Fantasy Golf Tournament Preview-AT&T Byron Nelson Championship

To start out this week’s preview article, we are proud to congratulate Fantasy Golf Insider’s own Jeff Bergerson as he qualified for the very first Draftking’s Live Golf Event at the TPC Boston for the Deutsche Bank Championship in September. He will be competing with 24 other people who qualify for this event for the $600,000 prize pool. We are really hoping that we have a large contingent of Fantasy Golf Insider Members that qualify for that live event. In addition to qualifying for that event, Jeff also won the Draftkings $300 3-Wood Event and the $20,000 first prize. We have also heard from many of you who had really nice weeks this past weekend and look forward to more wins leading into the U.S Open and hope that we can have a Fantasy Golf Insider Member take home the $1,000,000 prize. Keep working hard with your research and you will continue to be profitable.

We have received a few questions from members about how to use the weekly articles on Fantasy Golf Insider. This tournament preview is for every form of fantasy golf including, season long leagues, one and done formats, contests on various sites including PGA.com and Yahoo (although we also have a specific preview for that as well), and of course daily fantasy golf. This preview talks about every important aspect of the upcoming weeks tournament including highlighting the players that we feel are the best plays of the week. Our picks in this preview are the conglomeration of several people’s opinions, those of which are very successful and profitable players in fantasy golf and have proven track records, two of them being Jeff Bergerson and Zach Turcotte. We use all of the tools available on our site to formulate our opinions and encourage you to do the same. Zach also writes a column dedicated solely to Daily Fantasy Golf on Draftkings each and every week as well, called The Daily Spin. Regardless of the format you play, we encourage you to read both columns, as there is important and insightful information contained within both of them to help you be a successful player.

Overall last week our picks were good, but some of our values and sleepers failed to deliver for us. Our boy, and top recommendation Jordan Spieth delivered yet again with a T2. Other top recommendations Zach Johnson T19 (disappointing), Russell Knox T24 and Shawn Stefani T19 were solid. Sleeper picks Martin Laird T43 and Jim Herman T33 also came through for us. Some of the guys who we missed on included John Senden, Sean O’Hair, Bo Van Pelt, and Chris Stroud. In the case of Van Pelt and Stroud, we were extremely surprised at the missed cut as their tournament history was so good (in the case of BVP he had not missed a cut in his last 11 appearances at Colonial). The other two guys who we mentioned and who disappointed were Ryan Palmer and John Peterson and will be a topic of a discussion this week. This topic is for you DFS players and one that we have discussed before, including last week in our tournament preview. The idea is for those of you that play in contests with large fields (GPPs-guaranteed prize pools). Last week we mentioned that we thought Ryan Palmer and John Peterson would be the most heavily owned players in DFS, and sure enough they certainly were. The reason was that their prices were reasonable, their statistics line up well with Colonial, and in the case of Palmer, had an outstanding tournament history. You might be saying, so that makes them pretty good plays correct? Yes, everything looked good for them to succeed and so much so that everybody else recognized it as well. But sometimes, the unpredictable happens and a result that does not make any sense takes place despite all the evidence the other way. Every week we have a good idea of who the highest owned players will be going into the tournament. In our preview article, we mentioned that a strategy might be to avoid those players for the sole reason that if they did happen to significantly underperform, it would give you a tremendous edge over the field. Sometimes it does not pay-off and the players that are heavily owned play well. For those other times like last week for the second consecutive week, it certainly does pay off. Ryan Palmer and John Peterson were owned between 30-45% throughout most GPP contests. Palmer of course inexplicitly missed the cut on Friday and Peterson missed the modified cut on Saturday putting those rosters that stayed away from them at an advantage over a nice chunk of the field. This was the second consecutive week something like this has happened as you can recall the culprits last week were the two highest owned players Jason Kokrak and Brendon De Jonge, who both looked like the best plays, mostly because their salary was so low. Starting this week and going forward we are going to mention a few guys that we believe will be heavily owned at the bottom of our preview article. These same guys might very well be included in our recommendations and we might believe that they will do well in the upcoming tournament. It will however give you an opportunity to implement this strategy of fading the players who will be heavily owned. Please remember that this is only a strategy you would use in GPPs and definitely not cash games as we do not care as much about ownership, and are simply looking for value. Our assumptions on ownership will be based upon pricing, industry “buzz”, and just our experience and expertise in the daily fantasy golf industry. One question you might ask is should I fade a particular player in GPPs who we believe will be highly owned across the board for all of my teams even if I like him to succeed? The answer is probably not, unless your research or feeling tells you that he will perform poorly. This is certainly not a strategy that will work all of the time and might not be one that you want to implement at all. We just thought we would discuss it as part of our ongoing education for our members. It is simply an option and one that some of the experts in the industry are currently using. It might just help you take down a big GPP.

