be able to deliver something like that. Now it'll be up to us to try and match the Americans from a golf standpoint, but I think the atmosphere and the crowd support is going to be awesome.

00:46:49
Speaker 1: I got I'd be remissivef I didn't ask you this. I don't want to take up too much your time, but I got to ask you a couple of quick questions while we got you here. Do you have a favorite Ernie story that you can share on the pole? You know he's my favorite player.

00:47:05
Speaker 2: No, Lee Western's your favorite.

00:47:07
Speaker 1: Well, Ernie's not really active anymore. You know what Ernie I was. I was always an earty guy grown up. I loved Westie and Ernie. Those are my two guys.

00:47:18
Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, Ernie I've known since since I was seven years old, and he came to play first time I met him, first time I saw him. Now, go back to the beginning of our conversation when I told you that Ernie is out Tiger Woods. Right, So, when Ernie was in his late teens, he was already known all over the country to be like this stud golfer and you know the next the next Gary player coming along behind. You know, all the other guys who were playing in South Africa at the time, the Nick Price's McNulty, Tony Johnson, David Frost, Fulton, Allam, all those guys. And here was coming Ernie now really possibly to catch these guys and be better than that. And he was playing an amateur tournament at my home course. And I was just spellbound by this guy the first time I saw him. Was tall and skinny, and he had this massive swing and wide arc, and I just followed him around for four days. For four days, I was never more than five yards from the sky, so there was you know, it's an amateur tournament, so there's no ropes, there's no and I was just like a little shadow. And so I've known him ever since then, and fortunately enough, he humored me throughout my early years and would always be nice to me and talk to me. And then when I started playing amateur golf and getting into the South African Opens and stuff like that, when I was fifteen sixteen years old, he'd play practice rounds or I would come over to the US play in Agga events and he would let me stay with him at his house. And so yeah, I mean that that relationship has always been pretty type like that, something that I'm extremely thankful for. So yeah, we go back a long way and have done a lot of crazy things together that I you know that I won't tell those kinds of stories of this setting, but he is a great friend of mine, somebody that I love and I'm very appreciative of being. He's been a huge asset to me over the years.

00:49:30
Speaker 1: Early Ernie. Like there's a somebody posted on Twitter years ago. I think it was David Polton, have you you know, the guy that posts all the old swings, And it was like this loop of early early Ernie just one swig, and I mean the amount of speed that that man generated from like his waist to the ball, you know, and the downswing is just unbelievable.

00:49:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know.

00:49:57
Speaker 2: And when he was younger, playing in South Africa, he had like this, like I said, always been really tall, but he was skinny, and he had a bit more of a like a Dustin Johnson bull but a couple inches taller. And then he would have the spiky white hair that was it was like kind of had a little bit of Billy Idol in it almost, and the guy was just like I'd never seen anything like him, you know, he had this massive arc and would he able to generate so much power with looking like he was not even trying.

00:50:37
Speaker 1: That's the thing. It seems like all the speed is at the very bottom of the swing. It's just crazy. I mean.

00:50:45
Speaker 2: Wait, he's a huge fan of Sam Snead And one of the things that Sneed said that Ernie always loved was swing easy and hit hard. And that's one of the things that he always said to me over the year is now, I couldn't do that. You know, I'm this little guy and grew up in very windy conditions and so my swing was much more fast paced and more about hitting down on it to compress it to get it out there. So you know, our swings are totally different. But those are the things that he was sort of little things that he would always say to me, Swing easy, hit hard. The way he's able to kind of whittle things down to be able to get the best out of himself and simplify things. He's an amazing competitor and probably a little harder on himself than what people realize. Rarely wants to win and can be tough on himself, but has the ability to make it not seem like that.

00:51:48
Speaker 1: It seems like, you know, like having followed his career my whole life and just you know you when you read in between the tea leaves, like you could tell that coming up second a lot to maybe probably the great a golfer. I mean, I say greatest golfer. I don't want anything Nicholas fans barking at me, but coming up second to the great golfer ever a bunch of times, and having him pull rabbits out of the hat like you could tell war on them.

