American Express: Power poised to pick up another title

Tournament History

After a couple of weeks in Hawaii, the PGA Tour moves on to California for the American Express. The tournament has had several sponsors and it's probably best known as the Bob Hope Classic.

The American Express began life in 1960 as the Palm Springs Desert Golf Challenge - a five-round pro-am won by Arnold Palmer. Between 1965 and 2012 it was known as the Bob Hope Classic before Humana took over sponsorship and revived its fortunes.

The tournament had been failing to attract quality fields and the perception was that the five-round format had much to do with its demise. It was reduced to the conventional four rounds in 2012 and it's been a much better received event as a result.

The tournament is a Pro-Am staged over three different courses (listed below) in rotation over the first three days with the host course, the PGA West TPC Stadium Course, staging the final round but last year's edition was staged over just two courses and with no amateurs in attendance due to the pandemic. The field played three rounds around the Stadium Course and one around the Nicklaus Tournament Course.

Venue

The Stadium Course, La Quinta, California

PGA West (TPC Stadium Course), par 72, 7,300 yards - Scoring Average in 2021 - 70.81
PGA West (Nicklaus Tournament Course), par 72, 7,204 yards - Scoring Average in 2021 - 70.95
La Quinta Country Club, par 72, 7,060 yards - Scoring Average when last used in 2020 - 69.18

The Pete Dye-designed PGA West Stadium Course was used for the first time six years ago and it's usually the hardest of the three courses used.

La Quinta was the easiest of the three courses again when last used in 2020 and it was the easiest par 72 used on the PGA Tour for four seasons in-a-row. The Nicklaus Tournament Course was the second easiest, but it played slightly tougher last year when the two tracks used were set-up slightly harder with no amateurs in the field.

With amateurs playing, the set-ups are deliberately less demanding than usually encountered on the PGA Tour and very low scoring is the norm. The Bermuda greens are set at around 11 on the stimpmeter and the rough is minimal.

Weather Forecast

TV Coverage

Live on Sky Sports all four days starting at 17:00 on Thursday

Last Six Winners with Pre-event Exchange Prices

2021 - Si Woo Kim -23 55.054/1
2020 - Andrew Landry -26 500.0499/1
2019 - Adam Long -26 1000.0999/1
2018 - Jon Rahm -22 10.519/2 (playoff)
2017 - Hudson Swafford -20 70.069/1
2016 - Jason Dufner -25 48.047/1

What Will it Take to Win the American Express?

What you do of the tee is largely irrelevant. Si Woo Kim ranked 16th for Driving Accuracy and 22nd for Driving Distance when winning last year and as a demonstration of how unimportant the driving stats are, the 2020 winner, Andrew Landry, ranked 61st for Driving Distance and the 2017 winner, Hudson Swafford, ranked the same for Driving Accuracy. Landry ranked third for DA and Swafford ranked fifth for DD.

Kim ranked first for Strokes Gained Tee-to-Green and he also topped the Greens In Regulation stats 12 months but the average GIR ranking for the 12 winners before him was 12.04.

This is a tough event to evaluate statistically as it's basically just a birdie-fest and it will undoubtedly boil down to who holes the most putts on Sunday but Par 4 Scoring and Par 4 Performance are stats to consider.

Kim only ranked 10th for Par 4 Scoring last year but the man who finished second, Patrick Cantlay, ranked first and the two winners before Kim, Landry and Adam Long, ranked first and second. Jon Rahm only ranked fifth in 2018 but the seven winners before him topped the Par 4 Scoring.

Is There an Angle In?

Given the first event of the year, the Sentry Tournament of Champions in Hawaii is a limited field event, and that last week's Sony Open is also staged in Hawaii, this is the first PGA Tour event of the year on the mainland and it's the first event of the year for a number of contenders. And that looks like something of a handicap...

Since Charley Hoffman won this when playing in his first event of the year in 2007, 13 of the next 14 winners have all had at least one start. Bill Haas, back in 2015, is the odd man out.

Interestingly, a decent performance doesn't appear to be vital. Kim finished a respectable 25th in the Sony last year but the two winners before him both missed the cut at the Sony and that was the case for the five winners between 2008 and 2012.

Of those seven winners to miss out on weekend employment at the Sony, the 2012, Mark Wilson, is the only one to have also teed it up at the Sentry Tournament of Champions the week before - where he'd finished 18th.

The 2013 winner, Brian Gay, had finished 31st at the Sony in his sole previous start and Patrick Reed, the 2014 champ, had finished 16th in the Sentry TOC but the three winners before Long had all shown something significant before they won. Jason Dufner took the title having finished ninth in the Sony five years ago, Hudson Swafford signalled his wellbeing with a 13th place at the Sony and the 2018 winner, Rahm, had finished runner-up to Dustin Johnson in the Sentry TOC. He didn't play the Sony.

