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Jack Nicklaus · The David Rubenstein Show

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Jack Nicholas is a golf legend and the winner of
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: a record six Masters tournaments among his eighteen career major championships.
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: He sat down with Carlisle Group co founder David Rubinstein
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: for his Bloomberg television show Peer to Peer Conversations. In
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: the conversation, Nicholas reminiscence about his favorite golfers, explains why
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: he and President Trump have a similar playing style, and
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: analyzes Tiger Woods chances of breaking his major's tally. So
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: let me go back to the beginning of golf and
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: so forth. I am not a golfer. I have to
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: be honest with you. I took it up when I
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: was nine. I quit when I was ten. I'm not.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: I'm not one anymore either. Okay, but now, well you're
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: pretty famous in golf. But um, it was too frustrating.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: And here's what I couldn't understand. Why is it that
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: so many people are addicted to something that is so
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: humiliating and frustrating for so many people all the time.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: If wald ever goes where it's supposed to go, why
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: why are people so addicted to it? Well, that's a
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: pretty good question. I kept trying to think about that
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: that's it's a it's a It's a never ending pursuit
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: of an unattainable goal, is what it really is. Right,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: You could try all you want, and nobody has ever
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: mastered the game. Well, most all athletes and all other
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: sports love to play golf because it's difficult. It's it's
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: challenging for him, and it challenges them at whatever level
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: they play. And I think that's why I enjoyed it.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: That's why I enjoyed it. I enjoyed playing it because
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: no matter how good I got, I could always be better.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: So when you were growing up, you played many different sports,
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: is that right? And actually you were recruited to play
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: football at Ohio State basketball basketball, but you were a
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: good football player as well, So at the time, golf
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: was not your most important sport, or was it one
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: of the three most important? Golf was another sport at
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: the time. But once I, once I started into college,
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: I want a national lesser than national travel. But it
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: got me on the Walker Cup team, and all of
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: a sudden, I was now one of the twelve best
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: amateurs in the country. And then later that year I
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: went the national Landor and I was ranked number one,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: and I said, hmm, maybe I'm better at this than
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: I thought I was. And then I almost won the
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: US Open the next year that I did when the
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: U s Aminor again the next year, and then I said, well,
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: maybe I need to go play against the best if
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: I want to be the best. So it was, it was,
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: it was, you know, a process. But your father was
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: the one who got you in the golf. Initially was
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: a golfer himself. He was a decent golfer as a kid.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: And then he quit for fifteen years and was a
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: pharmacist and he broke his ankle playing volleyball. He ended
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: up having three operations and had it fused, and the
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: doctor said, Charlie says, if you don't want to end
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: up the wheelchair, you better walking again. So he took
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: he went. We moved out to the suburb to Upper
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: Arlington to Soyota Country Club. He joined there, took me
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: along to carry the bag and because he couldn't make
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: a game, because a good walk very far. And that
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: particular year that fellow name Jack Grout came to Siota
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: and the PGA Championship came to SIoT of that year.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: So I got all that in my first year of
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: playing golf, and it just sort of got me charged
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: up to learn a sport. Now, Jack Grout became your
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: coach for most of your career. He was my coach
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: until he passed. So your father and Jack Rout were
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: the people who mostly got you on the way in golf.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: You would say, yep, my dad was. My dad was
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: sort of my best friend and my and uh and
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: my idol. I love my dad because and he just
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: he just did everything with me, just just he just
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: gave up everything for me. In those days, Um, it
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: wasn't clear that you could make a big career financially
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: and as a professional golfer. So you were thinking of
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: getting a degree as an accountant or to be a pharmacist. Well,
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: I started college. I mean, most kids want to be
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: what their dad was. So my dad was a pharmacist.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: So I went through pre pharmacy. I hated afternoon labs
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: all right, and so my dad taught me out of
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: go before we went to pharmacy school and talked talked
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: me into doing something else. So I started selling insurance
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: and I just love selling life insurance to my fraternity brothers.
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: They really needed it, and so I did that for
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  Speaker 1: a while, and I did pretty well at it, and
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: I was making good money, and uh, I got married
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: and had a first child, and but I really wanted
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: to play golf, you gonta, That's what I did. You
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: got married to Barbara and you've been married how many years?
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: Next month? Years? Okay? And the result is five children
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  Speaker 1: and twenty two grandchildren's right now. You never forget a
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  Speaker 1: name of a grand job when they come along. You
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: know their names. I know their name, and I know
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: I know their birthdays. Really, okay, it's pretty impressive. So
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: in those days you were thinking of maybe becoming professional,
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: you weren't sure, and you met with Bob Jones, did
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: you Robert Jones, famous most famous amateur golfer of them all?