00:52:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's probably right. It must It must have been really tough for him because he knew that there was nobody else in that particular period that could really hang in there. But he's got to run into this, this guy by the name of Tiger Woods. It was just so tough to beat at that time. One of my favorites was always to watch that tournament when they played at Kappaalua and they were going back and forth just making eagles and birdies and putts, and eventually on like the third playoff hole. You know, Tiger makes that huge putt down the hill there on the first hole and when the camera zooms in, the balls just like bouncing all over the place. It's like, how on earth does this guy make this pott? But there they were going back and forth at it. And think back to that President's Cup in O three as well, the dark I mean, gosh, that guy was so it was was he still is so damn good, but he was so freaking good in his prime man. And actually this morning I watched something on on social media and they had Adam Scott saying the five best players he's ever played with, and yeah he had. He had Ernie at number two and Tiger at number one.

00:53:22
Speaker 1: I still argue Ernie over Phil in terms of the second best player of the generation because Ernie at his peak was so freaking good. And I think that's I think I take. I would say your five best years over your peak is your peak. And the consistency and what he did across the world was unbelievable.

00:53:44
Speaker 2: I mean, that's a tough one. It's a tough one when you look at so here's what I'll explain it. You look at I mean, Michelson, what what are we on forty five PGA Tour wins?

00:53:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know the sixth major is really.

00:53:57
Speaker 2: Really Ernie's got four majors and and nineteen PGA Tour wins. But you know, also tying into something we were talking about earlier, Ernie flew around the world and competed a lot and one I don't even know how many times. We could probably check it on Wikipedia.

00:54:13
Speaker 1: Sixty if I remember correctly exactly.

00:54:17
Speaker 2: Now, if Onie had just focused on the US and he didn't go to Asia and he didn't go to South Africa and Australia and play, you know, how many PGA Tour events would he have won? Nobody will ever know, But I would like to think that if he dedicated his whole life to living here in the US and competing on the PGA Tour week after week, it would probably be double on what he has. Yeah, And so that's that's where it gets a little tricky to weigh up these players. Although you know, Michelson is up there man forty five PGA Tour wins playing in Tiger's time, just wrap your mind around that.

00:55:00
Speaker 1: The Kila the Kila wind was was his helpless You know that that whole thing. I mean, I he gained Brooks, you know, he took like to do that when he had no form coming in no form, but going out of it, I mean that wind is going to be It was an amazing wind to watch.

00:55:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, but it goes to show with guys like that, and you can you can throw Tiger in twenty nineteen at Augusta in the same category from a standpoint when when when athletes are that good and you just give him a sniff of it with nine to play, It's like riding a bike for these guys, man, they know exactly what needs to happen at what time they need. They know where to stand to make sure that you can feel their presence. They know how to work the crowd. They know how to stay out of trouble and just put themselves in there to where you know, Okay, maybe this other guy's gonna fall over and I'm going to win this thing. And but but Michelson, you know I was I was calling the golf that week for CBS, and I'm fifteen was my hole and he steps up there and just laces this t shot further than anybody had hit it all day and then did it again on sixteen, and I was like, wow, I mean, that is that's pretty impressive to stand up the guys in the late forties fifty he was fifty, he was fifty. Was he fifty or fifty one at the time.

00:56:26
Speaker 1: I think he was fifty one, he was fifty one.

00:56:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he stands up there and he hits the two longest t shots of the day on those holes. Geeesh, that is that's so impressive.

00:56:39
Speaker 1: What are the what are the coolest moments I thought of that tournament. I was following Brooks and him, and on the twelfth hole, the par five twelve or is eleven twelve or eleven part five, he was hit it over in the into the butt, into the dunes, and Brooks h right down the middle and he said to Brooks that he was gonna have to get a drop because somebody picked up his ball. He said to Brooks right away, Hey, if you want to hit, go for it. And Brooks didn't said no, no, go ahead. And meanwhile, you know, you could tell Brooks was just a little irritated in general. And then Phil was playing slow the whole day and he just goes and he's and he's like yucking it up with all the fans, and the fans are eating it up. Everybody's laughing. There's no rules official around, so of course it's five minutes till one gets over. You know, the fans are laughing, and you could tell Brooks is getting just irritated, and Brooks.

