by Hank Gola / Daily News

Anthony Kim has never felt so good on the golf course, even though he feels so bad.

Kim, who won the Houston Open and finished third at the Masters in a two-week stretch, has been playing with an injured left thumb that will require surgery to reattach a ligament. It’s just a question of when, and he’s simply playing too well to stop. He’ll tee off in the Quail Hollow Championship, which he won as a rookie in 2008, on Thursday.

“When you’re making birdies, it doesn’t hurt so bad,” said Kim, who makes more than anyone other than Tiger Woods. “And then when you make a bogey, it tingles a little bit more. I just ice it, take some Advil and just try to make it through another round. I’m just trying to get as many tournaments in before I take care of it.

“The doctor told me when the pain gets too hard to deal with, that’s when I should do it. But as of now, he said it can’t get any worse, so I guess that’s a good thing. I’m just going to keep playing until I can’t anymore.”

Kim’s doctor is also telling him he’ll have to miss between two and three months, including rehab, so he’s trying to figure out just when that break should occur. He’s No. 3 on the PGA Tour money list and No. 10 in the world. He knows he’s not going to be able to make it through the end of the season.

“I don’t think I’m going to take that chance because I want to play in the Ryder Cup…That’s a huge goal of mine,” he said. “It was probably one of the greatest moments I’ve ever had (in 2008). I want to be healthy for that. I just want to time that right.”

“But at the same time, I want to play in all the majors, too, so in golf, there’s not really a good time to take time off.”

Kim, of course, has to earn enough points to make the Ryder Cup team.

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Michael Street / Examiner.com

The focus of the 2010 Masters was the return of Tiger Woods, but Asian golfers had their day, too. Anthony Kim bested the four-time Masters winner, while K.J. Choi tied him, creating the best showing ever by Asian golfers in the Masters.

In 2001, Woods (who is part Asian) won the tourney, and Toshi Izawa finished fourth, six shots off Woods’ pace; this put two golfers in the top four and top ten.
This year, Kim finished in third, four shots behind winner Phil Mickelson, while Choi tied Woods at five shots back.

But Y.E. Yang also finished in the top ten, making this the first time that three or more Asian golfers finished in the top ten of the Masters.

Kim had started the Masters with an excellent 68 (-4), good enough for third place, but he slipped back on the second and third days, with scores of 70 and 73, respectively.

This left him tied for ninth going into the final round of play, and he finished the front nine with birdies on seven and eight, leaving him two under for the day. But he put the pedal down on thirteen with a birdie that started a string of four straight holes below par, highlighted by an eagle on fifteen.

Though he couldn’t keep the run going through the final two holes, it was enough for Kim to power past Woods with a -12, as Woods sat in the clubhouse, having merely shot even par over those same four holes to finish with a -11.

Choi also started strong, shooting a 67 on the first day, tying him for second, then shooting a 71 and 70 on Friday and Saturday. He was ready to contend at the start of the day, in a twosome with Tiger himself, and started out strong on the front nine, ending at three under.

But when Kim accelerated, Choi ran into trouble. He began his back nine with a birdie, but put together back-to-back bogies on the thirteenth and fourteenth holes. Choi recovered with a bird on fifteen, but the damage was done, and he could only struggle to a fourth-place tie with Woods.

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Anthony Kim brings it home in the first playoff hole with Vaughn Taylor to capture his third tour title. Kim shot a final round -2 under at the Shell Houston Open. His four birdies matched with two late bogeys kept the tournament interesting.

Kim’s win netted him $1,044,000.00 and 500 FedEx Cup points – vaulting him all the way to second place behind Ernie Els in the FedEx Cup standings.

Check out all of AK’s updated stats.

by Michael Fitzpatrick / Bleacher Report

Contenders: Paul Casey & Nick Watney
Paul Casey: With six Top-11 finishes in his last seven events, few players on tour have been more consistent over the past two months than Paul Casey.

Casey lost in the finals of the World Match-Play Championship three weeks ago, and tied for fourth at last week’s Honda Classic where he also tied the course record with a 64 in round two.

Although still fine tuning his game after missing a large portion of last season due to a rib injury, Casey is inching closer to his top form. He may not be quite ready to win this week, but it would be surprising if he doesn’t notch yet another Top-10 finish.

Nick Watney: With two Top-10 finishes in his first six events, Watney is off to a solid, but not exceptional start to the 2010 season.

The Blue Monster course at Doral is a bomber’s paradise, which sets up perfectly for Watney who finished second behind Phil Michelson at the 2009 WGC-CA Championship.

Over the past two years, Watney has shown occasional signs that he is on the brink of reaching that upper echelon of the PGA Tour. A win this week would certainly catapult him up the FedEx Cup point standings as well as the World Golf rankings.

