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

Each year, I always worry about the events in between the US Open and The Open Championship. With every passing week, the fields get a little weaker with the quality of players up top dropping off gradually until we end up with a bunch of young, up and coming players to lead the charge by the time we get to the John Deere Classic. During these weeks, you always see at least one column drop a little later than normal. It is not so much the writing process that takes longer, but the selection of my key four starting players for my cash lineup that I agonize over the most. Sometimes it takes me three hours of going back and forth over every possible lineup before I finally have a roster that I feel comfortable utilizing for the week. With fewer golfers available that feel like automatic plays, I do my best to tackle the value on the board available to us to put together something that looks reasonable each week.

Surprisingly, this year has produced one of my better runs in cash games of late. The last five weeks, I’ve managed to sail through to the green beginning with the US Open and continuing on all the way through the JDC last week. It appeared that Zach Johnson would severely disappoint us early on last week, but he squeezed through the cut on Friday and played well over the weekend, locking down another 6/6 performance for my cash roster. I know that a lot of you do not play cash games, but for me, I take a great deal of satisfaction in being able to slowly grind out a profit each week, even if my GPP teams are not producing big results. In this past year, I have noticed a lot of FGI logos in the green on cash game leaderboards so I am pleased that the strategy is paying off, but I do want to write about how I build my cash team each week and how I differentiate it from a GPP roster.

A few years back, people would make the asinine argument that there was no difference between a cash game roster and a GPP roster in PGA contests. This never rang true for Jeff and I and we were always quick to point out what made it a silly notion. Everything about building your cash game roster in golf revolves around each player’s ability to make the cut. In PGA contests, making or missing the cut means everything to your team’s success in a given week. In GPP contests, you are looking to maximize finishing position as much as possible. If you build a lot of lineups in the $5 or the mini-max, you go into the week knowing that you are not going to get all (or even many) teams fully intact through the cut. You are selecting a player pool with golfers who you believe have high potential upside and balance that against projected ownership. You are going to use players that have a high ceiling, even if that means taking some risks on guys that have a low floor as well and who miss more than their share of cuts.

I keep seeing smart players make mistakes in cash games so I find myself wanting to share some of the things that spin my head in circles each week. I think a lot of times, these DFS players are so used to building teams for MLB/NBA/NFL that they take for granted the importance of the cut. They are so used to plugging in players like Le’Veon Bell or Russell Westbrook at the top and then unlocking value with backups pushed into starting roles for other teams that they think the same thing can be done for golf. On some level, this could be a practical approach if the cut was not an issue. If you could simply look towards the top for four players and then more or less get value from your cheaper players, you could be successful. However, once you factor in the cut and the devastating impact that it has on your lineups, you will see that this is rarely an optimal strategy for your cash builds. Remember, when you are building your cash game lineups, you are not looking to beat the entire field, just half, or slightly more than half for double ups. You do not need to maximize your points, only to minimize your risks. This is where I am seeing the biggest mistakes from week to week.

The most common error I am seeing in cash game builds right now is paying up for big stars in weak fields during filler events. Yes, every once in a while DJ or Rory are going to crush one of these events, but more often than not, they let their foot off the gas, work on a part of their game and will only occasionally contend. In this case, making the cut is not enough for us as cash game owners. They must be in contention to justify the extra $2500-3000 that it takes to spend up to get that player. When you allocate those dollars to one player, it takes away from your ability to spend on other solid players that week and forces you to navigate tougher waters in the middles and lower $7k range to fill out your team. In these weaker fields, ginger stepping through that mine field is no easy task so even if you get something like a 9th place finish that week out of your star, you made things much harder on yourself in selecting other players who have a high probability of making the cut.

Generally speaking, I like to limit my spending on players to below $10k each week. Once you cross that threshold, you start to put a lot of extra pressure on yourself for constructing the rest of your team. Now, in a week with a major tournament, this is less of an issue. Take a look at the field this week and see the types of players in the middle and upper $7k range that we have to work with: Webb Simpson, Ian Poulter, Marc Leishman and Rafa Cabrera Bello. Now look at the names last week that we were working with in that same range: Peter Malnati, Cameron Tringale, Vaughn Taylor and MacKenzie Hughes. Notice a difference there? It should be obvious that in weeks with stronger fields, we have a lot more flexibility in the way we construct our team.

