Scott made Valspar 'chalk'
By Sportsbook.ag
Tournament: Valspar Championship
Date: Mar. 12 - Mar. 15
Venue: Innisbrook Resort (Copperhead)
Location: Palm Harbor, FL
The PGA continues its Florida swing of the season when they head to Palm Harbor for the Valspar Championship. This is a fairly new event as it was founded back in 2000 and has been held annually since then at the par-71, 7,340-yard Innisbrook Resort and Golf Club. Scores have become increasingly hard to come by here in the past few years with the winner doing worse in each successive season since Gary Woodland posted a 15-under in 2011.
Last year it was Aussie John Senden who held off Americans Kevin Na and Scott Langley for the win. He shot a score of 7-under over the four days of the tourney, posted the lowest round of the week with a 64 on Saturday and tamed the “Snake Pit” for two birdies on the final day of competition. Only two players (K.J. Choi and Retief Goosen) have earned the trophy here multiple times and eight of the 14 champions have been from other countries besides the United States.
It should be an exciting field to watch as Henrik Stenson and Adam Scott stay in Florida to compete here and join Jim Furyk, Justin Rose and Jordan Spieth to round out players from the top-10 of the Official World Golf Rankings in the field. Besides that just three other golfers (Matt Kuchar, Patrick Reed and Jamie Donaldson) will be competing from the top-25 in the OWGR.
Now let’s take a look over some players who could do really well this week and bring home a win come Sunday.
Golfers to Bet:
Jim Furyk (20/1): The Valspar Championship is one of 16 tournaments that Furyk has won over his tremendous career, doing so with a score of 13-under par in 2010. Since then he has continued to play solid golf at Innisbrook with a top-20 finish each year and also was the runner-up in 2012. Furyk was the best scrambler on tour last year after being successful in 69.3% of his opportunities and he already has a scrambling percentage of 66.7% on the year. He has dotted the top of the leaderboard in each of the first three events he’s played in this year so far, placing no worse than 14th, and seems poised to earn his first win since 2010 in Palm Harbor this week.
Daniel Berger (40/1): Berger is the newest phenom on what is becoming a young man’s game with super-athletic newcomers poised to rule the game. He showed his ability on the main stage when he took on Paddy Harrington in a playoff at the Honda Classic, eventually losing, but showing that his first win is not far off. It wasn’t his first solid showing, though, and he has six top-25’s and three top-10’s in 11 events this year. His combination of total driving (93, 8th on tour) and scrambling (62.8%, 53rd on tour) should give the 21-year-old the power and finesse that it takes to win on this course.
Harris English (40/1): English missed his last cut at the Honda Classic, but had made it to the weekend in each of the previous six tourneys and included both a third and second-place finish. He’s long off the tee (299.5 yards per, 27th on tour) and has a scrambling percentage of 65.6% (27th on tour) which allowed him to get a seventh-place finish at this event back in 2013. He’s been a consistent competitor on tour over the past three years with a total of 13 top-10’s since the start of 2013 and while he only has two victories, he should always remain a threat to put up some low numbers and this week is no different.
Justin Leonard (500/1): Leonard is a long way away from being the player who has won on the tour 12 times in his career and he hasn’t done so since 2008. While he hasn’t played to the top of his game, he’s always put up solid efforts at Innisbrook and has three top-30 finishes in the past four years; including a fourth in 2013. His scrambling (68.5%, 10th on tour) and driving accuracy (67.9%, 22nd on league) show that he is still an extremely talented golfer and could put up his best effort of the year this week.
Boo Weekley (85/1): Weekley is having a great start to the year and has already nearly matched his winnings from last year and has three top-10’s in his first eight events after getting just one such finish last year in 24 tourneys. The three-time PGA Tour winner is coming off a solid tie for sixth at the Puerto Rico Open when he shot 69-68 on the weekend. He hasn’t performed particularly well here recently, with a missed cut in 2012 and an 84th-place finish last year, but he showed he can tame Innisbrook with a runner-up performance in 2013 where he shot an amazing 63 on Sunday and nearly overtook Kevin Streelman. His amazing ability to dominate the courses with strokes gained tee-to-green (1.22, 10th on tour) and finesse with a 64.3% success-rate scrambling (30th on tour) will give him every opportunity to string together some nice holes and low scores.
