Fantasy Golf Sleeper Report – 2015 Frys.com Open

The Sleeper Report: Fantasy Golf Sleepers, Long Shots, and Undervalued Picks for the 2015 Frys.com Open from Silverado CC

2015 Frys.com Open Fantasy Sleeper Preview

Following what was an exciting and impressive sixth consecutive victory by the Americans at the President’s Cup, the PGA TOUR now heads to Silverado Country Club for the 2015 Frys.com Open.  This tourney first made its debut back in 2007 and will kick off the 2015-16 season at the par-72, 7,203-yard course in beautiful Napa, CA.

The field will be fairly strong for an early event such as this one and will be headlined by the No. 3 golfer in the world, Rory McIlroy, who will be joined by three other players from the top-15.  No. 7 Justin Rose, No. 12 Brooks Koepka, and No. 15 Hideki Matsuyama are the others kicking off their season very early and they should be well ahead of the rest of the competition when they tee off on Thursday morning.  Also coming to the course will be three members from the President’s Cup; the aforementioned Matsuyama, Charl Schwartzel, and Chris Kirk.

Plenty of scoring should be witnessed here as the winning score has never been worse than 14-under-par while the winner has had a margin of victory of two or fewer strokes in each of the eight installments—and on three different occasions, they needed extra holes to decide the outcome.  This event has been won by an American in five of the eight years, but it was Sang-Moon Bae who put up a score of 15-under last year to beat out Steven Bowdith by two strokes.  Bae will not make the trek back to defend his title as he completes his military obligations in South Korea.

Another aspect of this event is getting to see the new golfers who have graduated from the Web.com TOUR joining the field and 34 such players will be doing so with the top name being finals money leader Chez Reavie who made 8-of-19 cuts on the PGA TOUR last year and ranked third in GIR (71.89%) during that stretch.

There are some obvious favorites this week with McIlroy leading the way at 9/2 odds, but with so many fresh names looking to make a mark on the TOUR, and others looking to get a quick jump on the FedExCup season, there are plenty of “under the radar” sleepers to keep an eye on.

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2015 Frys.com Open Fantasy Sleeper Report

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2015 Frys.com Open Fantasy Sleeper Report

Mix and match these players with your usual rosters (or play them separately) to get the most out of your picks this week.

Daniel Summerhays – Vegas Odds 80/1: Summerhays finished the previous season ranked 31st in the FedExCup standings thanks to a very strong finish to the year.  He rattled off a top-11 performance in four of his last seven events and shot up the rankings in the playoffs with a sixth at The Barclays and ninth at the Deutsche Bank Championship before narrowly failing to get into the final.  He was solid yet unspectacular here last year, finishing in 42nd with four consecutive rounds of par or better as he shot nine-under on the par-fives over the four days.  The BYU graduate will need to improve his distance off the tee (284 yards per drive, 137th on TOUR) if he hopes to compete from week-to-week, but if that happens he will have a leg up on the competition as he is an elite putter (0.642 strokes-gained putting, 3rd on TOUR).  Watch for Summerhays to kick off the new season in splendid fashion.

Cameron Smith – Vegas Odds 100/1: Smith looks like he should be studying for his driver’s test rather than playing golf professionally, but the 22-year-old has made his mark quickly on the PGA TOUR last year with five top-25s in his 13 events played.  The Aussie really showed he has the ability to compete with the best-of-the-best when he earned a fourth-place finish at the tough U.S. Open and then followed that with a tie for 25th at the PGA Championship.  His strong finish to the end of the season combined with the amazing putting (0.961 strokes-gained putting) should launch him into the limelight this year he joins the infusion of young talent coming to the TOUR.

Graham DeLaet – Vegas Odds 100/1: DeLaet really faded away last season, but he has shown in the past that he is capable of putting together tremendous stretches of competitive golf.  Last year this came in February when he had two of his three top-10s on the year and went 25-under-par over four events.  He was able to do well here last season when he finished with a tie for 39th with four straight under par days.  DeLaet ranked in the top-50 in driving distance (32nd), driving accuracy (47th), and GIR (22nd) which should give him a head start on the field, and if he could improve his putting (-0.014 strokes-gained putting, 110th on TOUR) his play would become much more consistent.  The 33-year-old has yet to score a victory on TOUR, but has been in the mix a few times with three-runner up finishes in the last three seasons and has a shot to be near the top again this week in California.

Bryce Molder – Vegas Odds 100/1: Molder has not had the most amazing career, but he has been playing on the PGA TOUR since 1999 and has one victory with just 24 top-10s.  There is one place where he excels, though, and that is at the Frys.com Open where he has been in the top-11 in three of the past four years; including getting his only career victory back in 2011 when he beat out Briny Bird in six playoff holes after posting a score of 17-under-par.  This past season was his best since 2012 as he made the cut in 19-of-26 events (73%) and even made a run at another win with a third-place at this very tournament.  He is not a big name, but is comfortable here and should play well this week.

Whee Kim – Vegas Odds 200/1: Kim was one rookie that was not talked about much during the 2014-15 season, but it looks like he is ready to take the next step after posting a third place at the Barbasol Championship and an 11th at the Quicken Loans National.  Those were surrounded by three missed cuts, but overall on the year he made it to the weekend more often (13) than he failed to (10).  He has room to grow but is someone to watch moving forward and could come out of the gate swinging after gaining some confidence at the end of last year.

Need a few more options to fill up your roster?  Remember to check out our new fantasy predictions stats page for Golficity Predicted Fantasy Points, Price Per Fantasy Point, and more info on every player in this week’s field!

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Want more of this week’s fantasy predictions?  Check out our full fantasy preview for the 2015 Frys.com Open here.

Cover photo by Rob Peterkin on Flickr