This week the PGA Tour stays in Texas and heads to the TPC Four Seasons at Las Colinas in Irving, Texas for the AT&T Byron Nelson. The TPC Four Seasons Resort is a Par 70 and measures in at 7,166 yards long. 2007 marked a major renovation of the course, so we will be taking that into consideration when looking at tournament history. The course itself is somewhat similar to Colonial in that it is not a long course, but it will penalize stray shots. The greens are large, but are far from flat and feature run-offs and closely mowed areas just off the green, so it will benefit great approach shots and solid putting. Many water hazards are also part of the TPC Four Seasons including a water cascade on the 18th hole extending from the landing area to the green.

Not a tremendously deep field this week, although it does include world #2 Jordan Spieth and world #7 Jason Day. Some other of the big names are Jimmy Walker, Dustin Johnson, and Zach Johnson. Overall, 10 of the top 30 players in the World Golf Rankings will be teeing it up. Some players with local ties include Martin Flores, Scott Verplank, who won this event in 2007, and obviously Spieth, who first played on an invite at age 16 and has four career appearances.

Last year Brendon Todd won his first PGA Tour victory by defeating Mike Weir by two after a bogey-free final day. Todd completed his Sunday final round with a 4-under-par 66 and actually went bogey-free over his final 31 holes. Weir birdied four of his first five holes on the way to his best finish since a runner-up showing at Pebble Beach in 2009. Todd’s victory made him the fourth man in the past five years to record his first PGA Tour win at the AT&T Byron Nelson, joining Sang-moon Bae in 2013, Keegan Bradley in 2011 and Day 2010. This is an interesting tidbit, because although it was those guy’s first win, they have gone on to have quite a bit of success between them. Taking a close look at those players that might be on the verge of breaking through and that look to have nice careers in front of them might prove to be a successful strategy this week.

Every week we look first and foremost at the Strokes Gained Statistic, with the emphasis on Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green as it has proven the most predictive of success of all the statistics. In addition to Strokes Gained we will be looking at Total Driving this week. Accuracy is definitely a must, like it was last week so we will look closely at driving accuracy. The difference however this week is that driving distance will be rewarded as long as it is not too inaccurate. Many bomber-type players who excel at driving distance have had success on this track over the past few years including most recently Dustin Johnson, Jason Day, and Morgan Hoffman. We will also be analyzing greens in regulation and scoring (both Par 4 and Par 5).

One of the most important factors that needs to be analyzed this week at the Byron Nelson is tournament history. For a complete tournament history for every player, check out our tournament history page.

Also, be sure to check out our sportsbook odds vs. daily pricing tool, as it helps identify some mis-priced players that present great value on the daily sites. A few of the guys who stand out on that tool this week include Morgan Hoffman, Jason Dufner, and Scott Piercy.

We will continue to strive to outwork, outperform, and supply our members the most relevant information in the fantasy golf industry. Be sure to always stick to solid lineup building, diversification, smart game selection, and disciplined bankroll management. See: How to win playing daily fantasy golf.

For access to our Top picks, value picks, sleepers, and more, become a premium member.

For those who are playing DFS, we think the best strategy is to continue to build the majority of your teams with the balanced approach as opposed to Studs and Scrubs Teams, where you have one or two top salary guys and the rest low priced guys.

