The Daily Spin – DraftKings Daily Fantasy Golf Preview – CareerBuilder Challenge

Some weeks, the words just flow from my fingers onto the page as I am so excited for an event that I just cannot wait to get to work on sharing my thoughts and strategy for the tournament. Other weeks, I sit for hour after hour with too many damn players on my Excel spreadsheet playing around with potential core units of players and manipulating salaries without finding anything that truly satisfies what I want in a pool of players. The CareerBuilder is an event that tends to fall into the later camp. It is a tricky event to get excited about with the impending conference championship games taking place on Sunday afternoon and evening. While golf could carve out a nice little spot for viewers early in the day, I am sure that there will be no live coverage until it absolutely coincides with the first NFL playoff game for the day.

The CareerBuilder Challenge, formerly The Humana Challenge  (in conjunction with the Clinton Foundation) and formerly The Bob Hope Classic before that falls just after a fun couple of weeks out in Hawaii and right before two of our favorite tournaments of the year with The Farmers Insurance Open next week at Torrey Pines followed up by the Waste Management Phoenix Open where our friend, Pat Mayo will be leading the charge on the always raucous 16th Hole during his bachelor party, enjoying the last truly positive EV weekend of his life. In between, we have this interesting little stop out in California’s Coachella Valley, about three months before that area comes alive with with rich girls dressing like ravers and late 30’s males with extra money to burn chasing them around during the annual music festival.

This is one of a handful of early season tournaments where the organizers decided to get creative with the cut and the number of courses involved over the weekend. Like Pebble Beach next month, we are dealing with a three course setup for the event where players rotate, taking a turn on each course through the first three rounds before an unusual cut which takes place on Saturday instead of the usual Friday afternoon. Before going any further, consider the strategic implications of this important change. With the cut coming later, it hurts players overall scoring potential as now when they miss the cut, they are only losing out on a single round, plus that round is at the toughest of the three courses, meaning that you should allow yourselves to get more aggressive this week when building your rosters. The potential does exist for a golfer who hits a tremendous number of birdies to miss the cut and still outscore a player who makes it through all four rounds.

That is not to say that a stars and scrubs approach is necessarily the best approach as the field is certainly one of the poorest that we will see all season. If you stack a few big salaries at the top, but then force yourself into the abyss of the lower and middle 6k range to complete the rest of your rosters, you may find yourself a little thin unless you catch lightening in a bottle and someone unexpected shows up like Andrew Loupe did a year ago. You can get more aggressive this week, but much like a no cut event, picking players who finish higher up on the leaderboard are going to be more important to roster which means you should do your best to give yourself as many shots as possible at locking down the winner and others that have a higher likelihood of finishing inside of the Top-10. Also beware that there is one more unusual rule about the cut that you will want to be thinking about as you sweat out the cut on Saturday. As golf likes to be unusual  with the rules around the cut and tries to limit the field for Sunday television coverage, for this event, if there are more than 78 players that make the cut based on the rule of Top-70 and ties, the cut then drops down to the Top-60 players and ties which would create an absolute nightmare scenario for any newcomer cheering on their players around the cut line.

Make sure you check out the weather this week as it will play a factor before the cut for the first time this season. On Thursday, we are looking at rain from the morning until mid afternoon and on Friday the current forecast is calling for 100% precipitation and winds between 10-15 mph. With the cut not coming until after the third round on Saturday, this leaves us with some interesting decisions about how to play the tee times for the week. As of now, I am not seeing the tee times posted, although they are usually out by Tuesday night. However, what you should be considering is trying to find out which players do not play on the Stadium Course until the third round when the weather clears up and should make conditions a little more palatable as historically, it has been known as a very tough course.

Of note this week, this is only the second year that these three courses have been used together for this event. La Quinta Country Club (7060 yards) has served as one of the three courses since 2010, but last year marked the first time the PGA West Nicklaus Tounrament Course (7204 yards) was used and the PGA West TPC Stadium Course (7300 yards) returned to the rotation for the first time since 1987 when players actually complained enough about the challenging course to get it removed from the rotation for nearly 30 years…and we think players are soft now! All are Par 72 courses with the standard, four Par 3 and four Par 5 holes. Scoring will be very low with the cut line reach somewhere around the -6 to -8 range. Utilize course history this week, but remember that it is not nearly as effective, given the rotation of courses over the years. Place a little extra weighting on current form and almost by default, the Vegas odds.

