Frankie Capan III came up just short of achieving even conditional status for this year’s PGA Tour season via his performance as a rookie last year.

But his late fall surge wasn’t all for naught — it’s why the North Oaks, Minn., native is in this week’s American Express field in La Quinta, Calif.

There are 156 players in this week’s tournament, which is played alongside a pro-am between three different courses. It’s also played the same week as a high-profile event on the DP World Tour, where many of the world’s top players will tee it up this week.

So while the American Express does tout many of the world’s best — Scottie Scheffler is playing — it is difficult to fill this big of a field. After going through all of the PGA Tour cardholders as well as those with conditional status, there were four spots remaining when the field was finalized Friday.

From there, the Tour turns to those just outside of last year’s top 125. Capan finished 127th, a position he climbed into last fall via a pair of top-six performances. He was the third-to-last man into this week’s field because of it.

Capan is a member of the Korn Ferry Tour — the PGA Tour’s primary feeder tour — this season. He already has played in one Korn Ferry event, where he missed the cut. He passed on the second Korn Ferry Tour event of this season in order to play in the American Express.

This is one of a few PGA Tour events Capan will get to tee it up in thanks to last year’s late surge, along with the likes of the off-field events the PGA Tour hosts on the same weekends as marquee, limited-field events.

While it’s difficult to transform your career in a weekend on a tour on which you don’t currently carry a card, a top-10 finish this weekend would earn Capan a start at next week’s Farmer’s Insurance Open in San Diego. And the ultimate dream, of course, would be to hoist the trophy on Sunday, at which point Capan would re-join the PGA Tour, where he’d automatically have a two-year exemption, and earn a trip to this year’s Masters.

Neither feat will be easy to achieve, but Capan did finish in a tie for 12th in this event a year ago — easily his best individual finish of his rookie campaign prior to the fall slate.

A rare opportunity knocks.

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Citing “significant financial headwinds,” Minneapolis’ Jungle Theater is cancelling the remainder of its current season and pausing all its programming through at least mid-summer.

The theater is not shutting down permanently, artistic director Christina Baldwin and managing director Rachel Murch-D’Olimpio said in a joint statement. But the duo seemed to characterize the programming pause as a necessary precaution to avoid a total closure.

“This pause allows the organization to step back from production, assess our options, and plan for the future, rather than continue in ways that could compromise our mission or impact,” Baldwin and Murch-D’Olimpio wrote.

The remainder of the Jungle’s 2025–2026 season was slated to include South Korean family drama “Wolf Play,” the based-on-a-true-story adaptation “Letters From Max” and a workshop reading of the play “Sonia Flew” by Melinda Lopez, partially set in Minneapolis. Separately, a scheduled Jan. 19 reading of queer playwright Jayne Deely’s “I Never Asked For A GoFundMe” did not take place due to escalating immigration enforcement activity, the theater announced.

Ticketholders and season subscribers can expect to hear more shortly, Baldwin and Murch-D’Olimpio said in the statement.

In 2024, the most recent year the nonprofit theater’s financial disclosures were made public via ProPublica, the theater lost around $442,000, and also ended 2023 in the red by about $400,000. But the theater appears to have been profitable in 2022, 2021, 2019, 2018 and 2017. Financial information for 2025 is not available, but many arts organizations, both locally and nationally, have struggled over the past year as they’ve grappled with the sudden termination of certain federal grant programs.

The 152-seat Jungle, which opened in the Lyn-Lake area of Minneapolis in 1991, has developed a reputation for creative stage productions and other programming, including improv nights and a theater criticism course.

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The Twins on Wednesday acquired utility player Tristan Gray from Boston for minor league catcher Nate Baez.

Gray, 29, has played 49 major league games with Tampa Bay, Oakland and Miami. He hit .231 with three homers and nine RBIs in 30 games for Rays last year and was acquired by Boston in November.

Baez, 24, hit .278 with eight homers and 54 RBIs last year for the Twins’ High-A Cedar Rapids and Double-A Wichita teams.

To make room for Gray on the 40-man roster, the Twins designated infielder Vidal Bruján for assignment. Bruján had been claimed off waivers from Atlanta on Jan. 14.

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The St. Paul City Council plans to introduce an ordinance today that would prohibit law enforcement from staging on city-owned property for federal immigration enforcement and would limit access to non-public spaces.

The move comes as the city council announced today they intend to introduce a series of ordinances and policy changes over the coming weeks in response to immigration enforcement actions.

The discussion began after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement operation on Nov. 25 on Rose Avenue near Payne Avenue. St. Paul police said they were called to assist as protesters gathered. They used chemical irritants and less-lethal munitions.

Since then, ICE has ramped up its presence and work in Minnesota.

“The City must move urgently and therefore will not wait for one comprehensive update to the City’s existing separation ordinance,” the city council said in today’s statement.

The separation ordinance says city of St. Paul employees are not authorized to enforce federal immigration policies. The ordinance was established in 2004.

The ordinance updates being planned “do not change federal law, do not interfere with lawful federal enforcement actions, and do not prevent compliance with valid warrants or court orders,” the statement said. “Instead, they clarify the scope of the City’s authority and responsibilities under local law.”

Proposed ordinance also discusses ‘non-public city spaces’

All seven city council members are sponsoring the ordinance being introduced at today’s council meeting, which begins at 3:30 p.m. It says city-owned or city-controlled parking lots, ramps, vacant lots and garages are not open to the general public without restrictions.

And “no federal, state, or local government entity or personnel is authorized to use” those spaces “as a staging area, processing location, operations base, or any other similar use for enforcing federal immigration laws.”

City officials cannot authorize access “except when required by a signed judicial warrant or when access is otherwise required by law,” the ordinance says. “Such spaces are not available to the general public for similar activities, and federal, state, or local government entities or personnel will not receive special or enhanced access to city property for operations enforcing federal immigration laws.”

The ordinance also discusses “non-public city spaces” that are not accessible to the general public, such as those requiring badge access, breakrooms, workstations, storage closets and employee-only areas.

“Non-public city spaces are not open for the purposes of enforcement of federal immigration laws except with a signed judicial warrant or when access is otherwise required by law,” the proposed ordinance says. “City employees do not have the legal authority to consent to permit access to non-public city spaces in situations where a signed judicial warrant or other legal obligation would otherwise be necessary to gain access.”

An ordinance is a city law enacted by the city council. It is read at three separate council meetings, a public hearing is usually held at the second reading, and it becomes effective after passage by the council and 30 days after publication.

City council members also plan to discuss “subsequent immediate and near-term actions” today, according to their statement.

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