Fantasy Golf Picks, Odds, and Predictions – 2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic

Fantasy Golf Picks, Odds, and Predictions for the 2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic  

Rocket Mortgage Classic Fantasy Preview

After an opening round of 62 on Thursday at the Travelers Championship in which he made nine birdies, Keegan Bradley replied to a tweet from the PGA TOUR that captured him sharing a moment of fatherly interaction with his two sons, who were watching on from outside the rope.

‘Such a special week for me,’ Bradley wrote, a New Englander with a relatively rare chance to play competitive golf on home soil in Connecticut. By the close of play on Sunday, he confirmed just how special it was by drinking a celebratory beer from the trophy.

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Bradley simply never relented, following his opening 62 with rounds of 63, 64 and 68 – the latter only compromised by a string of bogeys when the tournament was, effectively, in the bag. Nobody else could get close to his tournament record of -23.

Does local connection and having family on the course turn an average golfer into an elite one? No, but it can certainly concentrate the mind of an outstanding player – Bradley is now a six-time PGA TOUR winner, with a level of ability that suggests he perhaps should have won more. There’s still plenty of time for that, of course.

He’s in the confirmed field for this week’s Rocket Mortgage Classic too, so who knows what the next few days will have in store for him….

Last Event’s Fantasy Results

Our shining star last week was Denny McCarthy who faded a bit over the weekend to finish T7 but still put up some solid fantasy points.

Out of 12 picks, 10 made the cut with 2 finishing in the Top 13.

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2023 Rocket Mortgage Classic Field

After a stack of majors and elevated events of late, it’s a rare foray into the meat-and-potatoes of PGA TOUR life with a lower-key event and a field to match.

Cast your mind back to last summer and you may remember Tony Finau’s reign of terror – he won the 3M Open and then this, the Rocket Mortgage Classic, in the space of a fortnight, before adding the Houston Open later in the year. Big Tone returns to Detroit to try and defend his title.

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Max Homa, Collin Morikawa and Bradley add some quality to the field, as does Justin Thomas, who finally looked like he had found a little something in his game in Connecticut last time out.

Four editions of the Rocket Mortgage Classic have been played at Detroit Golf Club, and three of the former champions are in the field – Finau alongside Cam Davis and Nate Lashley. The likes of Tom Kim, Sungjae Im and Sepp Straka have also banked top-10s here, and will be looking to improve on that this week.

This Week’s Course Preview

With winning scores of -18, -23, -25 and -26 at Detroit GC in the past four years, you get a feeling of just how easy this golf course plays.

A whopping eleven of the eighteen holes averaged under par in 2022, with the seventeenth in particular – a 577-yard Par 5 – confirmed as one of the easiest holes on the PGA TOUR….there were nearly as many eagles as bogeys made here 12 months ago.

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Donald Ross, who isn’t renowned for the ease of his golf courses, must have been in generous mood when he designed Detroit GC, because other than 80 or so bunkers there really is little else to challenge the players – there’s tree lines, yes, but no real water to speak of and greens that are a breeze to find and hold.

Four of the Par 4s of this 7,370 yard Par 72 are sub 400 yards too, so there’s a wealth of birdie opportunities to be found on the real estate – hence those super-low winning scores.

It’s a week when the big stick can be dusted off and hit with abandon off the tee, with non-penal rough giving everyone a shot at hitting greens – Finau, remarkably, made 91.7% GIR here last year, which is one of the best performances (for that particular stat) in PGA TOUR history.

The Bentgrass/Poa mix greens run nice and pure too, so it’s simply a case of make birdies or go home at Detroit GC.

Weather Forecast for Detroit, MI

One of the only things that could stop the players tearing Detroit GC apart is a tricky weather forecast….there’s nothing of that note to worry about in 2023.

We’re expecting a warm and largely wind-free week in Michigan, with Thursday opening up sunny and with a top temperature of around 80 degrees.

There’s the suggestion of some rain on Friday and Saturday – whether that comes, and in what quantity – we won’t know until later in the week. But again, the mercury will hit 80 degrees and the wind will remain playable at 9mph.

Sunday looks set to be a mirror image of Thursday: sunny with some cloudy spells, single-digit wind speeds and a top temperature of 80 degrees.

DETROIT WEATHER

Last Year’s Results from the Rocket Mortgage Classic

Having won the 3M Open just a week, Tony Finau torched Detroit GC and the rest of the field to claim the Rocket Mortgage Classic by some five shots.