Top Stud Picks:

Jordan Spieth– At this point it would feel like we were cheating on our boy Jordan if we left him out of our preview. It would also be foolish, since he is a freaking stud. Last week he took T2 at the Crown Plaza Invitational in his home state. This week he looks to follow that up on his home course. As we mentioned earlier in the preview he has played in this event four times with a 37th here last year, 68th in 2013, 32nd in 2011, and 16th in 2010. If we are discussing specifically DFS, none of those finishes would be good enough to pay of Spieth’s price this week, but it is hard to imagine him finishing outside the Top 10. He did miss the cut at The Players, but before that he had a T11 at RBC Heritage, won The Masters, runner-up at Shell, runner-up at Valero, and won Valspar. Spieth ranks 67th in driving distance, 101st in driving accuracy, 96th in greens in regulation, 9th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 6th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 2nd in Total Strokes Gained. He is the real deal and should be utilized in all formats. With that being said, he is not an ideal cash game play in DFS as he depletes your salary cap so much, and hinders your ability to roster other quality players that will have a good chance of making the cut. If you missed our tournament preview last week, check it out and read our discussion on good cash game plays vs good GPP plays (GPP only)

Jason Day- He did not play here last year, but he did in 2013 when he took 27th. Before that he had three consecutive Top 10s with a 9th in 2012, 5th in 2011, and won it in 2010. Day’s current form has not been up to his high standards as he missed the cut at The Players, was bounced in the first round of the WGC Match Play, had a T4 at Zurich, T28 at The Masters, T17 at Arnold Palmer and T31 at WGC Cadillac. He did win the Farmers in February however. Day is the type of high level talent that can win a tournament any given week, which is why we need to consider him, especially given that the field is on the weaker side this week. Day ranks 5th in driving distance, 175th in driving accuracy (which is a concern), 18th in greens in regulation, 30th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 29th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 14th in Total Strokes Gained. (GPP only)

Dustin Johnson- Not the prototypical guy we like here at TPC Four Seasons, but there is no denying his success here. In five career appearances, Johnson has three Top 10s including a 7th last year, 20th in 2011, 7th in 2010, and 4th in 2009. He started March on a tear with a win at the WGC Cadillac, a T6 at Valero, and a T6 at The Masters. Since then he has slowed down a bit with a T43 at Zurich and T69 at The Players. He clearly has some of the most talent of anybody on tour and when he can putt remotely well, as opposed to losing close to three strokes to the field putting, he can win anywhere. He ranks 1st in driving distance, 188th in driving accuracy, 106th in greens in regulation, 8th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 150th in Strokes gained putting, and 10th in Total Strokes Gained. Sometimes guys just play well on certain courses without any obvious reason why and Johnson is a great example here. (Mostly GPP)

Ryan Palmer- This play sets up so perfectly as a do-the-opposite/zig while the field zags play. After a week in which Palmer played at his home-course, had an outstanding tournament history, laid a complete egg and missed the cut and burned roughly half of all the people who play daily fantasy golf, how many people do you think are going to be anxious to own Palmer this week? Well us for one. It is not like he has forgotten how to play golf and all of a sudden stinks, he had one bad tournament, which in golf is not unheard of. He has actually played well at TPC Four Seasons over the past four years with a 22nd last year, 33rd in 2013, 9th in 2012, and 2nd in 2011. Before his devastating missed cut last week he did miss the cut at The Players, T33 at The Masters, T6 at Valero, and T12 at WGC Cadillac. Statistically he still ranks 14th in driving distance, 149th in driving accuracy, 43rd in greens in regulation, 14th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 80th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 8th in Total Strokes Gained. We are certainly not saying to load up on Palmer this week because he has missed his last two cuts. However if you want to stand apart from the field in a GPP you will be getting a high quality player that people will avoid for the sole reason that he burned them last week. As we have lectured in the past, we cannot use our emotions to dictate or decisions, but instead actually use it against other people to profit. Is it guaranteed that he performs well this week? Of course not, we are just always looking for opportunities like this and Palmer looks to be a great play this week. (Mostly GPP, but could also be used in cash games as he is generally a consistent cut maker).

