Perry among the favorites in Bridgestone at Firestone

The maverick has won three times in his last six starts, with two other top 10s.

AKRON (AP) — For more than two decades, no one ever paid much attention to Kenny Perry unless he happened to be holding the trophy at the end of the week. Few players have won 12 times and nearly $26 million so quietly.

But there is no avoiding the attention now.

Perry has won three times in his last six starts, with two other top 10s. What brought him as many headlines, however, was his decision to skip the British Open and stick to his original road map that would lead him to the Ryder Cup in his native Kentucky.

He was vilified for turning his back on a chance to win a major, and even some of his fellow Americans privately expressed disdain that Perry would duck the best players in the world. More amazing than a 47-year-old making the Ryder Cup team is that Perry has done this without having played in three majors or two World Golf Championships.

But instead of the spotlight causing him to cower, it has emboldened him.

“I’ve always run from it, to tell you the truth,” Perry said Wednesday at the Bridgestone Invitational, one of the World Golf Championships. “I’ve always been trying to hide from attention. But this year, for some reason, I feel like I can prove a point. It may not happen. I may fall flat on my face that week. It may be too much pressure, too much burden that I can’t handle it. I don’t know.

“But I’m still going to enjoy it.”

In his new role as a maverick, Perry is among the favorites at Firestone when the $8 million WGC event begins today with 80 players from around the world who qualified by winning select tournaments, being among the top 50 in the world or having played in the most recent Ryder Cup or Presidents Cup team.

It will be the first significant event at Firestone without Tiger Woods since 1996, when he was winning his third straight U.S. Amateur. Woods is the three-time defending champion at the Bridgestone Invitational, where he has won six times.

Perry has never won a WGC event, although he came close three years ago when he had a two-shot lead over Woods at the turn, only to bogey five out of six holes and tie for sixth.

“I got the fist pumps put on me,” Perry said.

These days, he is getting more than just fists. Perry has relished in the reaction from some of the players who are trying to capture the potion that has enabled him to win so much this summer. They are touching him for luck, even rubbing his golf clubs.

“It’s just been magical to have it fall together the way it did,” Perry said.