Fantasy Golf Tournament Preview- PGA Championship

The last major of the year, The PGA Championship is upon us and your last chance at becoming a millionaire by playing fantasy golf, and frankly we can’t contain our excitement. Team FGI will be in attendance at Whistling Straights so if you plan on going, let us know and we will meet up for cocktails.

Last week for the second straight week we had a big time underdog come out victorious. As a matter of fact in most Draftkings contests, Shane Lowry was owned by only about 2% of entries across the board. If you were fortunate enough to have Lowry on any of your teams and surrounded him with some other guys who did well, than congrats. We heard from a ton of our members who did exceptional last week, so we want to congratulate all of you.

The balanced approach in constructing lineups that we recommended turned out to be very successful. Unfortunately we were not able to foresee Lowry winning and did not recommend him to you, but we were able to provide you a ton of exceptional picks last week. To start with, our studs Jordan Spieth T10, Jason Day T12, and Rickie Fowler T10, all provided solid performances, although with the price structure the way it was on Draftkings, you needed to get more out of those guys, which speaks even more to the balanced approach last week. Adam Scott truly surprised all of us with a lame duck performance of T45. All of us at FGI agreed that for his price we looked at him as an excellent option, but it did not come to fruition. The real bizarre part about Scott’s performance was that his putting was actually good and his ball striking was awful. This is opposite of what Scott has been doing all season long.

Our sleeper picks did extremely well with our guy Robert Streb continuing to win us money by finishing 5th, Danny Lee finished T6, and Russell Henley T17. The only guy who disappointed was Brendon Todd who finished T61, but if you get three sleepers in the Top 20 and two in the Top 10, you have to be happy. Finally our value picks- Jim Furyk finished T3 easily out-producing his price, Patrick Reed had a T15, and Brooks Koepka T6. Let’s talk a little about Koepka. He was our number one value pick in this preview last week, Zach Turcotte wrote him up in his Daily Spin article, Roger Casey recommended him in his FantasyAces column, and we talked about him on our webcast as a great option. Frankly we could not have screamed from the rooftops about him any louder, and we hope you listened and rolled with him and got paid off. As long as we are discussing Brooks, one of the themes we have been stressing to our members who play on Draftkings and FantasyAces is the importance of points scored as opposed to just place finished in the standings. We have said on many occasions that Brooks Koepka excels in this category which makes him tremendously valuable. We are shocked and amazed that industry people do not talk more about this because it is absolutely imperative. We actually heard somebody else in the industry say he specifically did not like Koepka this week, oops. To give you an example this past week of the importance of scoring, Koepka finished T6 in the standings with three other guys. Here are the Draftkings point totals for those four players:

T6 Brooks Koepka 83.5 points
T6 David Lingmerth 77 points
T6 Danny Lee 75.5 points
T6 Henrik Stenson 74 points

That is the only proof you need as far as the importance of scoring vs place in the standings. Most people only factor in where guys placed, but as you can see the point totals can vary greatly and that is the most important thing in DFS. Thousands of dollars can be won and lost over ten points in DFS, so be sure to factor it into your thinking.

On to the final major of the year, which is the PGA Championship held at Whistling Straits in Kohler Wisconsin. The Straits course hugs the coastline of Lake Michigan and replicates the seaside links courses in Ireland and the United Kingdom. The Pete Dye designed course opened in 1998 and has hosted the PGA Championship in 2004 and 2010. The Straits is home to bluffs, massive sand dunes, over 500 bunkers and 14 water hazards. The greens are composed of bentgrass, fairways are a blend of three fescues, the primary rough is the same fescue blend as fairways, but maintained at a higher cut, and the deep rough is a blend of four fescues. The Straights is a Par 72, has four Par 5s and four Par 3s, and measures will measure up to 7,790 yards long this week.

This week of course features the fourth chance this season to become a millionaire as Draftkings offers another installment of its Millionaire Maker tournament. All you have to do is beat out a mere 188,925 other entries. This is obviously an extremely difficult feat, but we will do everything in our power to help one of our members win life changing money. In our premium member section below, we will show you the winning lineups of the last two Millionaire Maker events and analyze them to see if we can find some similarities that we can exploit in helping construct our lineups.

We mentioned the PGA Championship was played at Whistling Straits in 2004 and 2010, and we have included the results from 2010 on our tournament history page. We will also place a lot of importance on results from Chamber Bay (The U.S Open) because it is one of the most similar style courses to Whistling Straits that there is. In addition we will also look at results from other links style courses, such as St Andrews to see who excels on this type of terrain.

