THE MODERATOR: Jon Rahm here at the 107th PGA Championship.
Q. Jon, you played a hell of a round of golf today and some tough breaks down the stretch. Just how close did it feel to being really special?
JON RAHM: It was really close. God, it's been a while since I had that much fun on a golf course, 15 holes. Even the first seven the day where I was swinging well and things weren't happening, but I kept myself in and made the pars that I needed and played really good golf from the 8th to the 15th.
It's just mistakes around the green -- you know, that bunker shot on 18, I thought I landed it where I needed to. It was just softer bounds and a misread and what to say about 15.
Yeah, the last three holes, it's a tough pill to swallow right now. Especially knowing 16 is not the narrowest fairway in the world. That bunker is in play. You're lucky enough, you have a shot to the pin. Not a terrible swing, but bad enough to put me in a real difficult situation.
More 16. 16 was tough. Never an easy shot, but it just -- you know, have to be firm with that right edge of the green, and if the wind doesn't move it, you're still in good position to make par. Even though it was really close to being a good swing, it was just bad enough to end up where it did.
At that point, 18 was just rough, right. The same mistake I did on 16 was the same mistake on 18, just different clubs. It wasn't that bad of a swing, not that far off. The result is horrendous, but feeling-wise it's not that far off.
A lot of positive to take from this week. Pretty fresh wound right now. But there's been a lot of good happening this week and a lot of positive feelings to take for the rest of the year.
Q. Jon, when you look back -- I know you said yesterday that you do look at the scoreboard a lot. Did you know you were in a tie?
JON RAHM: Yeah.
Q. What was your feeling right then? You feel like you had the momentum and this was maybe your tournament?
JON RAHM: That's a hard thing to say. I feel like that only happens when you're walking down 18 if you have the lead and you know it's yours. Up until then, it's anybody's game.
I mean, you know what position you're in because, even if you don't want to look at leaderboards, the crowd lets you know. They're so excited, it doesn't matter, they'll tell you. Even when you don't know exactly what's going on on a hole, if you here a cheer, you do know what's going on.
Like on 12 green when I hit my putt, at the same time I heard a cheer from 10; I was fully aware that was a Scottie birdie. I just could tell, you're there enough times.
Even then, even if I was 1 back, I knew that if I finished, I parred 13; if I finished the five holes under par, I was going to give myself a really good run to possibly win it and maybe go into a playoff.
If there's ever a time where it felt like it was slipping away to an extent, it was not birdieing 14 and 15; that was definitely the mistake, before, obviously, finishing poorly.
Q. You talked about how much fun it was for those first 15 holes, but then when it turned, was it just nerves down the stretch there that compounded the mistakes, or what led to some of those bad swings? Was it subconscious, or can you even answer it this early on?
JON RAHM: It's a couple of things. If there's ever somebody that's sitting right here that tells you nerves weren't a part of it, they're clearly lying. It's the main thing we do as a professional sport; it's controlling what goes through your mind.
But it's a bit of -- it's a couple of things. I think it's linked to some of the things I've been working on in the swing. It was the trend today, right. The tee shot on 3, 5, 7 and then 16. They are not bad swings. It's just a ball that starts left, and it's not quite cutting.
In fact, I would say 5, 7, and 16, if it's zero wind, all the three balls are in the fairway. But with the wind being off the right, it's not a swing that I can afford to make, right. So it's kind of what happened there.
I've been hitting my draws fairly well, and the only reason why I didn't choose to do it on the hole was I didn't think I could cover that bunker, and I would have left the ball probably too close to the edge to have a chance go for it. So that's why I thought the stock fade was better because if I over-fade it, it would be in the front of the bunker and have a chance to go for it. Maybe that was the time to aim at that bunker and unload as hard as I possibly could on that swing and hope for the best, but that has its risks as well.
So, yeah, I think it was a bit of nerves. Can't pinpoint exactly right now. I'll go back to what happened. I didn't feel like I rushed anything. I didn't feel like the process was bad.
So that's something that I can't quite tell you right now. I might need to think about IT for a little bit.
Q. You said the wound was still pretty fresh. How do you heal that over these next few weeks?
JON RAHM: I think it's the first time I've been in position to win a major that close and haven't done it. The only times I think I've been in the lead in a major on a Sunday, I've been able to close it out, and this is a very different situation.
So I don't know exactly. But if it's ever a time, that's what family's for is the best. Luckily I'm going to get home maybe on time to get the kids to bed or not, I'm not sure. To them, whatever I did today, win or lose, they don't care. So that's always a good perspective.
I always like to go back a little bit on something that Charles Barkley likes to remind basketball players all the time. Like, I play golf for a living. It's incredible. Am I embarrassed a little bit about how I finished today? Yeah. But I just need to get over it, get over myself. It's not the end of the world. It's not like I'm a doctor or a first responder, where somebody if they have a bad day, truly bad things happen.
I'll get over it. I'll move on. Again, there's a lot more positive than negative to think about this week. I'm really happy I put myself in position and hopefully learn from this and give it another go in the U.S. Open.
Sorry for the long answers. I'm trying to process things right now.
Q. The tee shot on 14. It looked like it was drawing in there pretty nice. Were you thinking it's going to hit and land and roll up on the green? Then it kind of took a nasty kick to the right into the bunker. I know the bunker isn't horrible, but when you're following it, are you thinking that ball's on the green and I've got an eagle putt?
JON RAHM: Hopes of an eagle putt, yes. To be fair, that might have been the best swing of the week. For a guy that can't hit draws, to hit a draw with a 5-wood that well in that moment.
If anything, I expected the wind to be just off the left. It was helping a little bit more than I thought. So it carried that extra 10 yards. Had it landed short of the green, it probably would have kicked a little straighter and had a chance to maybe stay on, but it landed on a part of the green that slopes severely to the right.
To be fair, where I ended up in the bunker, if A-plus is on the green, that's position A. That's about as easy an up-and-down as you're going to have. Being in that position right on the fairway is a harder shot. Still fairly easy, but it's a harder shot.
At that point, I did what I had to do on the tee shot. Even if it had landed on the green on line, it probably would have gone long, and that's a much more difficult up-and-down.
There's nothing I'm going to overlook on that one off the tee. That was a perfect shot.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports