-
Wednesday start at Torrey Pines
-
Concentrate on the top class contenders
-
Read my Ras al Khaimah Championship preview here
Tournament History
Originally called the San Diego Open and first staged in 1952, the Farmers Insurance Open is now in its 72nd year. It's been played at Torrey Pines since 1968.
The event is played over two courses, with the entire field playing both the North and South Courses over the first two days before the weekend play is staged entirely on the tougher, longer, South Course.
The South Course was also the venue for the 2021 US Open, won by the 2017 Farmers Insurance Open winner Jon Rahm.
For the second year in-a-row, the Farmers Insurance Open will start a day earlier than most PGA Tour events so the fourth and final round will be on Saturday.
Venue
Torrey Pines, La Jolla, California
Course Details
North Course, par 72, 7,258 yards, stroke average in 2022 - 71.44
South Course, par 72, 7,765 yards, stroke average in 2023 - 73.62
Both courses were designed by Billy Bell Jr. and were opened in 1957.
The South Course was extensively revamped in 2001, by Rees Jones; after it had been awarded the 2008 US Open, and it was tweaked again ahead of the 2021 renewal.
This piece here details the renovation staged before the 2021 edition.
The North Course had always differed quite significantly to the South but it underwent a renovation of its own, by Tom Weiskopf, prior to the 2017 renewal and the scoring differential between the two narrowed considerably after that.
In the two renewals prior to the North Course overhaul, there was a 3.57 strokes differential in the bad weather of 2016 and a difference of 3.29 in 2015 but in the seven years since the course changes, we haven't seen a differential that wide.
The North Course has consistently averaged less than the South but by varying degrees and not by much. The largest differential occurred in 2021 but it's worth bearing in mind that the US Open was staged on the South Course in June 2021 and preparation for the toughest of the four majors will have been underway when this event was staged.
Differential between the North and South Courses since the North's renovation
- 2017 - 1.49
- 2018 - 1.5
- 2019 - 1.89
- 2020 - 1.96
- 2021 - 3.21 (US Open year)
- 2022 - 1.36
- 2023 - 2.18
TV Coverage
Live on Sky Sports all four days, starting at 17:00 on Wednesday
Last Eight Winners with Pre-event Prices
- 2023 - Max Homa -13 28.027/1
- 2022 - Luke List -15 95.094/1 (playoff)
- 2021 - Patrick Reed -14 36.035/1
- 2020 - Marc Leishman -15 80.079/1
- 2019 - Justin Rose -21 19.018/1
- 2018 - Jason Day -10 26.025/1 (playoff)
- 2017 - Jon Rahm -13 55.054/1
- 2016 - Brandt Snedeker -6 19.018/1
What Will it Take to Win the Farmers?
Other than Strokes Gained: Approach and putting, nothing really jumps out statistically here and, unsurprisingly for a championship course, most winners rank fairly-highly in all or almost all other categories.
The South Course is long so distance off the tee is often advantageous but it's far from essential.
The 2022 winner, Luke List, ranked 12th for Driving Distance and four of the 10 winners before him ranked first or second for DD but three of the last four winners have ranked between 34th and 55th.
Rahm, who ranked seventh last year, was the only player inside the top-ten to rank inside the top-25 for DD, so a lack of length can be overcome.
We haven't seen any winner top the Greens In Regulation stats since Bubba Watson way back in 2011 and Reed ranked a remarkable 63rd three years ago (as well as only 39th for Strokes Gained: Approach) but 16th was the worst any of the previous six victors ranked for GIR.
Greens In Regulation was a key stat last year, with the first six home ranking third, 32nd, second, first, seventh and 13th and Strokes Gained: Approach is another metric to concentrate on.
Last year's winner, Max Homa, topped the SG: Approach stats, the top-four in the rankings all finished inside the top-six and five of the last six winners have ranked inside the top-five for SG: Approach.
When Jason Day won the title for the first time nine years ago, his Putting Average ranking was only 33rd and List only ranked 28th two years ago but they're the exceptions.