The statistics we are going to analyze this week are strokes gained tee-to-green, strokes gained putting, total driving (driving distance + driving accuracy), greens in regulation, and scrambling. The distance of Whistling Straits is extremely long and is one of the longest courses the players see all year. For this reason we want guys who can hit the ball long off the tee. However as we saw at Chambers Bay, bombing it off the tee without regard to accuracy will not work. Total driving is a great statistic because it will combine distance and accuracy and reflect who will be able to conquer the length but also avoid the unforgiving rough. Greens in regulation will also be important as difficult bunkers and rough will be tough to chip out of and scrambling will be hard. Those who can zero in on the greens with their approach shot will benefit greatly. Finally, as with all majors, putting will be crucial, greens will be fast, and as always those with the most effective flat stick will come out victorious.

Last week we told you about the excellent opportunity that has presented itself on FantasyAces right now as they are relatively new to DFS golf. We would recommend you check it out, because there is money to be won there and be sure to check out our own Roger Casey’s article which is written specifically for FantasyAces scoring system and pricing model. They don’t have very large contests as of yet, since they are new, but it is ripe for the picking. If you sign up through this link: SIGN UP FOR FANTASY ACES
Use the Promo Code: INSIDER, you will get an outstanding 20% first time bonus (up to $250). If you do it through this link or the banner on our front page we get credit for you signing up and can keep making FGI better. If you have specific questions, feel free to shoot us an email, or hit us up on Twitter @Fantasygolfers.

Be sure to check out our sportsbook odds vs. daily pricing tool, which has proven to be extremely valuable by identifying players who’s price is lower than the sportsbook odds reflect, thus helping us find value.

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

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Specific Strategy and Analysis for the Draftkings Millionaire Maker Event

The first thing that we can see from the winning Millionaire Maker rosters is that they contain the champion along with the runner-up. In both, the winner was actually owned by more than 15% of the field, so don’t feel as though you need to be incredibly outlandish with your selections. You can win if you choose a popular high priced player. Generally in major tournaments, the cream rises to the top and the top priced players litter the Top 10. You will see however that each of these rosters contains a guy or two that was owned by less than 5% of the field and finished really well. Ollie Schneiderjans and Marc Leishman were those guys in The Open Championship and Louis Oosthuizen and Jason Dufner in The U.S Open. As we preach, you most likely are going to have to have all six of your guys in the Top 20 and these rosters back that up. David Duval was an outlier as he finished T49, but you will notice that his point total was equivalent to a finishing spot much higher than that. A good starting point is to choose the guy who you feel has the best chance to win The PGA Championship, regardless of what you think the ownership will be. Then select a few guys who you believe will out-produce their price, rack up points by scoring birdies, and can finish in the Top 15. Finally, identify two guys who you believe will be owned by less than 5% of the field yet can still finish in the Top 20. It does not do you any good to select a guy who is owned by a very low % yet misses the cut, so do not be tempted by the real low dollar guys just for the sake of being different. We will list several guys below our recommendations that will have low ownership yet we believe still present the possibility of finishing high. This is obviously a very difficult thing to do, but if you can, it will pay off. Armed with this information will help give you the best chances of building a lineup that can contend in the Millionaire Maker, but you are still going to need all the breaks to come your way. Best of luck, we want an FGI member to go down in Fantasy Golf History.

 

Top Stud Picks:

 

Jordan Spieth- The good news for those of you who play DFS and want to select Spieth, this week, you can. Unlike last week where if you selected him across most sites, especially Draftkings, you were crippled, the soft pricing gives you plenty of cap space to roster quality players around Spieth. Now the bad news, everybody else who wants to own Spieth will be able to as well and we think that will be quite a few people. Even knowing he will be heavily owned, we are still going to recommend him, because frankly we think he has a really great shot at winning this week. He ranks 82nd in driving distance, 69th in driving accuracy, 40th in total driving, 33rd in greens in regulation, 3rd in strokes gained tee-to-green, and 6th in strokes gained putting. We obviously know he won The Masters and the U.S Open at Chambers Bay, and narrowly missed the playoff at The Open Championship, so there is no reason to believe he will not contend. He finished T10 last week at The WGC so that might deter a few people. If you happen to be able to select him in season long leagues, do not hesitate. If you want to be overweight Spieth this week in DFS vs. the field you will have to own him in more than 30% of your lineups as that is what we believe his ownership will be in the major GPP contests. (GPP and Cash games)

