"I probably shouldn't say this, but if I had played in the [Greg] Norman-[Nick] Faldo era, instead of winning 25 times with two majors, I probably would have won 40 times and had six majors."

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Monte Burke talks to Johnny Miller, his usual humble self, offering a few thoughts worth checking out there. Highlights:

Forbes: Give us an idea of the preparation you go through before covering an event.

Johnny Miller: I don't want to brag, but I do more homework on the course than any other announcer.

More than Gary McCord?

I chart the greens to get all the breaks. I walk down into the greenside bunkers. I walk into the fairway bunkers to see whether a player can reach the green from them. My goal is to get to know the course as [well] or better than the players.

That doesn't take much these days!

Forbes: What's your take on the overall state of the game?

Johnny Miller: They've got it really good. The Tour is a fantastic place to be right now. I don't look back and say I got hosed. I think our era, if you don't count money, was maybe the most exciting era. You had Palmer, Nicklaus, Player, Trevino, [Raymond] Floyd, [Hale] Irwin, [Tom] Weiskopf, myself and Hubert Green. It was a golden age of golf from 1970 to 1980. I don't know if there will ever be one quite like it. Every era has two or three great golfers. Our era had six to 10. I probably shouldn't say this, but if I had played in the [Greg] Norman-[Nick] Faldo era, instead of winning 25 times with two majors, I probably would have won 40 times and had six majors. That era had [Fred] Couples, Norman, Faldo and [Curtis] Strange, but it didn't really have guys who could play on Sunday. We had the great era of Sunday players. There's a lot to be said for that.

That's great Johnny, but it was a state of the game question, not the state of your game had you been in your prime during the 90s (wait...didn't you win a tour event in the 90s?).

Now this was interesting:

Will Tiger break Jack Nicklaus' record of 18 career major wins?

Everybody has a choke point. Nicklaus' was winning the Grand Slam. All of Tiger's life ever since he was kid, he's wanted to get to 19 majors. It's probably going to get a lot harder with these last five. Let's put it this way: He doesn't want to go next year without winning any majors, because he'll probably start second-guessing himself.

Tiger is a pretty old 33. He's been going at it for an awful long time. Maybe he's one of those guys like Tom Kite or Gary Player, one of those guys who never lost the love of competition and traveling and living out of a suitcase in a motel room. They just couldn't get enough. Maybe Tiger will be that way, but maybe if he has more children, he'll play just eight tourneys a year. It's not a guarantee that he'll win five more. There are plenty of guys who played great golf, had great careers and only won a few majors. If I had to guess, I'd say that he will beat the record, but it will be a struggle.

You Realize...

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...this may be the best indictment yet of the FedEx Cup, courtesy of Gary Van Sickle on Twitter:

Tiger Tests Out New Edgy Nike Ad Slogan On Suzann Pettersen

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From her post-Canadian Women's Open win press conference:

Q. Looking back at yesterday, Karrie said that it was probably going to be daunting to be all alone in front with a five-stroke lead, a big lead. And you look at her, and she's an LPGA Hall of Famer; did it feel like that out there? Did you think about that? Did you have the nightmares from last night that we talked about?

SUZANN PETTERSEN: To be honest I didn't sleep that well. I tried to – actually, it was funny, tried to look an all of the press conferences on the U.S. Open last night before I went to bed and there were a few kind of big wins yesterday and a few surprises, and I tried to look at all the underdogs and what they said in their press conference. Everybody kept saying, you never give up, you keep grinding and you've got to believe you can do it. And I tried to bring those words kind of with me today, just keep believing what you do and don't fear anything. The door is wide open and you've just got to keep doing what you're doing.

Alright, enough with the cliches. What was Tiger's text message?

In that way, I used a lot of other sports and performances in kind of an inspirational way. I got a message from Tiger this morning, ‘Keep doing your shit.' So I guess I did keep doing my shit. (Laughter).

Why "just do it" when you "keep doing your %$#@" is so much more bold, direct, global, iconic and 21st century brand worthy?

False Alarm: Woods Just Tweaking His Backup Putter Fleet; Nike Reps Flood Norton Pubs Overnight

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Doug Ferguson tells us Tiger Woods was not mulling a putter change, but instead merely fixing his back up set of Nike putters to his weird grip configuration should his Scotty Cameron (A) accidentally get dragged from the back of Tiger's Buick Enclave, as Dan Jenkins suggested he do, or (B) get dropped in a lake by Stevie.

Woods was only checking the alignment of the grip on his backup putter. He prefers it to be 1 degree to the right, which slightly closes the blade on impact. This grip was too square, and the glue had already dried before Woods could twist it where he wanted it.

He has several backup putters, which hardly anyone ever mentions.

"That's because I haven't needed it," Woods said.

"None of the greats go a career without having a futile moment with the putter."

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There are a couple of worthwhile looks at Tiger's recent putting "woes" of late (wouldn't we all love to putt so poorly). Thanks to reader Joey for Thomas Boswell's take in the Washington Post. Boswell says Tiger has "learned how to lose" and makes an interesting but ultimately hard-to-buy comparison with Jack Nicklaus's career arch.
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in·ter·est·ing (in-t(ə-)rəs-tiŋ) : holding the attention : arousing interest

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It's hard to interpret the early reviews of Liberty National, but it seems like most of the players are trying their best not to blast the design. Shoot, Norman Vincent Ogilvy is tweeting about how great it is that players are actually discussing design. Granted, it took a Cupp-Kite nightmare, but he's finding the positive in that. Impressive restraint!
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“I woke up that morning and didn’t expect to win"

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Thanks to reader Tim for this Kyung Lah CNN report on Y.E. Yang which included what could not have been music to Presidents Cup captain Norman, assuming the translation was correct.

Watching Yang play with his friends on this Dallas, Texas golf course, you can see that love of the game is obvious. Yang later tells me that he hopes to never face off with Tiger again, because he’s not sure he’d win again. You get the sense that while wins at the PGA level are important, this game with friends is just as important — and at the heart of why Yang managed to accomplish what no other golfer in the world could.

The video version:

Jack Nicklaus has also has some interesting observations on the Yang win at Hazeltine in this sitdown with Tim Rosaforte. And is me or is Jack way too pleased that Tiger won't be breaking the all time major's mark at St. Andrews next year?