The American Express 2026

January 21, 2026

Hope everyone enjoyed the opening weekend of the PGA season. No need for a long intro this week. Let’s dive right into one of our favorite events of the season, The American Express Tournament:

The Course

This week, we should really say “Courses”. One thing that makes the AMEX so much fun is that it is one of only a small handful of PGA events that are played on multiple courses. This week, golfers will be competing on The Jack Nicklaus Tournament Course, The La Quinta Country Club, and The Pete Dye Stadium Course. Every golfer will have the opportunity to play each course before converging for a final round at the Stadium Course.

This unique structure provides us with a 54-hole cut, as opposed to the typical 36-hole cut. This should allow for riskier DFS plays, since missing the cut only costs you one round of scores. It also puts more weight on the weather forecast and who is playing where as it happens. Luckily, for this year’s AMEX, the weather looks extremely consistent at 68-74 degrees with minimal rain.

Jack Nicklaus Tournament Course

This is a fun and challenging desert-style course at around 7,200 yards give or take a few pending tee box placements. It has the famous 15th hole par 5 featuring the island green, and what isn’t common is a shared green for holes 9 and 18. There are also multiple holes with water in play and the rolling mounds feeding into perfectly placed bunkers can ruin anyone's day if they aren’t accurate. The course forgives nothing and the wind is unpredictable as it’s guarded by Santa Rosa mountains, so the longer players that can keep the driver in the bag and hit longer irons off the tee should excel here. As such, for this course, we like to focus on driving distance and accuracy from tee to green.

La Quinta Country Club

The La Quinta Country Club is a long-standing staple of the PGA Tour, having previously been played in the Bob Hope Classic before the event was renamed to The American Express in 1967. This course is the shortest of the three courses to be played this weekend -it plays about 7,000 yards with a much more traditional layout and recently remodeled greens.  La Quinta is truly designed for all styles of play. Still, this course presents its own set of challenges. Bunker placement, contoured fairways, and the remodeled greens leave plenty of awkward lies. As such, we will focus our attention on course history and ball striking here.

Pete Dye Stadium Course

There is a reason that this is the course our golfers will play for the final round of the weekend. The Stadium Course is longest of the three – it plays to a minimum of 7,300 yards. Greens are tiered and typically play very fast.  

You didn’t ask, but our personal favorite hole of the tournament (slightly edging out the 15^th hole at Jack Nicklaus) is the Stadium Course’s 17^th hole. Modeled to resemble TPC Sawgrass, the 17^th hole par 3, featuring it’s iconic island green, offers something for us golf nerds to get extra excited about. This hole, rightfully named “Alcatraz”, brings as much aura as the 17^th hole at Sawgrass and the 12^th hole Augusta.

If you’re still reading, let us also mention The Stadium Course’s 16^th hole, which features the infamous “San Andreas Bunker”, which has broken many golfers previously. As such, we will key in on SG: Approach and SG: Putting.

The Purse

The total purse this week is similar to last week’s Sony Open and second-tier overall: $9.2M total, with $1.6M going to the winner, $1M to the runner-up, and $635k for third.

(We break our purses into a three-tiered system. The Top tier purses include the four majors, three FedEx cup events, and nine other tournaments which are $20M purses. Our second tier ranges from $8-10M. Finally, the bottom tier is everything else and includes many events that are simultaneously being played during top tier events by Tour players that did not qualify.)

Looking Back

While 2026 presents a different set of circumstances after one of the two kick-off Hawaii events was cancelled due to Kapalua course conditions, nine of the last ten AMEX winners opened their season in Hawaii. Last year, Sepp Straka played both Hawaii events before winning the AMEX by two strokes (-25 overall) over Justin Thomas.

Fun Fact - since 1960, The American Express/Bob Hope Tournament has seen nine golfers win the even multiple times, including Arnold Palmer with five wins and Johnny Miller, Corey Pavin, Phil Mickelson, Bill Has, and John Rahm each notably winning the event twice.

Our Favorite Golfers This Week (DraftKings pricing and odds)

The field as usual has some big names including World #1 Scottie Scheffler making his season debut. It is easy to pick him as he is the far and away favorite to win at an astonishing +290 with the next closest at +2000 so we will save his write up for a larger purse and also time on a resume that essentially writes itself.

Scottie Scheffler ($14,200 DK; +290 to win)

While Scottie is set to make his season debut, we plan to stay away from him this week. Why is our first listed golfer someone we plan to fade? For starters, he is still the betting favorite and highest priced golfer on DK. Secondly, for one-and-done purposes, Scottie is likely to be best played in an event with a bigger purse. Lastly, and most importantly, we are not likely to fade Scottie again at any point this season.

Sam Burns ($9,800 DK; +2500 to win)

Burn baby Burn… in six career starts at the American Express, Burns has only one missed cut (2021), and four top 25’s, including two top 10’s. His above average strokes gained off the tee and putting make him a popular pick this week. Burns has the makeup to perform well at all three courses this week so long as he can keep the ball in the fairway.

Patrick Cantlay ($10,400 DK; +3000 to win)

Similar to Burns, Cantlay has the experience and the style to continue his history of success at this event. In seven efforts, Cantlay has made the cut six times, including four top 10s and a  runner-up finish back in 2021, His game matches with this event perfectly especially his strokes gained from approach shots where he is in the top tier statistically.

Si Woo Kim ($9,000 DK ; +3500 to win)

Si Woo Kim fits the mold to become the 10th player to win this event multiple times. His +3500 odd line is a bargain and worth a play if you want to dabble. In eight previous efforts, Kim has made all eight cuts. He has five top 25 finishes, including a win back in 2021. While he usually isn’t the strongest putter, Kim’s flat stick seems to work best at the event year after year. Moreover, Kim’s other strokes gained stats are all well above average, which is a benefit considering FIR’s and GIR’s lead to wins in this event.

Kensei Hirata ($6,200 DK ; +100000 to win)

We always like to provide at least one golfer in the $6K range for you to consider. As mentioned earlier, the 54 hole cut presents an opportunity to take on a risker play. Hirata finished in the top 25 at Sony last week, matching his result from the year before. Of note, those are his only two PGA Tour events, so there is inherent risk with playing the recent Korn Ferry graduate.

One-and Done Notes

The Sony was not our strongest showing to start the year, so it’s important we use the stats and data we have and not be afraid to use a bigger name to land a top 5 finisher this week. You shouldn’t be afraid to use a top 25-30 golfer here, especially if you don’t feel confident in them for the upcoming top tier events.

We will discuss more on our strategies as we move forward, including when to consider fading the field or when it’s best to play chalk. If you don’t want to wait, feel free to reach out in the comments or over on X @FTO_picks. We are always happy to talk golf with you!

Our One-and-Done Picks

Collin – Sam Burns

Frank – Si Woo Kim

That’s it for this week. Check back Tuesday for our Farmers Insurance Open preview and follow us on our new X account @FTO_picks!

*This preview does not represent our final betting picks for this event. For our full set of picks, check out our Game Picks section!

**Odds accurate at time of posting.