Justin Rose- A guy who has been absolutely on fire lately with a T3 last week at the WGC Bridgestone, T4 at Quicken Loans, T6 at The Open, 74th at the Scottish Open, T27 at the U.S Open, and 2nd at The Memorial. Rose ranks 7th in total driving, 18th in greens in regulation, 17th in strokes gained tee-to-green, 87th in strokes gained putting, and 83rd in Par 4 scoring. Rose missed the cut here in 2010 for the PGA Championship. On Draftkings he is priced at $10,000, which will save you a little cap space if you choose him over the other top tier players. He will also be one of the lower owned top tier players, which is also appealing. (Mostly GPP)

Jason Day- It seems like Day just steps up his game in big events and he has shown that again this season including a win at the RBC Canadian, T4 at The Open, T9 at the U.S Open, and a win at the Farmers. It is surprising that Day does not have a major championship to his credit, but that could change this week. He ranks 67th in total driving, 28th in greens in regulation, 27th in strokes gained tee-to-green, 20th in strokes gained putting, 2nd in Par 4 scoring, and 10th in scrambling. Last week Day didn’t seem to have his A-game, but he was still able to muster a T12. If it were not for a bout of vertigo at Chambers Bay he might have been able to win that elusive major, but on a similar track he can do it this week. This sounds crazy, but with the soft pricing on Draftkings this week, you can actually have Day and Spieth on the same roster and still have four other quality guys around them. Having what could be the winner and runner-up is very intriguing. (Mostly GPP)

Rickie Fowler- After a sub-par start of the season, we have been recommending him a lot lately and he has been brilliant. Current form is a T10 last week at WGC Bridgestone, runner-up at Quicken Loans, and T30 at The Open. He won the Scottish Open and The Players Championship already this season. In watching a lot of him, he just looks like he is in the zone right now. He ranks 10th in Total Driving, 106th in greens in regulation, 46th in strokes gained tee-to-green, 88th in strokes gained putting, 101st in Par 4 scoring, and 127th in scrambling. It is a bit worrisome how dreadful he looked in route to an early exit from Chambers Bay when he missed the cut badly. We will try and erase those memories from our heads because of his outstanding current form. (Mostly GPP)

Louis Oosthuizen- We will be honest with you, Louis makes us nervous, but how can you ignore runner-up performances at the two best comparison courses to Whistling Straits that we have. Normally he does not make our recommendations because of this inconsistency and unpredictability, but we will endorse him for some GPPs and particularly in the Millionaire Maker event on Draftkings. Outside of the Opens, Oosty has a T73 at Greenbrier and missed the cut at Travelers in the last month and a half. He ranks 32nd in total driving, 20th in greens in regulation, 29th in strokes gained tee-to-green, 158th in strokes gained putting, 13th in Par 4 scoring, and 64th in scrambling. He will probably either contend to win this tournament or miss the cut, which makes him strictly a GPP play. (GPP only)

 

Top Value Picks:

 

Brooks Koepka- As we talked about earlier, point accumulation is the name of the game in DFS and Koepka is the poster child. We already talked about how amazing he is at accumulating points in DFS. Priced at $7,800 on Draftkings and for the millionaire maker looks like fantastic opportunity. A T6 last week at WGC Bridgestone, T18 at RBC Canadian, T10 at the Open, T22 at the Scottish Open, and T18 at the US Open mark his last five tournament results. Koepka’s statistics are outstanding ranking 8th in driving distance, 140th in driving accuracy, 14th in greens in regulation, 34th in strokes gained tee-to-green, 8th in strokes gained putting, and 37th in total driving. The stats that show he scores in DFS are 17th in birdie average, 2nd in eagles, and 10th in birdie or better %. He is a DFS monster and we continue to be shocked by others in the industry who are not as keen to it as we are, but that is ok for us and team FGI, we will continue to profit because of it.