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: And how did you actually come to meet him? Well,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: he was he was a speaker at at the banquet
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: in my first U s Aminar when I was fifteen
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: years old and at that time, and he was he
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: got he got paralyzed as he would on and but
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: he was he still walking with canes at that time.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: And he saw me play having in the last practice round.
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  Speaker 1: They said, young man, I'm gonna come out and watch
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  Speaker 1: you play a little bit tomorrow. Here have my fifteen
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  Speaker 1: year old kid playing in my first yuice Ebert and
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: the greatest player who had ever lives, Bob Joe's, is
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: gonna come out and watch me play. And he came
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: out and I immediately went bogey bogie double bogie. Lost
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: my match, but it was a great experience and I
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: became a good friend. Uh. And he was he was
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  Speaker 1: great counsel. He was, he was, he was he was
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: really a really a good man. So you decided ultimated
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: turn professional in the year after you won the second
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: Amateur and won the US Amateur twice. After you had
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: done that, you decided you'd make a career out of it. Well,
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: I didn't have any more goals to or anything. We
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: have more to do in amateur golf. And I wanted
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: to be the best I could be at at playing golf,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: so I said the only way I could do that
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: is to play against the best. The only way to
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: do that's play against the pros. So that's why, all right,
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: In those days the compensation was good, but not compared
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: to today. So now I was making as much money
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: selling insurance as I would have played one playing golf.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: But you did I I surpassed it, though, So as
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: you went on, you had the rivalry with Arnold Palmer
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: a bit. He was the leading golfer when you came
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: in the pros and then you surpassed him in many ways.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: But what was it like in the early days when
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: you were rising and he was sort of at the top. Well,
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: you know, I'm I wasn't real popular because I started
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: beating Arnold, and uh, you know, I wasn't popular with
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: myself because I was an Arnold Palmer fan. And in
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: Arnold was a good guy. He we got to be
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: very close friends, our wives got to be very close friends.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: But he was and he never really seemed to mind
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: that I beat him more than he beat me. And
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: I'm sure he probably did inside, but he never let
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: me know it. He took me under his wing, and
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: uh he's ten years older than I was, and uh
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: he he was. He was great to me. So I
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: have no I have nothing but love for Arnold Palmer.
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  Speaker 1: So in your career, you won eighteen majors, which is
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: the most of anybody, and Tiger Woods is now one
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: with the most recent masters win fifteen. But many people
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: think that trying to beat your records almost impossible. I
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: don't know. Tigers. Tigers pretty good. So let's see, you
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: won the Masters six times, and is that your favorite tournament?
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: The Masters? Probably so in your course of your career, eyes,
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  Speaker 1: I remember you've won more than a hundred uh tournaments,
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: that right, and the eighteen Majors, And you were the
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  Speaker 1: leading money winner seven times, leading shot lowest shot for
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: a tournament for a year seven times. And there's no
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: record in golf you haven't achieved, is that right? Was
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: there anything left for you to achieve? I don't know
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: that it is any record that I haven't achieved. But
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: you know my record is is good. But you know
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: you could always be better. That's that's the neat thing
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: about the game of golf. No matter how how good
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: you get us up, you could be better. So um,
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: in terms of being better, it's hard to know how
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: you can do much better than you've done. But that's
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: you asked you about a couple of things. What is
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: it the key that makes somebody a great golf or
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: is it concentration? Is it physical ability? Is it just
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: I think the combination of those things. I think I
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: think your mind is a big part about it. I
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  Speaker 1: think you've got to believe in what you can do.
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: You've got to learn to play within yourself. I think,
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  Speaker 1: I think anybody in all walks of life, I don't
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: care what business you're in, you need to work within yourself. Uh.
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  Speaker 1: And then and you need to do what you can do,
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: not what somebody else can do. And he's out and
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  Speaker 1: you start believing in that. And then I think winning
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: breeds winning. So I was lucky my first year I
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: won the US Open and won the biggest tournament in
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: golf my first first, first year out. Uh that I
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: believed that I could play. So so all of a
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: sudden they started coming in a little easier for me.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: So in the first year you won the US Open,
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: was that in a playoff with Arnold Palmer had to
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: fight Arnold's gallery a lot. But I never had to
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: fight Arnold. He always treated me with respect. It treated
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: me like a uh fellow competitor and we so I
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: didn't have those issues. So one of the most enjoyable
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: tournaments people would say to ever have watched, anybody could
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: have watched, was the Six Masters. When you were an
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: old old man of um those days that seemed like
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: an old man. But today to me it's very young today, right,
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: so people had never no one had ever one I major.