What we do have for key stats are as follows (provided by the good folks at Fantasy Golf Metrics):

Birdie of Better Percentage: 25%
Strokes Gained Tee to Green: 25%
Strokes Gained Putting: 20%
Par 5 Scoring: 15%
Prox 150-175: 10%
Scrambling: 5%

These numbers are going to be imperfect as well given the limited data available on the two newer courses. However, the numbers do make a lot of sense if we break it down. At the top, BoB% is always important, but becomes especially important in a week whee the winning score will be in the mid -20’s and the cut will be around -7. The only way to make birdies is to be good at getting into position to make them (SGTG) and being able to knock down putts (SGP). All of the PAr 5 holes are reachable in two shots making it imperative that golfers capitalize and make birdies. The proximity number is very close to the average distance to the pin after most golfers hit their tee shot. And of course, scrambling tends to make it into the model at the bottom each week as the importance of saving shots at an event like this is always crucial.

[cointent_lockedcontent view_type=”condensed buyButtonOff”]

Going into this week, there are the usual questions about cash games versus GPP contests. My feelings on cash games this week are only a little better than they were for the no cut event a couple of weeks ago. We just do not get full value from our opponents when they make what would normally be a critical error in their lineup. With the setup the way it is, this will end up reducing our edge and so that while cash games may not be something that I avoid completely this week, they will no have my usual interest. The pool of players that you can get away with using this week in cash games is going to be a little deeper than normal. However, in terms of overall roster construction, I would not get too bold in terms of grabbing more than one or two players on the lower end of the spectrum as there is really a good deal of value in the middle 7k and 8k ranges to build a strong roster with even if you start with the most expensive player in Patrick Reed. For my cash games this week, here is a quick look at the players that I believe are most worth focusing on:

Patrick Reed – $11,200
Bill Haas – $10,500

Charles Howell III – $9,900
Emiliano Grillo – $9,800
Jon Rahm – $9,700
Brendan Steele – $9300
Jason Dufner – $9,200

Kevin Na – $8,800
Luke List – $8,600
Webb Simpson – $8,200
Ryan Palmer – $8,000

Hudson Swafford – $7,900
Martin Laird – $7,800
Lucas Glover – $7,700
Adam Hadwin – $7,500
David Lingmerth – $7,300
Roberto Castro – $7,000

Cameron Tringale – $6,700

While there are a few other golfers in the field this week that you can certainly make a case for, this is the group that I will stick with for the week and I will do so probably without going all the way up to Reed in cash games, but I listed him since it is not that tough to build a good team if you did want to include him in the mix.

In moving on to our GPP player pool for the week, again I am struck by the thought that this event could be won by any number of players in the field which leads me to open up a bit on the number of players that I own. I stretched my own pool of players out to just over 30 this week, which for a full field of over 150 players is still pretty reasonable. The goal, as always is to really go big on our core group of players at the top and get as many through four rounds as possible while hopefully finding the winner. GPPs are an emotional grind throughout much of the season. Due to the way that we construct rosters, we are going to have a lot of losing weeks, especially when a few key, heavily owned players at the top blow the cut like they did a week ago. The point of it is to be in great position every so often so that on the week where we finally hit everything with our top picks, we have a lot of teams that cash, and a few that cash really big. It only takes one or two really big weeks all season to be profitable if we stay patient, but it will get tough sometimes.

In PGA, literally any player on an given week can miss the cut which is what makes PGA so much more maddening than any other DFS sport in existence. It is what makes the game so much more volatile than NFL, but also so very exciting. The darkhorse players in NFL are generally so obvious by kickoff due to price, injuries or match ups that most everyone in the community knows about it and jumps on these plays. With golf, every week of the season there are going to be players that are near the top of the field where there will be no rhyme or reason as to why they finished so well. This is why we use a wider player pool when constructing our lineups. It would be great if we could stick to 20 golfers and then smash GPP’s on that alone. However, we want to work our core group of guys the way a locksmith works to crack a safe so that we try a lot of different combos to get to the one that clicks to crack the safe.

