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Rocco Mediate Interview: Bethpage Will Be 'Nuts'

Rocco Mediate still hears from fans about his performance against Tiger Woods at last year's U.S. Open at Torrey Pines. (John Mummert/USGA)

Rocco Mediate spoke with the media on Tuesday at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, where he is preparing to play in the Memorial Tournament. Mediate discussed his experiences at last year’s U.S. Open at Torrey Pines, where he was runner-up after a thrilling 19-hole playoff with Tiger Woods, and offered his thoughts on Bethpage State Park’s Black Course, site of the 2009 U.S. Open. At the 2002 U.S. Open at Bethpage, Mediate shot 72-72-74-76 – 294 to finish in a tie for 37th, 17 strokes back of Woods’ winning 277.

MODERATOR: Before we open it up for questions, we're two weeks away from the U.S. Open at Bethpage. Rocco, last year's Open, as you know, was one for the ages. Can you reflect back on what that experience was like for you as well as maybe talking a little about your preparations for this year's Open at Bethpage?

ROCCO MEDIATE: Well, it was the golf experience of a lifetime, bar none. It was five days of controlled, semi‑controlled insanity, I guess you could say. Especially on Monday. It was crazy on Monday. I got to test everything I ever learned about golf in that one day. And it turned out almost great. But it turned out pretty good.

It was some kind of, I don't know how to explain it, one of those dream scenarios that you want. Any athlete wants to play against the best guys for the biggest tournament, and I got to do that. It was awesome. It was fun. And I want to do it again.

It's hard to get in those situations all the time. It just goes to show you how good Jack [Nicklaus] has done over his career, winning 20 [majors] and Tiger at 14. Tiger at 14 is just dumb. It's amazing that someone can do that many. The majors are so hard to get ready for four times a year.

In preparation, it's all the same. It's a striker’s week. This is a striker's week at Memorial, and so is the U.S. Open. So nothing different. Just driving the fairway and go. That's all you can do at these tournaments, or you're toast.

How much attention have you gotten since that Monday of last year? And have you been surprised at how much?

MEDIATE: A lot of attention every day, still to this day. I get a lot of people off the golf course saying how much they loved it, telling me where they were, and just great stories. Remarkable stuff.

It's just been great. It hasn't really stopped. A lot of people watched that Monday, and a lot of people got a lot out of it, it seems. It's just been a lot of fun. It's hard to believe how much that impacted people. It's amazing.

Can you say a couple of really weird places you might have been where somebody came up to you and said, “hey, unbelievable U.S. Open,” or that shocked you? If you could pass on just a couple of stories about what happened with the attention…

MEDIATE: The funniest one, one of the funniest ones was maybe a week or so after. I was sitting in the airport by myself. But I was sitting across from the gate on the floor. Just put my little bag down, and I had a Starbucks with me. And I'm sitting there, and I kind of dozed off for like two or three minutes, maybe five. I don't remember. I was just so tired. And when I woke up, there were about 10 people around me. It was like they were looking at ‑‑ I don't know what they see. But they had pencils and pens out and pieces of paper. And they were waiting for me to wake up. It was priceless.

I looked up and I went, “are you guys serious?” [Laughing], and it was so funny. I ended up signing a bunch of stuff and talking to them. It was just priceless.

All major championships are played on very difficult courses, and bad shots are inevitable. How do you as a professional golfer continue to go about your business without letting the bad shots or bad luck take over your emotions?

MEDIATE: Well, in the U.S. Open, if you're talking about majors, obviously, that's going to happen no matter how good you hit certain shots. There's going to be weird things happening, and bad bounces, whatever you want to call them. All that stuff's going to happen that week, especially because everything is so much more difficult and you have to be so much more precise.

So the guy who does it the best and doesn't let it kill him is the one who is still standing at the end of the week. So it's almost [like] you expect that in the U.S. Open. Bethpage is going to be a tremendously unbelievably good test of golf, as it always is, as it was last time, I believe. And my favorite type of golf is that penalizing stuff that if you're not precise or in the fairway you don't get to play good.

I love that aspect about the U.S. Open. It actually brings the driver back or makes the fairway become important again, which I think that's what golf's all about: driving it in the fairway.