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: I guess over the age of maybe forty forty two
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: at that time. Tiger won the Masters now at forty three,
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: but forty six was considered ready for you know, a
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: golf cart or a wheelchair or something. So you were
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: you were not leading that tournament until really near the end.
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: You were but four shots behind with the final nine
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: holes to go, Is that right? I was, I was
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: still the first time I led the tournament was after
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: seventy one holes going to the last. But you were
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: four shots behind at the final nine. So did you
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: actually think you could win? Well? I, uh, well, I
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: burnie nine, I buried ten, I buried eleven, I messed
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: up twelve a little bit, but then I buried thirteen.
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: And then when I eagled fift and burnie sixteen and
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: burned seventeen. Yeah, I thought I could win because I
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: was late. But it's not the most emotional win you've
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: ever had. Well, you know, it's kind of funny because
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: I I really I really finished playing golf by then.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: I played by had won two majors when I was
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: forty years old, and I really just enjoyed playing golf
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: and I wanted to be part of the game. And
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: I just sort of struck lightning to the bottle a
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: little bit that week, and all of a sudden, I
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: got around to uh, the last nine holes of last
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: ten holes, and I remembered how to play. I mean,
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: you you get yourself in contention and all of a sudden,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: much like what Tiger happened to Tiger at the Bastards
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: this year, when when when I saw the fellow start
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: to fill up the creek on at Raised Creek, which
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: is a twelfth hole, and he took us pretty little
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: shot out kind of down the middle of greened, I said,
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: tournaments over, because he will remember how to play. And
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: that's what I did. I learned, I remembered how to play,
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: and I remembered how to finish it. It was, it was,
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: It was really fun being able to do that. You
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: earlier in your career decided that you wanted to be
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: involved in golf course design, and as I now understand
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: that you have personally designed by three courses and your
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: company has designed over I guess it's four hundred or so,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: and uh, about a thousand tournaments have been held on
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: these courses so, and they're in forty six different countries
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: in forty different states, so it's pretty impressive. Well, I
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: got into it by following Pete Die. Pete Die has
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: been sort of the premier golf course designer over the
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: last thirty years or so. And Pete one day called me,
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: and this is in the mid sixties. He said, Jack,
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: I'd like to have you come out and see I'm
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: doing a new course for following Fred Jones, and I
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: want you to come out and see what it is.
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: I said, what anybody see? Pete? He says, I want
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: you to critique it for me. I said, Pete, I
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: don't know anything about design. He saw, you know more
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: than you think you know. I said, okay. So I
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: went out, looked through the golfers, we did things, and
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: then he asked me a couple of things. I said,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: I don't know anything about that. He says, yeah, you do.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: Just tell me what you what you would like to see,
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: and he did it. Well, I got piqued my interests
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: and I got a call from Charles Fraser's Spines plantation
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: down in Harbor Town and and in Hilda Island, and
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: he said, Jack, I'd like to have you to your
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: golf course. First, I said, well, I don't know anything
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: about it, but I got a young guy who I'm
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: working with, Phillim Pete Die, who I think i'd like
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: to work with. So I did that. I made I
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: made twenty three visits into that trip with with with
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: with Pete. Uh. About six months before the Turban, they
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: came and told so, we're gonna have the Heritage Golf
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: Classic there, which they've had there ever since since nineteen
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: sixte Arnold won the first tournament. Um, I loved it.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: I had a ball. I was just tremendous. So I'm
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: talking about golf course. Is your favorite course to play
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: of any other than the ones who might have designed.
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: I assume that there's the ones who liked the most.
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: Absolutely know who's your favorite child? You know what, the
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: same thing. But let's suppose take the ones you didn't sign.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Which ones would you say were your favorites to play? Well,
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: if I had one round of golf player, I'd probably
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: got to Pebble Beach, which we just left the US
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: Open last week. I love Pebble Beaches, the scene out there.
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: I won the U s Amitar there, won the US Open.
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: There went three three Crosbie's out there, and I just
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: I just love the place. And then and then, but
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: my two favorite places in the game are probably Augusta
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: National and St. Andrews. When you finished your professional career,
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: I think it was two thousand five, your last tournament
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: was the British Open. So was that pretty pretty emotional?