Si Woo Kim absolutely loves a Pete Dye designed track and playing the Dye designed Stadium Course three times certainly helped him 12 months ago but that's still a link to consider, even though the field will only play it twice again this time around.

Is There an Identikit Winner?

Kim was a 55.054/1 chance 12 months ago but this is a great event for really-big outsiders. The two winners before Kim went off at 1000.0999/1 and 500.0499/1 and between 2008 and 2014, all seven winners went off at a triple-figure price.

Multiple event winners are fairly common so previous winners are well worth considering closely. Arnold Palmer loved this event and he won it five times between 1960 and 1973, the Tournament Host, Phil Mickelson, has won it twice and Bill Hass became the seventh player, other than The King, to win it a second time when he took the title in 2015 so we're perhaps due another multiple winner.

Winner's Position and Exchange Price Pre-Round Four

2021 - Si Woo Kim Tied for the lead 5.14/1
2020 - Andrew Landry tied for the lead 3.412/5
2019 - Adam Long solo 3rd - trailing by three 23.022/1
2018 - Jon Rahm T4th - trailing by two 4.03/1
2017 - Hudson Swafford T3rd - trailing by two 8.07/1
2016 - Jason Dufner led by two strokes 1.875/6

In-Play Tactics

Bill Haas sat tied for 16th and four off the lead after round one in 2015 but that's by some distance the furthest any winner has trailed after the opening round in each of the last eight years.

Landry was tied for sixth after the opening round and just two off the lead in 2020 and Kim sat third and two back last year but the other five winners since 2014 all sat first or second after round one, suggesting a fast start is essential.

Those bare stats suggest a fast start is essential but it's worth bearing in mind that Cantlay trailed by seven at halfway last year and very he very nearly won. He was matched at a low of 1.51/2 when he birdied the final hole to lead by a stroke, having been matched at a high of 330.0329/1, but Kim birdied 16 and 17 to pip him. And he wouldn't have been the first to win from some way off the pace...

Justin Leonard was eight back at halfway 15 years ago and a number of winners have been four, five, six and seven back with two rounds to go. David Duval in 1999, trailed by seven before he shot 59 to win by a stroke so you clearly can come from behind with a wet sail.

Being up with the pace has been the place to be of late but it's still worth looking for an odds-on shot to take on in-running if recent results are anything to go by. Incredibly, in 12 of the last 15 renewals we've seen at least one player trade at odds-on without winning and in two of the last three renewals there have been two players trade at odds-on before losing - Scottie Scheffler (1.9210/11) and Abraham Ancer (1.715/7) in 2020 and Phil Mickelson (1.695/7) and Adam Hadwin (1.081/12) in 2019.

It's also worth mentioning that two of the last four winners, Landry and Rahm, both traded at very low odds before looking like they might get beat. Landry traded at as low as 1.031/33 when he shot six clear of the field with three birdies in-a-row after the turn in 2020 but the pick-ups were immediately followed by three straight drops and Rahm, in 2018, was matched for more than 30k at 1.061/18 in regulation play and he hit a low of 1.051/20 before Landry birdied the 72nd hole to take the event to extra time.

Year after year players trade at odds-on and get beat or in the case of Landry and Rahm, come close to throwing it away, so it's a great tournament to trade on a Sunday.

Market Leaders

By swerving the Sony, Jon Rahm is taking the same route in as he did when he took the title in 2018. On that occasion he finished second to Dustin Johnson at the Sentry two weeks prior and this time he arrives on the back of a runners-up finish to Cameron Smith.

The world number one finished sixth here when defending in 2019 and this is his first visit since. On his only other appearance, he finished 34th on debut in 2017.

Rahm's chance is very obvious and I wouldn't be in the least bit surprised to see him take the title for a second time but in an event where outsiders fare so well, backing the short-priced favourite is not easy to do.

Having finished 2021 in fine style, the FedEx Cup winner, Patrick Cantlay, began 2022 impressively enough with a fourth-place finish in the Sentry Tournament of Champions two weeks ago but the same applies to Patrick as applies to Jon - can we really go taking a single-figure price about anyone in an event that invariably goes the way of an outsider?

Selection

The course and current form of Ireland's Seamus Power is impossible to ignore and he's my only bet for now - although I will have an outsider or two in the Find Me a 100 Winner column.

Power missed the cut here on his last visit, back in 2019, but he was 21st on debut in 2017 and 11th 12 months later. He's a better player than he was three or four years ago, with a PGA Tour title to his name after his Barbasol Championship victory last year, he currently ranks number one for Par 4 Scoring on the PGA Tour, and he's bang in form to boot.

On Power's final outing of 2021 he finished fourth in the RSM Classic, and he finished third at the Sony Open last week, having finished 15th at the Sentry. If he maintains that level of form he will contend and I thought 44.043/1 was fair.

Selection:
Seamus Power @ 44.043/1

I'll be back later today or tomorrow with the Find Me a 100 Winner column.

*You can follow me on Twitter @SteveThePunter