7023-Kim knows he'll be rusty but he's excited to return at Firestone

7023-Kim knows he'll be rusty but he's excited to return at Firestone AKRON, Ohio -- He's been hitting balls for 12 days now and putting one-handed for the last month. But while the other 81 players in the field were playing practice rounds in advance of the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational, Anthony Kim was back in a doctor's office having an MRI and x-rays done. The tests were a precaution because Kim was feeling some pain in his left thumb. "But structurally everything is fine and now I just need to go out there and put the ball in the hole," he said. That could be easier said than done, though. Kim hasn't played a hole -- much less a round of golf -- since he had surgery on May 5 to repair a partially torn ligament at the base of his thumb. So he doesn't know quite what to expect when he tees it up with Louis Oosthuizen at 10 a.m. on Thursday. Shoot, Kim has been so far removed from the game that he didn't even know who the South African was until he turned on the TV to watch the final round of the British Open. "It said somebody had a five-shot lead, and I didn't know that he had won on the European Tour before," Kim said. "... I follow ... the PGA TOUR, and not much else. So I hadn't heard of him. But he played an incredible British Open." Kim would have loved to have been at St. Andrews, too, but it was just too soon after the surgery. But there is another major on the horizon next week, as well as the Ryder Cup in October, so the young American is anxious to test his game at Firestone. "I actually had a little bit of adrenaline hitting balls yesterday on the driving range and hadn't felt that in a long time," Kim said. "... I'm not sure how I'm going to play, but I'm going to come in with a good attitude, try to stay as patient as I can. I know that's going to be tough not having played for three months and probably will be a little rusty. "But I came here with the attitude of I'm here to prepare for next week. I have four days of golf guaranteed, even if I shoot 110." Kim actually expects his swing -- "it's simple enough," he says -- to come back pretty easily. He's a little concerned about the state of his short game, and he doesn't want to make a bad decision in the heat of the moment. "But that happens when I'm playing a lot of tournaments anyway," Kim said with a grin. "So I guess I really don't have to worry about too much. "Everything to me golf-wise seems like it'll be there. I know I'm not going to be quite as sharp and game-tested, but at the same time I'm so happy to be out there. When you have a good attitude and you're excited to be on the golf course, you start playing a little bit better, and I'm excited about that." Kim admits he was nervous the first time he took a full swing -- "I just said, please don't come off, and that was to my thumb," he said. He doesn't think he's hitting his driver quite as long as he did, either. "It doesn't feel like it has the same pop," Kim admitted. "But it's going straight, which hasn't been the case the whole year. Just to have my thumb attached to my hand has been a plus, I'm sure." Kim's surgery was actually done during the week of THE PLAYERS Championship, and he has missed two majors while he rehabilitated his thumb. During that time, he has studiously avoided looking at the Ryder Cup points list or the Official World Golf Ranking. "I don't need that. My ADD is wild enough where I get thrown off by anything," said Kim, who has dropped to No. 5 in the Ryder Cup. "I ... just tried to make sure that I worried about everything I could control, and there wasn't too much that I could do sitting at home on the sofa." The time away from the game wasn't a total loss, though. Kim got to spend time with his friends and he welcomed a French bulldog name Deebo into his family. He also spent about a month in San Diego with his mom, taking her out to lunch or dinner, and sharing the occasional bottle of wine. "When things like (the thumb surgery) happen, golf becomes a little less important, and I get to enjoy the things that my parents and I have worked so hard for together, and that's very rewarding for me," Kim said. "It gives me a mindset to come back out here so we can do it again and I can take some time off and spend time with my mom again." __________________ Triplets now 9 months old [url]https://omgwearehavingtriplets.com[/url]