Fantasy Golf Sleeper Report – 2021 Open Championship

The 2021 Open Championship Fantasy Sleeper Report

It’s the one week in the golfing calendar where some of the usual rules go out of the window.

The British Open, or the Open Championship if you prefer, is one of those weeks where the Europeans – or those who have played on the European Tour at least – have something of an edge. Indeed, only three Americans have won the Open Championship in the past decade.

The tournament is played out on Links golf courses, which for the uninitiated are the traditional layouts found in Britain for well over a century – don’t forget, the game originates from the coasts of Scotland in the late 1800s.

Links golf courses typically have similar characteristics across the board, including undulating landscapes, sandy and almost dune-like surfaces, and super-fast run-out on the fairways and greens. Of course, many such tracks are exposed to the elements too….and boy, can the wind blow on the coastlines of the UK.

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Royal St George’s plays host to the British Open this week, and it’s the 15th time that this track – found in the appropriately-named English town of Sandwich in Kent, has taken on the duties.

The last time was back in 2011, when Darren Clarke landed an emotional victory with a winning score of -5. In the end, only a handful of players finished the week under par, and one of those was a young Dustin Johnson.

Royal St George’s plays like a typical Links course, in that it’s super-tough but still mostly dictated by the weather. The fairways are tough to hold, given how undulating and fast they are, and beyond the first cut of rough things take a nasty turn with tangly fescue and native grasses.

The Bentgrass greens will be tough to hold. They are fast and have tightly-mown edges and run-offs, leaving some difficult short-sided chips and even blind shots into perched greens.

And then there’s the wind….conservative estimates place that at 13-16 mph this week, and at its peak you would expect it to run to 20 mph or faster – not a whole heap of fun for the players.

It should be noted that Royal St George’s doesn’t have a straight up and down, front and back nine set-up. It actually takes the form of a pair of figure-of-eights, which basically means that the wind can play in different directions on every hole.

Don’t underestimate the need for a good caddie this week, and those that have been schooled in the vagaries of Links golf will definitely earn their paycheck.

We picked out a 55/1 winner in this column last week in the form of Lucas Glover at the John Deere Classic, and we’ll be hoping to double-up at the ever-fun British Open.

But who has made our Open Championship sleeper shortlist?

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The 2021 Open Championship Fantasy Sleeper Report

Cameron Smith – 66/1 – The Mullet King won’t mind if the wind turns the British Open into a hair-raising experience this week.

He’s a former Sony Open champion and a two-time Australian PGA Championship winner, so while all around him are losing their heads he’s keeping his cool in the breeze.

Has he got the game to win a major? Well, he’s finished in the top-10 in The Masters not once but twice this season alone, and his clever short game and grinding style are perfect for Links golf.

Marc Leishman – 70/1 – With three finishes of T6 or better within his last half-dozen British Open appearances, Marc Leishman has to be seriously considered this week.

To say his form this season has been inconsistent would be something of an understatement, but in amongst the mediocre stuff there’s been a win (albeit alongside Smith in the Zurich Classic) and a solo third at the Travelers Championship last time out, so it’s certainly not all doom and gloom.

A play-off runner-up in this event back in 2015 and a two-time Masters top five finisher, Leishman absolutely has the pedigree to win a major, and layouts like Royal St George’s surely represent his best chance.

Branden Grace – 70/1 – As soon as the wind is up, we’re drawn in to think about Branden Grace’s chances.

His low-flying bullets are perfect for a stiff coastal breeze, and his short game is good enough – when the mood takes – for him to recover from missed greens.

The South African is a noted Links performer who set the low round record at the Open Championship of 2017, and with decent form of late – solo fourth at the Memorial followed by T7 at the U.S. Open – would it be a surprise if Grace served up similar this week?

Sergio Garcia – 70/1 – Few can claim to have a British Open record as strong as Sergio Garcia’s.

He has delivered a stack of top-10s in this event, including one at Royal St George’s back in 2011, and his major record is outstanding – he has won or finished runner-up in three of the four biggies.

His form, with three consecutive top-20s worldwide, is trending nicely, and the Spaniard is more reliable in contention than many give him credit for – you don’t win this many times worldwide if you can’t seal the deal.

Bernd Wiesberger – 125/1 – The Austrian is a pretty prolific winner on the European Tour, banking eight titles in his career so far and four coming since the start of 2019.

A long, straight hitter with an excellent array of chip shots, it’s no surprise that Bernd Wiesberger has pedigree on Links golf courses too.

A winner in Scotland and France on such layouts, he also has a stack of decent efforts in Ireland and elsewhere – and he was T4 in the PGA TOUR’s own RSM Classic, which certainly has a Links feel to it.

It would be a shock if Wiesberger was to win here, but that’s reflected in the odds of a player that is very much capable on his day of winning a big event.

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Want more of this week’s fantasy predictions? Check out our full fantasy preview for the 2021 Open Championship here.

Sleeper Report Predictions This Season (2020-2021)

[skill_bar heading=”Total Top 3s” percent=”2.70%” bar_text=”5 out of 185 picks” style=”background-color: #5fb341″][skill_bar heading=”Total Top 10s” percent= “10.81%” bar_text=”20 out of 185 picks” style=”background-color: #5fb341″][skill_bar heading=”Total Top 25s” percent=”24.95%” bar_text=”48 out of 185 picks” style=”background-color: #5fb341″][skill_bar heading=”Total Winners Picked” percent=5.40%” bar_text=”2 out of 37 events” style=”background-color: #5fb341″][skill_bar heading=”Total Runners-Up Picked” percent=”5.40%” bar_text=”2 out of 37 events” style=”background-color: #5fb341″][skill_bar heading=”Total Made Cuts (Includes Sleepers)” percent=”63.24%” bar_text=”117 out of 185 picks” style=”background-color: #5fb341″]

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Cover photo via Instagram