Once among the brightest young talents in professional golf, Anthony Kim disappeared form the game for 12 years before surprisingly re-emerging in 2024 and quickly signing with the LIV Golf League.
Exactly what happened during Kim's enforced hiatus will - for now - remain something of a mystery, although the 39-year-old has since shared that he was struggling with addiction, depression and anxiety during much of that decade or so.
The details involved in that break will be shared when the time is right, according to Kim, but the man himself has at least partly explained the peculiar circumstances surrounding his return and why he ultimately opted to go with LIV Golf over the PGA Tour.
Confirmed by Kim while speaking to Rick Shiels during a recent match on the latter's YouTube channel, both the PGA Tour and LIV Golf League were interesting in adding the three-time pro winner to its ranks around January 2024.
Fuelled by a desire to continue turning his life around and being a good role model for his young daughter, Kim eventually came around to the idea. But this was after - in his own words - having barely touched a golf club for the past 12 years.
Anthony Kim is a three-time winner on the PGA Tour
The tours were apparently aware of Kim's situation but felt the former world star was still worth pursuing, even if Kim wasn't so sure.
Speaking to Shiels about the prospect of returning to the pro game, Kim said: "It definitely wasn't something that I thought was even possible. I had heard there was some interest in me coming back to golf, but then they had heard how far removed I was from the game and I figured there was zero chance.
"Nor did I even want to play golf [at that point] because the last memories I have of playing golf are not fun. It was injury, struggle, addiction, depression, mental illness. So golf wasn't something I remembered and I was like 'yeah, let's go do this.' Wasn't even on my radar.
"But once I got sober for a few months and realized that both tours wanted me to play, I started taking it a little more seriously."
A deal to bring Kim to the LIV Golf League was agreed shortly before LIV Golf Jeddah in March 2024 - the third event of the campaign - and the enigmatic Californian went on to finish 53rd out of 54 players.
A 16-over score for the week might have been disappointing to Kim, but given the circumstances it was not a bad effort at all. And as the season wore on, he would make steady improvements to earn just less than $1 million in prize money.
Less than a year earlier, though, Kim playing pro golf at all wasn't even on anyone's radar. Except from "some random guy" on social media. Kim revealed that his whole second career is arguably down to a post from someone on X (formerly Twitter) - a person he is extremely grateful for.
Anthony Kim smiles during round one of LIV Golf Jeddah 2024
Kim explained: "The funny thing is that this conversation [about coming back] really got started because some random guy posted on his Twitter.
"I didn't even have Twitter, somebody sent me a picture of the tweet that said LIV signs me for a ridiculous amount of money. I wish they did! That's news to me. I must have been deeper into addiction than I thought!
"But then the rumors started and I got a call from some guys from the PGA Tour who said "is this true? Did you already sign?" At the time, I was like 'I don't even have golf clothes and people are asking if I've just signed for $100 million.'
"It was so insane that it all started from a social media rumor. And I have no idea who this guy is, but I owe him at least dinner!"
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