TOUR Championship - Golfers to Bet
By: StatFox.com
The PGA season comes to an end this weekend, when the world’s top golfers compete in the TOUR Championship at East Lake Golf Club. There are tons of scenarios that come into play this weekend, but the most important thing to know is that Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas, Dustin Johnson, Marc Leishman, and Jon Rahm would all win the FedExCup with a victory on Sunday. Last year, Rory McIlroy was the guy that came away with the win in this tournament. He shot a 12-under to defeat both Kevin Chappell and Ryan Moore in a playoff. McIlory will not, however, be playing this weekend, which makes Jordan Spieth the most recent winner in this field. Spieth shot a nine-under to beat Danny Lee, Justin Rose, and Henrik Stenson by four strokes apiece in 2015. To say he’ll be hoping for yet another performance like that one would be an understatement. With that out of the way, let’s now take a look at some of the best value plays to win the season’s final event on Sunday:
Jordan Spieth (19-to-4) - Jordan Spieth is currently in the top spot in the FedExCup rankings, and Spieth is going to be eager to get out there and try to earn a victory this weekend. Spieth has seen some of the media attention shift to guys like Thomas, Johnson and Rahm this year, and he definitely takes that personally. Spieth is the best golfer in the world and he wants everybody to know it, and a victory on Sunday would cement him as this season’s champion. With him playing extra motivated, he’s worth a shot at 19-to-4. It also helps that he has won this event before.
Justin Thomas (10-to-1) - While Spieth has some motivation in this tournament, Thomas has it as well. He has grown up with Jordan Spieth and has heard all about how his best friend is the best in the world. Well now it’s Thomas’ time, and he has absolutely shined this season. Thomas has five TOUR victories this year, and he also won a major. He must be taken seriously and his odds are pretty favorable at 10-to-1. That is worth a shot for a talent like him.
Marc Leishman (18-to-1) - Marc Leishman just might be the hottest golfer in the world heading into this tournament, as he just won the BMW Championship and that victory came after a third-place finish at the Dell Technologies Championships two weeks before. Leishman now finds himself in a situation where he can be the FedExCup champion with a victory, so look for him to play with a sense of urgency in this one. He has a lot more to play for than a lot of his competitors, which is a good reason to take a chance on him at 18-to-1.
Daniel Berger (60-to-1) - Daniel Berger is ranked 14th in the FedExCup rankings and 24th in the Official World Golf Rankings. He is a very good golfer and that is exactly why he stands out as a tremendous value at 60-to-1. Berger has already won a tournament this season, as he won the FedEx St. Jude Classic. He also has two second-place finishes on the year. Berger’s success this year should not be ignored, and neither should the fact that his game is a good fit for this course. Putting a quarter-unit or so on him would be a wise move.
TOUR Championship Golf Betting Picks
By Adam Burke
Bangthebook.com
It comes down to the final 30. Only 30 players will be on hand for this week’s TOUR Championship at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta, Georgia. This is the finale of the FedEx Cup playoffs and championship will be crowned on Sunday. East Lake has been the home of this event since 2004, so we have a ton of course form data and a lot of the usual suspects are on hand for this year’s final season event.
This isn’t it for the golf season with the Presidents Cup coming up next week at Liberty National, but this will be it for the points events. Next week’s event is all about pride. This one is about money and a title. This has been a very tough course historically. The best winning score here dating back to 2008 is just 13-under by Henrik Stenson in 2013. This event lacked drama from 2012-15, with the winners all pacing the field by three strokes or more, but Rory McIlroy won it last year at 12-under in a playoff over Kevin Chappell and Ryan Moore. It took 76 holes to decide a champion last year. McIlroy did not qualify in the top 30 for this year’s event.
This is a bear of a par 70 that measures almost 7,400 yards. It is interesting that the most dramatic tournament in some time came after course officials, in conjunction with the PGA Tour, decided to flip the two sets of nines to put the par 5 ninth at the back end of the course because the par 3 that used to signal the 72nd hole just wasn’t dramatic enough for a tournament of this stature. The par 3s are a big challenge on this course with a lot of water and a lot of unfortunate landing spots around the greens. The par 4s are long, though reachable in two for most of the players, and the par 5s are where players can pick up some strokes.
Per the odds over at 5Dimes Sportsbook, Jordan Spieth enters as this week’s clear-cut tournament favorite at +490. Spieth won this event two years ago with four rounds under 70 and a final score of 9-under. Henrik Stenson’s first-round 63 was probably the most notable round of the tournament, but Spieth was the most consistent player and took down the win. Spieth seems to alternate his finishes here. In 2013, Spieth shot 10-under, but simply couldn’t run down Stenson with his final-round 64. Last year, he was only 17th and in 2014, he was 27th out of 30 players at 12-over. Spieth hasn’t won since The Open Championship, but he was seventh last week and second in each of the previous two events.
Dustin Johnson is next on the board at +730. DJ has been pretty consistent the last two years. He finished fifth in 2015 and sixth in 2016. He shot 4-under in 2015, including a strong final-round 64, and 5-under in 2015 with a bad final-round 73. A 64 wouldn’t have been enough to run down McIlroy, who shot a 64 of his own. Sunday was a great day for scoring last year, but Johnson had his worst round and fell off the pace. With the longer par 4s, Johnson is in great shape on a course like this, but he hasn’t played well in his last two events. He won The Northern Trust and then finished 18th at TPC Boston and 33rd at Conway Farms. Johnson did end 69-64 last week, though, so maybe that will be the momentum he needs to get going.
Rickie Fowler is +985 and this is a win that most people hope to see Rickie Fowler get. Fowler has a lot of wins and has played well in a lot of events, but he has never won a major and has never won the FedEx Cup playoffs. He finished second last week in the BMW Championship and has five straight top-20 finishes. He didn’t qualify for this event last year and finished 12th at even par in 2015. He was eighth here at 5-under in 2014, six shots off the winning pace from Billy Horschel.
Jon Rahm could very well finish his season with a Cinderella story. Rahm is +1000 and has been one of the most consistent players on tour this year. Rahm, whose only win came at the Farmers Insurance Open, has finished third, fourth, and fifth in the FedEx Cup playoffs events thus far. He only has one round over 70 out of his last 12 rounds. He’s striking the ball extremely well and things are setting up nicely for him. East Lake is a tough course, especially for somebody without any course form data to go off of, but Rahm has 10 top-10 finishes this season and has all of the necessary skills to score the biggest win of his career.
Moving down the board a little bit, this seems like a good spot for Hideki Matsuyama at +1800. Matsuyama has not played well in his last two events, but we’re not that far removed from Matsuyama’s win at Firestone and fifth-place finish the following week at the PGA Championship. He’s a huge hitter and a tremendous ball striker, which are two much needed elements at East Lake. Since his TOUR Championship debut in 2014, when he finished 22nd, Matsuyama has finished 12th and fifth at this event. We may be getting a bit of value on this price given his recent struggles.
Also at that +1800 price point, Paul Casey is a guy that has had a lot of success at East Lake. Casey has back-to-back top-five finishes in this event. For others looking at course form plays, Justin Rose is a guy that has had a lot of success, but the +1085 price tag isn’t good enough.
It would be a pretty big surprise to see anybody outside of the top names take this one down, so you probably need to pick a couple of the prominent players and roll with them.