The First Tee – The Safeway Open

Welcome to the 2016-2017 PGA TOUR SEASON!!! After a brief vacation, we are back at the first tee, but this time there seems to be something special in the air – or so we thought. Tiger Woods announces, just after salaries are announced, that he’s withdrawing.

Yearly Roundup

Whether you’re a first time reader, or been with me for a while, the object is to help you all become more informed and hopefully earn some good money along the way. I provide a weekly strategy review of the high volume “pros” as well as my thoughts for the upcoming tournament. Want to see a specific user on the list? Hear my thoughts on developing trends? Feel free to tweet me and follow me @dfsgolfer23 with any questions suggestions or comments. Enjoy Reading!

Weekly Roundup– The Tour Championship

Prior to the 2015-2016 year, avid golf fans were very used to seeing a meltdown of epic proportions from DJ. Whether it’s the “ghost” penalty stroke, or the three putt, time and time again DJ would blow a victory that was seemingly his, and DJ returned to that form again at the TC, blowing not only this tournament but the FedEx Cup as well.

My Fantasy Week Recap: All over Ryan Moore helped me end my 2015-2016 PGA Tour season on a high note, placing relatively well in the Pressure Putt Championship, and other good finishes in the 4$ Drive the Green Championship.

The Winning Strategy: With only 30 golfers, you needed to have all three in the playoff, as well as at least 2 others in the top 10. Phil Mickelson provided some good value of golfers placing outside the top 15, with 78 DK points.

Right & Wrong
• Where I went Wrong- Not enough Rory
• Where I went Right-Chappell and Moore

Player Ownership Analysis

With two big contests this week, I’ll focus on the Pressure Putt Championship and the Drive the Green Championship for the results.

SaahilSud – Ending the year on a very high note, Saahil had a nice player mix. Let’s check out and see if he used the whole field.

• Results:
o $4- 150 Entries entered: Best Finish-16th, 90th
o $400-20 Entries Entered: Best Finish- 5th, 10th, 16th x2, 25th, 47th, 60th, 75th, 78th 81st 11/20 lineups cashed.

• Players Used-
o $4- 25/30 Players used
o $400- 14 Players used

• Player Own %- $4 used for example. Not many differences
o Gary Woodland- 72%
o Bubba/Hideki- 67%
o JB-57%
o Charl-54%
o Rory-53%
o Berger/Spieth/Mickelson/Kuchar- 30%
o Ryan Moore- 26%

Jetblackx – After a solid week in Atlanta, let’s see if Jetblackx could continue the success into the Tour Championship. However, I’ll stop you all right there, as this famed user decided to take Jason Day at a 95% clip in the $400 and a 66% clip in the $4. As you can imagine, that killed the results.

• Results:
o $4-150 Entries-0 in top 100
o $400-20 Entries: 0 lineups cashed

• Players Used-
o $4-26 Players used
o $400-23 Players used

• Player Own % 4$
o Kisner-74%
o Dufner/Day/Na-65%
o Spieth-46%
o Mickelson-36%
o DJ-35%
o Scott-32%
o Reed/Mcilroy-25%

PriestsApp – Another good performance at the BMW for our third resident user. Let’s see if he could continue that success into the TC.

• Results:
o $4- 150 Entries entered: Best Finish: 290th
o $400- 20 Entries Entered: Best Finish- 54th, 95th, 119th, 163rd, 190th 5/20 lineups cashed.

• Players Used-
o $4- 28/30 Players used
o $400- 21 Players used

• Player Own %- 3$ & 33$
o Na*Ouch*-71%
o Spieth-59%
o Kuchar- 49%
o DJ-45%

AEJones – After taking home the trophy in the $300 buy in last week, Mr. Jones did not find the same success here in East Lake.

• Results:
o $4- 8 Entries Entered: Best Finished- None in the top 200
o $400- 12 Entries Entered: Best Finishes- 61st 3/12 Lineups Cashed
o $4- 36 Players used

• Players Used:
o $4- 18 players used
o $400- 18 Players used

• Player Own %- 400*
o Day-61%
o Koekpa-48%
o Bubba-40%
o Casey-39%
o Schwartzel-36%
o DJ/Dufner-25%
o Hoffman/Palmer-24%
o Spieth/Na/Thomas-23%

ChipotleAddict – The results of the TC fail to compare to the story that broke last week that he and his brother (username: Papagates) were being investigated by DraftKings after Papagates turned in, among many other top finishes, a tie for first place in the Millionaire Maker Week 4 NFL contest. The alleged penalty comes from both users “sharing in profits” and thus improving their odds to win by both max entering contests. This has been a big problem for DraftKings in its pursuit to make DFS legal in every state, as some hesitation has come from “un-fair advantages” given to these players that can max enter. We have already seen the max number of entries reduced significantly, 500-200- to the now 150, and I can imagine this is something DK will take very seriously. As far as the TC goes, he did not participate in these contests.

