Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy joined a host of other elite golfers in committing to the 2019 Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines next week. For McIlroy, it will be his first time to play the event. Woods has won this tournament seven times and also won at Torrey Pines when the 2008 U.S. Open was played there.
Those two join a crew that includes Justin Rose, Rickie Fowler, Xander Schauffele, Jon Rahm, Jason Day, Jordan Spieth, Tony Finau and Patrick Reed to form the first full field marquee event of 2019.
There had been speculation that Woods might open his year in Hawaii alongside McIlroy at the Sentry Tournament of Champions at Kapalua, but he ultimately passed on that to start where he feels most comfortable starting (and where he started 2018).
Last year, coming in off his fourth back surgery with an ambiguous timeline, Woods made the cut at this tournament and finished T23, seven strokes back of the leaders who eventually went to a playoff.
Woods won here in 1999, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 in addition to that iconic U.S. Open win. He also has six other top 10s on this track. This should probably be obvious, but he leads the event in all-time earnings with $6.9 million.
It will be McIlroy's second consecutive start at a new PGA Tour event for him as he transitions his focus from the European Tour to the PGA Tour more full time in 2019.
