U.S. Open Championship 2017

Thursday, June 15, 2017

Charley Hoffman

Flash Interview

Q. How happy are you with the round?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: 2-under is great. Actually, tee-to-green I played about as good as I possibly could. Gave myself a lot of looks. Made a couple and had a couple of kick-ins. Gave myself a lot of opportunities. And that's all you can ask for.

Made a good up-and-down on like 4, sort of kept the round going, which was nice.

Q. How do you think the course is playing?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: If you're ever going to get a U.S. Open and be able to score, today was the day. The fairways were semisoft. The wind was not blowing too hard and the greens were receptive. So if you hit the ball in the fairways, which are fairly big, you could score. All in all, the fairways weren't that hard to hit today. You had the opportunity to hit a lot of good iron shots, and had the ability to make some birdies.

Q. Did you hit it in the rough?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I only hit it in the rough on one hole, and that was 4, where I scrambled to make par. But I was thankful to hit a bunch of greens and a bunch of fairways, probably the most stress-free under 2-under I ever played at a U.S. Open. That's for sure.

Q. Did the wind pick up?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Definitely the wind started blowing, right around our back nine, which is the front nine around the par-3, 6. It seemed like it was starting to pick up little bit.

And 7, the par 5 played pretty hard in the wind.

Q. Did you feel that wind coming up and did you change?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: You know, it was more on the greens, all of a sudden the greens pick up a little bit of pace, if you start putting downwind or downhill. That's where I started noticing. I think the wind plays more of a key on the greens around here than actually tee shots, because they are fairly generous tee shots.

Q. This is your first major since being in contention at Augusta. Did you take anything from what you did there and were you more comfortable here, more confident?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I always take positives out of the situation. Obviously didn't finish Augusta the way I wanted to. I know I can win a major. Played with those guys in Augusta. Played shot for shot with them. Ran out of steam at the end.

If I keep playing my game, I can have I chance to win a U.S. Open, a Masters are PGA. I know my game is good enough, with that being said, you've got to put four rounds together, that's why it's so hard. I know I can ring a couple of together, now I have to prove I can do it four in a row.

Q. If the scores stay low today, do you expect it to toughen up?
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I think they set it up pretty tough. When it rains the night before the first round, you really can't do anything about it. If the rain stays away and the wind picks up, this golf course is going to be a beast, it's going to be hard. You're going to get some red numbers today for sure. If it does firm up, it's going to be a really hard golf course.

Q. Seemed like --
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: They had a few tees up. No, it didn't feel like a 7800 yard golf course, because the greens were receptive. All of a sudden, if 6-irons aren't stopping on the green, they're bouncing over, it's a little different story.

Q. (Inaudible.)
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: I saw it happen. I was sitting on 7 tee and my caddie goes, look at that thing just blew up. And it was going down through the air. I didn't see it explode, but it definitely was just happened when he tapped me on the shoulder. So I saw it fluttering down through the sky.

Q. Did you see guy (inaudible.)
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Oh, there was a person in it. No, we were wondering if it was manned. And I think someone said if it was manned it wasn't manned anymore, so hopefully he got out safe.

Q. He did.
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Good.

Q. (Inaudible.)
CHARLEY HOFFMAN: Yeah, you know, all of a sudden all day it didn't really matter if you were putting into the wind or downwind, because there wasn't much wind. All of a sudden you had to be strategic in where from, so you wanted to putt uphill and if you could uphill into the wind. That's where the strategy came in a little bit.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports
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