With this victory, his ninth, Matsuyama is now Asia’s most prolific PGA Tour winner, passing South Korea’s K.J. Choi, who has owned that record since the 2011 Players Championship.
Whether Tom Kim’s meteoric ascend will create a new momentum for the men’s game in Korea and across Asia, as Pak once did for women’s golf, is yet to be seen but there are parallels and early indication to suggest another boom may well occur in the Far East.
The Internationals’ ability to hang in there was largely due to a Herculean contribution from the four South Korean members of the team at Quail Hollow.
From humble beginnings, the glowing career of Korea’s K.J. Choi includes eight PGA Tour wins – the most by an Asian golfer – but none was more satisfying that winning the Players Championship 10 years ago.
Si Woo Kim’s three-stroke victory over Ian Poulter and Louis Oosthuizen this morning at TPC Sawgrass was the second of his career and easily the biggest.
A routine four-footer did it, the kind of putt Charlie Wi had sized up thousands of times and regularly converted without much fuss in his 20-plus years in professional golf. But he missed it this time, and as the ball broke away from the hole, something broke inside him.