The 2021 American Express: PGA Tour Betting Odds
Spain’s Jon Rahm is favoured on the golf odds.
This event has been around in some form since 1960 and was for years known as the Bob Hope Classic and was a five-round tournament. It’s a typical 72-hole event these days but played over two courses at PGA West in La Quinta in California (basically Palm Springs), both par 72: The Stadium Course (7,115 yards) and the Nicklaus Tournament track (7,150 yards).
It’s the first time in tournament history that the event is being played at fewer than three courses and it is for COVID reasons. The pro-am portion of the tournament has been eliminated and the cut will go from the typical 54 holes to 36
Phil Mickelson took over as tournament host a year ago and this was renamed The American Express. Scores are going to be very low as the worst score to win since it became a 72-hole event was 22-under 266.
The defending champion is American Andrew Landry. He shot 26-under 262 to beat out second-place Abraham Ancer by two shots. Landry, who actually blew a six-shot lead at one point in the final round, led the field with 31 birdies over the four rounds. He became the second player to win this tournament after previously losing it in a playoff – which he did in 2018 to Rahm. Tom Kite also did it, losing in a playoff in 1992 and winning the next year.
Americans have won the tournament the vast majority of time with the late, great Arnold Palmer doing so a record five times. No one else has captured the event more than twice. The only repeat winner was Johnny Miller in 1976; Landry is +15000 to join him.
The American Express Betting Odds
Rahm is the highest-ranked player in the field at No. 2 in the world and also the +600 favourite. As noted above, he beat Landry here in a 2018 playoff and finished sixth in 2019 before not playing last year. Rahm didn’t play last week at the Sony Open in Hawaii.
Patrick Cantlay is +1600 with Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed both +1800. Kevin Na, who won the Sony Open on Sunday, is +3300. Cantlay has played this tournament once and was T9 in 2019. Koepka hasn’t played here before and makes his 2021 debut overall. Reed hasn’t played here since missing the cut in 2018.
Na finished at 21-under 259 on Sunday to win the Sony Open by a shot over Chris Kirk and Joaquin Niemann. Na won for the fifth time on the PGA Tour in his career and the fourth season in a row — joining only Dustin Johnson and Bryson DeChambeau as players who have accomplished that feat. Na was 17th here last year. Mickelson makes his 2021 debut and is +5000. He has won this tournament twice but not since 2004.
Canadian lefty Mike Weir took this event in 2003 when it was five rounds as he shot 30-under 330. Adam Hadwin has been runner-up here twice by a shot: In 2019 to Adam Long and in 2017 to Hudson Swafford. Hadwin didn’t play last year, when Michael Gligic was T21, David Hearn T37, and Nick Taylor, Mackenzie Hughes and Roger Sloan missed the three-round cut.
Hadwin is +6600 this week, Taylor is +15000 off a T11 at the Sony Open with Hearn and Sloan both +30000 and Gligic +50000.
The American Express Predictions
Take Rahm and Hadwin for Top 10s, but the winner at +3300 is Ancer. He missed the cut last week but sometimes getting a few extra days off can be a good thing, and he has improved his finish each of his past three visits here, including that runner-up a year ago.