Why Anthony Kim’s first round at LIV Golf Jeddah ended
Why Anthony Kim’s first round at LIV Golf Jeddah ended
Anthony Kim is at the bottom of the leaderboard after the first round at LIV Golf Jeddah, but what is his standing?
Anthony Kim is back as a professional golfer after being away from golf for nearly 12 years. The enigmatic American looked nervous and rusty after his round in Jeddah and unsurprisingly ended up at the bottom of the rankings out of 54.
He bogeyed his first hole, the par-5 18th, but after hitting his best second shot, he bogeyed the fifth as well, going 2-over for a six. He then got his only birdie on the 6th hole and was within 1 over, but he continued to hit shots on the way home and finished at 6 over.
Kim Byung-hyun made seven bogeys and one birdie in the 76th round, leaving him two strokes behind the leader at the bottom and 14 strokes behind the leader. Kim appeared to have trouble keeping up with playing partner Cameron Smith on the tee, but he himself is not one of the most prolific hitters on the field.
Some of his shots only go 250 yards or so, and many of them hit 160 degrees of ball speed, a far cry from Jon Rahm or Bryson DeChambeau, despite the Jeddah wind. There wasn’t. Aside from the birdie bounce, the positive aspect of Kim’s round was the lack of doubles. Eight players hit doubles on the first day, but he wasn’t one of them. Double bogeys are easy to spot at gunpoint on the Champion Course, so he can be confident his round won’t be a real failure.
Instead, as bogey after bogey slowly followed, he will try to energize them with the LIV golf he plays in every tournament over the weekend and the rest of the season. In addition to the team championship, as an individual wildcard. During Kim’s first tour, Greg Norman was in the commentary booth at LIV and explained exactly what Kim was back with.
Was it money? His desire to compete again? Obviously there were both of these factors, but it appears to have been due to his wife’s desire to learn how to play the game. “He got interested in golf because his wife, Emily, wanted to learn how to play,” Norman said.
“So they went to the golf course, and Emily said he was a very, very good teacher, and Emily got really into golf, so we played together two, three, four times a week a year. I started playing golf.”
Even without Kim’s best traits, he was in one of the groups to watch and it was great to see his positivity again.