Valspar Championship Betting Odds - Provided by Sportsbook.ag
Adam Scott 12/1
Henrik Stenson 25/2
Jordan Spieth 27/2
Jim Furyk 20/1
Patrick Reed 24/1
Matt Kuchar 25/1
Luke Donald 27/1
Justin Rose 29/1
Brandt Snedeker 30/1
Lee Westwood 30/1
Ryan Moore 30/1
Nick Watney 35/1
Daniel Berger 40/1
Gary Woodland 40/1
Harris English 40/1
Louis Oosthuizen 40/1
Jamie Donaldson 45/1
Kevin Na 45/1
Martin Laird 50/1
Russell Knox 55/1
Jason Dufner 60/1
Sangmoon Bae 60/1
Will MacKenzie 60/1
Ian Poulter 65/1
Padraig Harrington 65/1
Brendon Todd 70/1
Charley Hoffman 70/1
John Senden 70/1
Joost Luiten 75/1
Justin Thomas 75/1
Cameron Tringale 80/1
Boo Weekley 85/1
Kevin Streelman 85/1
Brian Harman 95/1
Charles Howell III 95/1
Brendon de Jonge 100/1
Francesco Molinari 100/1
George McNeill 100/1
Retief Goosen 100/1
Shawn Stefani 100/1
Robert Garrigus 110/1
William McGirt 110/1
Freddie Jacobson 120/1
Jerry Kelly 120/1
Kevin Chappell 120/1
Marc Leishman 120/1
Adam Hadwin 120/1
Chesson Hadley 130/1
Jonathan Byrd 130/1
Tony Finau 140/1
Alex Prugh 150/1
Daniel Summerhays 150/1
Jason Kokrak 150/1
K.J. Choi 150/1
Scott Stallings 150/1
Morgan Hoffmann 160/1
David Toms 170/1
Rory Sabbatini 170/1
Scott Langley 180/1
David Hearn 190/1
Jeff Overton 190/1
Sean O 'Hair 190/1
Carlos Ortiz 200/1
Ernie Els 200/1
Matt Every 200/1
Will Wilcox 200/1
Jonas Blixt 210/1
John Peterson 220/1
Zac Blair 230/1
Alex Cejka 240/1
Jon Curran 240/1
Martin Flores 240/1
Michael Thompson 240/1
Andrew Svoboda 250/1
Blayne Barber 250/1
Brian Stuard 250/1
Bryce Molder 250/1
Charlie Beljan 250/1
Colt Knost 250/1
Jhonattan Vegas 250/1
Michael Putnam 250/1
Spencer Levin 250/1
Vijay Singh 250/1
Ben Crane 300/1
Bo Van Pelt 300/1
Carl Pettersson 300/1
J.J. Henry 300/1
Jason Bohn 300/1
Jim Herman 300/1
John Huh 300/1
Kyle Reifers 300/1
Ryo Ishikawa 300/1
S.J. Park 300/1
Scott Brown 300/1
Stewart Cink 300/1
Chad Campbell 350/1
Chad Collins 350/1
D.A. Points 350/1
Erik Compton 350/1
Fabian Gomez 350/1
Gonzalo Fernandez-Castano 350/1
Lucas Glover 350/1
Andres Romero 400/1
Billy Hurley III 400/1
Brian Davis 400/1
Danny Lee 400/1
Hudson Swafford 400/1
John Merrick 400/1
Kevin Kisner 400/1
Luke Guthrie 400/1
Mark Wilson 400/1
Max Homa 400/1
Nicholas Thompson 400/1
Ken Duke 450/1
Ricky Barnes 450/1
Steve Wheatcroft 450/1
Derek Fathauer 500/1
Justin Leonard 500/1
Steven Bowditch 500/1
Tim Wilkinson 500/1
Chez Reavie 550/1
John Daly 550/1
Justin Hicks 550/1
Robert Allenby 550/1
Sam Saunders 550/1
Troy Merritt 550/1
Brice Garnett 600/1