Why did Anthony Kim reckoned as the 'next Tiger Woods' walk away from golf?

U.S. Open - Round Three
Anthony Kim (Image via Rob Carr/Getty Images)

US golfer Anthony Kim had a flourishing golf career ahead of him. From early on in his short professional career, he displayed a golf swing masterclass every time he played. He was touted to be the next Tiger Woods.

In 2008, at just 22 years of age, he won his PGA Tour event at the 18th green. And he looked beyond excited about it.

He was quoted as saying:

"That walk up 18 was the best feeling in my entire life. I want to re-create that as many times as possible now."

That unfortunately couldn't be the case for very long. In 2012, four years after his first win, he walked away from golf and never returned.

He was struggling with a lot of injuries at the time and needed time to recover. He had injured his Achilles tendon and undergone surgery.

That is the reason that has been cited for him stepping away from the sport. But what bugs the fans to this day is why he won't make a return.


Why isn't Anthony Kim returning to golf?

Anthony Kim at the 2011 U.S. Open - Round One (Image via Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)
Anthony Kim at the 2011 U.S. Open - Round One (Image via Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)

Since Anthony Kim walked away from golf in 2012, he has been rather radio silent. He may not have particularly hidden himself from the world, but he has managed to dodge the prying eyes of the media.

Perfectly described as 'golf's yeti', he has become an elusive figure in the golfing community. News about his whereabouts and well-being pop up every now and then and still gather just as much attention as they did back in the day.

After the inception of LIV Golf, many thought that Kim would join the league, but that did not happen.

In 2023, he is only 37-years-old, a young age for a golfer. So, it is quite natural for people to wonder if he will ever return.

Anthony Kim had taken out an insurance policy on his body when he was still playing golf. Reports have cited that while he received monthly pay cheques for his injury recovery, they would stop coming if he returned to golf.

According to Sports Illustrated's 2014 article, the payout he received was somewhere between $10 million and $20 million. And some reports have suggested that money is the reason he is not coming back to golf.

In 2015, Kim admitted to still receiving pay cheques three years after he left golf. However, he denied the claims that the insurance policy was the reason he was not coming back. In an interview with an Associated Press reporter, he said he was rehabilitating several injuries.

However, the insurance payout has not been a satisfactory reason for the fans who watched in awe as he made the golf ball behave according to his will at tournaments.

Another reason that has been suggested is that he had outgrown the sport. Kim shared a tense relationship with his father, Paul Kim, who had also helped train him.

There are several stories swirling that say once Paul threw Anthony Kim's second place prize in the trash. Or that the father-son duo weren't on speaking terms for two years after a fallout when Kim was in college.

In 2006, after Anthony Kim left college, he stayed with his golf swing coach, Adam Schriber, in Michigan. He trained in the morning and slept on the couch in the living room at night. He spent his afternoons playing with Schriber's children, hiking, kayaking, fishing, and all the other activities that the child prodigy did not get to enjoy.

Perhaps that was his first introduction to a life without golf. He soon achieved a second-place finish in his first PGA Tour event, the Valero Texas Open. With his prize money of a whopping $300,000, he bought a condo in Dallas. However, he didn't forget the "best summer" of his life in Michigan.

Adam Schriber had said that he had played golf with Kim twice in the last two years, and his golf swing was still just the way the world remembered it. But there is a slim chance that fans will get to see that again.

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Edited by Yasho Amonkar
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