23 January 2021: Sungjae Im shot a 7-under 65 on Friday at The American Express to take a one-stroke lead over first-round leader Brandon Hagy and four others. After a promising opening round effort, Anirban Lahiri suffered an unexpected cut when a 73 in the second round dropped him to 3-under, just below the cut line. The Indian was inside the top twenty after the opening round where he made a steady 68.
On Friday, Anirban picked up a birdie on the 7th hole of the Nicklaus Tournament course, but his card suffered a big dent soon after. At the par-3 eighth hole, he landed in the greenside bunker and three-putted for a double bogey. At the par-4 ninth, Anirban got wet and conceded another bogey. Even though he fought hard to turn the tide, birdies at 11 & 13 proved inadequate as he took another bogey on the 12th hole and slipped out of the weekend action.
Im, the 22-year-old South Korean who was the PGA TOUR’s rookie of the year in 2019, had seven birdies in the bogey-free round on the Stadium Course at PGA WEST, highlighted by three in four holes around the turn.
Hagy was in position to join Im at 11 under, but he bogeyed his final hole with a tee shot into the fairway bunker to finish his 70.
Canada’s Nick Taylor (66), South Korea’s Si Woo Kim (68), Tony Finau (66) and Mexico’s Abraham Ancer (65) also were 10 under. Emiliano Grillo (66), Francesco Molinari (66) and Doug Ghim (68) were two shots off the lead.
The leaderboard was crowded with low scores as usual at the Palm Springs-area tournament long hosted by Bob Hope. Im, Taylor and Ancer were among 12 players who didn’t make a bogey Friday.
After splitting the first two rounds over two courses, the players will all play the Stadium Course for the final two rounds.
Tournament host Phil Mickelson made 18 pars for the first time in his 2,201 rounds of PGA TOUR play. The 50-year-old missed the cut at 2 over.
With his drives looking sharp and his mid-range putts dropping regularly, Im is off to another strong start at a tournament in which he has already finished 10th and 12th in his short PGA TOUR career.
“I’m pretty satisfied with how I played all of my shots,” said Im, who feels his putting has improved sharply this year. “Speaking of putting, I started drawing a line on the ball as I visualize my putts, and that seemed to work pretty well today.”
Im also feels he might have an edge because didn’t travel home to South Korea during the holiday break due to the mandatory coronavirus quarantine required. Instead, he stayed in the house he recently purchased in Atlanta and practiced for the new season.
Hagy made 10 birdies in his opening round, but got off to a rough start Friday on the Stadium Course with two early bogeys. He rallied with birdies on his 16th and 17th holes, but his errant drive on his final hole kept him one shot off the pace.
Taylor, who also led the Sony Open in Hawaii after two rounds last week, shot a 66 with six birdies on the Stadium Course. He had three straight birdies on the back nine of his bogey-free round, including a 24-foot birdie putt on the 15th and an 18-footer on the island green at the 17th.
Taylor appears to be rounding into impressive form as he prepares to defend his Pebble Beach title in three weeks.
“My game feels really good right now, so hopefully it keeps peaking,” he said. “It was a lot of intimidating tee shots, iron shots into greens. I feel like I missed in the right places. I drove it really nice on the par-5s and gave myself pretty easy looks on a few of them.”