Branden Grace- The fact that he is priced at $7,300 on Draftkings looks like a fantastic deal considering he plays so well on links style courses like Whistling Straights. He had a T20 at The Open at St Andrews, T17 at Scottish Open, and T4 at The U.S Open. Grace has shown this season that he is capable of winning tournaments as he has wins at the Qatar Masters and Alfred Dunhill Championship on the European Tour. His stats do not register on the PGA Tour, but on the European Tour he ranks 8th in greens in regulation, 24th in driving distance, 197th in driving accuracy, 18th in scrambling, and 36th in putting. Last week he finished a solid T17 at the WGC Bridgestone, but that was not on a links style course and this week is. He will most likely be overlooked this week with such a deep field and so many options, so we like him even more. (GPP and Cash Games)

Danny Willett- Having won the Omega European Masters and taking T6 at The Open Championship on his last two links style courses he played, we are expecting Whistling Straits to set up nicely for him. Willett came out on Friday and said he had been taking an antibiotic for some sickness, so maybe that was the reason he had shot a 70 and 71 in the first two rounds and then bounced back with a pair of 69s on the weekend. At any rate, that will be good for us, as most people will not know about that and thus his popularity will be even lower than it would have been in the first place. Willett’s European Tour rankings include 23rd in greens in regulation, 75th in driving distance, 146th in driving accuracy, 4th in scrambling, and 39th in putting. He did miss the cut at Chambers Bay, but has clearly started playing better recently. (GPP and Cash Games)

Shane Lowry- Although no longer a guy under most people’s radars with last week’s win, his $7,500 price on Draftkings, presents us a ton of value. Lowry has had a rollercoaster season with four Top 25s on the PGA Tour yet missing four cuts in eleven events. A T9 at the U.S Open, T6 at the BMW PGA Championship, and win last week shows he can compete in top notch fields. His European Tour rankings are as follows: 45th in greens in regulation, 86th in driving distance, 77th in driving accuracy, 65th in scrambling, and 152nd in putting. You can easily combine him with one or two studs on your Millionaire Maker rosters, and we recommend you do so. (GPP and Cash Games)

Jim Furyk – He continues to produce despite the fact that he is 45 years old and does not have near the length as most everybody else on tour. His game is so solid however that he overcomes the lack of length obstacle. Last week he took T3 at WGC Bridgestone, and before that 4th RBC Canadian Open, T30 The Open, T42 at the U.S Open, and T5 The Memorial. Furyk ranks 81st in Total Driving, 24th in Greens in Regulation, 7th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green), 115th in Strokes Gained Putting, 22nd in Par 4 Scoring, and 19th in Scrambling. In 2010 Furyk finished T24 at The PGA Championship at Whistling Straights. Length is always a concern with Furyk and especially this week at a long track. Last week however he seemed to be able to neutralize another long course, so we expect he can here. We are not expecting him to contend for the championship but a Top 10 would be fine with us. (GPP and Cash Games)

Hideki Matsuyama- For those of you who are playing on Draftkings, Matsuyama is a perfect example of the soft pricing this week. Last week his price was $9,400 and this week it is $8,000. In top level fields Matsuyama has played consistently well although has not broken through yet with a big finish. A T37 last week at the WGC Bridgestone was a disappointment but before that a T18 finish at both the US Open and Open Championship, T17 at The Players, 5th at The Masters, and T23 at WGC Cadillac are all very good finishes. In total this year he has eight Top 10 finishes in 18 events played with two 3rds and a runner up finish. Matsuyama ranks 38th in driving distance, 35th in driving accuracy, 8th in greens in regulation, 1st in strokes gained tee-to-green, 129th in strokes gained putting, and 4th in total driving. For season long leagues he might be a great option if all your other studs are used up, because one of these events he is going to breakthrough with a win. A combination of Matsuyama and Koepka in a DFS cash game seems like an excellent base. (GPP and great cash game play)

Martin Kaymer- Last week was a bit of a head scratcher for us as Kaymer was never able to get anything going and was only able to post a T45. This was surprising because we though he was gaining some momentum by finishing T12 at The Open and 4th at the Alstom Open de France in his last two tournaments. We are not going to let this discourage us this week however and rather look at it as an opportunity as most people not be choosing him. Kaymer does not qualify for official PGA rankings but on the European Tour ranks 11th in greens in regulation, 70th in driving distance, 152nd in driving accuracy, 115th in scrambling, and 72nd in putting. For those of you who don’t remember, in 2010 at the PGA Championship on this very same course, Kaymer won the championship by defeating Bubba Watson in a playoff. All of these things pointing in the right direction for Kaymer and he is only the 14th highest priced player on the board on Draftkings this week. He is definitely a contrarian play this week, which will make it really nice if he can show some of the top level form we have seen from him in the past. (GPP only)

 

Top Sleeper Picks:

 