The other big mistake that I see is in putting your cash game success or failure onto the shoulders of one player. We’ve discussed at length the importance of ownership in GPP contests. We created the framework for it in DFS Golf years ago and were the first in the industry to publicize it so thoroughly. There is typically an optimal range to work off of when constructing your rosters each week to avoid being too chalky or too contrarian. This is a concept that does not apply as much to cash games, but I do find that there is one specific application where it is worth mentioning.

You do not want to be out on an island with a player in your cash games. There is very little benefit to being an owner of a player who is owned by just a few percent of the field. In GPP contests, you want to find lower owned players with high upside so that you and only a few other players will benefit when things work out. On the flip side, are you comfortable being one of just a handful of players who owns someone unreliable like Danny Lee, Carlos Ortiz or Josh Teater in a cash game where their best possible performance only rewards you with a double? When you own these types of players and are out there on that island, what you have essentially done is to put your entire cash game life on the success or failure of a very mediocre at best type of player. If they miss the cut, you go down and take nobody else with you along the way, unless you find a second player on your roster, also largely unowned, who outperforms their salary dramatically. Now I do not know about you, but I am not interested in flipping a coin on whether or not some random name is going to show up on a certain week because of an isolated rolling stat over a few rounds that points to him being in play.

When I build my cash teams, I want to build it with six, high floor players each week. I do not mind overlap in ownership on my cash game rosters. If I own a golfer that takes a nose dive and I am the only one to use him, I am likely done for the week. On the other hand, if I own a golfer that is 40% owned who misses the cut, then I am likely still alive. Therefore, if two golfers end up exactly equal in weighting for the week after you have finished your research and you could choose one or the other for your cash team, it should make sense by now to pick the one that is higher owned. Going contrarian does not have a big enough payoff in a double up to make it worth the risk of putting so much pressure on a single roster spot. Most weeks, you are not going to hit 6/6 through to the weekend. It is inevitable that even the best golfers are going to surprise you some weeks with a missed cut. Our goal each week is to look for ways to minimize risk, while maximizing value. We have been able to do that really well so far this season, but the process is one that requires application each week so that we never let sloppy habits develop. The difference between a winning and losing year in cash games is only a swing of a few close weeks one way or the other.

Now that I have that out of my system, we can move on to the final major of the year, The Open Championship. This is a fun major that I always look forward to every July. The courses that we see for this major are so much different than anything else that we see throughout the rest of the year on tour that it almost feels like a different sport. There are American links style courses out there and they are more prevalent by the year for the US Open, but they do not generally have the same sort of feel as the courses of Ireland, Scotland and England. The most important consideration that comes into play at this event is the weather as that is the main defense for all of these courses with the location near the coast and few if any trees to speak of to protect the players from the wind. When you do your planning, I would hold off on building your lineups until Wednesday afternoon or evening. If there is one thing that you can count on in trying to track the weather here, it is that it is constantly changing. The forecast today could change dramatically by tonight. Jeff had one of his bigger wins here in 2015 based on a last minute read of the weather which showed an opening in the AM wave on Thursday which he capitalized on in winning a seat for the live final that year.

As of right now, I am not seeing any real data that would suggest that one wave would have a distinct advantage over the other. On Thursday, the winds will be around 13-15 mph all day long with gusts of 21-24 mph throughout the day. Even in looking at the hour by hour forecast, I do not see a single hour where a group of players would have an obvious advantage over the others. Light rain is also expected in the afternoon, but nothing notable for now. On Friday, the weather looks surprisingly nice at this point. We may actually see some sunshine in the morning with winds at around 8 mph and gusts up to 10 mph. In the afternoon, the sun looks to give way to the clouds, but the winds fall down to 2-5 mph with gusts up to 7 mph. Light rain is expected on Friday afternoon. Saturday, the weather looks even better with light winds all day and and no current rain expected in the forecast. Sunday, it appears that the winds may pick up by the end of the day, but not so much as to look like a big factor right now. Could this be setting up for one of the easier Open Championships in terms of scoring? Keep an eye on this link the net couple of days and into the weekend to see how much thing change.

If the winds are not going to be a problem, that will really change the way this course plays for the week. When the winds kick up, it forces players to either club down or risk hitting the ball into the deep fescue that can be extremely penal. With driver more available this week, it brings more of the heavy hitters back into the mix for me as I will discuss below in the Player Pool section of the column.