One note on how I build my rosters is that I almost never drop below 5% exposure on any individual player. I have just never seen the point in using a player at only 1-2% in building 100 lineups. If you happen to hit the winner with that strategy and own them on one team, you have to hope the rest of that singular roster played perfectly in order to capitalize on your small buy of shares. I want to make sure that if I use a player, I at least get a few different combinations around them if I manage to have a real longshot win an event. Nothing is more disheartening than to see that you were one of only a few folks to own the winning golfer in the $3 GPP and to then see that team has three golfers on it that missed the cut.

PLAYER POOL

CORE

Ryan Palmer – 8000 – 60%
Lucas Glover – 7700 – 50%
Webb Simpson – 8200 – 40%
Jon Rahm – 9700 – 40%
Roberto Castro – 7000 – 35%
Adam Hadwin – 7500 – 30%
Patrick Reed – 11200 – 30%

Our core group is a mix of very strong players entering the week in completely different positions as to how they have looked so far this season. We lead in at the top with Ryan Palmer who hurt us as a secondary player last week. He played tremendous in his opening round before an inexplicable collapse on Friday took him outside of the cut. It was unusual given how well he tends to play in Waialae, but it gives us a great chance to jump back in on him this week, in a weaker field and at a lower price. Palmer has finished inside the Top-20 in five of his last six starts here and while the courses have changed, he is still an elite tee to green player in this field with excellent mid range iron play that sets up well here and a dynamic scorer who excels particularly well on Par 5 holes. Hopefully, last Friday was simply an aberration and we are getting a very good player at a decent discount for the week.

Lucas Glover enters this calendar year in much the same manner as last year, looking much improved from his normally atrocious putting as he was only slightly below average in the handful of events he played in during the fall. If we could get results like that on the greens all year from Glover, we would take it and play him every week as his tee to green game is about as good as any player on tour and he is very consistent with it. He still hits it over 300 yards off the tee, hits fairways and is a sniper in terms of hitting greens. He has played well over the years in this event and picked up back to back Top-20 finishes. It is always a risk to go big with Glover, but the upside is there when he hits.

Webb Simpson is in a similar vein to Lucas Glover in that he is infinitely talented in his tee to green play, but lousy with his putter. Since swapping over from the anchor a couple of seasons ago, he has really struggled to putt reliably, although he was sharp overall last week in Hawaii. Hopefully, he can maintain that this week on similar style, Bermuda greens. If he can manage to be merely mediocre with his putter, he should be in good shape for the weekend as he has finished in the Top-25 here the last three seasons.

Jon Rahm will probably be a popular pick this week, but rightfully so. He is a beast off the tee and unlike many of the others that we are playing this week, he is also one hell of a putter. The Par 5 holes here are not terribly challenging which should lead to a lot of eagle putts for Rahm over the weekend. It does not take more than a couple of eagles to really boost a player’s score on DraftKings so I think a player like Rahm is a perfect fit for this setup and against a softer field. He has not played competitively in a few months, but having the extra round this week should help to keep him out of too much trouble.

Roberto Castro started to break out last season down the stretch and has quietly missed only one cut in his last 17 starts including a 2nd place finish at the Wells Fargo and a very impressive 3rd place finish at the BMW during the FedEx Cup. Castro has made the cut here in all five career starts with two Top-25 finishes, but really seemed to step up his game last season when he elevated his tee to green game, finishing ranked 21st in strokes gained tee to green. He is accurate off the tee, hits a lot of greens, possesses a strong short to mid range iron game and is surprisingly good on Par 5 holes as a shorter hitter. Castro should finish inside the Top-25 this week and we are getting him a bargain level price.

Adam Hadwin is a relatively good ballstriker who stays out of trouble and although he lacks much power, he is a fantastic putter which gives him plenty of opportunities to score, particularly on easier courses like a couple that are in play this week. Hadwin finished in 6th place last season at the new setup for this event and had a nice season last year overall as he started to make the cut more consistently and was also able to post six Top-25 finishes. The worry for Hadwin is usually distance on courses, but that is not a problem this week which means that players like Castro and Hadwin will not be at as much of a disadvantage as normal to some of the bigger hitters which should allow their strengths to shine.

