Paul Azinger - "Choke for the Cash or Prestige?" SHORT TRACK

Intro Music 0:07

Straight down the middle. It went straight down the middle. Then it started to hook just away.

Paul Azinger 0:16

And so I got my card back. And then I immediately felt the insecurities that became flooding back when I was on the tour in 82, and I'd lost all the swagger that I had in 83. And then at the end of 84, uh I talked to a guy named Mac McKee, who my wife knew, who trained he used to take on all comers at the fair when it and he'd travel, so he was a pretty tough guy. And um he just took me he taught me the mental side of of just sports in general, really, used kind of East German philosophies to progressive relaxation and all that stuff. And so I started to apply that thinking that in my mind I had done something different than these guys were doing, and that gave me the kind of confidence I had when I was on the mini tour. And all of a sudden I started playing better and keeping my cards. So it was really a progression of self-belief, more so than the physical stuff.

Mike Gonzalez 1:12

I I wasn't aware the progressive relaxation uh bit uh went back that far in your career.

Paul Azinger 1:18

I never really much talked about it, but it was a real thing to me to deal with the nerves and the pressure, and I finally got to where I, you know, uh I really loved being in that pressure situation. You gotta overcome that though. At some point you have to embrace it. And I think it was in about I know when it was. It was in 1985. My wife and I were still living in a 24-foot motor home. Um, this was our fourth year of living in a 24-foot camper really. Still didn't have two nickels to rub together, still hadn't paid taxes ever. So um I was tied for the lead with Bernard Langer and Bobby Watkins, and Langer just won the Masters the week before. This was 1985. And so I'm gonna be in the last group on Saturday for the first time in my life, and I was so nervous I couldn't handle it. I called my friend Bert Yancey. I know Bruce knows all about Bert. He would stopwatch me, and and you know, he always Bert was major instrumental in just a few things that he'd ever said to me. But uh I said, Bert, I said, I think I'm I hate this feeling. I'm too nervous. I don't I'm gonna quit. I don't like it. And he said, son, you want to be so nervous you can't spit. I said, why is that? He says, 'Cause if you're not, you're in the middle of the pack. And it literally my the everything I can feel everything goes flood out of my body. The the pressure, the bra it was such a mindset, such the simplest thing. You want to be so nervous you can't spit. When I won the Phoenix Open my first ever tournament, um I was at Pebble Beach the next week playing a practice round by myself and I got to the third hole, a dog leg left there, and Bert was on the green. It's a little big wedge or nine iron or something, downhill shot, and I saw Bert because you know he wore a bandana at that time, flapping in the wind or whatever. And I got down there and he came up real close to me and shook my hand. And Bert said, Congratulations on winning the Phoenix Open. Are you gonna go to the British Open? And I was like, I don't know. I never it never crossed my mind to ask me if I was gonna go to the British Open was the most random question. After he said, Congratulations, are you going to the British Open? I said, gee, Bert, but I don't know. I never thought about it. And that's when he dropped the sun on me again. He said, Son, you can win all the Phoenix Opens you want. But you can't make history unless you win a major. And if you don't play the British Open, you've cut yourself out of 25% of the major championships. And you know, that little walk down to that fourth T, Bruce, when you just a slight downslope down to that fourth T. I went from playing for the cash, playing for the prestige, just like that for prestige. And that's when I realized you either choke for cash or prestige. Because guess what? I had a chance to win that British Open. I bogeied the last two holes. Yeah. Boy, you should have. That was mine. That was mine. And I let it get away, and it broke my heart. And then the next year I had a chance, and Slumin shot 65, and it broke my heart. So, but it was Bert that instilled the you gotta be you wanna be nervous enough you can't spit and you can't make history unless. That was it.

Mike Gonzalez 4:40

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Intro Music 5:02

It went smack down the fairway. Just make off nine. It went straight down the middle by the way.