I am not going to discuss the course too much at length in my column. I think Adam did a great job this week in breaking down the details in his column so I will give a brief overview and then get on to the meat of the column for the week. Royal Portrush is a Par 71 course that plays at a little over 7,300 yards. It is a traditional links style course on the North Atlantic coast and is considered one of the top courses in the world outside of the US. As is typical, the course will play as challenging as the weather permits this week. The fairways are on the wide side so if the winds are down, there should not be a lot of trouble off the tee. If players do miss, however, they could be in real trouble with the 60 or so bunkers around the course and if you have never seen a pot bunker before, they can be extremely problematic to get out of due to depth and steepness. The greens will be a reasonable size, but will have a great deal of undulation and steep runoffs around the edges which means that players are going to need to be able to scramble in order to save big numbers this week. For a deeper dive, check out Adam Daly’s column here or Ryan Baroff’s here. Both did an excellent job this week in analyzing the course and talking about different issues to consider when looking at how players will approach the tournament.

KEY STATS

Strokes Gained Tee to Green: 30%
Strokes Gained Putting: 25%
Birdie or Better Percentage: 20%
Scrambling: 10%
Proximity: 10%
Bogey or Worse Percentage: 5%

 

PLAYER POOL

CASH GAME PLAYS

I feel really good about my cash game lineup this week, but I am a little conflicted. I sat down on Sunday night to put it together and I had my team set up within five minutes and really liked the look of it right away. I talked to Statboy about it the next day and after he ran his model, he had come up with the same team. Jeff was able to guess the team correctly on his first try and when Aaron e-mailed us the final model for the week, he included the first three optimal teams that popped up and of course, the lineup I had constructed was at the top of the page.

Why is this important to know? I think there is going to be a ton of overlap on lineups this week. I know that people will foolishly still take some silly chances this week as they always do, but this will be a tight week for cash as it will be harder for our opponents to make stupid mistakes with so many good golfers available in the middle ranges. We’re not going to see people throwing out Danny Lee or Josh Teater in cash games this week. Even in the lower $7k range we have players available to us that have been crushing the European Tour over the last few months so it will take some really terrible decisions for folks to put together a bad team this week. What this means is that we will just have to trust our instincts when it comes to making great value picks and hope that nobody trips up along the way. Even if one of our players does happen to slip up, I cannot envision a scenario where any of them will be owned by less than 25% of the field so we are certainly not going to be out on an island this week with any questionable players.

When you look over the names I have listed for cash games, you will notice that it stops at $9,500. That is purposeful. I am sure that Rory will gain some traction this week, even in cash games. He’s my favorite play of the week among the top names and I am going to own plenty of him in GPP contests. That said, if you pick Rory to lead your cash team, you are definitely going to miss out on some great players in the $8-9k range this week. I think you run into two problems by doing this. First, I think that those names in the middle to upper $8k to middle $9k range are all very capable of winning the tournament this week. Do you want to risk only having Rory as a big horse with a shot to win or would you rather have four golfers that I think could win? The other issue in choosing Rory over the other four is that all of them are likely to be very chalky this week. I am guessing that Rory may hit 15-20% in cash for the week, but the guys that I am going to use in the upper range will likely push 40-70%. If one of those heavy chalk plays makes a deep run and he is not on your team, you are likely in trouble. On the flip side, if Rory dominates and finishes well, not having him on your cash team will not be the kiss of death as it is likely that those rosters will have a tougher time being 6/6 and there are fewer overall to deal with.

 

Xander Schauffele	9500
Francesco Molinari	9400
Patrick Cantlay	9000
Adam Scott	8800
Matt Kuchar	8700
Jason Day	8600
Hideki Matsuyama	8500
Henrik Stenson	8400
Paul Casey	8300
Gary Woodland	8200
Matt Wallace	8100
Ian Poulter	7700
Marc Leishman	7700
Webb Simpson	7600
Rafa Cabrera Bello	7500
Brandt Snedeker	7400
Patrick Reed	7400
Zach Johnson	7200
Bernd Wiesberger	7100
Erik Van Rooyen	7100

 

Patrick Cantlay – This is a discount on where Cantlay should be priced. Look at his tee to green game and his total strokes gained numbers and they are significantly better than many of the names that are above him this week, which makes him a lock for me at $9k in cash games. You could certainly considering going up a little higher to start your team, but I do not think you gain anything by passing on Cantlay. His tee to green game has been solid the last couple of years since he returned to the tour, but where I am really impressed is in how his short game has improved so dramatically this season. If we take a deeper look back than normal, we see that over his last 36 rounds, Cantlay ranks 9th among this superior field in Strokes Gained Short Game, far better than most of the more expensive names and bested from tee to green b just two players in DJ and Rory. His win at The Memorial solidified him as an elite player by beating a very talented field and the next step will be to win a major. He finished 12th in his first shot at The Open last season and should only improve from there.