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, I had you had your family there
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: and had the family there, They're all there. My son
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: Steve keddy for me during that week, and uh, we
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: stopped on what's called the Silkin Bridge, which is the
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: bridget trosses An eighteenth fairway, and we we didn't get
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: a decent picture of Steve. Steve was crying too much
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: and Tom Watson was he's crying. I mean all they're
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: all emotional. I'm trying to figure out how to finish
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: the golf tournament. They're they're crying on me. And so
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: we a great time though, and it was fun. I
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: loved it. I would not I didn't want to finish
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: on Friday, but I did finish on Friday, So you
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: your last shot was a birdie. You know, It's kind
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: of funny because yeah, I wanted to make the cut
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: that day. And after I threw put it from the
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: front edge of thirteen or seventeen trying to make bertie,
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: I got to the eighteen pole and I hit the
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: ball at about fourteen feet behind the hole. Now, the
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: poll had not gotten anywhere near the whole all day,
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: and I knew that that put because the tournament was over.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: I did no matter where I hit it, the hole
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: was going to move in front of it. And that's
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: what it did. That made my last put. I started
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: my my professional or my career in major championships in
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: nineteen seven with a birdie on the first hole I played,
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: and I finished it on St. Andrews with a fourteen
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: foot put with the bertie. So after you got a birdie,
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: you said, well, maybe I should stay a little bit
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: longer and play at I stayed long enough, David. So,
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: you've played with many prominent individuals over the years, and
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: prominent golfers. If you could pick any golfer to be
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: your partner in a twosome, who would you want to
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: have as your partner? Um, well, I think I'll have
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: to pick Tiger today. But through the years, you know,
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: I never got to play with Bobby Jones, even though
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: I know him and new him and really really really
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: loved the band. I would have loved to have played
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: with Jones, and I would have loved I played quite
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: a bit of golf with Hogan. Hogan was fantastic. You've
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: also played a lot of presidents of the United States.
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: I've played with a few, and um, which one is
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: the best? And playing golf? Well, the ones I've played with,
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: actually Trump is probably the best player. Trump plays pretty well,
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: you know, he he plays a little bit like I do.
• 15:33
  Speaker 1: He doesn't really ever finish many holes, but he can
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: hit the ball and he just he goes out and
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: plays and it just enjoys it. And but he's won
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: several club championships and uh, he could play. Uh Gerald
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: Ford I played, I mus played fifty rounds with Ford.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: I used to play with him at the A T
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: and T every year. And Ford was about a thirteen handicap,
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: but he played to a thirteen handicap. Uh. Clinton, I
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: never knew what Clinton might do. Clinton would he might
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: play to a play with ten or he might play
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: to a thirty. But but he had a nice sculfs
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: way and he enjoyed. All these guys enjoyed playing golf.
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: And I don't think any one of them really were
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: very serious about the game, but they all enjoyed playing.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: And I think that it's good for the game of
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: golf to have the President of the United States say,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: you know, this is my game. So when you're playing
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: in those kind of matches, let's say, are fun with
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: the president, and let's say the ball is ten feet
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: away from the whole, Why do people just not say
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: put it out as opposed to, oh, you can have it.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: Why is that done so much? You just say, I
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: think that's a little bit of courtesy or well, that's
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: a little bit of politics. Took think you give me
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: mine if I give you, I'll give you. I give
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: you yours if you give me mine. That kind of routine,
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: which is not golf. Now you have a grandson who
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: recently had a Master's Part three tournament got a hold
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: on one. Was that a fairly emotional thing to see
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: your grandson get a hold on one? Pretty good? You know,
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: it's kind of a funny story because it's his name
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: is g. T which is Gary Thomas after his father.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: He's a junior and we're playing, Uh we went out
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: and playing nine holes and uh, I said I always
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: asked the kids because they have a different one caddy
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: for me every year. The Master's turn says, do you
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: want to uh, do you want to hit the ball?
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: And he says, well, none of my cousins have ever
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: gotten it on the green. I said, well okay, I said, yeah.
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: He said, I'd love to hit a balls. Okay, so fine.
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: So he I said, well, if you're not knocking on
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: greeny Mays will make a home one. He said okay.
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: So he saw with his dad was the masters did
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: it on Tuesday? United said, he says people, people, He
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: says people thinks I'm gonna make a hole in one.
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: He says, really, yeah, he I'm knocking to greyways. Don't
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: make a hole. Darner for next day knocks it right
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: in the hole. And you know Gary Players who is
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: actually named after Gary, my son Gary, because Gary was
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: such a great friend and such a great role model.