Top Value Picks:

Ian Poulter- You might be hard-pressed to find a player that is playing more consistently than our outspoken little European friend. Last week’s T5 built upon a T30 at The Players, T18 at RBC Heritage, T6 at The Masters, T21 at Arnold Palmer, T24 at Valspar, T49 at WGC Cadillac, and T3 at Honda. He also checks out in the key statistical categories including 54th in driving accuracy, 27th in greens in regulation, 40th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 39th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 23rd in Total Strokes Gained. He does not have any tournament history, so that might be a concern, but he hadn’t played at Colonial since 2010 and look how he fared there. (GPP and Cash Games)

Justin Thomas- One of these young players that we like so much, and one that continues to deliver unbelievable results considering it is his first year on tour. His last four appearances have produced a T7 at Wells Fargo, T24 at The Players, T12 at Zurich, and T11 at RBC Heritage. He is a long ball hitter as he ranks 19th in driving distance, but can sometimes be a bit inaccurate off the tee as he ranks 157th in driving accuracy. His approach game is solid and ranks 55th in greens in regulation, 32nd in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green and 28th in Total Strokes Gained. We expect another good showing from Thomas who has shown consistency with his game and also the ability to explode with a high finish. (GPP and Cash Game)

Marc Leishman- Not the statistical rankings that you would predict success for on this course, but Leishman has had incredible success here in the past as well as success at Colonial, last week’s venue and similar to TPC Four Seasons. Tournament history includes a 3rd here last year, 12th in 2013, 3rd in 2012, mc in 2011, 12th in 2010, and 8th in 2009. Leishman ranks 196th in driving accuracy, 137th in greens in regulation, 104th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 66th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 87th in Total Strokes Gained. Keep in mind however that Leishman struggled considerably earlier in the season, some of which were attributable to his wife’s health and those stats are scewed a bit because of that period of time. Since she recovered however Leishman has been a new player as he placed T27 last week, T24 at The Players, advanced at the WGC Match Play, and T28 at Zurich. We are hoping Leishman might still be under most people’s radars who are simply looking at season long stats without putting them into context, but think because of his outstanding tournament history, that he might be a popular pick this week. In GPPs you might want to consider fading him on some rosters. (GPP and Cash Games)

Brendon Steele- Just three weeks ago Steele was everybody’s darling as he had a string of consecutive cuts made, then he missed two consecutive at Zurich and The Players and everybody jumped off the bandwagon. As a matter of fact, in DFS, Steele was owned by around 5% of the field in a lot of contests on Draftkings in his last tournament. Too bad for the 95% he took T9. Prior to the two missed cuts, Steele had a T25 at Shell, T8 at Valero, T35 at Arnold Palmer, T11 at Honda, and T14 at the Northern Trust. Overall he has made 13 of 15 curs with seven Top 25s and three Top 10s. He has proven to be a guy that we can rely on week in and week out. He ranks 10th in driving distance, 142nd in driving accuracy, 33rd in greens in regulation, 16th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 99th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 15th in Total Strokes Gained. He has missed the cut in his two appearances in the Byron Nelson, but we don’t care as he is a new and improved player than he ever has been in the past. (GPP and Cash Games)

Brendon Todd- He is the defending champ, which means he will not fly under anybody’s radar, but he has everything it takes to succeed here and he is playing really well. Last week at Colonial he finished T43 and before that he had a T51 at The Players, 4th at RBC Heritage, missed the cut at The Masters, T30 at Valero, T24 at Valspar, T23 at WGC Cadillac, and T10 at AT&T Pebble Beach. We mentioned that he won it here last year and also finished 17th in 2013 after missing the cut in 2012 and 2009. Todd is not a long ball hitter off the tee, but rather an accurate player ranking 14th in driving accuracy, 94th in greens in regulation, 29th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 22nd in Strokes Gained Putting, and 13th in Total Strokes Gained. Todd is an outstanding cash game player as he is extremely consistent in making cuts, which is the goal for cash game play. (GPP and Cash Games)

Russell Henley- Although he does not have any tournament history it is too hard to ignore a guy who has made 13 of 14 cuts, including six Top 25s, and three Top 10. Most recently he has a T24 at The Players, missed cut at RBC Heritage, 4th at Shell, T49 at Arnold Plamr, T56 at WGC Cadillac, and T44 at the Honda Classic. Statistically he looks good as he hits the ball long, but not at the expense of accuracy. Henley ranks 40th in driving distance, 73rd in driving accuracy, 85th in greens in regulation, 84th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 9th in Strokes Gained Putting, an 33rd in Total Strokes Gained. (GPP and Cash Games)

