GREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA | It would be enough had Joohyung “Tom” Kim merely won the Wyndham Championship after making a quadruple bogey on the first hole Thursday.
Only four players in the past 40 years have won a tournament with a quad on their card.
But there is more.
At 20 years and 1 month old, Kim became the second-youngest PGA Tour winner (behind 19-year-old Jordan Spieth) since World War II.
To separate himself from a knot of players atop the leaderboard, Kim shot 27 – that’s right, 27 – on the front nine in the final round, allowing his biggest concern coming in to be whether a nearby thunderstorm would stay away long enough for him to finish.
Two months ago, Kim – who almost named himself Buzz Lightyear but instead took the name of the cartoon character Thomas the Tank Engine – had no PGA Tour status.
“All I could do was laugh because just some shots I hit there was pretty awful,” Kim said of his Thursday start. “But I don't know, for some reason I felt calm. It was one bad hole, and I just told myself, 'You know what? I can still get this.' ”
Joonyung Kim
Suddenly, he’s ranked 21st in the world and 34th in the FedEx Cup playoffs, for which he was not eligible until his victory Sunday.
“This five-week stretch feels like it’s been three months,” said Kim, who won by five strokes over Sungjae Im and John Huh thanks to a final-round 9-under 61.
Kim plays golf with an effervescence, leaning into the game. He shook off the nightmarish start, something few players might have been able to do, and stamped himself as a new force.
“All I could do was laugh because just some shots I hit there was pretty awful,” Kim said of his Thursday start. “But I don't know, for some reason I felt calm. It was one bad hole, and I just told myself, You know what? I can still get this.”
Having earned special temporary membership on the PGA Tour earlier this summer, Kim locked up his full privileges for 2022-23 at the Rocket Mortgage Classic a week earlier, easing the pressure at Sedgefield. Still, Kim said it felt like his putter “was 200 pounds” as he tried to finish his first PGA Tour victory.
“This is just the start for me,” Kim said. “We bought the car. I just need to drive it.”
While Kim elevated his status, Max McGreevy was the only player who started the week outside the top 125 to play his way into the FedEx Cup playoffs. With his T5 finish, McGreevy jumped 22 spots, to 104. Austin Smotherman, who missed the cut, fell from 125 to 126.
“I haven't played good golf in a long time,” McGreevy said, “so I was just trying to play good golf, and I thought it could take care of itself.”
Ron Green Jr.