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Fans of numerical order will appreciate the fact that he fired rounds of 64, 65, 66 and 67 throughout the week – enough for a final score of -26, a tournament record and enough for a five-shot lead over Patrick Cantlay and Cameron Young.

Finau made 27 birdies and only one bogey in a dreamlike week of golf in which he also found 82% of fairways from an average driving distance of 309 yards – this was golf from the gods.

Where to Play Fantasy Golf for the Rocket Mortgage Classic this Week

As we have learned, the best players tend to do the business at Detroit GC, so we can have some confidence in the rosters that we draft. That can be reflected in our contest selection, with a couple of games in particular proving attractive:

• PGA $1M Sand Trap: If you’re going to part with $25 (or more if you enter multiple lineups) to play the $1 million contest, you should do so when there’s a clear formula for success – as there is in the Rocket Mortgage Classic. The winner takes home $200k for their efforts.
• PGA $350k Drive the Green: A lower budget option is this $5 contest, which sees the winner bank $50k and the top-30 teams win at least $500 as part of the $350k prize pool.

This Week’s Fantasy Notes

It’s amazing how often the cream has risen to the top at Detroit GC.

In 2020, Bryson DeChambeau defeated Matthew Wolff – then considered one of the finest young talents in the sport – to lift the trophy, while a year later two of the smoothest young swingers around (Cam Davis and Joaquin Niemann) went to battle with the former coming out on top.

In 2022, Finau led home a field that included tied second place for Patrick Cantlay and Cameron Young, with Tom Kim in solo seventh and Wyndham Clark in T8.

The upshot? The classiest operators thrive at this layout, and that tends to start off the tee – all of the players mentioned above are quality drivers of a golf ball.

So that’s a useful starting point alongside other stats that tend to mark out the best players in the world: Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green, Greens in Regulation, Scoring Average and Birdie Average are as basic, but as important, as stat builds go at courses like Detroit GC.

Strong drivers that make plenty of birdies is as straightforward a profile as you need, and there’s really no point in deviating too far away from that – if you want an extra data point or two to round out your build, take a look at the putting stats from last week at TPC River Highlands. That venue has the same Bentgrass/Poa mix greens as Detroit GC.

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Our Top 5 (and Top 2 Sleeper) Fantasy Picks and Odds to Win the Rocket Mortgage Classic   

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Top 5 Picks/Odds to Win the Rocket Mortgage Classic  

Top Tier Pick # 1

Rickie Fowler (Odds: 18/1, FPPG: 77.5, Salary: $10,400)

The train of momentum behind Rickie Fowler right now shows no signs of slowing down, and his all-round game – allied to a strong putting show last week – make him an obvious contender this week.

Since January, Fowler has served up ten strokeplay top-20s in fourteen starts – it’s a level of consistency that few in world golf can lay claim to in 2023. What’s more, he’s finished no lower than T13 in any of his last four starts….a run that nearly brought him a U.S. Open title and a round of 59 at the Travelers.

Although not quite as strong off the tee as some, Fowler still fits the bill of a Detroit GC thanks to his outstanding ball striking – he also ranked 13th for Putting on the Bentgrass/Poa greens of TPC River Highlands last week, so there’s really no holes to be picked in Rickie’s chances in Michigan.

Key Stats:

• Birdie Average – 9th
• SG: Tee-to-Green – 12th
• Total Driving – 23rd

Top Tier Pick #2

Tom Kim (Odds: 22/1, FPPG: 71.2, Salary: $9,800)

After record a front nine of 29 on Saturday at the U.S. Open, Tom Kim went on to finish T8 at one of the toughest tournaments played in months.

So maybe he was due an off week at the Travelers Championship, although rounds of 64 and 65 there confirm that the Korean’s game is in rude health.

An excellent ball-striker, Kim finished seventh on his Detroit GC debut a year ago and has won at another Donald Ross layout (Sedgefield), so that shouldn’t have come as a surprise.

Few are as proficient as Kim at hitting greens in regulation, and if he can just find an extra gear or two with the flat stick then PGA TOUR title number three could be in the offing in Michigan this week.

Key Stats:

• SG: Approach – 8th
• Total Driving – 15th
• Birdie Average – 24th

Mid-Tier Pick #1

Brian Harman (Odds: 45/1, FPPG: 62.5, Salary: $8,800)

Although he’s not a powerhouse of the modern game, Brian Harman is a better driver of the ball than you might think – ranking 46th for SG: Off-the-Tee, and that should lay the foundation for another strong run from the left hander.

