Still strong: Even without top two players in the world, American Express field is stellar

Posted by Admin January 18, 2025 Golf

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Golf fans in the desert might be envious that Rory McIlroy and Jon Rahm are playing in the Hero Dubai Desert Classic on the DP World Tour this week, while Scottie Scheffler and Xander Schauffele withdrew from playing in The American Express in La Quinta. The La Quinta field went from a great field to a good field, fans might be tempted to say.

But wait a minute.

Having No. 1 Scheffler and No. 2 Schauffele in the field certainly would have added prestige to The American Express. It also would have marked the first time since the Official World Golf Ranking began that the desert tournament had the No. 1 and 2 players in the field in the same week. But the folks at SportFive, the management company that runs The American Express, and American Express itself have worked hard in the last decade to improve the annual field in the desert.

The result has been that this week’s field, while impacted by the loss of both Scheffler and Schauffele, still ended up being at least as good if not better than many regular PGA Tour events.

Consider a few facts:

Even with Rahm and McIlroy in its field, the Dubai Desert Classic will award that winner this weekend 34.36 points for the OWGR. The American Express, without the top two players in the world, will award 50.68 points. You can argue just how relevant the OWGR are these days with no points being awarded to LIV Tour players, but 16 points is a sizeable difference for the winners this weekend. It wasn’t long ago that the Abu Dhabi tournament was awarding more points to its winner than the winner in La Quinta.
The numbers are convincing, too. Eight of the top 25 players in the world, 10 of the top 30 and 18 of the top 50 in the world are in La Quinta. People forget that many regular PGA Tour events don’t come close to those numbers. Yes, major championship and signature events can claim 90 of the top 100 or so, but regular events fight for stars. The American Express gets those stars.
There are marquee pairings in this week’s La Quinta field. Certainly not every twosome in a 156-player field has a major winner or highly ranked player. But consider the Wyndham Clark/Rickie Fowler pairing at the Nicklaus Tournament Course on Friday. Clark won the 2023 U.S. Open just two hours away in Los Angeles. But Fowler received a little larger reception from the gallery as one of the tour’s more popular players. Fowler has six wins including a Players Championship title.
Other stories in the field include major champions like Jason Day, Zach Johnson, Danny Willett and Justin Thomas, a player with two PGA Championship titles who would be welcomed in any field in the world. Past American Express winner Charley Hoffman is looking for another desert title 17 years after he won here. Canadian Nick Taylor is looking for two wins in two weeks. And on and on it goes. There are good stories wherever you look on the PGA Tour and in this field. Day and Thomas are a marquee pairing, by the way. Patrick Cantlay and Billy Horschel are a top pairing, too.
You know there is a 17-year-old pro in the field this week in Blades Brown, certainly a story worth watching. But that’s just one year after a 20-year-old, Nick Dunlap, won the tournament as an amateur. With PGA Tour fields shrinking in 2026, The American Express will remain at 156 players, meaning younger and unknown players may look at the La Quinta tournament as the best chance to score the breakthrough victory that Dunlap achieved last year.

As so it goes at The American Express and plenty of other PGA Tour events that aren’t majors or signature events. It’s still a field of some of the best players in the world, accomplished players with significant achievements.

Yes, it would have been fantastic to have both Scheffler and Schauffele in the field this week in La Quinta. Some things are out of the hands of tournament organizers or the PGA Tour such as injuries or illnesses. The American Express had a strong field with Scheffler and Schauffele in the mix, and it’s still pretty strong without those stars, though it lacks some of the sparkle it could have had.

So the sparkle is dulled a bit, but it is still a sparkle.

Larry Bohannan is the golf writer for The Desert Sun. You can contact him at (760) 778-4633 or at larry.bohannan@desertsun.com. Follow him on Facebook or on Twitter at @larry_bohannan.