It's just hard not to go through a week where something really weird happens. If you even think back to when Tiger won at Pebble Beach in 2000, I think he made an 8 on the third hole one round, and still shot, you know, 150 under and won by 10 or 12 shots. Whatever he won by. [Editor’s note: It was a record 15-stroke margin.] So he didn't let that affect anything, really, because he might have buried the next two or three holes. But things like that will happen occasionally.

I double bogeyed one hole last year, the 15th hole on, I believe, Saturday. I just kept going. I birdied the 17th hole and I felt better about it. I ended up shooting 72, and I was still there continuing that stretch.

Sometimes you can't do that, though. It gets to you and beats you up.

Everyone's talking about not only the course at that stage but the atmosphere there. What do you remember most about the way the air was at Bethpage in '02?

MEDIATE: Oh, God. Well, first of all, New York fans are some of our best fans. They're crazy. They're loud, and they fit right in with me. So I'm looking forward to all of that stuff. It's just that they're very proud of their golf course there. They're very proud. Bethpage is one of the best golf courses in the world, or we wouldn't be playing there.

It's been around a zillion years, and we got to see it first-hand seven years ago, yeah, '02. It's just really a neat atmosphere. They love their golf up there. And like I said, it's going to be nuts up there if the weather is good. Nuts.

First question, you won a ton of people over last year just by embracing the experience. It was obvious you were embracing the experience. I'm wondering if, since then, have there been cases where you've really gotten upset at getting so close and not winning? Have you let yourself be upset about getting so close?

MEDIATE: No, you look and think about what you could have done. We could always say, “Boy, I had that 71st hole that I hit…” And walking up to the green I kept saying to myself, “It's over. Just get into the 18th hole, it's done.” One of the best putts I've ever hit, just caught the edge and lipped out…

I feel like I really passed the test. I did lose, but I didn't lose because of a lack of technique. It's just it was one shot here, one shot there. Made a couple of mistakes, just like he did. I happened to make one more at the end and that was the end.

It made me a better player even though I lost. I know under the most intense situations, my golf swing pretty much works. My putting was not bad, and my chipping was okay. I had one bad pitch. That's how I look at it.

Yeah, I wanted to win. If I would have lost [playing against anybody else,] I would have been devastated. But with Tiger you just don't know what the hell he's going to pull off. He pulled off some amazing, amazing things just to be there. And that's what the great ones do. Period, that's what they do.

I wonder how it sits with you. Would it perhaps be better [if it had been] a tournament that you did win versus one that you haven't won?

MEDIATE: It's okay. A lot of people knew me before the Open. It's just that people who were not in the game got to know ‑‑ actually both of us … It was not to watch me, but it was to watch Tiger kill me.

When that didn't happen, they really turned it on. And this actually happened, and that's the cool thing about how it switched back and forth. But, no, I don't mind this at all, whatsoever. Like I said, I didn't bogey the last two holes to lose. Nothing bad really happened. It's just I lost. It's that simple.

I was wondering if you could offer some insight on your appearance in the U.S. Open. Is that as simple as hitting the ball straight in a tournament that kind of demands accuracy off the tee, or is there more to it than that?

MEDIATE: Yeah, that's pretty much the bottom line there. Driving the ball off the fairways, and when you miss putting the ball in the right place. I have a rule most of the time that if I hit it in the rough I can't go for the green even if I want to because so many bad things can happen.

Now at Bethpage, with the length it's going to be, if I miss, I can't reach [the green] even if I wanted to. So it's a matter of being able to get the ball down from 40, 50, 60 yards a lot of times in the week. You're not going to hit every fairway. They don't allow that to happen.

I remember at Pinehurst [at the 2005 U.S. Open], I never went for the green one time out of the rough. And I bet you, I was probably in the rough 20 times. I bet you I got it up‑and‑down 15. So that's why I was right there with the exception of a couple of three putts. I don't know, it might have been a different ball game there.

So I guess it is about the striking part, you know. I know if I go to Bethpage playing like I am now, I'll be able to compete. I don't know if I'll win or finish in the top, but I'll be able to compete there. I don't care how long it is. If I drive on those fairways, I don't care, I'll definitely be able to compete. That's the key. Especially on that golf course.

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