Adam Scott – In his last five starts, Scott has finished 12th, 18th, 8th, 2nd and 7th. Three of those were the first three majors of the year and the other two were The Memorial and The Players Championship. Scott has taken a more laid back approach to his schedule this year and it seems to be paying dividends as he’s looked fresh this year and been in contention repeatedly. He can still hit it 300 yards off the tee and his iron play is as good as it has ever been. He s 4th on tour this season in SGATG and the big upgrade has been with his putter where he has made enormous strides and is now among the top putters on tour. Top top it off, he’s been one of the best on tour year after year at The Open, having made the cut nine straight times with seven of those resulting in a Top-25 finish and four of those resulting in a Top-10. He’s one of the best values in all formats this week.

Matt Kuchar – It’s tough to envision a major where Kuch is not an automatic cash game play and this week will be no different. Kuch is having one of his best seasons on tour and returns to The Open after close calls the last two years when he finished 2nd in 2017 and 9th last year. As far as recent numbers, he ranks 4th in SG Total over the last 24 rounds, right behind Cantlay and Scott. His putter has gotten hot of late and he ranks 5th in SGP during that same time frame. He’s made 16/17 cuts on the season, has twelve Top-25 finishes, eight Top-10s, two 2nds and two wins this season. Winning his first major would be a great way to end the season and is very much in play this week.

Henrik Stenson – There were some rough patches for Henrik to start the season, including three straight missed cuts on the European Tour, but he righted the ship after that and really hit his stride just before the US Open. He’s now finished in the Top-10 in his last three starts and looked sharp in Scotland in finishing 4th last week. Henrik is an excellent links course player. He uses his three wood over a driver which tends to work well on these types of courses and gives him great control off the tee. His approach game is really where he stands out. He leads the PGA Tour in SGAPP by a pretty dramatic margin and the rest of his game seems to be falling into place just in time. Over the last decade, he’s 9/9 in making the cut at The Open with five Top-25 finishes, three finishes of 3rd or better and a win three years ago. He’s priced at the salary average this week, but again, that seems way off compared to others above him who do not have his form or historical play at links style courses.

 

GPP PLAYER POOL

CORE – 25% – 50%

Rory McIlroy	11600
Justin Rose	9900
Xander Schauffele	9500
Patrick Cantlay	9000
Adam Scott	8800
Matt Kuchar	8700
Hideki Matsuyama	8500
Henrik Stenson	8400
Matt Wallace	8100
Webb Simpson	7600
Rafael Cabrera Bello	7500

 

Rory McIlroy – How can I not play Rory in Northern Ireland this week? He’s been great throughout the season, has two wins already and is dominant when it comes to The Open Championship where he has three finishes in the Top-5 the last three years and a win in 2014. His tee to green game is better than anyone else on tour this season and it is not close right now. He’s also improved his putter substantially over the last couple of years. He seems healthy this year and much more engaged from week to week than in the past when he admittedly seemed to take being on the tour for granted. Now, he looks like a guy who wants to go out and win every week. He’s made 12/13 cuts on the year and recorded an impressive, eleven Top-10 finishes. He will be heavily owned so if you use him, be sure to do so with purpose if you are looking to gain an edge. I will likely shoot for 35-40%.

Justin Rose – When we last saw Justin Rose, he was struggling in the final pairing at the US Open. What impressed me about Rose that week was not so much his 3rd place finish, but the fact that he could have such a bad week with his irons and still end up with a chance to win on Sunday. He did it with an incredible short game and that is what is so encouraging coming into this week. Rose has been very good at The Open over the last five years with four Top-25 finishes and two Top-10s and finished 2nd to Molinari a year ago. Outside of a bizarre missed cut at The Masters, Rose has had a nice year with a win and several near misses. He has not been quite as dominant as we have seen in the last two years, but we are also getting a nice discount on his price and I am not convinced that there is really that much of a difference between Rose and those priced above him this week.

