Has Tom Kim found his solution after Genesis Scottish Open victory?

NORTH BERWICK, Scotland – Golf came easy to Tom Kim. It always has.

He was dominant as a 13-year-old junior in the Philippines, and again as a newly minted pro in Thailand at age 15. He found quick success on the Asian and Korean tours. He had six worldwide wins before he reached the PGA TOUR.

Once there, there was no learning curve. Kim won his third start as a TOUR member – the 2022 Wyndham Championship – and added another win two months later at the Shriners Children’s Open, becoming the first player since Tiger Woods to win twice on TOUR before turning 21.

Quickly, he was the darling of multiple International Presidents Cup teams, almost single-handedly reinvigorating hope that they could finally beat the Americans. He was proclaimed a global superstar, and there was reason to believe it.

That was a while ago.

You know that if you look at the world rankings. You know that when you see he played an Additional Event, opposite the Truist Championship, as recently as two months ago. You know that most of all ... because Kim will admit it.

Kim is still young – only 24 – but he’s spent five years on the PGA TOUR, and for nearly half that time, for the first time in his golfing life, he struggled. It’s why he took an extra breath to appreciate what happened Sunday, outlasting the likes of Rory McIlroy, Matt Fitzpatrick and Robert MacIntyre to win the Genesis Scottish Open.

“Golf is a very up-and-down sport,” Kim said after. “That's something I've learned.”

Hard work doesn’t guarantee results. That was tough to stomach for someone whose hard work always led to results. There were many long days on the range in the last two years. Before, that always translated into progress. Work hard, and you’ll get what you want. Those words hold true in many aspects of life. Not professional golf.

You don’t know what you don’t know, and Kim didn’t know how to struggle. It was humbling. Confusing. Jarring. Do you make drastic changes or do you stay the course? Do you keep the team around you or do you clean house? When is too early or too late to make those adjustments?

Kim did what most young players are forced to do at some point: trial and error and suffer through more of the latter than the former.

A frequent playing partner of Scottie Scheffler back in Dallas, Kim had grown accustomed to witnessing perfection. Day in, day out. Rain or shine. Whether the body feels good or not. At home or at a tournament. With just enough gazing around, Kim developed a debilitating expectation: Every one of his shots needed to be perfect. That he didn’t need to do that clicked around The Open Championship last year.

But that only helps when you feel like you can be perfect sometimes. The mentality was starting to fall into place, but his golf needed work.

Kim cycled through caddies and swing coaches, eventually foregoing one altogether last summer, thinking he needed a cleanse and full ownership. But earlier this year, a friend implored Kim to seek out noted swing coach Sean Foley. He thought Kim and Foley would hit it off. That offered another part of the solution.

The last step was to marry the two. With a sustainable mindset in place and the right mechanics in place, Kim expected the results to come quickly. They didn’t. He needed more patience.

“I've gotten to really understand, the last couple years, no matter how good you do, things might go your way,” Kim said. “Things might not go your way and you just have to accept that. I guess that comes with maturity, comes with time, comes with growing.”

It’s fitting, then, that his breakthrough came while playing links golf. This style of golf is nothing if not patience-inducing. Pot bunkers deliver brutal results. The little humps and bumps that line fairways and greens can quickly turn away a well-struck shot and impose an unfair penalty given the execution. Putts bounce on the rugged surfaces. Wind pops up and affects the waves in drastically different ways. Golf is always a game of luck and never more so in links golf.

Kim’s drive rolled into a divot on the fourth. on Sunday He made birdie anyway, accepting that he needed to alter his strategy and pulling off the shot. He took the lead walking off that hole. Others tied him at times, but he never lost it, shooting a bogey-free 64.

After he sank the winning putt, Kim cried. He said after that if he didn’t have to do media, he would have just gone back to his rental and cried more.

“I've gotten to really understand that these moments are something to be really grateful for, instead of more like, 'Oh, I won,'” Kim said. “I think I was too young to really comprehend what was happening.”

Next week is a new week, but Kim will ride this confidence into The Open Championship. He has a win under his belt, the third of his career. He contended at the U.S. Open, too. He will hope to maintain that form, but he’s come to realize what many come to realize at some point in their career: It doesn’t last forever.

So, for now, he’s going to enjoy.

“At least I now know I have the experience of how to deal with those careers moments,” Kim said. “So I'm going to try to hold those moments to my core for as long as I can, and all I can do is just keep growing.”