Long shot: Soren Hanson
Just in case you haven’t turned on a golf tournament over the past two years, here’s a news flash for you—the Europeans are rising and rising rapidly up the World Golf rankings.

Ian Poulter cruised to victory at the first World Golf Championship of the 2010 season, and it would come as no surprise if another European walked off with a WGC title this week.

Soren Hanson, of Denmark, may be unknown to all but avid golf fans, but this guy can flat out play.

With four Top-10 finishes in his last seven events, Hanson is now ranked 45h in the world and could be a solid addition to Colin Montgomerie’s 2010 European Ryder Cup team.

Hanson averages 295.2 yards off the tee this year, so he should feel right at home on the Blue Monster course.

He may be a long shot to win this week, but don’t be surprised if we get to know Hanson a lot better over the coming days, weeks and months.

Winner: Anthony Kim
Anthony Kim has been one or two mistakes away from winning his last two events.

Kim was in contention after two rounds at the Waste Management Phoenix Open before finding the water twice on the 15th hole during his third round and dropping back to an eventual 24th place finish.

Kim managed to finish second at last week’s Honda Classic despite closing the third round with three consecutive bogeys.

All though we’ve heard it before from more than a few players, Kim has said numerous times that he is “close” to putting it all together.

If Kim can avoid those few mistakes that have cost the last two events, he could walk away with his third PGA Tour win this week at Doral.

Back-to-back wins by Kim and Camilo Villegas with Tiger Woods’ return likely coming within a matter of weeks?

Things may be about to heat up on the PGA Tour.

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THE HONDA CLASSIC: Transcript archive

PHIL STAMBAUGH: Final round 67, and second place finish, your best since the ’09 Mercedes-Benz Championship. Very nice tournament. You shoot 67 today and rallied back from yesterday. Maybe a few thoughts about your round and how you played overall.

ANTHONY KIM: It was a good week. I’m excited with the progress going into next week, and I think I’m just trying to peak for the majors this year, and obviously I want to play well every week. But the Masters is the tournament I’m looking forward to.

So I’m playing well, I’m thinking well, I have a good attitude and hopefully I can keep practicing hard and keep improving.

Q. What are you most happy with, the progress you’ve made from last year?

ANTHONY KIM: My attitude’s a lot better. I really want to — yesterday I wanted to break every club in the bag, but then I wouldn’t have had a set to play with today, so I’m glad that I didn’t. Just try to keep a positive attitude, and once that happens, I’m going to play good golf.

Q. When you wanted to break every club in the set yesterday, what was different about your reaction now, as opposed to other times?

ANTHONY KIM: When they did break? No, I just laughed it off. You’ve got to putt things in perspective and unfortunately last year I was injured and had to deal with some bad golf, a bad attitude and lack of practice.

So I know I’m putting in the time, and good golf will come, because I know it that I have the ability to do it. It’s just a matter of going out and doing it now.

PHIL STAMBAUGH: Can you take us through the day? What was your mind-set starting out?

ANTHONY KIM: Well, I got off to a quick start today. First hole, ten, 15 feet, made it.

3, I 2-putted from a good ways away, and 4, hit it to about a foot. So got off to a quick start.

13 and 14 were a couple good birdies to put myself back in there. I made a long one on 14, and just let one slide by on 15, which was unfortunate.

You know, the Bear Trap, I guess 17 got me again this year, and played that 4-over it looks like. I guess next year I’ll try to do a better job on that hole.

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Randall Mell / GolfChannel.com

Anthony Kim is letting go of the caddie who helped him to his only PGA Tour victories.

Eric Larson, who toted Kim’s bag in both of his breakthrough victories last year, caddied for Kim most of the last two seasons. Larson was told he wouldn’t be needed the rest of the fall and is uncertain whether Kim will retain him for next season.

Kim will play the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospital for Children Open in Las Vegas with former University of Oklahoma teammate Brodie Flanders as his new caddie.

Kim’s decision had nothing to do with what unfolded at the Presidents Cup, where Kim found himself at the center of controversy in the aftermath of the international team event. Kim told Larson at the Tour Championship that he was going to make a change. Allenby apologized Wednesday for comments accusing Kim of returning to his hotel “sideways” after a night out on the town before their Sunday singles match.

Larson said Kim told him he just felt like he needed a change but that Larson deserved to be on his bag Presidents Cup week.

“Obviously, I was disappointed,” Larson said. “I would love to continue caddying for Anthony.”

Larson will caddie for his long-time friend and former boss, Mark Calcavecchia, at the Frys.com Open next week, but he’s uncertain about his future. Kim left the door open to a possible reunion.

“Brodie will caddie for the balance of this season while Anthony evaluates the future of the caddie position,” said Chris Armstrong, Kim’s agent.