CSURAM88 – After very minimal participation in the BMW, it was the same for this contest as well.

Results:
o $400- 5 Entries Entered: Best Finishes- 0/5 lineups cashed

• Player Used:
o $400-16 players used

• Player Ownership %-
o Snedeker/Scott-80%
o Walker/Kuchar/Thomas/Kisner/Berger/Matsuyama/Schwartzel/Grillo- 40%

PSBC22 – Back on the list after a brief rest bit, let’s see if max entering could help his results.

• Results
o $4- 150 Entries entered: Best Finish-475th
o $400-20 Entries Entered: Best Finish- 47th 70th 8/20 lineups cashed

• Players Used:
o $4- 29 Players Used
o $400- 23 Players Used

• Player Ownership %- $4
o NA-71%
o Spieth-59%
o Kuckar-49%
o DJ-45%
o Dufner-42%
o Moore/Matsuyama-39%
o Scott/Schwartzel/Grillo-30%

FlavorFlav – The rapper is back and this time as the breakthrough performer of the week. Let’s see why.

• Results
o $4- 4 Entries entered: Best Finish-455th
o $400-13 Entries Entered: Best Finish- 3rd, 8th, 61, 70th, 88th 9/13 lineups cashed

• Players Used:
o $400- 13 Players Used

• Player Ownership %- $4
o Moore/Grillo- 93%
o Berger- 85%
o Matsuyama/Spieth-47%
o Mickelson/Casey/Scott-39%
o Rory-23%

The Safeway Open:

1. Approach shots 175-200 seems to be the highest % of shots taken amongst the winners the last few years. However, a significant % is taken under 100 yards so that’s a very interesting statistic to look at as well – Garrigus, Points, Lingmerth, Bohn, Mickelson

2. Tee to Green – Casey, Simpson, Kuchar, Bradley, Garrigus

3. Par 5 Scoring – Varner, Howell, Steele, Mickelson, Thomas

4. Scrambling Average – Mickelson, Kuchar, Casey, Na, Simpson

5. Birdie or Better % – Mickelson, Garrigus, Kuchar, Thompson, Howell III

Player Focus: The Safeway Open

On the Rise: I was able to sift through and score 1/3 playoff contenders as well as the 4th place finisher. However, I did have Kevin Na who was DFL. I try to leave out the top 5% of the field out of this section.

• Tiger Woods – $8,800…. NOT… Maybe in January? Maybe March at the Valspar? Maybe never?

• Kevin Na – $9,900 Mr. DFL himself, Na after his “sprint round” Sunday in East Lake where he actually played reasonably well seeing as he was running in between shots, has had a nice few weeks at home with his newborn. Kevin will look to try make good for losing in a playoff to Grillo last year here in Napa.
o Price/Points Return (P/PR: This is the normal breakeven point for the respected golfer. In golf we try and use a 10x Return as compared to football where we look for a 5x return.
o 99 DK Points

• Johnathan Vegas – $9,100 A really nice 2015-2016 for Vegas, making it all the way to the TC. Really one of the surprises of the season starts off a familiar venue where he placed 10th last year. Missing out by just 1 or two golfers in the 3/5 stats above I like his game for this course.
o P/PR= 91

• Jason Kokrak – $8,100 Another nice surprise from the 2015-16 season, Kokrak looks to get his season off to a better start than he did last year, where he was DQ’d from the event. Coming in with the 24th best Tee to Green game from last year mixed with his distance off the tee give him the ability to make some eagles here in Wine Country.
o P/PR=81

• Hudson Swafford – $7,800 A really solid year for Swafford making it all the way to the BMW where he came in 56th, Hudson makes his way back to Napa where he has found some prior success placing 17th and 9th in his previous 2 appearances.
o P/PR=78

