Padraig Harrington Provides Longest Answer To One Question In The Modern Transcript Era

To one of the shortest questions too...1856 words worth from Padraig Harrington after the Waste Management Open's third round, all to this (seemingly) harmless question...

Q.  Did you change your golf swing?

PADRAIG HARRINGTON:  No, I must admit ‑‑yeah, I've changed my golf swing, but I change it every day.  I changed my golf swing this week.  That's what I do:  I get up in the morning, and I change.  That's who I am.

Hmmm...paging Dr. Freud to the Waste Management Open media center. Dr. Sigmund Freud pick up the white courtesy phone as soon as possible.

If I had a problem since 2008 going down the road of changing, I'm a person who has always managed never to read anything about me.  I keep the media, certainly what people are saying about me, out of my world.

So since 2008 I'm on a higher level and I keep getting asked the same questions.  Eventually if you keep getting asked why you change your swing, again, you start explaining yourself and it turns into defending yourself.

Probably last year I probably ‑‑late last year I came to the conclusion, you know, I didn't actually change, because what I do every day is keep trying to evolve, and that's what I do.  Every day I change is being me.

People's perception of me changed because they assumed that because I won and peaked in 2007 and 2008, they assumed I was at a level I wanted to be at or had what I wanted, and they assumed why would you keep trying to change.  But the only thing I know is changing.  It gets me out of my bed in the morning and gets me motivated.

I'm 41 years of age and I think I'm a kid, and the reason I think I'm a kid is I think I'm going to find the secret every day.

I hit eight bags of balls before my round Thursday morning working on my swing.  I just love it.  That's who I am.

As regards to my form, I peaked obviously in 2007 and 2008.  Everybody peaks.  Professional golfers tend to last about 18 months when they peak and drift back to who they are.

Now, if that was a peak, and then you have an average play, yes, probably in 2009 or 2010, anyway, I played below average.  You have to play below average if you are going to peek as well.  The way I look at it, and maybe this is a mistake I made, you're trying to compare yourself to your absolute peak in 2008, whereas I should always be trying to work off my base, my average play.

If I can improve my baseline, that means when the peak comes around, it will be a little higher, probably a little bit longer.  You know, that's the game.  It ebbs and flows.

Like this answer. Oh, don't let me interrupt. Better yet, just go to the transcript and scroll down a bit if you want the rest. Just look for the long block of text.