Anthony Kim

Los Angeles native Anthony Kim , 24, who won two PGA Tour tournaments in 2008 and was tabbed as the next great young American golfer, is determined to rebound after what he called a "disappointing" 2009, in which he had only three top-10 finishes after eight the year before. Playing the Northern Trust Open at Riviera Country Club as his first PGA Tour event this year, Kim is tied for seventh after shooting a five-under-par 66 Friday. "What I did last year was so disappointing," Kim said.

U.S. Open champion Rory McIlroy won $2 million in the Shanghai Masters on Sunday, beating Anthony Kim with a par on the first hole of a playoff. McIlroy holed a two-foot putt for the victory after Kim missed a three-footer. McIlroy had a chance to win in regulation, but the 22-year-old star from Northern Ireland missed an eight-foot birdie putt. He closed with an even-par 72 to match Kim (69) at 18 under par on Lake Malaren's Jack Nicklaus-designed Masters course. The $2-million first prize is the richest in golf.

He was standing in a stiff Georgia breeze, wearing his stiff Masters stare, when the most amazing thing happened. Tiger Woods spoke, but nobody listened. The voice from the throne was drowned out by the cheers for a serf. As Woods stalked behind the 18th green explaining how he missed yet another putt, Anthony Kim was standing on the green sinking one.

Tiger Woods couldn't get out of the bunker in one shot. Twice. Yet Woods still has a chance to win the Farmers Insurance Open. Bill Haas, who almost won his second consecutive Bob Hope Classic last week before losing in a playoff, is the halfway-point leader, standing at 11-under-par 133 after his second-round 66 on the Torrey Pines South Course on Friday. Haas has a two-shot lead over Anthony Kim and a three-shot lead over a group of seven that includes Phil Mickelson, Murrieta's Rickie Fowler, defending champion Ben Crane and John Daly, who a year ago here after the second round suggested he might quit golf.

The kid's got some nerve. When Anthony Kim was 9 or 10 years old, and small for his age, he was talking smack to middle-aged men on the putting green. They laughed as they lined up their putts and threw down quarters, betting against the skinny grade-schooler in the glasses. But the kid spent hours at a Studio City golf course. And while his swing on the driving range was mighty, his touch on the green was soft. He struck long putts that gracefully broke to find the hole.

Anthony Kim is just like every other teenage-wannabe-professional golfer who has been swinging a club since age 2. But with one notable exception: This kid is going places. The Studio City resident celebrated his 14th birthday less than a month ago and was among the youngest of 66 competitors at the U.S. Junior Amateur Regional qualifier Monday at Woodland Hills Country Club.

SOUTHPORT, England -- Twenty-three things about 23-year-old Anthony Kim, the surging golfer and amusing gabber playing his first British Open with two PGA Tour wins already: 23 In a biographical turn seldom seen on the planet, Kim's parents, Korean immigrants, moved their only child from Studio City to La Quinta at age 16, trusting him to reside alone and attend La Quinta High amid ample golf courses and scant urban distractions, while they ran their herbs store on 6th Street in Los Angeles.

Anthony Kim advanced to the Volvo World Match Play Championship semifinals Friday despite losing to Scott Strange by three holes in his final-round match at Finca Cortesin in Casares, Spain. Strange needed to beat Kim by at least four holes to advance and was 4-up going to the par-five 18th, but Kim took the hole after hitting his second shot to within four feet. Strange put his third shot into a bunker before conceding the hole. Kim will face undefeated Robert Allenby in the semifinals.

Hit: Too bad for Anthony Kim they couldn't make Sunday Round 1 of the U.S. Open. After playing the first three rounds in 17 over par, Kim finally got the hang of Oakmont Country Club and shot a three-under 67. Only Paul Casey, who shot a second-round 66, had a better round for the week. Kim, 21, had three birdies on the front nine but said he missed five putts inside 10 feet that could have pushed his score lower. Miss: Geoff Ogilvy. After winning last year's U. S.

Anthony Kim made par on the second playoff hole Monday to defeat John Poucher and win the Southern Section Individual golf championship at Canyon Country Club in Palm Springs. Kim, from La Quinta High, and Poucher, from Santa Barbara San Marcos, finished regulation tied with six-under-par 66, one shot in front of Taylor Wood of Santa Margarita. Defending champion Nico Bollini of Anaheim Servite shot 70 and tied for 10th.

