Michelle Wie likes to laugh that a lifesize cardboard photo cutout will stand in for her at Punahou School's graduation Saturday while she resumes her lucrative golfing career.

But after four months away from competitive golf and 10 months since she last contended for a victory — a lifetime for a precocious 17-year-old who has had the golf world at her Nike-bedecked feet — Wie-watchers are also trying to picture just where her career stands.

Can she be the larger-than-life, barrier-bending contender she was last spring and summer when she seemed on the verge of a breakthrough victory? Or, will her struggles, often injury-plagued, continue?

When Wie tees off tomorrow in the LPGA Tour's Ginn Tribute at River Towne Country Club in Mount Pleasant, S.C. in her first tournament appearance since January's Sony Open in Hawai'i, it will be anybody's guess where her game is. Even she says, "I'm not really sure how well I can play because I've been out so long, but I feel good about my game right now."

What is known is that the golf world hasn't stood still in her absence. While she has been away from the LPGA and tournament golf, sidelined with wrist injuries that there is a tight-lipped reluctance to talk about, rival Morgan Pressel has become the youngest winner of an LPGA major, winning the Kraft Nabisco last month at the age of 18 years, 10 months. Other youngsters have emerged.

Closer to home, since Wie was last seen bouncing from sand trap to rough at the Sony Open, missing the cut by 14 strokes, Moanalua High's Tadd Fujikawa stole much of her thunder and youthful stage as his effervescent smile and any-man lack of pretension won hearts.

Now, Wie, the princess of potential, tries to get back on the fast track where she had seemed poised to run laps around the field. Wie, who turns 18 on Oct. 11, seemed a sure bet to put her name in the record book last year with three third-place finishes and a second through a globetrotting July. But she mustered only a 26th place in the British Open and finished 17th out of 20 in an invitation-only field at Samsung while missing a string of cuts against men on three continents.

Wie maintains she is healed and has renewed energy. Observers note she's sporting a new support team, shaken and stirred, with a new caddie.

She claims the injury-enforced timeout was something of a "blessing in disguise," telling a press conference yesterday, "I realized what life was like without golf. Truthfully, it kind of sucked. I don't really like it." Wie said, "I never realized how much I missed it (golf). How much I actually love golf and I love being out here at tournaments."

Wie has her game face and smile back. Now, we wait to see if her game returns, too.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.