How Blades Brown Could Make History At The American Express

Blades Brown’s appearance at The American Express is becoming memorable in more ways than one.

The 18-year-old shares the lead with World No.1 after two rounds, meaning his maiden PGA Tour win is firmly within his sights at the halfway stage.

Even if he doesn’t go on to lift the trophy, though, it is thought he will make history as long as he makes the cut, which comes after the third round.

Per the Golf Channel’s Brentley Romine, Brown, who turned pro in December 2024 after opting to skip college, will become the first player in the modern era to play eight competitive rounds on the Korn Ferry Tour and the PGA Tour in as many days.

Brown’s marathon run of golf began on Sunday, January 18th at the Bahamas Golf Classic on the Korn Ferry Tour.

Rounds of 68 and 74 on the first two days guaranteed his involvement in all four rounds as he made the cut by three on the way to finishing T17.

However, rather than having a few days to recover before his next start, Brown faced a flight of around 2,500 miles to California for his first PGA Tour event of the season, which began the day after the Bahamas Golf Classic finished.

According to Romine, Brown took a private jet to Palm Springs for the event, where he had a tee time of 9.58am local time on Thursday.

If Brown was fatigued from the trip, it didn’t show, with a five-under round of 67 on Thursday at La Quinta Country Club, which he followed with a remarkable 12-under 60 at Nicklaus Tournament Course the next day.

That leaves Brown rubbing shoulders with Scheffler at the top of the leaderboard and, barring a disaster, a shoo-in for all four rounds at The American Express to complete a record-breaking week.

According to Romine, only one player has come close to the feat in recent years – TJ Vogel, who placed T19 at the 2022 Great Exuma Classic in the Bahamas before flying to Miami, then Los Angeles to tee it up at The American Express.

However, on that occasion, Vogel missed the 54-hole cut, ensuring his run of consecutive rounds in as many days stopped at seven.

Assuming Brown does go one better than Vogel, it will be just the latest record broken by the prodigy.

Among the highlights is a US Amateur record that had stood for 103 years set by Bobby Jones, which Brown broke in 2023 when he became the youngest medalist in the history of the tournament.

A year later, he earned medalist honors at the US Junior, joining Tiger Woods and Bobby Clampett as the only players to earn medalist honors at both events.

Following his brilliant second round at The American Express, Brown, who made his PGA Tour debut at the 2024 Myrtle Beach Classic at the age of 16, was asked if he’d had any time to relax after his Korn Ferry Tour appearance. He answered: “I'm going to go take a nap after this, and probably get some food.”

At the halfway stage, it seems certain Brown will need to wait another two days until he can fully recuperate from his grueling, and potentially record-breaking, week.