Island Packet Verizon Heritage 2008 Coverage | Harbour Town, Sea Pines Resort, Hilton Head Island, SC

By JEFF KIDD
jkidd@islandpacket.com
843-706-8121

Anthony Kim’s amateur credentials and early pro results probably created unrealistic exceptions, a few of his PGA Tour colleagues say ... including some he had for himself.

“It’s tough to win out here. I have to realize that,” Kim said Thursday after his 4-under-par 67 put him one shot behind the leaders at the Verizon Heritage. “I expected to win out here real early. I definitely feel I’ve gotten a little beaten up out here.

“But that’s definitely to my benefit. It’s going to help me in the future. I’m learning as I go, and I’m still learning every day.”

Keep in mind, Kim’s PGA Tour debut left little room for improvement — after his third all-American campaign at the University of Oklahoma, Kim helped the United States win the Walker Cup, turned professional shortly thereafter and received an exemption to the Valero Texas Open.

He then tied for second in his first PGA Tour start.

Kim has posted five more top-10s since but still seeks his first victory.
“To win a golf tournament is a lot to ask,” said two-time Heritage winner Stewart Cink. “I think when we’re playing golf in the Tiger Woods era, I think winning tournaments has sort of been cheapened a little bit because you see Tiger do it so regularly, you get the perception that you think everybody ought to snap their fingers and have some trophies.”

Kim himself might have been guilty of that mind-set — “I want a jacket, I want a jug, I want everything,” Kim told Golfweek magazine shortly after turning pro.

But if Kim’s brash talk has raised some eyebrows on the PGA Tour, so has his talent.

“I think he’s adjusted pretty quickly, by most standards,” said former Heritage champion Justin Leonard, who won a U.S. Amateur title at age 20.

“... I know at that age, I wasn’t nearly as mature a golfer as he is.”
Kim made four birdies on the front nine Thursday before his first bogey at the par-4 11th — he failed to save par from a greenside bunker — started a mild mid-round swoon. He missed a short birdie putt at the par-3 14th and removed his ball from the cup and slung it into the pond bordering the green in one motion. On the par-5 15th, when he tore a mighty divot with a third-shot approach that left him just outside birdie range, he slammed his club head into the turf, leaving it jutting from the ground handle end up.

“That was a little frustrating,” he said.

Kim closed on a high note, though, rolling in a 28-foot putt for birdie.
Kim is playing for the first time since taking an 11-day break from golf, which he spent buying a new house and furnishings in his hometown, La Quinta, Calif. He’s also playing with a 2008 Nike Sumo driver head, which recently replaced a 2003 model.

“And I’ve been hitting that great ever since,” Kim said. “I’m looking forward to the next three days.”