That was evidenced last week at TPC River Highlands, where a superb tee-to-green performance powered Harman to a T2 finish. That in itself built upon a hugely impressive opening round of 65 at the U.S. Open a week before.

Ranking inside the PGA TOUR’s top-50 players for Par 4 and Par 5 Birdie or Better Leaders, Harman will surely love the ease of the challenge at Detroit GC – he will almost inevitably hit lots of greens, and if he maintains his putting performance of last week (+1.25 strokes gained on the field) than he will surely be in contention.

Key Stats:

• Par 5 Birdie or Better Leaders – 25th
• Total Driving – 30th
• Greens in Regulation – 32nd

Mid-Tier Pick #2

Brandon Wu (Odds: 70/1, FPPG: 61.6, Salary: $7,500)

If we’re going to hang our hat on the basic tenets of off-the-tee brilliance, GIR and birdies made, Brandon Wu’s season-long form suggests he has to be part of our roster build.

His results perhaps don’t tell the whole tale for a player who ranks amongst the top-50 on TOUR for SG: Off-the-Tee, GIR and Birdie Average – a set-up which suggests that Wu should be contending for silverware.

Like many ball-strikers, it’s on the greens that Wu shows the weakest part of his game, but when that clicks good things tend to follow – he’s served up five top-20 finishes this term, included a pair of of podium places at Pebble Beach (T2) and the Mexico Open (solo third).

That would suggest he’s most at home at coastal courses, but a T19 turn amongst the best in the business at the PLAYERS Championship suggests that Wu can also thrive in tree-lined tests too.

Key Stats:

• Birdie Average – 30th
• Greens in Regulation – 50th
• SG: Off-the-Tee – 54th

Low-Tier Pick

Luke List (Odds: 110/1, FPPG: 49.6, Salary: $7,100)

There were two items of note on the agenda from Luke List at the Travelers Championship.

His approach play numbers were good – prowess with iron and wedge is the foundation of his game, while (and you may want to sit down for this next part) he also gained strokes on the field putting.

Yes, you read that correctly, List putted nicely at TPC River Highlands, so if there’s a continuation of that in Michigan from a respected ball-striker the confidence of a high finish will soar.

Here’s a fun stat – aside from the Travelers, the RBC Heritage is the only tournament in 2023 in which List has lost strokes to the field off the tee….that’s from a staggering 15 starts!

Key Stats:

• SG: Off-the-Tee – 13th
• Greens in Regulation – 14th
• Par 4 Birdie or Better Leaders – 29th

Sleeper Pick for the Rocket Mortgage Classic

Kevin Yu (Odds: 100/1, FPPG: 73.5, Salary: $7,000)

Fire up any of the key ball-striking or scoring metrics on the PGA TOUR this season, and in amongst the giants of golf you will more often than not find the name Kevin Yu.

His is a season of promise and disappointment. Yu flew out the traps with top-10s at the Bermuda Championship and AT&T Pebble Beach, but then disaster struck and he was forced to miss four months of the season following knee surgery.

He returned at the Travelers Championship. Ring rust? What ring rust – Yu opened up 65-67 and barely looked like he’d been away, before a weak weekend saw him tumble down the leaderboard to T49.

But a fit and firing Yu will prove to be a real asset to DFS players – especially at this price point, where you doubt he’ll be positioned too often in the future.

Key Stats:

• Greens in Regulation – 2nd
• SG: Off-the-Tee – 3rd
• Birdie Average – 14th

Alternative Sleeper Pick for the Rocket Mortgage Classic

Zac Blair (Odds: 250/1, FPPG: 49.9, Salary: $6,700)

One swallow doesn’t make a summer, as the old saying goes, so it’s always wise not to back players after one surprisingly high finish.

But Zac Blair’s T2 at the Travelers Championship was built upon a sublime ball-striking performance, where amongst elite company he ranked fourth for Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green for the week.

The problem for players like Blair is backing up one stripe show with another, but if he can bring anything like the form he showed at TPC River Highlands to Detroit GC, that salary of $6,700 could prove to be the mother of all bargains.

Key Stats:

• Proximity to Hole – 20th
• Par 4 Birdie or Better Leaders – 68th
• SG: Tee-to-Green – 86th

This Week’s Sample Fantasy Lineup

Note: Sample lineups provided as examples only.  Be sure to mix-and-match players to best fit individual contests.

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Fantasy Golf Predictions This Season (2023-2023)

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