• Grayson Murray*– $7,500 If you have been part of the FGI community for a while and have been reading Keegan Scott’s Web.com pieces, then you already know who this is, and might have a leg up in this tournament. *More on that in the next section. Second on last year’s money list behind Wesley Bryan and first during the Web.com finals series. A teammate of another Spartan that has already made big noise on tour, Jon Rahm, Murray makes his first start as a rookie on tour. He also was first in par 5 scoring and 4th in driving distance on the Web.com tour this year, so this course could set up well for him.
o P/PR=75

• Robert Garrigus – $7,100 – My stats pick of the week, Garrigus shows up in 2/5 in the categories above. Priced at 7100 it’s a pretty decent value, even with his only appearance being a missed cut. However, he did withdraw from his previous tournament “The Barclays” so monitor that situation if you plan to roster him.
o P/PR=71

• Michael Thompson – $7,000 Earning his 2016-17 card by winning the Albertsons Boise Open, and coming in second during the Web.com finals series, Thompson heads back to Napa where he his 0/2 in his two starts.
o P/PR=70

• Blayne Barber – $6,600 Not having to go the Web.com finals series to earn his card, Barber made the playoffs and placed 41st at the Barclays, not quite good enough to make it to the DB. After a nice 6-week vacation he returns to Northern Colorado where he’s missed one cut and placed 39th in his two attempts.
o P/PR=66

• With no golfers under 6K this week I’ll try to provide some great value plays in my section.

2016-2017 Tour Rookies: Last season, we saw Emiliano Grillo, Si Woo Kim, and many other rookies perform at a very high level and compete on tour. I don’t expect that to change this year. As I mentioned before, if you haven’t read Keegan Scott’s write-ups you should, as in my next section I’ll give you my top 5 rookie players of the week. *Not including Grayson Murray

• Chen-Tsung Pan – $7,400 – We first saw Mr. Pan competing for Chinese Tapaei in the Olympics, as this Washington Huskie earned his card by placing 11th in the top 25 combined ranking. Seven top tens in his 2015-16 campaign Pan comes in as one of the most highly touted rookies.

• JT Poston – $6,500 – This North Carolina Tarheel product is 1/3 ACC golfers on the list. Poston had 4 top 10s in 18 starts in his 2015-16 season which earned him 11th on the combined money list.

• Ollie Schniederjans – $6,500 – For those of you that have been playing DFS-Golf for a few years, you’ll remember his name from the 2015 British Open, as well as a few PGA tournaments. He had to go through the Web.com as he was still an amateur during that tournament, and finished 7th in the top 25 combined ranking. A win and 5 top 10 finishes in his 2015-16 season, I like Ollie to make a big splash on tour. His Georgia Tech teammate is up next.

• Richy Werenksi – $6300 – This New England native, earned his card by placing 4th in the top 25 “combined rank” for the Web.com tour. He had 4 top 10s and 1 win last year on the Web.com. A rookie product from Georgia Tech, he’s used to highly competitive golf coming from the ACC.

• Seamus Power – $6,200 – Another Olympian makes this list, as Power contended for a medal at the Olympics. At the ripe age of 29, Power is considered a late bloomer and was able to parlay his Olympic success into 1 win and 3 top ten finishes in his 2015-16 campaign. He earned his card by placing 12th in the combined money list.

Pick to Click: Coin flip last week. I thought tails never fails, but this time I was wrong it came up Heads. Nice work Rory. I’ll try to get back on it this week. This category this week features any golfer listed above 10,000.

Justin Thomas – $10,400 – As much fun as that Ryder Cup was, not being a participant, and one of the last three left of the team, I expect Thomas to earn his second PGA Tour victory to start his campaign to make the 2018 team. Last year he found success in Napa finishing just one shot out of the playoff.

Heading South – Fades

If this were a Ryder Cup review, I would have absolutely failed you picking Reed, but it wasn’t and I gave you good advice there.

Roberto Castro – $9,300 – finishing 17th in his home town of Atlanta, Castro travels all the way to Napa where he placed 69th last year. A really solid year in 2015-16 for Castro, I just think this price is a little too high, and can’t see him winning. Not a total fad, but close.

The Pro Review: With a new year starting, I plan to update this regularly as lineup and roster construction is pivotal to everyone’s success in DFS.

Using Stats from Last Year: Full Field Statistics
Players Used: 38
Top Golfer % Owned- 63%

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