Brooks Koepka- Big time talent, Koepka burst onto the scene with a win at Waste Management, and we were very happy about that since he was one of our recommendations that week. Since then he has not regained that success as his best finishes have been T17 at WGC Cadillac and T33 at The Masters. We will say that he was struggling with a rib injury for a good share of that time period between then and now. Koepka missed the cut here last year, but ranks 9th in driving distance, 149th in driving accuracy, 71st in greens in regulation, 35th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 15th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 12th in Total Strokes Gained. We like the fact that he has not done much in a while and think that his ownership will not be high in DFS. In addition, his price on Draftkings this week is very intriguing. (Mostly GPP)

Top Sleeper Picks:

George Mcneill- One of those guys that continues to produce solid, consistent performances, yet he does not get much attention. We recommended him two weeks ago as a value play and he delivered for us. Last week Mcneill took T5 at Colonial, and before that he had a T28 at Wells Fargo, T17 at The Players, T12 at Zurich, T44 at RBC Heritage, and T20 at Valero. He ranks 78th in driving accuracy, 151st in greens in regulation. In six career appearances, Mcneill’s best finish was in 2009 when he took 16th. When we saw Mcneill’s salary come out on Draftkings at $7,100 we cringed. That price is not in the top 50 of players prices, which makes Mcneill a ridiculous value on Draftkings, so much so that we are afraid everybody else is going to notice it. We were hoping he would be between $8,000-$8,500 and remain under most people’s radars this week as we like him a lot. This is a difficult one to decide on. Is he going to be so highly owned because of the mispricing or is he still such an obscure player that ownership will not be high. Our best advice would be to obviously roster him in cash games and some of your GPPs as he looks like a good play. Hopefully, the ownership will not get too high. (GPP and Cash Game)

Scott Brown- Not a guy who we expect to go out and win the Byron Nelson this week or even make a Top 10 for that matter, but a guy who has been consistently making cuts for the past two months. Starting the end of March, Brown has made seven straight cuts including a T33 last week at Colonial, T13 at Wells Fargo, T30 at The Players, T36 at Zurich, T37 at RBC Heritage, T37 at Shell, and T56 at Valero. Not bad for a guy that nobody every rosters or even talks about. He has one career appearance in this tournament and he took 49th in 2012. Here are his statistics for the year, although you have to segment them from the beginning of the year and over the past two months. He has been playing had much more accuracy during that time period and not too many people will notice that as they will just look at the season long numbers. He ranks 112th in driving distance, 102 in driving accuracy, 133rd in greens in regulation, 105th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 88th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 103rd in Total Strokes Gained. (Mostly GPPs)

Will Wilcox- So far in the 2015 wraparound season, Wilcox only has six tournament appearances, but he has made the most of them making the cut in five of them. His last outing he missed the cut at Zurich, but before then he had a T33 at Valspar, T6 at Puerto Rico, T18 at AT&T Pebble Beach, T14 at Sanderson Farms, and T63 at CIMB. He has only played in the Byron Nelson once previously and took 78th last year. Statistically we like where he sits however ranking 74th in driving distance, 30th in driving accuracy, 5th in greens in regulation, 68th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 92nd in Strokes Gained Putting, and 69th in Total Strokes Gained. (Mostly GPPs)

A couple deep sleeper possibilities for you in case you really want to roster a couple of studs:
Jim Herman who we recommended last week and he had a T33. For some bizarre reason he is $1,400 less this week than last week. Cameron Smith, Carlos Ortiz, and Adam Hadwin.

A few of the players that we can foresee having high ownership this week in DFS include:
Jordan Spieth, Ian Poulter, Marc Leishman, and Morgan Hoffman.  As the week goes by we might update this list based upon what we see and hear in the industry. Update: We are going to add a couple names to the high ownership this week. Charley Hoffman, Jason Day, and Keegan Bradley.