Rounding out the core group this week is Patrick Reed. I just could not see fading the top player in the field yet again and Patrick Reed really is the class of this field. He won here in 2014, although his performances at this event have been a little uneven over the years. Reed looked good at Kapalua two weeks ago, battling through the flu to finish in 6th place for the week. He should arrive here feeling much better and looking to get this season off on the right foot. When he is not too wild off the tee, there is not much that can stop Reed who has one of the best short games on tour and is clutch with his putter when the pressure is on as he showed at The Ryder Cup in the fall. For his price, I could not get a larger share without sacrificing below, but at 30%, we are still going to own him at a higher percentage than the rest of the field which I am willing to live with.

SECONDARY

Martin Laird -7800 – 25% – steady player, made six straight cuts here w four of those finishes in the Top-25, looked good in the fall, well rounded game overall
Hudson Swafford – 7900 – 25% – has made 18 straight cuts, would use him more, but can’t put together four straight solid rounds and caps his upside, good ball striker and putter
Paul Casey – 10000 – 25% – burned us all badly last week, but looked fine after putting miserably Thursday, a great bounce back play
Charles Howell III – 9900 – 20% – just continues to excel putting up consistent Top-25 finishes, not as excited with the price this week, but his game is almost that good now to merit it
Jamie Lovemark – 9600 – 20% – long ball hitter and strong player on Par 5 holes, finished in 4th a week ago and 6th here last years, a USC product, should be comfortable
David Lingmerth – 7300 – 20% – two 2nd place finishes here and has made the cut in all four starts, still a wildcard to me as I never know when he will show up, balanced game
Jason Dufner – 9200 – 20% – defending champion here, like Palmer, he looked great last week on Thursday before crumbling on Friday, love his chances to bounce back this week
Luke List – 8600 – 15% – emerging talent, I keep thinking he is not for real and he keeps proving me wrong, 5 straight Top-15 finishes, 6th here last season, excellent Par 5 scoring
Brendan Steele – 9300 – 15% – from the area (Riverside), played well two seasons ago here w a 2nd place finish, long hitter with a good tee to green game and good with Par 5 scoring
Kevin Na – 8800 – 15% – consistent cut maker with Top-10 potential on any given week, finished 3rd here last season and has three Top-10 finishes in this event
Cameron Tringale – 6700 – 15% – terrible statistically, but grew up nearby and has always handled this event well, making the cut in all six of his starts here with decent upside for the price

TERTIARY

Bill Haas – 10500 – 10% – two time champion of the event, looked good a week ago, if his putter is there, he can be competitive any week
Chez Reavie – 7500 – 10% – finished with an impressive final round last weekend, tends to be a streaky player so hopefully that was the start of a strong stretch
Keegan Bradley – 7400 – 10% – cut maker who blew the cut a week ago, steady ball striker w a shaky putter, a nice price for a bounce back play
Soren Kjeldsen – 7000 – 10% – is a better player than his price would indicate, but also missed the cut last week, should be low owned and has reasonable upside
Anirban Lahiri – 7000 – 10% – yet again, another player who underperformed last week who is way better than his prices indicates, played well here a year ago and is usually consistent making cuts
Cameron Smith – 7000 – 10% – looked great last week and continues to grow into one of the emerging young talents on tour, building off the success he had in the fall
Bryson DeChambeau – 6800 – 10% – was sick in his opening round last week and nearly had to WD, but fought through adversity to post a respectable finish, lot of scoring potential in his game
Emiliano Grillo – 9800 – 5% – talented player, great from tee to green, does not make many mistakes, wish I had more room for him, but not a fan of the price versus overall upside potential
Henrik Norlander – 6800 – 5% -playing well of late after a respectable 2016 campaign, made 11 cuts in his last 12 starts
Brandon Stone – 7000 – 5% – intriguing player to watch this season, playing really well of late on the Euro Tour with a recent win, worth a small buy as these players do tend to struggle a bit when coming over to the PGA Tour initially
Alex Cejka – 6800 – 5% – very sound statistically for the event, has made the cut here his last four starts with two Top-25 finishes
Colt Knost – 6500 – 5% – after knocking the rust off last week and hopefully shaking off his injury from last season, he should be ready to go at an event he’s played well at in recent years
Bud Cauley – 6000 – 5% – really struggled in the fall, but played well late last season, finished 14th here last year, a lot of upside for this low of a price

[/cointent_lockedcontent]