Homa ranked sixth last year and Reed ranked number one in 2021. As many as five of the last eight winners have ranked fourth or better, and ten of the last 12 winners have ranked inside the top-ten for Putting Average.
Is There an Angle In?
Jon Rahm went against the grain when he won here seven years ago as he was the first debutant to win at Torrey Pines since the event moved there 50 years previous. Even if we disregard seven-time winner, Tiger Woods, course form has been a huge indicator.
Homa had missed five cuts here before last year's victory, but he'd also finished ninth and 18th, in 2020 and '21, and although he was a big outsider two years ago, List had finished 12th in 2018 and 10th in 2021.
Reed had finished sixth 12 months before he won and the 2020 winner, Marc Leishman, had twice finished runner-up in the event previously. And they were far from the first to give us an indication that they liked the place...
Scott Stallings hadn't made a cut here before winning nine years ago but he was very much the exception rather than the rule and it's worth noting that he followed up his win with a second 12 months later.
Brandt Snedeker was winning here for a second time when he got lucky with the draw in foul conditions in 2016 and Jason Day has also won the event twice.
Justin Rose struggled to get to know the place but he had been fourth and eighth in the two years prior to his 2019 victory. Ben Crane, Nick Watney and even shock 2004 winner, John Daly, had all finished inside the top-10 in at least one of their previous two tournament appearances. Despite the 2017 result, think very carefully before backing someone with little or no previous at the track.
Glen Abbey, which has hosted many a Canadian Open, provides far and away the strongest course correlation but unfortunately, we haven't had an event staged there since 2018.
In his only visit there back in 2013, Reed finished ninth and Rahm was runner-up in the Canadian Open in 2016, after Luke List had led at halfway!
Jhonattan Vegas, who's won two editions of the Canadian Open at Glen Abbey, finished third here on debut in 2011. Farmers winners, Jason Day and Bubba Watson, finished one and two in Canada in 2015, and Glen Abbey winners, Brandt Snedeker and Tiger Woods are multiple Torrey Pines winners.
Is There an Identikit Winner?
There have been only three winners in the last 30 years that wouldn't be described as absolutely top-class.
At the age of 37, and after years of trying, Luke List was finally getting off the mark for the very first time on the PGA Tour two years ago. The 2014 winner, Scott Stallings, was something of an anomaly and although a multiple PGA Tour winner. Ben Crane couldn't be described as top-class either but every other winner going right the way back into the last century has been straight out of the top drawer and I'd think very carefully about backing a raft of outsiders.
Winner's Position and Price Pre-Round Four
- 2023 - Max Homa - T4th - trailing by five 22.021/1
- 2022 - Luke List - T19th - trailing by five 290.0289/1
- 2021 - Patrick Reed -tied for the lead 4.131/10
- 2020 - Marc Leishman - T7th - trailing by four 48.047/1
- 2019 - Justin Rose led by three strokes 1.4840/85
- 2018 - Jason Day T4th - trailing by three 8.88/1
- 2017 - Jon Rahm T13th - trailing by three 55.054/1
- 2016 - Brandt Snedeker T27th - trailing by six 200.0199/1
In-Play Tactics
This is one of the rare events where a fast start is far from essential and in the last ten years we've seen winners sit tied for 63rd, 77th, 90th, 95th and 113th after round one.
Reed, three years ago, was the first - first round leader to go on to win since 1996 and Tiger Woods (2008 and 2013) and Justin Rose five years ago, are the only halfway leaders to convert.
Like Rose, Woods was never headed in 2008 and 2013, once he'd hit the front at halfway, and he was also in front after round three in 2003 but other than Reed in 2021. The only other third round leaders to go on to win this century are Phil Mickelson in 2000 and John Daly in 2004, and he needed to win a three-man play-off.
The last eight pre-round figures are listed above but prior to that, Stallings was three back and trading in excess of 30.029/1 ten years ago, Snedeker trailed by seven strokes after 54 holes in 2012 (when Kyle Stanley lost having led after the first three rounds and having been matched in-running at 1.011/100), and Watney had been five back three years earlier.
