#6
Consider the swan
♫ “The Man's Machine - Jamie T"
A phrase I hate but concede too is “when you watch a swan it is calm and graceful over the water but under the surface it is paddling furiously”. I hate it because it’s lazy, generic and can be caught coming out the side of the mouth of the over-zealous middle manager at a company all-hands. I concede to it because it’s accurate and I can’t do better.
Golf is a boring sport. I have had a relationship to the game for about 20 years now. The fashion is drab and it’s brand appeals to mostly rich men. The clubs can be elitist and snobby. The financial barrier can be high. When you tell people you play golf they may baulk and call you posh. Golf clubs often make you wear collared shirts and tailored trousers. The haters aren’t wrong.
But consider Anthony Kim.
I was about 13 years old when I got fully hooked on golf. I was spending 6-12 hours a day at the course & clubhouse in the summers. Amongst other juniors we would play, practice, eat €5 sausage-and-chip baskets and drink 50c Mi Wadi blackcurrants. Anthony Kim was 22 years old, enjoying his first season on the PGA tour.
We would finish our days playing and practicing and often go home and watch golf on the TV or devour interviews and playing tips from YouTube. Tiger Woods was in his prime then and his “aura” was unmatched. Everyone else in the sport appeared to be as the game’s critics said they were: stuffy, unathletic and lacking charisma. That wasn’t the case with “AK”. He got his initials on his belt, told everyone he was a superstar, bought flash cars and hit the bars & casinos in between tournaments (reportedly also during tournaments). He fist pumped his way around, got the crowd on his side, and seemed to piss the old guard off. We loved him.
Returning to the swan. In every setting that I have heard about the swan, it is considered a good thing that the swan is not showing us the chaos. I’d like to see a swan fight. I’d like to see the other side of these swans. I don’t trust their presented reality. The presented version of golf is often tucked in shirts, handshakes and quiet claps. But the chaos in these guys’ minds is what I tune in for. What is great about good championship golf, is that on a Sunday you have up to 10 guys competing for something they have always dreamed of. If and when they perform or crack, we, the armchair psychologists get to enjoy the drama and see who capitulates in a moment we will never have and who can perform in a way we never could.
6th in the world by 2008. Anthony Kim left the PGA tour in 2012 after withdrawing from his third tournament in a row. Rory Mcilroy won the PGA that year by 8 shots and became world no.1. AK was 26 years old. Rory 23. That was the last time we saw AK in almost any capacity for 12 years.
What happened in those years will eventually come out and be covered in longer articles than this. The rumours were that he took an insurance policy payment out for his many injuries, and he couldn’t afford to come back and play – because he would owe the money back. Sightings in Las Vegas were often mentioned in reddit columns.
He re-emerged on the Saudi-backed Liv tour in early 2024. The anticipation was high for a lot of people my age who grew up watching him. We hadn’t even seen this guy do an interview let alone swing a golf club. Anti-climatically, he could barely play and certainly couldn’t compete.
And so the sad case of this now weathered looking, washed up, generational player was to fizzle out. He talked of sobriety; he didn’t want to go into details about his disappearance. The interviews didn’t give much away, and his game didn’t warrant watching. The new AK would show up to events and finish close to the bottom of every LIV event for 2 years. Anthony Kim lost his rights to play on LIV, and most of the golf world moved on.
Until a month ago.
the black swan
A black swan has multiple meanings
1. Something that is extremely rare
2. An event that comes as a surprise, has a major effect, and is often inappropriately rationalized after the fact with the benefit of hindsight
One month ago, at a LIV qualifier (an event where players can earn their way back to the tour), where there were 3 spots up for grabs, Anthony Kim was 1 shot outside the cut line as he played the last hole of the second round. 12 years away. 2 years back playing. 2 years of what should be embarrassing results, online ridicule and performing in the shadow of a former glory. And after 2 rounds at this qualifier that has almost no fans, on a shoddy looking course (you too can also watch the YouTube highlights) he faces elimination if he doesn’t make a birdie on the last hole. Eliminated into a second golfing abyss.
Anyone who is familiar with AA (Not AK) knows that recovering alcoholics are encouraged to believe in a higher power. The new AK worships and loves his family, god and the sobriety that they motivated him to find. He believed that his personal comeback was much harder and more rewarding than any golf achievement could ever give him. Watchers from afar wouldn’t know any of this. <swan ‘s feet fluttering>
And of course, he birdied that 18th hole. To stay alive. He would later say that was his career golf highlight. 2 days later, he finished the event in the top 3. In a field of 80. He had earned his rights back on LIV and in an interview showed a flash of the cocky young phenom: “well that should silence the haters who have been talking shit”.
3 weeks later and a week ago today he would beat John Rahm & Bryson DeChambeau in the final round on Sunday to win his first tournament in 16 years and 4 million dollars in front of tens of thousands of fans. With 4 majors between them since 2020 and both considered top 5 players in the world, AK was 5 shots back and had a 0.6% chance of winning on Sunday if you believe in such things. If you’ve read this far and you haven’t seen the highlights. Go. The scenes matched the moment. The golfing lake of tranquillity was disturbed once again.
For him and his family the comeback was completed beneath the surface and quietly away from media, crowds and online rumours. But for the fans who have followed him, posted in forums, chatted on the range and in the bar for over a decade. We got our comeback too. And it was fucking glorious.
