Q. Did the 9-wood make it in the bag?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: Yes.
Q. How did that go?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: Pulled it straight left on 8.
Q. Will it be in the bag tomorrow?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: It will be in the bag.
You always wish to hit your first -- look, I never even thought about a 9-wood. When we were flying here, Joe, I was just asking about 4-irons. It's kind of a club, not that I struggle with, but I want to find the perfect distance and launch, especially in certain conditions. It was a perfect 9-wood, just bad swing.
Q. First official round with Joe on the bag. How was that dynamic today?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: It was awesome. Look, anything new is going to be interesting, and it's going to be a learning curve, but at the end of the day, right now I have to take full accountability of how I'm describing shots to him, how we're going through it. It's not as simple as 150 yards, hit it 155. Like I don't do numbers like that.
There's going to be this learning curve, but I think we did a really good job of just being really decisive on what we were going to do. If you hit a little bit offline or a little bit of a bad swing, like there's answers to it. Like I said, I just have to take accountability for what I'm doing out there.
Q. How valuable is a caddie to like the process of your game? I feel like there's a lot of disagreement among golf fans about like is a caddie really helping those shots, pars, birdies, and bogeys?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: It's huge. Look, I think what's happened over the past week probably surprised a lot of people. It's not like I've been playing poorly. I've had some good finishes this year, but it's a true partnership out there. When you're going back and forth and a lot of dialogue, not just over the shot, but as you're going through the holes, I mean, look, we're out there for five hours and more through the warmup and everything.
We spend a lot of time. We're bouncing back ideas, talking just about anything. It's a whole mood and vibe that you're looking for. It's not always going to be perfect, but it was really, really nice today.
Q. Do you think it's ever like quantifiable how many shots a good caddie can save you?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: I mean, it just depends on the player. You look at a regular amateur player that's from a scratch to a 10 handicap, a great caddie can save a lot, like more than you could think of, right?
But for a good player, those one or two shots or handful of shots throughout a week could be the difference of winning a tournament to finishing in the top 10 or making the cut even.
Q. You said something with JJ just kind of felt off, something was missing. How do you describe the vibe or the feeling that you were looking for that wasn't there?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: It's hard because you can ask any caddie, and they say they're going to do this, do that, but you don't really know until you're out there.
What's great, when I talked to Joe, is that we're always willing to learn, how do we get better? I think he's still amazing at what he does, but it's always pushing the boundaries of like what can we do better tomorrow? How do we improve? What do we continue to do great and learn from that.
That's kind of how I've always looked at it. I'm very excited about the future.
Q. How do you envision taking accountability of your game and the caddie change maybe helping you go from playing really, really good golf to getting over the line and winning a tournament?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: When it comes down to it, it's just -- like I said, right now he knows my game, but he doesn't. I have to describe these shots that sometimes seem very mundane and you get a little bit lazy, where a 9-iron could just -- like a day like today, wasn't blowing much, pretty stock wedge shots, pretty stock iron shots.
A few weeks ago, I might have just stepped up and hit a pitching wedge, where today I'm really trying to describe the shot in as much detail, and that's how I've always played. It's just going back to that.
Q. The old putter is back in the bag?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: Yes.
Q. The Spider experiment is over?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: It's not over. The last few days at home I was putting, I went back to the blade and made a lot of putts and felt comfortable. So why not stick with that instead of kind of going out on the putting green and spending an hour or two trying to figure out do I use this, do I do that? Just stick with what I've been seeing at home.
Q. You shot 7-under, but you look like you felt like you could have done a little better. Like how are you feeling in the wash-up now sitting third at 7-under?
COLLIN MORIKAWA: It felt great. There's always going to be some that you feel like you leave out there, but a day like this, first day, with everything going on, it felt very, very good. It felt like I was in control. When I was out of position, made my pars when I needed.
Like I said, it was just being able to describe those shots a little bit more today to Joe just kind of helped me execute those shots and really feel and be comfortable with what I was trying to do.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports