Fantasy Golf Predictions
Fantasy Golf Picks, Odds, and Predictions – THE PLAYERS Championship
Fantasy Golf Picks, Odds, and Predictions for the 2022 PLAYERS Championship
PLAYERS Championship Fantasy Preview
Winners win and losers….well, they don’t win, put it that way.
The confidence Scottie Scheffler took from his Phoenix Open victory just a couple of weeks ago was clear for all to see as, with others losing their minds in the teeth of Bay Hill, he got stronger as the finishing line approached.
You’d pretty much need two hands to count off the guys that could have won the Arnold Palmer Invitational – Gary Woodland, Chris Kirk, Tyrrell Hatton, Billy Horschel, Viktor Hovland, Talor Gooch – as one of the more chaotic PGA TOUR Sundays in recent memory unfolded.
There were diatribes against course officials and, on the part of the usually serene Rory McIlroy, a snapped wedge as Bay Hill proved almost unplayable – just four players in the field going round on Sunday under par.
Scheffler’s final flourish – a two-putt from 69ft – was befitting of a man that saw the finishing line and ran towards it. The likes of Woodland and Kirk, not regulars to the winners party in recent years, found their nerve betrayed them.
From one elite-grade test to another….the PGA TOUR hangs around in Florida and this time heads to the incomparable TPC Sawgrass for the biggest of the non-majors, THE PLAYERS Championship.
Last Week’s Fantasy Results
Although our top guy Rory McIlroy finished T13, it’s important to note that all seven picks plus all five sleeper report picks made the cut at a difficult Bay Hill.
We had guys like Kirk and Woodland who helped the cause and how about that Keegan Bradley pick at T11?
PLAYERS Championship Field
It’s routinely and lazily described as the fifth major, so we might as well run with the billing and confirm the quality of the field meeting in Ponte Vedra this week.
It’s a field dominated by the top 100 in the OWGR, with eight former FedExCup champions and as many prior PLAYERS victors also making the trip.
Defending champion Justin Thomas is amongst them, as are world number one Jon Rahm, former PLAYERS winner McIlroy and major-man Collin Morikawa to name just four.
Scheffler and his Bay Hill combatants – Hovland, Horschel and co – make the short trip to Sawgrass, while the likes of Dustin Johnson, Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay will be only too keen to add another big trophy to their collections.
This Week’s Course Preview
A man synonymous with some of the most iconic courses in the sport, TPC Sawgrass is perhaps Pete Dye’s masterwork.
Forget the almost gimmicky island seventeenth hole, this is 18 holes of pure class from start to finish and is what we might describe as a fair test of golf – rather than Bay Hill last week that was, in the end, anything but.
What Dye has done is create a dizzying body of real estate – no two holes play in the same direction consecutively, and with left and right swinging doglegs, and typically a cross wind, TPC Sawgrass can prove rather confusing for newcomers….always a note worth making ahead of our draft.
This is also one of the wateriest venues on the PGA TOUR rotation, and with more than 80 bunkers there is so much danger lurking at every turn.
The only saving grace, perhaps, is that the rough is fairly tame, but even so hitting out of it to some classically small Dye greens is not exactly ideal.
About those greens. For years, TPC Sawgrass has been laden with Bermuda on the dancefloors, and after a series of overseeding missions a couple of years ago, reports suggest the greens are now mostly overridden by Poa Annua. One thing we do know for certain is that they will run super pure and quick too – about 13 on the stimp in fact.
That is, of course, if the rain doesn’t slow them down….
Weather Forecast for Ponte Vedra Beach, FL
You might not believe it, given the glorious sunshine at Bay Hill last week, but rain is heading for Ponte Vedra and in a big way.
It’s always difficult to be specific given the nature of thunderstorms, but some heavy downpours are scheduled every day from Tuesday right through to Saturday – in what quantity, we’ll have to wait and see.
But take it as a given that Sawgrass will be besieged by the wet stuff at some point this week, even if Sunday – according to the early forecast at least – is set fair but exceptionally cool….54˚F is not exactly Floridan.
Watch out for the wind too. Conservative estimates put the breeze at 11-20 mph for all four days, and that will provide yet another obstacle for the players to overcome.
Last Year’s Results from THE PLAYERS
These ‘championship’ golf courses generally require an elite player to tame them, and that was no different in 2021 at TPC Sawgrass.
Justin Thomas added the fourteenth victory of an already stellar career to his name, triumphing by one shot from Lee Westwood – whose somewhat shock assault on the trophy just came up short.
He accelerated over the weekend, shooting the lowest round of the tournament on Saturday with 64 and then making birdie-eagle-birdie after the turn on Sunday to leave the Brit – who made three bogeys on the front nine – flailing.
With a bogey at 14 righted at 16, all that was left was for Thomas to play 17 and 18 in good order and watch on as Westwood made bogey on the famous seventeenth to end his hopes of the unlikeliest of victories.
Where to Play Fantasy Golf for THE PLAYERS Championship this Week
It’s been some build-up to this event on the various DFS sites, and finally we get a chance to savor a diverse and – most importantly – bankroll-boosting slate of contests. Here’s two we’re playing this week:
- PGA $2.5M Fantasy Golf Millionaire: Well, it would be rude not to. For $25, we can try our luck at taking down the $1 million top prize and win a ticket to DK’s Tournament of Champions series. With the top 40 players all banking at least $1,000, there’s plenty to get excited about here.
- PGA $40k Dogleg: We’re big fans of single-entry contests for THE PLAYERS Championship, and the reason for that is simple – a lot of the players that non-informed gamers would assume would play well at Sawgrass often don’t. Let’s make our insight count, with $33 entry offering a shot at the $4,000 bounty.
This Week’s Fantasy Notes for THE PLAYERS Championship
One of the curiosities of TPC Sawgrass is that there are many ways to skin the proverbial cat – hence why this trophy has been lifted by as unlikely a trio as McIlroy (blasting it 305 yards off the on average and hitting just 58% of fairways), Webb Simpson (as accurate and as steady as ever) and Si-Woo Kim (the Korean as unpredictable as ever).
But it was Justin Thomas 12 months ago who offered a very useful glimpse into what it takes, and his protocol – sometimes hitting bombs, sometimes clubbing down, always immaculate with irons and wedges through the back – was the right strategy for this layout.
It helps that he scrambled, chipped and prodded well enough to keep him in contention, and at a layout where the super-smooth greens do somewhat negate the advantage of putting merchants, Thomas was able to take care of business.
The truth is that Pete Dye designed Sawgrass in a manner that would test all facets of a golf game, and so drafting those without a glaring weakness in their armory is the way to go this week – so, perhaps more crucially than normal, striking the right balance in your draft and not being too top-heavy will prove vital.
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Our Top 5 (and Top 2 Sleeper) Fantasy Picks and Odds to Win THE PLAYERS Championship
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Top 5 Picks/Odds to Win THE PLAYERS Championship
Top Tier Pick #1:
Justin Thomas (Odds: 14/1, FPPG: 107.3, GPFP: 139.43 Salary: $10,400)
Believe it or not, Thomas was priced at 20/1 with the sportsbooks and $9,900 on DK when we drafted him a year ago, and while those numbers have been squeezed somewhat in 2022 the fact remains – this is a perfect layout for a flusher like JT.
Even aside from that victory, Thomas has a pretty good record at Sawgrass, all things considered, and last year’s win was no fluke – his tee-to-green prowess gives him an edge on the vast majority here.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, he hasn’t won since, and while we don’t subscribe to the notion that players are ‘due’ a win, JT will surely be thinking that it’s high time he got back into the mix for honors once more.
The crucial aspect here is that his putting has improved enough in recent outings – T8 at the Phoenix Open followed by solo sixth at the Genesis – to suggest he can contend again.
Key Stats:
- Birdie Average – 1st
- SG: Tee-to-Green – 4th
- SG: Approach – 10th
Top Tier Pick #2:
Daniel Berger (Odds: 33/1, FPPG: 88.8, GPFP: 109.22 Salary: $8,800)
We’re going to go with the assumption that his ejection from the top of the leaderboard at the Honda Classic will provide fuel to the fire for Daniel Berger, rather than weighing too heavily on him.
Focusing on the positives, he was in excellent touch at PGA National and really should have won the event at a canter – that speaks volumes about his standard of play.
