By: @Ryan_Humphries on Twitter & LineStar Chat

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Tournament & Field 🏆

After spending two weeks in Hawaii, the PGA Tour will kick off the West Coast swing with a trip out to La Quinta, California where PGA West will play host to The American Express. This is one of the more unique tournaments on the entire Tour schedule as it features a three-course rotation with a 54-hole cut coming after Saturday’s round (top 65 + ties). This is a full-field event with 156 golfers preparing to tee off. Similar to last year, this will be a fairly strong field with 52 of the world’s top 100 ranked golfers on site, including four of the top 10. This should be another great week of golf and the PGA schedule only continues to heat up after this! Best of luck!

The Course Preview ⛳

TPC Stadium Course (TPCSC, played twice)

Par 72 | Length: 7,113 Yards

Course Difficulty Last 5 Years: 39th, 35th, 37th, 37th, 36th

Nicklaus Tournament Course (NTC)

Par 72 | Length: 7,159 Yards

Course Difficulty Last 5 Years: 36th, 40th, 39th, 34th, 40th

La Quinta Country Club (LQCC)

Par 72 | Length: 7,060 Yards

Course Difficulty Last 5 Years: 43rd, 44th, 43rd, 41st, 49th

All three courses in play this week are shorter Par 72 tracks that range between 7,060 and 7,159 yards in scorecard length and feature Bermuda greens. The greens are also overseeded with Ryegrass and Poa Trivialis and will run on the slower side, around 10-11 on the stimpmeter. The TPCSC will be the only course in which golfers will play twice, once before the 54-hole cut and once in the final round on Sunday. Several factors will lead to the order in which these three courses play in terms of least to most difficult. LQCC is the most likely to be the easiest course to play on while the PDSC is the favorite to play as the most difficult while the NTC lands in the middle. However, there is not a wide gap in difficulty between any of these courses and the TPC Stadium Course certainly hasn’t provided the same challenge it once did. However it shakes out, we can expect plenty of scoring this week as the winning score has been 22-under or lower in each of the previous seven seasons. It’s also worth pointing out that each of the previous nine champions at this event either played in the Sony Open or Sentry TOC in the two weeks prior.

Strategy Notes 💡

With every golfer receiving a guaranteed three rounds of play (barring injury or disqualification), I believe it brings a “stars and scrubs” approach further into play. Also, if you play showdown contests, there could be a noticeable edge to be had by rostering golfers who play on the easier course. As mentioned above, the LQCC is likely to be the easiest of the three, followed by the NTC, so I’d start there with golfers on Thursday (in single-round formats). Once it is known how things will play out after the opening round, then you can make adjustments if need be for the Friday and Saturday single-round DFS contests. Generally, unless the player performances indicate otherwise on Thursday, we’ll want to mostly avoid golfers in single-round formats (on Thurs., Fri., and Sat.) who are competing on the TPC Stadium Course.

Weather & Tee Times ⛅

Click the image above to view the most up-to-date forecasts.

⚖️Weather Verdict: With three courses in play, tee times are condensed among this field to begin with so there are no traditional “waves” to take advantage of. The weather is ideal to begin with -- plenty of sunshine and no troublesome winds to speak of, so weather should have zero bearing on DFS decision-making this week!

The American Express Tee Times & Round-By-Round Course Assignments

Key Stats to Consider 📊

1. Strokes Gained: Ball Striking (SG: App + SG: OTT) | 30%

2. Birdie or Better Percentage | 25%

3. Par 5 Average | 15%

4. Par 4 Average | 10%

5. Strokes Gained: Around the Green | 10%

6. Strokes Gained: Putting | 10%

PGA Tour Stats Page

The AmEx DFS Model Standouts 🏅

Below are the top 25 ranked golfers in both my overall model and my key stats model. Below that are the top 25 leaders in average finishing position over the last five and last ten starts. The players ranked on these lists do not necessarily mean they are the top golfers I’m targeting for this week's event, but many of these guys should no doubt be favorable DFS options.

Overall Model Rank: A golfer’s ranking (within the current field) in my personal DFS model, which weighs all of the key stats listed above in this newsletter, as well as factors like course history, recent form, recent average fantasy scoring results, and odds to win.

Key Stat Rank: Provides a golfer’s overall rank (within the current field) in my "key stats only" model, which considers only the key stats listed in the section above with the specified percentage weights allocated towards each statistic.

The AmEx DFS Cheat Sheet📑

Click the Cheat Sheet above for the higher-quality direct image link

Alternative Cheat Sheet Direct Image Link

Cheat Sheet QR Code:

That will do it for our PGA preview! Best of luck this week and, once again, feel free to hit me up in the LineStar chat or on Twitter @Ryan_Humphries with any questions.