One of the first things Tom Kim did after tying Sam Burns in his singles match Sunday at the 2024 Presidents Cup was seek out Xander Schauffele and U.S. captain Jim Furyk.
A day earlier, Kim accused members of the U.S. team of ‘cursing at us’ during their Saturday foursomes match, in which Kim and partner Si Woo Kim fell against Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay.
“I think the start of the round was definitely a little harder, but as it got towards the end, it got a little feisty out there. I could hear some players cursing at us. That part wasn’t really — I don’t think there was good sportsmanship there. But it’s all part of the fun. I understand it,” was Kim’s response to a question Saturday after the matches ended.
Come Sunday, Kim and Burns went toe-to-toe, with Kim a little less demonstrative than he had been known to be in his two Presidents Cup appearances. It came down to the 18th, and Kim missed a winning birdie putt to halve the match.
Shortly after handshakes, Kim darted off the green to Fuyrk and Schauffele. He was asked about it Sunday night.
“Yeah, it was just about my comments yesterday. I just told him like, hey, I didn’t mean it to go in such a negative way. If it did, I just said I’m sorry. It was just I felt like what I heard yesterday, some comments that I’ve heard was at that time, just coming off the green, it came to me so personally and just I felt like it was right to share,” Kim said.
“Definitely, I didn’t really at that time, just didn’t think it would be so negative. I really didn’t mean to — because when I played with Patrick and Xander, obviously we’ve battled a few times and they’ve always been such great competitors. They’ve never — I’ve always felt like there’s such a good sportsmanship between us. It was just outside the ropes, and I felt like that was a little misunderstanding on my part, which I should have explained better.
“So I went to him and I said, ‘I didn’t mean it that way. I apologize if it came out wrongly. It was just this and this happened, but if it affected you guys so negatively, I really do apologize. I didn’t mean to do it in that way.’
“This event is all about doing things you would never do and creating energy and doing all these things. If I — I do certain things on the greens when I make putts, and I expect them to do the same thing. It’s all part of the game. It was just about that.”
The next question was about whether he wanted to approach a player and captain, and insisted he wanted to, trying to clear the air.
“I felt like it was right for me to go up and share the way — you know, what the meaning was coming from that comment.”
Schauffele was asked about the conversation Sunday night, too, and he declined to comment, saying if Kim wanted to talk more about the conversation, then he could.
And he did.