The Daily Spin – DraftKings Daily Fantasy Golf Preview – Shriners Open

It took a few weeks, but it is finally starting to feel like golf season again as some of the better players on tour start to make their way back to play in a few events this fall to keep themselves ready for 2020 and also to gather up a few FedEx Cup points so that they do not fall too far behind when the winter events start running in January. We are also in a nice stretch of familiar fall venues, though that will change next week as the tour heads back to Houston where it used to stop the week prior to The Masters each spring.

Last week produced one of the more heartwarming finishes of the year. Cameron Champ, who won at Sanderson Farms last fall, won the Safeway Open in dramatic fashion as he nearly lost a seemingly insurmountable lead to Adam Hadwin and avoided a playoff with a birdie on the final hole to seal the win. It was an amazing win for Cameron who dedicated the win to his grandfather who recently entered hospice care. If you are unfamiliar with the story behind the relationship between Champ and his grandfather, be sure to go check it out. His grandfather learned golf back in the 1940s and then taught Cameron how to play when he was two years old in his backyard. They are a really tight family and I had the chance to walk a round watching Champ play back in January at Torrey Pines and his dad was there rooting him on every hole along the way. It was only recently that Champ even found out how bad the cancer was for his grandfather so I can barely imagine how he was feeling trying to get through the tournament this past week. It certainly has not been an easy year in 2019 for Champ and his family so it was great to see him get another win as he’s a very talented young player with a bright future.

As for me, it was a battle for the week, but I came out ahead. My cash lineup got off to a rough start and I was not sure how things were going to go when I only managed t0 get 4/6 through the cut, but in the end, it held on and I was able to double up. Tringale, Frittelli, Morikawa and Reavie all made it through the cut and the last three all put forth a nice effort over the weekend to get me into the green. Ryan Moore tripped me up at the top, which was disappointing, though his inconsistency never surprises me. I also bought into the Tom Hoge momentum for one extra week and got what I deserved for using him in cash games. At the end of every season, I always tell myself, Now this year, I am not ever going to make a marginal play in cash games. It did not take long for me to blow that up this fall. Hoge had been playing well and it seemed like a spot where he could keep it going for himself, but alas, you just don’t play golfers like Tom Hoge in cash games. Period. Full Stop. Insert whatever dumb ‘talk to the hand’ phrase you like. Hoge has been around long enough so that I should know better than to trust 3-5 solid tournaments of play. Sometimes it just gets too tempting to stretch that last dollar with a cheaper golfer, but it bit me last week. I would like to think that I will not make that mistake again, but it is hard not to when enough numbers align so we will just need to work on curbing it where we can.

On the GPP side, my gut instinct worked out well with my top couple of names as JT roared back after a terrible start to finish fourth and Adam Scott finished 17th, though far better of an outcome than Patrick Cantlay, who was 40th, or Hideki Matsuyama who missed his third cut in his last seven starts. Other heavily owned players that fared well for us included Dylan Frittelli, Collin Morikawa and Charles Howell III who all finished inside the Top-10. In addition to Ryan Moore, Byeong Hun An was a massive disappointment for our core as he whiffed on the cut badly. Just a week after getting close to his first win, he looked deflated last week and was not competitive. It was a rare missed cut for An and not something I see as an ongoing issue as his tee to green game is too good for him to struggle for long. I also stuck with Bronson Burgoon for a week too long as a core. He’s played really well of late, but until he does so for a full season, we still have to consider him as a player that will have some flashes during the season, but who also is likely to blow the cut regularly as well.

This week, the tour heads to Las Vegas and TPC Summerlin. It’s not right on the strip out there, but I am sure a few players will find their way down to the action at some point. It fits in well with most of the other fall tour stops in that the course is pretty easy for the most part and usually leads to quite a bit of scoring and does not mentally tax the players that much. This is definitely not an event where you will hear a lot of grumbling from the players. The course plays at 7,250 yards and is a Par 71. That would not raise eyebrows when considering the length, but Vegas has a couple thousand feet of altitude to contend with so that shortens the course up by 5-10% which means that a lot more styles of play can compete here, though having a great driver to work with will certainly help and can shorten the course into a drive and pitch style affair, though up until the two most recent winners (Cantlay & Bryson), we had seen plenty of plodders reach the winner’s circle who were strong with their irons and short game to get the job done. The fairways are somewhat narrow, but the rough is kept short, the trees are scattered and the desert vegetation is only in play on the worst of tee shots this week. The greens are bentgrass so be sure to check out our Turf Splits tool for help on the greens, but mostly, we’ll be looking for strong iron play, a quality short game and the ability to score a lot of birdies this week.

Key Stats

Strokes Gained Tee to Green: 25%
Birdie or Better Percentage: 25%
Strokes Gained Putting: 20%
Scrambling: 10%
Proximity: 10%
Par 5 Scoring: 5%
SGAPP: 5%

 

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