Robert Streb- Our guy Streb continues to be under-priced in major tournaments, and we will thus continue to roster him and get paid off. Last week he paid off huge for us with a 5th and before that a T18 The Open, T14 John Deere, and T2 at Greenbrier. At a ridiculously cheap price of $6,800 on Draftkings, he is going to give us a whole lot of upside but still help us save plenty of cap space for the big guys. Streb ranks the following: Total Driving (41st), Greens in Regulation (10th), Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green (32nd), Strokes Gained Putting (28th) Par 4 Scoring (13th), Scrambling (72nd). He also finished a respectable T42 at Chambers Bay for the U.S Open. (GPP and Cash Games)

Justin Thomas-He has had a stellar rookie season on the PGA Tour this year. Seven Top 10s already this season including his last two events played, Thomas has proven he can compete with the big boys. We are using Chambers Bay as a great comparative course for Whistling Straights Thomas actually finished 4th in the stroke play competition in the U.S Amateur Championship at Chambers Bay in 2010. The final two guys mentioned are both playing well this year and will be overlooked by most people this week. Thomas ranks 60th in Total Driving, 45th in Greens in Regulation, 25th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 100th in Strokes Gained Putting, 83rd in Par 4 Scoring, and 36th in Scrambling. Thomas has missed seven cuts this season which will make him mostly a GPP play in DFS for us. He is the type of player we like in DFS because he racks up a lot of birdies. (Mostly GPP)

Jason Bohn- This is not Bohn’s first rodeo so we do not have to worry about him being wide-eyed under the bright lights of major championship. As a matter of fact, Bohn has played in four PGA Championships and has missed two cuts, but also has a T34 in 2005 and T40 last year. Bohn has found something in his game this year and is playing better than ever before. In his last three events played he has a T4 at Quicken Loans, T12 at John Deere, and T13 at Greenbrier. Bohn is one of the best in the game in Par 4 scoring ranking 4th on the PGA Tour. In addition he ranks 82nd in Total Driving, 25th in Greens in Regulation, 41st in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 37th in Strokes Gained Putting, and 30th in Scrambling. We like the combination of current form with experience and think he will make the most of this opportunity. (GPP only)

Pat Perez- Normally we have written off Perez by this point in the season, as he perennially starts the year strong and then fades. This year however has been different and he has made the cut in his last eleven events played and in that time has racked up eight Top 25s. Perez ranks 147th in Total Driving 40th in Greens in Regulation. 70th in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green, 45th in Strokes Gained Putting, 7th in Par 4 Scoring, and 30th in Scrambling. Like with Bohn, Perez has been here before several times and actually took T6 in 2005 at the PGA Championship, plus a 21st in 2012 and a T46 last year. All of these things including a price-tag of only $6,000 on Draftkings makes Perez an intriguing option this week and one we like. (GPP and Cash Games)

Deep Sleepers:

 

Emiliano Grillo- This is the exact type of player that we discussed earlier that it is going to take for somebody to win the $1,000,000 prize, whether he is the actual guy, we will see. Take a look at his season in our Whos Hot Rankings and you will see he is actually played really well this season including a T22 at the Canadian Open, T10 at Barbasol, T41 Scottish Open, T21 at Nordea Masters, T30 at the Irish Open, and 6th at Espana. A really solid season for this Argentian, and the best part is that not many rosters will have him in the Millionaire Maker. Look if we knew for sure he was going to finish in the Top 10 this week, we would back up the truck and be on our own Caribbean Island. Unfortunately we do not have those magical powers and all we can do is identify those guys who will have the best opportunity to do that, and we think Grillo is one of those this week. Like we discussed earlier, you are going to need a low owned guy and we now Grillo will be low owned, now if we can just get him to finish high. (Mostly GPP)

Richie Ramsay – If you are looking for a guy that nobody will own in DFS this week, take a peek at Ramsay. On the European Tour he ranks 54th in greens in regulation, 131st in driving distance, 48th in driving accuracy, 54th in scrambling, and 108th in putting. In his last five tournaments he has a T10 at the Omega European Masters, T68 The Open, MC Scottish Open, T57 Alstom Open de France, T11 Lyoness Open. Obviously a long shot, but if you want a guy with next to zero ownership and only $6,000 on Draftkings, we think he is a good option. (GPP only)

 

A few guys that we believe will have really low ownership in the Millionaire Maker event that you might want to consider rounding our your lineup with include:
Martin Kaymer, Victor Dubuisson, Jason Dufner, Charl Schwartzel, Andy Sullivan, Russell Knox, and Jamie Donaldson.

 

Best of luck to all of you, and please let us know if you are in contention on Sunday so we can send some good Karma your way and root you on.

-Fantasy Golf Insider

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