Livescore
As 17-year-old Blades Brown prepares for his professional debut at the PGA Tour’s The American Express in La Quinta this week, he has a definitive goal for 2025.
“I’m not able to dunk yet,” Brown said. “That’s actually one of my goals this year is to be able to dunk.”
It’s a natural goal for an athletic young man, especially one whose mother played in the WNBA. But this week, basketball will take a back seat to Brown’s new career as a professional golfer.
A high school junior from Nashville, Tenn., Brown turned professional in December and will make his first start for money at The American Express, where another amateur, Nick Dunlap, won the title in 2024.
“Nick has been a huge inspiration for me ever since, because I was watching that live on TV when he made that 6-footer on the 18th green, and it just gave me so much inspiration to know that somebody else similar to my age is able to do that,” Brown said. “And then it raises the question, what if I can do that?”
Brown is hardly a random selection for a sponsor’s exemption into a PGA Tour event. At 16, Brown was co-medalist in the U.S. Amateur – a championship won that week by Dunlap – and last summer he made his PGA Tour debut in the Myrtle Beach Classic, making the cut and tying for 26th.
“When I was playing the Myrtle Beach Classic for my first event, I cannot put into words how I was feeling on that first tee, and ever since then I’ve been itching to get back out there, so I’m really pumped to be able to play the The American Express this week,” Brown said Tuesday ahead of the tournament’s opening round.
Brown is also signed with SportFive for representation, the same company that operates The American Express, so the La Quinta tournament makes sense for his pro debut. But it is also a demanding tournament for a new player with its three-course rotation.
“We got here about four days ago, just because, I mean, three golf courses, that’s a lot of golf course knowledge that you need to know,” Brown said. “So I got here four days ago, and as I was flying in I saw the golf courses and pickleball courts and I’m like, this is my place right here.”
While younger players and amateurs have been playing strong golf on the PGA Tour in recent years – Dunlap was 20 and a sophomore at the University of Alabama when he won last year – Brown is the youngest golfer to ever play in The American Express. But his swing coach believes Brown has a game that can hold up to the PGA Tour.
More: American Express storylines: Nick Dunlap’s encore, Blades Brown’s debut and Wyndham Clark leads field
“He’s always had this confidence in his putting, it’s always been incredible, even as a youngster,” said Graham Benson, teaching pro at Richland Country Club in Nashville where Brown and his family are members. “That showed up first. His chipping as well. But he’s just continued to improve at every aspect of the game.
“Watching him do his homework out here, yesterday at La Quinta (Country Club), his golf IQ is just about as high as you would see with anybody,” Benson added. “So that’s really impressive, and he just continues to add to a part of his game as well.”
Brown’s achievements also might merit a PGA Tour start, including being only the third golfer to be medalist in both a U.S. Junior Amateur and a U.S. Amateur. The other two are Bobby Clampett and Tiger Woods.
“Those three names are pretty fantastic and he’s played in one PGA Tour event, he made the cut,” said Pat McCabe, executive director of The American Express. “It’s just a great story that he is now turning professional and making this his debut. That is the future of the game, right? The young players coming out, whether it is through PGA Tour U or via playing as an amateur and getting out, that’s the future of the game.”
Brown says the decision to turn pro was difficult, especially with so many strong golf colleges recruiting him. In the end, with input from his parents and those around him, turning pro made more sense, he said.
“There were a lot of trade-offs in every decision that we make, and for me turning professional was a very difficult decision, but it was the best decision that I believe was for me,” Brown said. “When someone comes up to you and says, ‘hey, do you want to play on the PGA Tour?’, I’m like, yeah, a 100%, let’s do it. So it was a very difficult decision, but I believe I made the right decision.”
Brown is limited to seven starts on the PGA Tour through sponsor’s exemptions, though he can play in more tournaments through Monday qualifying or qualifying for events like the U.S. Open. The idea would be to win enough money to earn an exemption to the PGA Tour. Otherwise, it will be back to the tour qualifying, where Brown was eliminated in the first stage last fall.
Brown won’t say a specific goal for success in his pro debut, focusing on the experience rather than the achievements.
“It’s hard to not have fun playing on the PGA Tour. Whenever you get to play courses like La Quinta, which is soft and, I mean, you got to go low this week, you got to make a few putts,” Brown said. “But then you can also play the Stadium Course (at PGA West) which, rock hard greens, concrete greens some would say. I’m really looking forward to playing this week.”
Dunlap, who was the first amateur to win on the PGA Tour in 33 years with his The American Express title last year, admits he only wanted to make the cut in 2024. His advice to Brown is simple.
“I approached it as, okay, this is going to be a learning year. It’s a big jump, and I knew that, I knew there was a difference between playing against college players and the best players in the world,” Dunlap said. “I knew I needed to get better in certain parts of my game and seeing golf courses for the first time is different. You don’t do that in junior golf and amateur golf.”
For now, Brown is happy to be playing on the PGA Tour, happy to be surrounded by family and friends and happy to test his golf game against the best players in the world.
“I feel like you’re put in a position out here where you have to get better. Playing against people such as Xander Schauffele, Scottie Scheffler, I mean you learn from the best,” Brown said. “I feel like that’s life, you learn each and every day. I’m probably not going to be going to school in college, but I am going to be going to school on the PGA Tour, so that sounds pretty good to me.”
This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: Teenager Blade Browns jumps from junior golf to PGA Tour at American Express
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