This is most definitely an event in which to take on the 54-hole leaders and Sundays offer up trading opportunities aplenty.
I backed the runner-up, Bradley, at 270.0269/1 with a round to go 12 months ago and he was matched at a low of 4.94/1. Only two other players were matched at a lot shorter than they'd began the day trading at...
Hideki Matsuyama hit a low of 5.24/1 having been matched at 800.0799/1 before the final round and although he didn't go quite as low as Matsuyama or Bradley. Rickie Fowler was matched at a low of 14.5 having been trading at around 260.0259/1 after round three.
Homa, who was a 22.021/1 chance after 54 holes, was the second Farmers Insurance Open winner in-a-row to win from five strokes back with a round to go and off the pace winners are common.
The draw is tough to work out now. List started on the South Course two years and between 2011 and 2018, all eight winners began the event on the South Course but four of the last five started on the North Course.
It depends how you want to interpret those results, is it only one of the last five winners have started on the South Course? Or nine of the last 13 winners have started the week on the South Course?
Market Leaders
After a torrid start to 2024 for golf punters on the PGA Tour, with three rank outsiders winning (the last two were matched at 1000.0999/1 before the off!), the Farmers Insurance Open may offer up some respite.
As highlighted above, the cream often rises to the top here, so it makes sense to concentrate hard on the market leaders, although the first three in the betting make little appeal.
Following his 10th in The Sentry and his third last week in The American Express, La Jolla native, Xander Schauffele, is the logical jolly and after a slow start, he's starting to build a solid bank of course form.
The 30-year-old missed four of his first five cuts in this event but if we include his seventh place finish in the US Open in 2021, his course form now reads a respectable MC-MC-MC-25-MC-2-7-34-13.
He's highly likely to contend again this week but it's now 18 months since he last won (the 2022 Scottish Open) and he's not the most reliable in-contention.
Collin Morikawa returns to the fray after a fifth placed finish at The Sentry and two weeks off. He has course form reading 21-4-3 with his fourth placed finish coming in the US Open in 2021.
After a barren spell of more than two years, the 26 -year-old won the ZOZO Championship in Japan as recently as October but his performance at The Sentry was slightly disappointing given he shot a pedestrian three-under-par 70 on Saturday having sat just two off the lead at halfway.
This is Patrick Cantlay's first visit to Torrey Pines since he finished 15th in the US Open and his event form isn't anything to write home, reading MC-51-MC.
Cantlay hasn't won since he defended his BMW Championship title in August 2022 and if his final round on Sunday at The American Express is anything to go by, the wait for his tenth PGA Tour title may continue for some time.
Cantlay began the fourth round trailing Nick Dunlap by eight strokes, so his chance was remote at best, but his four-over-par 76 was still disappointing.
Selections
The industry-best of 12/113.00 about the defending champion, Max Homa, looks a reasonable price so I couldn't ignore the 15.529/2 available on the exchange.
The Californian has an incredibly strong record in his home state, having won the Genesis Invitational and the Fortinet Championship (twice), as well as this event and as an added fillip, the Fortinet is not the only title he's won twice.
Homa has a habit of playing well in the same events and in addition to successfully defending the Fortinet in 2022, he's a two-time winner of the Wells Fargo Championship (2019 and 2022).
Homa was a very impressive winner of the competitive Nedbank Challenge in South Africa on debut in his penultimate start and his 14th at The Sentry will have knocked a bit of rust off after almost two months off.
Homa has less question marks over him than the three above him in the market and he's the one to beat.
Australia's Jason Day is another contender who's won the same events on multiple occasions and he's my only other selection before the off.
The 36-year-old has won the WGC-Match Play twice and after a break of five years in-between victories on the PGA Tour, he won the AT&T Byron Nelson for a second time last year, 13 years after he won it a first time.
He's already won the Farmers twice previously (in 2015 and 2018) and he's repeatedly played well here, even when not at his best.
Day arrives at Torrey Pines after a tenth at The Sentry and a 34th placed finish last week at The American Express and I thought he was fairly priced at 28.027/1 given he's no bigger than 25/126.00 on the High Street.