What’s it like for you not playing a heavy competitive schedule?
Well, I haven’t played any schedule. I played the last two days, and that was my eighth and ninth time since the British Open last year. I just haven’t played any golf, and that’s been OK. I’ve been working hard. Most people work all their life, retire and play golf. I played golf all life to retire to work. And I’ve enjoyed it. I’ve had an absolute blast.

Will it be strange to observe the Memorial, but not play in it?
I suppose it might. You know, I’ll play in the pro-am. Other than that, I’ll be around. There will be a certain day I’m not going to play in it any way. I would have liked to have basically done a little bit better last year. And I haven’t ruled out the Memorial to come back (and play). After I played at St. Andrews last year, I said I’m going to stay away from everything for a year, and I’ve always reserved the right to come back and host the Memorial, and I may do that in the future.

What are you going to do during the week of the Memorial?
I’ll find something. I’ll probably get a little more involved in the tournament. I haven’t done that recently. I don’t know, I’m not too worried about that.

What do you think of the new course?
I think it’s a pretty stiff test of golf and that’s what [men’s coach] Jim Brown wanted. . . . We eased some of the greens that have been, over time, too severe. And created a few more pin placements. We tried to get a little more of a Mackenzie look in bunkering. I think we’ve done a pretty darn good job of it. I think the golf course is going to be very nice. One of the things we have out here which nobody’s talked much about is we created an OSU bunker situation between nine and 10 which you don’t see on the ground but certainly see through the air when you fly over. I need to get up in the air and look at it to see what it really looks like.

What’s the biggest change on the course?
[Holes] one through 18 and the driving range [laughs]. There’s a lot of change. There isn’t anything out here we didn’t change.

Did this make you feel extra special redesigning this course?
They’re all special. I can’t say any is more special than another, because I think every one of them you put your all into. But obviously, going to Ohio State, and being here and being a part of the university for so many years, having such a great affiliation with what goes on here, to be able to come back and do that and give a little something back to the university is special to me.

Did you have good designs to work [from]?
Never saw them. [Mackenzie] was never here. They keep talking about a Mackenzie, but this golf course was done about four years after he passed away. He had given some original ideas, but it was carried out by his people. I can have golf courses carried out by my people, but they’ll never carry it out the same way I would carry it out. The idea and the flair of what he tried to do greens-wise . . . is pretty much what he used to do. The rest of the golf course really wasn’t him. So what we tried to do is take the bunker look that he used, and put that bunker look back into the golf course. And many of the same locations, but modernize the locations to today’s distances and then put some new tee locations. [We kept] the same routing of the golf course. The only hole we really changed was the fourth hole. We did change the 14th hole, [and] made it a par-4 instead of a par-5, but basically it was a par-4, lengthwise, today. And so, I made it a par-71 rather than a par-72. It’s a pretty strong golf course.

Do you anticipate the women playing in the NCAA Tournament could have some problems with the golf course?
[It] depends where they play from. It’s an issue of length, as it is with most golf courses today. If length is not really an issue, they’ll be fine.

How pleased are you with the changes at Muirfield?
It won’t look that much different when they’re done with it. We needed a couple things done at 12. We needed to get a little bit more teeing area. We needed some gallery space behind the tee. And the members have been playing from the bottom all these years, [and] they keep wanting to come up and play the top tee. We said “good gracious, why don’t we move them up there?” So, that’s what we did. I think that was a great change. We got wonderful comments on that. . . . We did the tee at 10 and people kept blowing it out there. I said, 'Well, if they’re going to blow it out there, if they miss it they’re going to get a penalty.' That’s why I put the bunker at 10 the way I did. At number one I didn’t want to change the bunkers and I didn’t have really any place to put the bunkers if I changed them because the hill broke over and went down. The only thing I could do there probably is move the tee back to where the bunkers relate more to what the hole is. So we moved the tee back 21 yards, I think. I think that’s about all we did last year. . . . It doesn’t really change much of the playability of the golf course, though.

In relation to Tiger [Woods], how soon after your father died were you in the right frame of mind to come back and play again?
That was quite a while ago. My father passed away in February, and I think I played in March some time. I took it in a different way. I felt like my dad wanted me to play golf. That’s what he lived for–what I did. So, for me to crawl in a shell I didn’t think was the right thing to do. I think Doral was like two weeks after my dad passed away. I didn’t play Doral, that was the only year I didn’t play Doral, and I don’t remember the first tournament I played after that.

Have you heard from Tiger since his father passed away?
No. I called him, and left a voicemail because he wasn’t taking calls.

What was your personal best here at the Scarlet Course?
I don’t know. No clue. I didn’t play the course very well.

Have you played much golf with the kids or grandkids this year?
No, I haven’t played golf with anybody. I’ve played maybe twice this year.

Are you feeling pretty well?
I feel great. I feel fine. I’ve gotten fat because I haven’t done anything. All I do is sit around and eat and travel. Boy, you try to travel and stay thin, it’s hard. I’ve put on about 10, 15 pounds. But it will come off.

Do you have a relationship with Bobby Knight at all?
Sure. I like Bobby. Bobby was a lot like Woody in many ways. He treated his kids great, stood behind his kids. He has great principles, graduated a lot of his kids through college and always did a good job with that. Sometimes, on Saturday nights, or whenever they play, you might want to say ‘cool it just a little bit Bobby’, but other than that I think he’s done a good job. I was with [former Cleveland Browns football player] Jim Brown the night before last and we were talking about it, and he’d seen Bobby not very long ago. He said, 'He’s one of my favorites.' Jim Brown likes him too for exactly the same reason [as I do]. The way he handled and treated his kids and stood behind them.