Xander Schauffele – To me, Xander is almost as deserving as Brooks is for being a golfer to target in big tournaments. Outside of his win at the Greenbrier in 2017, most of his other great performances have been in big tournaments against elite fields. 2017: 5th US Open, 1st Tour Championship  2018: 2nd The Players Championship, 6th US Open, 2nd The Open Championship, 3rd BMW, 7th Tour Championship  2019: 1st WGC HSBC, 1st TOC, 2nd The Masters, 3rd US Open   How do I go against that over the last three years? He’s an excellent tee to green player who has really stepped up all parts of his game this year and in particular, his putter which should help him greatly in his pursuit of a 1st major win.

Hideki Matsuyama – Hideki has not had the big, breakthrough win at a major yet and for that reason, his price is shockingly low this week at just $8,500 even though he’s been really good all year and playing his best golf of the season over the last couple of months as he’s notched six straight Top-25 finishes. You already know how talented Hideki is from tee to green each season and his approach game is second only to Henrik Stenson this season. What is really exciting for Hideki fans is that his putter has been heating up of late and over the last 24 rounds among this field, he ranks 25th in SGP. If you have followed Hideki for any amount of time, you know just how amazing that stat is for him and how much it should help him at an event where he will need to sink some birdie putts to compete. He’s had mixed results at this event the last few years, going 4/6 in making the cut, but he does have three Top-20 finishes and I really do think we are getting the best Hideki this week that we will have seen at this event.

Matt Wallace – It is possible that rising talent, Matt Wallace gets overlooked this week due to the slew of elite players in the $8k range. I will not be one of those people as I have been watching him closely over the last few months and targeting him here as someone that I wanted to be overweight on this week. American fans should have been impressed with his play of late as he finished 3rd at the PGA Championship and then 12th at the US Open. He’s been in contention all over the place on the Euro Tour finishing 2nd the the DP World Tour Championship at the end of the last Euro season, finishing 2nd at the Omega Dubai Classic, 2nd at the British Masters and 3rd at the BMW International Open. He’s a solid tee to green player and has plenty of links course experience. I am expecting his excellent recent form in majors to continue this week.

Webb Simpson – There are not many value plays as strong as Webb Simpson this week at only $7,600. He was the highest owned golfer at the US Open and came through with a solid weekend performance to finish 16th for the week. Everyone knows how Webb fixed his putter over the last couple of years, but less are aware of how much his tee to green game has improved from this year over last as he is much better off the tee and in his approach game, areas that are likely more sustainable than a hot putter. He’s made 14/15 cuts on the season with ten Top-25 finishes and four Top-10s. He’s trending well at The Open having made four straight cuts and finished a career best, 12th last year. His short game should be the difference maker this week as he ranks 8th among this field over the last 24 round in SG Short so I think his floor is high this week with the potential there to crack the Top-10 if everything goes right.

Rafael Cabrera Bello – Before RCB headed off overseas to prepare for this tournament at a couple of links style courses, he had not been playing his best golf. He was making cuts, but the four events leading up to the Euro events were forgettable. Fast forward to this week and he’s now finished in the Top-10 in three straight starts in Europe and has been in contention to win. Add in that RCB played here back in 2012 at the Irish Open and it feels like things are lining up well him this week. On the season, he’s missed just one cut on the PGA Tour in sixteen starts and has eight Top-25 finishes. He has not always been elite at The Open, but did finish 4th two years ago and seems to be ready to contend this week.

 

SECONDARY – 15% – 20%

Jon Rahm	10600
Jason Day	8600
Paul Casey	8300
Marc Leishman	7700
Eddie Pepperell	7600
Patrick Reed	7400
Erik van Rooyen	7100
Bernd Wiesberger	7100
Michael Lorenzo-Vera	7000

 

TERTIARY – 10% – 15%

Shane Lowry	7900
Ian Poulter	7700
Tyrrell Hatton	7400
Brandt Snedeker	7400
Zach Johnson	7200
Jim Furyk	7100
Andy Sullivan	7000
Thomas Pieters	7000
Andrea Pavan	6400

 

SPRINKLE – 3% – 5%

Matthew Fitzpatrick	7600
Chez Reavie	7100
Joaquin Niemann	6900
Jorge Campillo	6900
Andrew Johnston	6800
Paul Waring	6600
Lucas Glover	6500