After Sepp Straka's two-shot victory at the American Express, the PGA Tour's West Coast Swing moves on to San Diego and the iconic Torrey Pines Golf Course, which hosts the Farmers Insurance Open.
As has been the case in each of the last three years, the tournament begins on Wednesday and finishes on a Saturday in order to avoid a clash with the NFL Conference Championship games.
Two courses are in operation for the opening rounds - the 156-man field rotates across the South Course and the North Course on Wednesday and Thursday before a 36-hole cut is made and the final two rounds are staged exclusively at the South Course on Friday and Saturday.
A 7,765-yard brute, the South Course is the more famous, much tougher track and has also hosted two US Opens, won by Tiger Woods in 2008 and Jon Rahm in 2021. Given its length, power is an advantage and high-quality ball-strikers tend to separate themselves from the rest of the field.
Xander Schauffele and Collin Morikawa have both withdrawn from the Farmers Insurance Open in the last week and their absence leaves Swedish superstar Ludvig Aberg and Sentry hero Hideki Matsuyama battling for favoritism.
Matsuyama, who posted a remarkable 35-under-par record winning score in Hawaii on his first start of the year, has the tee-to-green class to handle the South Course. But two top-10 finishes from his 12 previous appearances is not that impressive for a multi-time PGA Tour winner and Masters champion.
Aberg is vastly less experienced than his Japanese counterpart but the Swede has already posted one top-10 finish at Torrey Pines, coming in ninth on his Farmers Insurance Open debut 12 months ago. There could be more to come in this year's tournament for one of golf's brightest talents.
While the 25-year-old failed to win a PGA Tour title last season, he posted a further seven top-10 finishes despite struggling with the knee problem which ultimately required surgery after the Tour Championship.
Aberg will be determined to add to his only career title, which he claimed at the 2023 RSM Classic. Torrey Pines' South Course provides a great opportunity for one of the best ball-strikers on the PGA Tour to make his class count.
The Swede signed off 2024 with sixth place in Tiger Woods's Hero World Challenge then he returned to action in encouraging fashion at the Sentry, finishing in fifth place and signing off with weekend rounds of 65 and 64.
Max Homa comes alive in his home state of California and the 34-year-old could find top form again back in the Golden State this week.
It's been a tough few months for Homa, who has not posted a top-t10 finish since finishing eighth at the Wells Fargo Championship in May, but he was happy with the state of his game at the Presidents Cup in September and has shown signs of revival in three subsequent starts.
The Los Angeles native carded rounds of 66-67-66 from round two of the Zozo Championship, where he finished 27th, then he struck the ball well at the Nedbank Challenge on the DP World Tour before again finding tee-to-green form at the Sentry.
Homa might not be far away from rediscovering top gear again and he's attractively priced as he returns to one of his favorite venues - he won the 2023 Farmers at Torrey Pines and was 13th last year.
Akshay Bhatia must contend with a mammoth journey from Dubai to California but Nicolai Hojgaard was faced with the same predicament last year and finished runner-up at the Farmers, so there's every chance Bhatia can follow suit.
The 22-year-old who, like Homa, is also from California, has become a regular PGA Tour contender who has won twice on the big circuit and almost certainly has room for improvement given his young age.
Bhatia, an accurate operator who is still powerful enough to cope with the demands of the South Course, qualified for the 2021 US Open at this venue and finished 57th - a superb effort for a then-19-year-old who was ranked outside the world's top 800 at the time.
He would have to wait almost three years to return, doing so in last year's Farmers, when he finished 13th behind Matthieu Pavon.
Hideki Matsuyama | +1100 |
Ludvig Aberg | +1100 |
Tony Finau | +2000 |
Sungjae Im | +2000 |
Keegan Bradley | +2200 |
Will Zalatoris | +2200 |
Jason Day | +2500 |
Mat Greyserman | +2500 |
Maverick McNealy | +3000 |
Sahith Theegala | +3000 |
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This article was written by a partner sports writer via Spotlight Sports Group. All odds displayed on this page were correct at the time of writing and are subject to withdrawal or change at any time.