00:57:39
Speaker 2: The tricks exactly he.

00:57:41
Speaker 1: Got gamed by by Phil like he because then then Brooks yelled over like Brooks or Phil, Phil, I'm gonna hit and Phil didn't hear him. Whether you heard him or not. I mean I was kind of in the same area. I heard Brooks yelling, but but it was just like it was just you just you watched it happen. And then Brooks made a bogie. He had a horrible layup shot right after Phil hit it out. I think Phil made birdie and there was a two shot swing and that was that was where you know that leave came from. And it was just unbelievable to watch it, and it was like God, you know, in this huge moment, Phil just took down arguably the best Major championship player here and he just he like he kind of gamed him.

00:58:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was definitely going deep into the tool bag there to to use everything he could. I thought the whole week was so awesome. The fans were great. It was almost like a little bit of a Okay, we're back now after the whole COVID thing, just to have it so pecked out. I remember running into you guys down there. It was a great, great vibe, really cool, interesting golf course. That is one of the most visually intimidating courses that I've ever played. Me one of the coolest moments was on seventeen on Sunday, when the whole week he's been going regular grip and then all of a sudden he's got like a two and a half foot and he goes to the claw and You're like, what on earth is.

00:59:12
Speaker 3: Going on here?

00:59:14
Speaker 2: And then you know, as somebody asks him afterwards about it, and he's like, well, the ball was sitting in a depression and when I used the claw, I launched it a little higher and I knew it would come out. And I'm like, dude, come on, I mean, it's just that's full in the nutshell. He's just so good at understanding the moment and knowing what the right thing to do and say is.

00:59:36
Speaker 1: He's he's a golf Genie for me.

00:59:39
Speaker 2: For me, he's top for me, he's top ten. Ever he really is, he really is.

00:59:43
Speaker 1: I mean that's the thing. It's like the just the experience level to know like those little things. I thought that that's why I thought the brilliance of Kiowa was with the wind and the design of it was you know, power was still really valuable and portant, but having having you you needed to know how to keep spin off the ball, uh in that heavy wind that was out there that week. You needed to know like what Pete Die was trying to bait you into and when to put, when to push the gas pedal down and play a little bit more aggressive, when to lay back and and be you know, And I just thought that was such a great venue because of you know, it's the It had the elements that we always hope that British Opens have or Open championships have, where that wind becomes that in in you know, sitting on that seventeenth hole watching shots on those days where the wind was heavy was unbelievable, you know, watching those guys hit hit the that two forty shot into the wind. It was that that tournament would be one of my favorite ones. That I've I've seen.

01:00:46
Speaker 2: Yeah, they've had two, they've had two good mages there. Yeah, with with mclroy winning as well, they've they've had a couple of good ones.

01:00:54
Speaker 1: Hey, we're gonna save talking about the Basterds for another time because you know, everybody asked you about that probably anyways, but you know.

01:01:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, sounds good.

01:01:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, but thanks so much for the time. And we're looking forward to the President's Cup this year.

01:01:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, I hope. So, yeah, I hope. So you know, we're looking forward to it too.

01:01:16
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, So we'll see you hopefully at its tournament this spring. And thanks for coming on.

01:01:23
Speaker 3: Awesome, thank you, thank you for.

01:01:36
Speaker 1: Listening to another episode of the Frida Egg Podcast. Today's episode was edited by the Great meg Atkins. Thank you, Meg. And as a quick reminder, Black Friday's coming up Cyber Monday, all that jazz. If you're looking for a great gift, we will have a fully stocked Frida Egg Pro shop. Those should be going up in the coming week or so. All this new merchandise that you know, it'll make your fellow Frida Egg fans really jealous. If you've got the latest gear or you can dress up your office and such with a print we will be doing a sale. The best way to know about the sale is the subscribe to the Frida Egg newsletter that will have all the details. Alsocial social media, so look for a lot of stuff for black Rie. That's a great way to support us and also update your wardrobe or your walls. Thank you guys again for listening to the Frida Egg podcast and the support throughout the year, and we'll talk to you soon.