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<\/p>\n
The teen sensation started red-hot in Round 2, carding six birdies and an eagle from his first eight holes. <\/p>\n
He had a golden opportunity to shoot a ultra rare 59, but missed a birdie putt on 18.<\/p>\n
Brown and Scheffler lead the way on -17, but there are a stack of contenders in striking range at the halfway point of the $US9.2m ($A13m) event, which uses a unique three course format.<\/p>\n
The highly spruiked Brown turned pro in 2025 as a 17-year-old, forgoing a college path to tee it up with the best golfers in the world.<\/p>\n
Brown played in nine PGA Tour events last year, with a T34 his best result (Mexico Open, Bermuda Championship). <\/p>\n
His round of 60 at the Nicklaus Tournament Course was the day\u2019s highest, matched only by fellow American Andrew Putnam, who shot 60 on the La Quinta track. <\/p>\n
The American Express uses three different golf courses (La Quinta, Nicklaus, Pete Dye) which the 156 players in the field each play once across the first three days.<\/p>\n
Blades Brown reacts after just missing a birdie putt on the final hole.Source: AFP<\/p>\n
At the end of the third round, there is a cut which slashes the field size to roughly 65 for the final round.<\/p>\n
Aussie star Min Woo Lee finished the first round in a share of the lead but dropped back through the field in Round 2.<\/p>\n
Lee is -11, six shots behind the leader. <\/p>\n
The best placed Aussie is young gun Karl Vilips, who is -12 after rounds of 67 and 65. <\/p>\n
Adam Scott and Jason Day are in contention as well, with both on -10. <\/p>\n
While Brown is a terrific story, the freakishly consistent Scheffler will be terribly hard to beat.<\/p>\n
The best golfer on the planet carded scores of 63 and 64 across the first two rounds at La Quinta and Nicklaus Tournament Course respectively. <\/p>\n
AMEX LEADERBOARD \u2013 ROUND 2<\/p>\n
S. Scheffler -17<\/p>\n
B. Brown -17<\/p>\n
SW. Kim -16<\/p>\n
SH. Kim -15<\/p>\n
M. McCarty -15<\/p>\n
Australians<\/p>\n
K. Vilips -12<\/p>\n
MW. Lee -11<\/p>\n
A.Scott -10<\/p>\n
J. Day -10<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"18-year-old phenom Blades Brown has stunned the golfing world in the second round of The American Express tournament…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":433667,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[5487,2095,53831,64,63,226835,43486,485,226828,226833,226834,11096,226829,2105,755,5505,10919,226831,5499,226826,105805,226832,2041,2067,226827,226830,1657,85,6953,2614,9020],"class_list":["post-433666","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-adam-scott","tag-america","tag-american-express-company","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-b-brown","tag-birdie-putt","tag-california","tag-college-path","tag-course-format","tag-course-record","tag-daniel-nuttall","tag-david-ford","tag-getty-images-inc","tag-golf","tag-golf-courses","tag-golfing-world","tag-j-day","tag-jason-day","tag-jed-jacobsohn","tag-la-quinta","tag-m-mccarty","tag-north-america","tag-northern-america","tag-p-b-dye","tag-phenom-shocks","tag-scottie-scheffler","tag-sports","tag-tee-times","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-young-gun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433666\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/433667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}