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: And uh, Gary was jumping all over the place. Tom
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: Watson was jumping all over the place. So when players
• 17:55
  Speaker 1: are playing golf and they're in a tournament, you're so
• 17:58
  Speaker 1: you're paired with somebody act the talk during when you're
• 18:01
  Speaker 1: walking down the fair way, they talk her. I thought something.
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: They didn't even talk to each other. Oh no, no,
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: the guys are good friends. Arnold and I had had
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: a fierce rivalry and we wanted I mean we we
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: blew more tournaments for ourselves, trying to beat each other
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: and worrying about the feeling. But we get off the
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: golf course and we look at it. We said, hey,
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: we did it again. We both shot seventy five. Well,
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: everybody else shot sixty five, but just the two of
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: us trying to beat each other. But they would shake
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: hands and say, Okay, were you going to dinner tonight?
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: You know? So you know that's that's. I love the
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: golf kids today. I mean I love watching Uh. When
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: Gary Woodland finished, and I don't see on television, but
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: he saw four or five of the other players or
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: six were out congratulating. But Justin Thomas won the PGA
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: two years ago, Ricky Fowler and Jordan's Speed were waiting
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: for him as he finished on the eighteen screen. The
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: guys really support each other, and and there and and
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: they've got enough money. They're not worried about the money.
• 18:55
  Speaker 1: They know it's a game and those guys are their
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: friends and they enjoy it. So UH. In recent years,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: Tiger Woods has struggled a bit, for he went ten
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: years between winning UH a major tournament. UM. Do you
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: think today that your record of eighteen UM majors can
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: be broken by Tiger or by anybody? I think so
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: kept because going He's gonna do it. Before Tiger, I
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: felt like I remember the last one the Tiger went
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: part of this was was it Tory Pines in San
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: Diego ten years ago? And Tiger hit it all over
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: the place and won the tournament. Now he has he
• 19:32
  Speaker 1: had he had had back fusion, and his swing is
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: much better now that it was. That he now learned
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: not to hit it hard because he doesn't want to
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: hurt himself. And Tiger's short game is fantastic. Tiger is
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: going to win a lot more tournaments. One of these
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: going to win you know, three or four more major tournaments.
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: I don't know, but Tiger's forty three in the game
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: of golf today is not very old. So let's talk
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: a moment about philanthropy. I'd like to talk about how
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: you and your wife had decided to focus a lot
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: of your philanthropy on children's hospitals. Well, we started, David
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: back with my daughter. Nineteen sixty six, our daughter Nan
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: was eleven months old and she started choking and we
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: never couldn't understand why. We get her to the doctor
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: and she'd be fine. We're finding the doctors and we've
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: got to get this gal down to the children's hospital.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: Went down to the Columbus Children's Hospital now Nationwide Children's Hospital,
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: and uh, they found a crayon at her windpipe and
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: they didn't have how in the world it did, but
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: they didn't have a pediatric bronchoscope, and they went down
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: with an adult broncoscope broke the crayon up, dropped in
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: her lungs. She got pneumonia. She's for about six days.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: She was, you know, touch and go. And as Barbara
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: and I were sitting waiting for Nan, whenever was gonna happen,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: we just said, uh, you know, if we ever are
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: in a position to help others, we wanted to be children.
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: And then fifteen years ago, the Honda Tournament moved up
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: from UH four are Deal to the Palm Beach area
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: and felt named Fred Millsaps came to me ran the charities.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: He said, Jack, what what are you having this area
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: for children's charities, and I looked at Barbara's as you
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: want to go for it, and she said, go for it.
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: So we started our foundation with then and we've been
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: the main beneficiary from Honda and several other events and
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: so forth, and we haven't really done anything large, but
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: we raised a little over a hundred million dollars in
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: the last fifteen years. Pretty pretty good. Now the university,
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: so the Miami City Children's Hospital has been renamed in
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: your honor. They went back Miami was Miami Children's and
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: we made association with Miami Children's and after a couple
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: of years I came back to us and they said,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: you know, we'd like to be a global hospital, so
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: we'd like to use the Nicholas name. And it's fantastic
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: to see to see what's happened with these kids. And
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: I want to tell you one thing, it's far more
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: important than a four ft put and then and I
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: enjoy it a lot more. You enjoyed in other ways.
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: This satisfaction of winning the Masters is it's fantastic, But
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: the satisfaction of saving a child's life is unbelievable. Well,
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: it's been a great life and a great uh inspiration
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: for so many Americans and people around the world. Thank
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: you for everything you've done for the golf world and
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: for our country and for philanthropy. Thank you well, David,
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: Thank you for having much for sire. Okay, thanks very much,
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: thank you so much. Thank you