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by Robert Lusetich / Fox Sports

Losing to the Americans in the Presidents Cup was frustrating enough. But for Australian Robert Allenby, losing his singles match to Anthony Kim was too much to bear.

Allenby referred to an unconfirmed report — strongly denied by Kim — that the 24-year-old had been out late Saturday night.

“Maybe we should all go out ’til 4 a.m. and show up and shoot 6 under,” Allenby said.

Kim actually shot 2 under, against Allenby’s five bogeys and only two birdies.

“He’s the current John Daly,” Allenby said, “He is the loosest cannon on that team.”

Kim said he went to his room soon after the team’s dinner Saturday night.

“I hope that was a joke,” he said of Allenby’s comments.

“I was in tip-top shape.”

Kim’s attitude had been something of an issue for the American team.

Earlier in the week, U.S. captain Fred Couples had words with Kim about his behavior. Couples said Sunday that he’d been “tough” with Kim.

“Not just me, everyone in the team was,” Couples said, without identifying Kim’s indiscretions.

Couples did say, however, that Kim was the least frequent visitor to the American team room, preferring to spend time with friends.

“You’ve got to understand, he’s 24 years old,” Couples said. “He’s younger than a lot of the guys. He’s not going to want to hang out with the wives or with Kenny Perry and I.”

Couples said he thought Kim’s attitude improved throughout the week, so much so that he awarded Kim one of only four Michael Jordan limited-edition Chicago Bulls jerseys given to the Americans’ best. The other three went to Tiger Woods, Steve Stricker and Phil Mickelson.

As for Allenby, he admitted his words were spoken in frustration.

“I’m just pissed off that I lost to him,” he said. “Maybe I should’ve gone out with him.”

Kim had some different advice for Allenby.

“He needs to go practice a little bit.”

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PGATour.com

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — For the briefest moment, it looked as though Justin Leonard only had to pick up his coin for the Americans to win the final match Thursday and take another big lead on opening day at The Presidents Cup.

First, there was some confusion over whether to concede his 3-foot putt.

Then came a shocking miss from Leonard.

The United States still wound up with a 3-2 lead at Harding Park, even if the International team claimed a partial victory.

“At the end, we were pretty fortunate to have 2 points,” Ernie Els said. “That’s one of the better starts we’ve had, believe it or not, for the last three Cups or so. So we are not too despondent about today.”

After Tiger Woods and Steve Stricker dominated early, and Phil Mickelson and Anthony Kim came to life late in their Foursomes match, a bizarre finish in the final match made it unclear who actually had the momentum going into Friday.

“We wanted to get out of the day with pretty close to a push, and I’m very, very happy,” International captain Greg Norman said.

Leonard and Jim Furyk had a 1-up lead playing the par-5 18th hole, and Leonard hit a splendid fairway metal to the green that left the Americans on the verge of another full point, especially after Furyk lagged the eagle putt to 3 feet. Retief Goosen hit his approach right of the green, Y.E. Yang chipped to 4 feet and Goosen made the birdie putt.

Then, the Goose forgot the score.

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Men’s Fitness

Many have predicted that Anthony Kim has the talent to become the “next Tiger.” For now, he just trains like him. Kim, 24, is part of the next wave of young players who grew up watching Woods and who’ve borrowed some of his strategies. The young phenom also utilizes the training methods used by Woods, who has become a mentor to Kim.

The following four moves demonstrate how the up-and-coming PGA star keeps his core muscles strong to help improve his swing on the golf course.

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PGATour.com

AKRON, Ohio — Joe Louis Barrow, Jr., chief executive officer of The First Tee, announced a new program Tuesday to engage young touring professionals with participants of The First Tee. Anthony Kim, a third-year pro and two-time PGA TOUR winner, is the first player to partner with The First Tee for the program and will serve as co-chair.

“We are delighted Anthony has agreed to join us as co-chair and to mentor and inspire The First Tee participants as they learn valuable life skills through the game of golf,” said Barrow. “A.K.’s interest and leadership will encourage other PGA TOUR and LPGA professionals to become involved with The First Tee, ultimately impacting the lives of more and more participants across our Chapter network.”

The initiative, called the Young Ambassadors Council, formalizes player involvement with The First Tee in their hometowns, at tournament sites, fundraisers, and other special events. Kim, a Dallas resident, recently visited The First Tee of Dallas, hosting a clinic for 38 participants on the driving range, where he demonstrated shots, answered questions, signed autographs and posed for pictures.

“I am extremely enthusiastic about this opportunity to serve as a youth ambassador,” said Kim. “As I recently said to the young people at The First Tee of Dallas, I wish a program like The First Tee existed when I first picked up a club. I enjoy helping the kids develop confidence on the golf course and showing them how golf can impact other parts of their lives the way it has for me. I am really proud to take on this leadership role and be a part of the program on a national scale.”

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