Berger has two top-10s to his name at TPC Sawgrass, and at a layout where variance is the order of the day that is impressive enough to suggest that he enjoys the unique conditions here.
Crucially, Berger is absolutely rock-solid from tee to green, generally doesn’t make a great deal of mistakes and is reliable enough with the flat stick to win – hence his pair of titles since 2019. Can he add a third this week?
Key Stats:
- SG: Approach – 3rd
- SG: Tee-to-Green – 5th
- Scoring Average – 11th
Mid-Tier Pick #1:
Shane Lowry (Odds: 45/1, FPPG: 65.5, GPFP: 66.16 Salary: $8,000)
Another who went very close at the Honda was Shane Lowry, and the Irishman is another who is amiable enough to take the positives from his week rather than the negatives.
He was particularly unlucky to have to play the birdie-able 18th hole in driving rain that week, and on such margins can elite golf tournaments unravel. But no matter – he got into a winning position, and that’s a good thing.
Lowry has been hitting better irons for a long time now, and as an accurate driver with a bit of magic around the greens he ‘s another that should enjoy Dye’s test – T8 here last year certainly hinted as much.
Key Stats:
- N/A
Mid-Tier Pick #2:
Talor Gooch (Odds: 66/1, FPPG: 88.8, GPFP: 71.02 Salary: $7,200)
As if to prove the quality of his game, Talor Gooch has won at the wide open RSM Classic and performed very nicely at super-tight Bay Hill last week – this is a man for all occasions.
Particularly high up on his hitlist will be TPC Sawgrass, where he finished T5 last year and where he can enjoy maximum reward for his exceptional tee-to-green game.
Gooch has got the form – T7 at the Arnold Palmer last week – and the assets to win at Sawgrass, and while putting remains something of an issue we expect he’ll rather enjoy the smooth roll in Ponte Vedra this week.
Key Stats:
- SG: Tee-to-Green – 14th
- Scoring Average – 14th
- SG: Approach – 14th
Low-Tier Pick:
Chris Kirk (Odds: 80/1, FPPG: 71.7, GPFP: 77.47 Salary: $7,000)
This little Florida Swing is perfect for Chris Kirk as the complexity ramps up a few notches.
Even in the power-obsessed modern game, he’s proof that a little can go a long way, and T5 and T7 finishes at the Arnold Palmer and Honda are evidence that Kirk can compete when there’s an emphasis on keeping your ball on a tight string.
TPCS Sawgrass is in that camp given the various hazards around, and aside from a withdrawal in 2016 Kirk has made eight consecutive cuts here – a T12 and two T13s the main fruits of his labor.
Key Stats:
- SG: Around-the-Green – 6th
- SG: Tee-to-Green – 12th
- Scoring Average – 34th
Sleeper Pick for THE PLAYERS Championship
Corey Conners (Odds: 60/1, FPPG: 70.4, GPFP: 56.28 Salary: $7,300)
At his best, Corey Conners is a sublime ball-striker and tailor-made for the challenge presented by TPC Sawgrass – as confirmed by his top-ten here 12 months ago.
The Canadian often seems to be in and out of form, but he was very good at the Arnold Palmer Invitational – ranking first for SG: Tee-to-Green on his way to T11 at Bay Hill.
That should set him up nicely for this week’s challenge, and with a short game that has improved just enough to contend with, Conners could be an unlikely challenger for the trophy.
Key Stats:
- Greens in Regulation – 4th
- SG: Tee-to-Green – 16th
- Scoring Average – 37th
Alternative Sleeper Pick for THE PLAYERS Championship
Brian Harman (Odds: 125/1, FPPG: 59.0, GPFP: 47.16 Salary: $6,900)
Although his form has tailed off somewhat, Brian Harman is still a pretty reliable campaigner and one of the few that seems to have a genuine, repeatable affinity with TPC Sawgrass.
In his last six trips, the left-hander has served up three top-10s – and outstanding achievement given the quality of THE PLAYERS field and the complexity of the challenge.
A missed cut at the Honda Classic was a rare aberration on Harman’s recent record, because otherwise he has been very good – T3 at the American Express and T14 at the Phoenix Open reminders of his talents.
Key Stats:
- Scrambling – 17th
- Greens in Regulation – 53rd
- Scoring Average – 57th
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 (2021-2022)
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