Inside the Field: Farmers Insurance Open

Abraham Ancer … Let’s try this again. After securing an exemption into last year’s edition as Mexico’s highest-ranked golfer, he’s risen about 200 spots in the Official World Golf Ranking. Although he still needed the same exemption for the opportunity to improve on last year’s T52, the U.S.-born dual citizen has gone off for seven top 10s since his debut at Club de Golf Chapultepec, including a victory at the Emirates Australian Open three months ago. Currently inside the top 10 on the PGA TOUR in Strokes Gained: Off-the-tee, total driving, proximity to the hole and scrambling. If he breaks through, it’d be cause for a national celebration, but it’d also be a dandy birthday present. He turns 28 on the Wednesday following the tournament. Russell Knox … He’s back to doing Russell Knox things with three top 20s in his last four starts. That surge includes a T14 in his last appearance at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am where he ranked T16 in greens in regulation and led the field in scrambling. For the season, he’s sixth on the PGA TOUR in proximity to the hole. Debuted at the Club de Golf Chapultepec in 2017 and settled for 70th place during what already was setting up as a slump. Byeong Hun An … Although based on the PGA TOUR on which he took advantage of starts in all three events on the Asian Swing in the fall, he’s added several starts on multiple tours before and since. Yet, the 27-year-old hasn’t let up, striking with five top 20s in eight starts over the last five months, including in his last two. Builds confidence with his power and precision, but he also stands over putts with a scorer’s mentality, so it’s just a matter of time before he’s celebrating his first TOUR victory. Returns to Mexico City since finished T48 in 2017 when he ranked T10 in total driving and fourth in proximity to the hole for the week. Richard Sterne … The veteran of 59 PGA TOUR starts and one membership card (2014-15) hasn’t connected for a top 25 on the circuit in 29 starts spanning five years. However, he’s opened 2019 strong with a runner-up finish in Abu Dhabi and a T13 in Saudi Arabia. Currently fifth on the European Tour in par-3 scoring and 17th in par-5 scoring. The 37-year-old from South Africa also isn’t inexperienced at Club de Golf Chapultepec where he appeared in 2017 (T72). Adrian Otaegui … The only first-timer at Club de Golf Chapultepec on this page is fresh off a runner-up finish at the ISPS Handa World Super 6 Perth, so the impact of fatigue and jet lag cannot be ruled out for the spry Spaniard even at 26 years of age. That result in Australia vaulted him to 64th in the Official World Golf Ranking and into this week’s tournament as the last man in the field, ironically leaving Super 6 champion Ryan Fox as the first man on the outside looking in. Otaegui finished 23rd in the 2018 Race to Dubai with the help of a victory last May. More recently, he’s recorded five top 25s in his last nine starts worldwide. NOTE: Sleeper is a relative term, so Rob uses unofficial criteria to determine who qualifies. Each of the following usually is determined to be ineligible for this weekly staple: Winners of the tournament on the current host course; winners in the same season; recent major champions; top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking; recent participants of team competitions.

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RENO, Nev. — Greg Owen had nine birdies on Saturday to take five-point third round lead of the Barracuda Championship. Owen had eight birdies and three pars on 11 holes before a double-bogey on 18 to finish a 14-point round in the modified Stableford scoring system that gave him 37 points going into Sunday’s final round. Stuart Appleby and Derek Fathauer both had birdies on 18 to finish round three tied for second with 32 points. Ricky Barnes had 15 points, including five consecutive birdies, to move up 14 spots into fourth place with 31 points. Second-round leader Richy Werenski had three of his four bogies on the back nine and fell into a tie for fifth with Tom Hoge, Ben Martin and Dicky Pride with 30 points apiece. The tournament is the PGA TOUR’s only Stableford scoring event. The system awards eight points for a double eagle, five points for an eagle, two points for a birdie and deducts a point for a bogey and three points for a double bogey or worse.

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SAN ANTONIO — Jordan Spieth continues to look for an older version of himself. The search shows moments of success. He shot 2-under-par 70 on a gusty Friday afternoon at the Valero Texas Open. He enters the third round with share of second place at 7 under par, two shots behind the leader, Cameron Tringale. Winless since 2017, the 27-year-old Spieth will again be a factor on the weekend in 2021. He often has been since early February at the Waste Management Phoenix Open. That was the week his work toward finding his older self — the golf swing of his youth — took a beneficial turn. He started rehearsing a move on the practice range at TPC Scottsdale in an effort to shallow the plane of his downswing. He wanted to swing like he was that freshman in 2012 at the University of Texas, beating Justin Thomas in the final match of the NCAA National Championship. RELATED: Full leaderboard | Tringale leads by two at Valero Texas Open "A swing feel that’s kind of like an artistic motion," is how he explained Friday, "like I almost can see it happening from behind me as I’m feeling it." The Valero Texas Open is his seventh start since embracing the drill. He's had three Top 5 finishes, a tie for 15th and two wins last week at the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play, where he lost in the Round of 16. For those anticipating a return to form for the 11-time winner from Dallas, the trend inspires hope. He is trying, he said, "to go back in time." He wants to find his swing of his 15-year-old self, or at least the one that brough him so much acclaim so soon. Spieth wants to reverse "essentially everything," he said, "all the bad habits I got into." He said his attack on the ball got too steep after 2017, when he won three tournaments, including The Open Championship. Then came all the questions and doubts. "I could sit here and tell you six different things I'm thinking about," he said. "I want it to be one or two." He appears, at times, to have achieved that simplicity and purity. He shot 5-under 67 on Thursday at TPC San Antonio, seven birdies against two bogeys. He birdied his first two holes Friday. He was 2 under after nine. He expected stress and it came. Texas in the springtime is a windy place. He made bogey at the 11th and the 13th. But he followed those with birdies at the next two, which included an approach on the 459-yard par-four 15th to 4 feet. Spieth coasted through the last three holes, wind and all, with straight pars. "I’m really pleased with where things are at, but they’re not where I want them to be at," he said. "I’m trying to kind of take it slowly and patiently and reward myself, be excited about the good ones and not get too down about the bad ones." So on goes the search. "I’m really just trying to go back in time structurally to a place that I’ve been," he said. "Trying to work backwards."

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