Teenager Blades Brown was sharper than anybody during the second round of The American Express on Friday at La Quinta, Calif., although his missed 8-foot putt on the final hole prevented history.
Needing one birdie over his final three holes to set himself up for an elusive round of 59, the 18-year-old delivered three pars instead to just miss out on posting the 16th sub-60 round in PGA Tour history.
Brown’s 12-under 60 was still good enough for the course record at the Nicklaus Tournament Course, while vaulting into a tie for the tournament lead with world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler at 17-under par 127.
“Scottie is obviously an unbelievable player and (I) have my name next to his name on the leaderboard,” Brown said on the Golf Chanel broadcast. “We’re halfway there so I have a lot of golf to go but this weekend, I’m going to focus on executing the shots I can and see what happens.”
His two-round start to the tournament is even more impressive considering he was playing in an event in the Bahamas this week and didn’t arrive in the Palm Springs area until Wednesday evening.
The Nashville, Tenn., native skipped college and joined the Korn Ferry Tour last season on a temporary status, but he does have experience playing in the California desert. His first PGA Tour event came on a sponsor’s exemption at The American Express last year, but he missed the cut.
Brown would have been the youngest to post a 59 on tour ahead of Justin Thomas, who was 23 when he accomplished the feat at the 2017 Sony Open. The most recent to shoot a 59 was Jake Knapp at the Cognizant Classic in February.
After starting his round at the 10th hole and shooting an 8-under 28 over his opening nine holes, Brown reached 12-under through his 15th hole of the day. Poised to reach the par-5 seventh hole in two shots, Brown instead put the approach shot over the green and settled for a par.
On his final hole, he put his approach shot to a comfortable distance for a birdie but missed the putt on the high side.
“I was actually pretty calm,” Brown said about the final putt, while admitting he did have some nerves late in the round. “… I said ‘OK, I’m going to execute the shot that I know I can. I’m going to putt this line that I see.’ Unfortunately, it didn’t go in, but I was happy with the outcome I had today.”
Brown shot a 5-under 67 in the first round at La Quinta Country Club and will play his final two rounds on the host PGA West Stadium Course.
“I’ll focus on the controllables that I can control and see what happens,” Brown said.
–Field Level Media
