Mawhee’s Fantasy Golf Breakdown- Deutsche Bank Championship
@dfsarmy_Matt
The Golfing world heads to Norton, Mass. this week to play at TPC Boston. Last year Rickie Fowler came back from three down with eight to play, and defeated H. Stenson by one, to win the Deutsche Bank Championship. Charlie Hoffman finished third followed by a large group tied at -8 which included last weeks winner P. Reed. As much as I hate to say it, because I really hate looking to much into course history, it will defiantly play a larger than normal role in my rankings this week. Unlike some courses TPC Boston has made a regular appearance on the Tour schedule for a number of years. There are several golfers who have played 5+ tournaments on this course and the starts are from this decade. So for our course history at TPC Boston we have a much larger, more relevant, sample size than we’ve had at the last few courses on the schedule. I find twenty rounds over five different starts all within the last 10 years pretty viable info. At least more reliable than four rounds from one start fifteen years ago.
If you look back at last year Fowler won by ranking at or near the top of a few different stats. He ranked first in scrambling, which helped lead him to card two bogey free rounds. Fowler also holed 14 puts of ten feet or longer, more than anyone else that week. So there’s no surprise he ranked second in strokes gained putting as a result, and I can’t forget he also ranked sixth in GIR. So when I looked back at other top finishers here over the years a few of the stats Fowler shined in last year reappeared. It’s been GIR and putting more than any other stat, even driving distance for those who love bombers out there, that have lifted guys to victory on this course. These stats give us our jumping off point for the week but don’t go stat crazy. One thing I want to emphasis to newer PGA guys this week is don’t get WAY to hung up on stats. Something I weigh heavily each and every week is how well has someone played recently. Golf is a mental sport, bad shots and rounds, can stick with even the best in the world. Find golfers that fit the type of guy you want and then see whose had the hot hand.
Because of a few emails I received recently there’s a topic I wanted to touch base on. What I’m referring to is confidence. To be more specific confidence in your DFS game and how important having it is. The other day somebody who’ve I’ve talked dfs with before and has read my articles sent me a email. Basically he said “I took golfer X out of my line up for golfer Y that you liked more and I did worse.” I assume his point was he lost because I was wrong. News flash, good dfs players aren’t always right, would be nice though. People become good dfs players because they have a process, they stick to it, and there confident in the results. Now I would like to take this moment to say reading my article each week should defiantly be a part of your fantasy golf process. Let me get back to the point for now. Don’t get off a certain play because the golfer you likes been labeled a bomber or a finesse player and so and so on the golf channel said this course doesn’t fit. If you’ve done the research and you see the stats you want, trust your gut. If a certain play checks all the boxes your trying to fill that week don’t let me or any other person talk you off of it. Making money playing DFS requires a certain amount of confidence. Confidence you’ll never have if you can’t think back to your process of researching and building LUs, and draw from that plays you’ve made that no one else saw or resulted in a nice payday. The point I’m trying to make, after rambling on there, is don’t get to caught up in everyone else hype. Set a process for how you’ll go about your research each week and how that plays in to your own rankings. Translate that into a Line Up and set back and see what happens. If you win, repeat and see if it continues. If you don’t win, after more than just one or two tries for god sake, decide if and how to adjust. Be confident not only in your process but that you can win with it. If you don’t believe that, then I hope your playing dfs with the intent to loose. If your wondering, that’s not my goal.
Now to what the people want some picks. Remember this week the stats I weighed the heaviest were GIR, overall putting, and as much as I hate to say it course history. Of course if you’ve followed any of my picks in the past you know I’ll be on the look out for the guy with the hot hand that’s been under the radar as well. Picks will be sorted into different price ranges. A top,middle, and value tier with a few of my favorite plays and notable mentions. Plays in each tier will be listed in no particular order.
Top Tier ($9,000+)
Jason Day- Day is coming off a T4 at the Barclays and before that a 2nd place finish at the PGA. He leads the tour in strokes gained putting and in nine starts at TPC Boston six resulted in top twenties.
Jordan Speith- Speith comes in this week fresh off top 15 finishes in three of his last four starts. Jordan ranks 5th on the tour in strokes gained putting and over the last two weeks has been hitting more GIR than his year long figures indicating he may have figured some things out.
Sergio Garcia- Garcia rebounded nicely from a MC at the PGA to finish 8th at the Olympics where he flashed some of that world class ball striking. They say this course can really give it up to ball strikers and Sergio is one of the best on tour. For the year he’s hit just over 69% of GIR which ranks him 7th on tour and of course that could be higher but a few of his starts don’t count toward official tour rankings.
Notable Mentions– Phil Mickelson, E. Grillo, and L. Oosthuizen.
Middle Tier ($7,000-$8,900)
Bubba Watson– This guy is always a fantasy option, he has been very consistent this year and provides that huge upside we look for. Bubba ranks 14th on tour in GIR and for the year has avg right around 29 puts per round. Throw in that Watson has made the cut here six out of his last seven tries and he’s a solid play this week.
Kevin Kisner– Kisner has been in great form recently. He’s hit 72% of GIR and avg 29 ppr over his last three starts. Kisner did finish 12th here in 2015 with stats very similar to how hes been playing recently. Made the cut in his last seven starts.
Steve Stricker– On this course his adjusted round scoring is 68.1 dating back 7 years. He has a victory and a 2nd place finish here to look back on. Of course he can put with the best of them avg 28 puts per round and Stricker hits a respectable 63.8% of GIR.
Notable Mentions– B.Koepka, B. Snedeker, and Jim Furyk
Value Tier ($6,900 and below)
Sung Kang– If your asking yourself who in the world is that. I understand but hear me out. In his last four starts he hasn’t missed a cut and has two top 20 finishes. Kang avg a awesome 72.9% GIR, 29 puts per round, and 17 birdies a week in those four starts as well. He has probably been playing about as good as he possibly can so I plan to ride that wave this week and see if it cont.
Webb Simpson– There are a few concerns coming into this week for Simpson. Most notably he’s had some struggles with the flat stick. He’s avg over 30.7 puts per round in his last few starts so hopefully we get some improvment on that this week. He does have a few things going for him though. He hasn’t missed a cut on tour since the US Open. Since missing the cut on this course in 09 and 2010 he’s made it to the weekend five straight times including his win here in 2011 and 9th place finish in 2014. Aside from the putting woes Simpson is still a great ball striker and has hit almost 75% of GIR across his last 4 tournys. If he can turn around his putting this week he should be a safe bet to play the weekend and even contend.
Notable Mentions- Ryan Palmer and Adam Hadwin
My Fades of the Week- Dustin Johnson(more of a gut feeling) and Justin Rose(aside from win at Olympics struggled to hit greens and he’s missed the cut here 3 of his last 5 attempts)
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