Fantasy Golf: DraftKings PGA AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

This week’s DraftKings PGA event will take us to Pebble Beach, California, for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. This event will be played on three separate courses: Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill, and Monterey Peninsula. Pebble Beach will play at 6,816 yards and a par 72, Spyglass Hill will play at 6,953 yards and a par 72, and Monterey Peninsula will play at a 6,914 yards and a par 71. A little different from normal, the cut will come after Saturday’s round. Each golfer will play all three courses and those that make the cut will finish the tournament with 18 holes on Pebble Beach, on Sunday.

These courses are extremely short, lending itself to some big scores. Those that can nail their approach shots and have their short game on point, will benefit here. With Poa Annua greens, putting becomes neutralized a bit. I’ll be focusing on GIR, driving distance, strokes gain tee to green, stokes gained on approach, scrambling, par 5 scoring, and birdie scoring.

Cut Format: As mentioned, golfers will get an extra round of golf in, with the cut coming after the third round. This is important for us playing on DraftKings PGA, as we’ll now get an extra round out of our rostered players. With this in mind, we should lean a bit more towards the stars and scrubs lineup construction, as making the cut is now weighted down.

Pro-Am Format: With the Pro-Am format, this tournament will not only have a different atmosphere, but also play a bit slower. It warrants the discussion of weighting course history slightly more. When analyzing previous winners, it appears as if they have had success in this tournament prior to their victories.

Weather: There is some rain in the forecast projected for Thursday and Friday, so you’ll have to watch that more closely up until lineup lock. As always, wind will play a factor at these courses and is more concerning than rain. In general high winds lead to high randomness, so if we see wind playing a role closer to Thursday, it may prove a larger fade on highly owned golfers.

Top Tier: $12,000 – $8,000

Quick note on the big three (Spieth, DJ, Day): Obviously these guys are elite players and have a substantially greater chance to both, make the cut, and winning the tournament, however, I think this week sets up for them to have extremely high ownership. Due to the variance in golf, as it pertains to DFS, there’s a case made for fading any golfer owned 20% or more. In tournaments, I’ll be looking to pivot off of these players where I can for that reason, but will still have some exposure, underweight of the field. If I had to rank them outside of ownership, I would go DJ, Spieth, Day.

Justin Rose – $9200

Justin Rose may end up being my highest owned golfer this week, depending on what projected ownership looks like before Thursday. After returning from injury, Rose has shown tremendous recent form with a 4th and 2nd place finish in his last two events. He’s only played this tournament once before, but recorded a 6th place finish. Rose has one of the best combinations of distance and GIR. He’s also under-priced relative to his Vegas projection of a 7.7% chance to win.

Patrick Reed – $8300

Patrick Reed’s price continues to fall, indicating that it may be time to jump on board. Reed is a better golfer than his price would represent, and given 68th place finish last week, he may come in lower owned than he should. As always, we need to target birdie makers, and Reed is one of the best, recording 15 course and field adjusted birdies per tournament.

Others to have exposure to: Jon Rahm, Phil Mickelson, Matt Kuchar

Mid Tier/Bottom Tier: $8,000 – $6,400

Shane Lowry – $7000

I’m not sure if DraftKings PGA is conducting their own social experiments or what, but Shane Lowry will be the greatest judge of DFS skill level at various buy-ins. Lowry is the clear-cut chalk this week and I think you’ll find that clear when looking at high-priced GPP ownership numbers. He has a Vegas implied chance to win of 2.2%. This is by far the highest of any player priced in this tier. Depending on your lineup construction in GPP’s, Lowry warrants considering, but he should be heavily considered in cash games.

Adam Hadwin – $7300

While I think putting should be weighted down this week, Adam Hadwin is one of the few top scoring putters that presents value this week. Hadwin is another player with a higher Vegas projection than those in this tier (1.8%).

Martin Laird – $7100

Martin Laird comes into this tournament in great recent form, with three top 10 finishes in his last six outings. Laird finished 7th last week in the Phoenix and we’ll be looking for him to carry that over into this week. While Laird has missed the cut every time he’s played in this event, it’s important to note those appearances were some time ago and his recent performance weighted more heavily. Laird scores well in ADJ. RD. scoring, and his Vegas projection is indicative of that. He has a 1.8% implied chance to win, quite higher than those priced around him.

Next: DraftKings Hoop Dreaming Picks

Others to have exposure to: Kevin Kisner, Jim Furyk, Pat Perez, Sean O’Hair, Nick Watney, Scott Piercy

Best of luck this weekend!