The little boy emerged from the crowd of seated youngsters on Monday afternoon at the Pro Kids Golf Academy’s North County campus. He had a question for Rickie Fowler, a host for the sixth year of a youth clinic that kicks off the week of the Farmers Insurance Open.

The kid identified himself as Justin Woods, age 8, and he asked very matter-of-factly, “How many times have you won? I’m not keeping track.”

Everybody laughed and Fowler smiled.

“Well, six times total,” he said. “But four times in the last nine months, so that’s pretty good.”


Maybe little Justin didn’t even know what happened for Fowler just more than a day earlier, some 8,000 miles away in the Middle East.

In a victory that produced further confirmation of how strong his game is, while boosting him to a career-best No. 4 in the world rankings, Fowler bested world No. 1 Jordan Spieth, No. 3 Rory McIlroy and No. 6 Henrik Stenson – all of whom contended in the European Tour’s Abu Dhabi Championship.

As wins on international soil go, this was even bigger than the Murrieta native’s victory in the 2015 Scottish Open, settling in a place behind his two biggest triumphs, both scored last year in the Players Championship and FedEx Cup Playoffs Deutsche Bank Championship.

The wheels of Fowler’s commercial jet left the ground at 2:30 a.m. in the United Arab Emirates, and when they touched down again nearly 17 hours later in San Francisco early on Monday morning, the buzz in the golf world already had turned to ditching the current “Big Three” by adding another member to the club.


“Fab Four?”

“It’s really cool,” Fowler, 27, said after the clinic he co-hosted with first-year PGA Tour pro Hunter Stewart. “It’s somewhere that I haven’t been before. To be inside that top five is pretty special.”

Fowler vaulted from sixth to fourth in the rankings, passing his good friend at No. 5, Bubba Watson. Spieth, Jason Day – who is defending his Farmers Open title this week -- and McIlroy are in front, but Fowler has closed the gap with top-10 finishes in seven of his last 14 starts.

Surprising for a guy who grew up on the West Coast, where the early portion of the new calendar years on the PGA Tour schedule is played, this was Fowler’s first victory in the first four months of the year. He looked poised for a continuation of 2015 when he notched a solo fifth at the Tournament of Champions at Kapalua three weeks ago.


“Over the past couple years I feel like I know what I’m bringing to the golf course, day in and day out, and I know what I’m working with,” Fowler said immediately after his win on Sunday. “That makes things a lot easier to not have to worry about working on something specific. I can go more on, ‘Hey, this is where I want to hit it; this is where we’re going to attack the golf course.”

After some grueling days because of fog delays in Abu Dhabi, Fowler forged a two-shot with a third-round 65. He was challenged most by Belgian Thomas Pieters, who finished one shot back in second, but never lost the lead. He overcame an early double bogey by twice holing out from off the green.

“I gave myself a lead and it had been a while since I played from the lead,” Fowler said on Monday. “So to go out and be able to hold onto it was pretty cool.”

Stronger and longer with a swing he developed with instructor Butch Harmon, Fowler has become a player who seems to rise up against the strongest fields. There was the impressive run through the 2014 majors when he went fifth in the Masters, second in the U.S. Open, second in the British Open and third in the PGA Championship.


The major efforts weren’t nearly as strong last year, with a tie for 12th at the Masters as the best finish. And that’s the difference between No. 4 and the top three. Fowler doesn’t’ have a major win; the trio have combined for seven.

“Last year,” Fowler said, “I didn’t have the greatest majors after the year before, but I think a combination of the two years – how I was able to hang around to get some top finishes in majors in ’14 and then last year to get wins – you put those two together, and we win a major this year.”

There was one other thing that pleased Fowler on Sunday. He got a victory in the new high-top golf shoes that have divided fans on the scale from innovative to ugly.

“The jinx is off,” Fowler told the kids.


“It’s amazing,” he later added, “about how much talk there is. Whether it’s good or bad, it doesn’t matter. As long as they’re talking about it.”