Most of the first- and second-round pairings for the Farmers Insurance Open golf tournament at Torrey Pines follow a formula. It's not as if tournament directors just pull names out of a hat. Except for three names. Maybe those were in a very small hat. Tiger Woods, Rocco Mediate and Anthony Kim will play together Thursday and Friday at Torrey Pines. "Funny how that pairing happened, huh? What a shocker," said Mediate, who at the 2008 U.S. Open here famously battled the limping Woods through regulation and then an extra 18 holes on the fifth day plus a sudden-death hole before Woods won. That also was Woods' last major victory.

Los Angeles native Anthony Kim , 24, who won two PGA Tour tournaments in 2008 and was tabbed as the next great young American golfer, is determined to rebound after what he called a "disappointing" 2009, in which he had only three top-10 finishes after eight the year before. Playing the Northern Trust Open at Riviera Country Club as his first PGA Tour event this year, Kim is tied for seventh after shooting a five-under-par 66 Friday. "What I did last year was so disappointing," Kim said.

Anthony Kim advanced to the Volvo World Match Play Championship semifinals Friday despite losing to Scott Strange by three holes in his final-round match at Finca Cortesin in Casares, Spain. Strange needed to beat Kim by at least four holes to advance and was 4-up going to the par-five 18th, but Kim took the hole after hitting his second shot to within four feet. Strange put his third shot into a bunker before conceding the hole. Kim will face undefeated Robert Allenby in the semifinals.

Galaxy midfielder David Beckham says a deal for another loan to AC Milan is "95% done." Beckham was loaned to AC Milan from last January through the end of the Serie A season, then returned to Major League Soccer in July. He wants to play in Europe again to ensure he'll stay sharp and earn a place on England's World Cup roster for the fourth time. "It's close," Beckham said. "I've always said I want to go back there if they want me. AC Milan have said they wanted me back since I left to go back to the United States and they're saying the same now. "It's 95% done so I don't know why it wouldn't happen now. It will be sorted out in the next month, and I will probably be going there at the end of December.

BIRDIE In a genuine golf nightmare, Retief Goosen stood in a bunker beside the No. 17 green with the ball pressed almost up against the wall. Viewers cringed; Goosen contorted. With his right foot in the sand and his left knee folded on the ground above, he swung, and in some genuine golf ingenuity, the ball flew out, trickled over and landed three feet from the cup to arrange birdie.

The chaos of an unusually breezy and pleasant Independence Day had not yet settled down Saturday afternoon, when anything seemed possible at the AT&T National. There was, at one point, a four-way tie for the lead, and forget the usual suspects, because it involved gentlemen named Cameron Beckman and Michael Allen, who have, between them, 19 trips to the PGA Tour's qualifying school. Rod Pampling, an Australian who entered the day trailing by a single shot, momentarily held the lead alone.

Anthony Kim transferred from Campbell Hall to La Quinta because the Palm Springs area offered better golf facilities than the San Fernando Valley. The move paid off Monday, when he shot six-under-par 66 at Canyon Country Club in Palm Springs and then defeated John Poucher of San Marcos in a two-hole playoff to win the Southern Section individual championship.

Birdie: the Golf Gods. You curse them when your approach shot rolls aimlessly into a bunker and when your putt lips out for an 89. But the Golf Gods deserve a birdie for pairing Tiger Woods with Phil Mickelson today at Augusta National. This Masters tournament has lacked some sizzle. We haven't witnessed a miracle chip-in or double eagle or sterling performance by a teenage phenom or past champion. (OK, Greg Norman's first round was close). But to make up for it, we get the wonderfully uncomfortable pairing of Woods and Mickelson, two all-time greats who seemingly can't stand each other.

Anthony Kim is regaining a lot of his strength and a little of his swagger. He can only hope his record start Thursday at the AT&T National will allow him to get rid of some frustration built up from a year of not winning. Kim ran off eight birdies over his final 13 holes and set the course record at Congressional with an eight-under-par 62, giving him a two-shot lead over tournament host Tiger Woods and two others at Bethesda, Md.

Birdie: the Golf Gods. You curse them when your approach shot rolls aimlessly into a bunker and when your putt lips out for an 89. But the Golf Gods deserve a birdie for pairing Tiger Woods with Phil Mickelson today at Augusta National. This Masters tournament has lacked some sizzle. We haven't witnessed a miracle chip-in or double eagle or sterling performance by a teenage phenom or past champion. (OK, Greg Norman's first round was close). But to make up for it, we get the wonderfully uncomfortable pairing of Woods and Mickelson, two all-time greats who seemingly can't stand each other.