The Tour heads to Mexico for the first World Golf Championship event of the 2019 Season as Phil Mickelson looks to defend his title!
My name is Josh Thomas, and I am a PGA and NFL Coach here at DFS Army! Welcome to the 2019 PGA Season! We here at DFS Army have got you covered this year with my weekly preview out on Sunday Nights, Chalk Donkey article breaking down the ownership projections, where to pivot, and GPP strategy out Tuesday Nights, and our Research Station that is full of more information than you could ever need!
Short course that can be dominated by a long hitter? Don’t know why I wasn’t all in on DJ last week, I was well over the field, but still. Looking back as a Monday Morning QB it seems so simple. Rory McIlroy made a bit of a charge on Sunday, but Dustin Johnson was up to the task and won going away with a score of -21. DJ and Rory topped the leaderboard all week and it was never really any doubt that the two of them would be dueling down the stretch, though a mediocre 3rd round from Rory let DJ open up a big enough gap to keep him comfortable on Sunday.
Sergio Garcia had a solid week with his irons finishing T6, and cashing his T10 bet that we touted in this article last week to help cover some of the losses from chasing Byeong Hun An. Man, Benny An! One of the most frustrating players to roster each week, he started out so hot with EAGLE, Birdie, and then proceeded to go 6 over on the next 6 holes and shoot 77 in round one. He showed some of the promise we expected on the weekend with a 64 and a 70 on Sunday, but it was too little too late for my betting card and DFS lineups.
Paul Casey continued his inspired play of late with a strong weekend finishing T3 and so did a player who we were all over at DFS Army, Ian Poulter. That’s Poulter’s third 3rd place finish in his last five tournaments. Pretty impressive form from the Englishman.
A big story from this week was the struggles of Bryson DeChambeau. While we were quick to crown him as the next Tiger Woods after his solid stretch of play earlier this year, he has struggled a bit and has shown his frustration on the course damaging it with his clubs in two consecutive tournaments. I think a break for him will be huge here to re-evaluate. He grinds so hard every day and I think when it doesn’t go well, it’s mentally exhausting.
Overall, a solid week for me with a positive ROI, nothing crazy and no huge sweats, but a solid week nonetheless and we live to fight another day. The tour heads to Florida for the ‘Florida Swing’ and the Honda Classic and we get a nice field with some new names taking over as some of the stars sit out this week!
VIP Shaptown88 crushed it this weekend at Daytona! Over 31K! Are you playing NASCAR DFS? Our NASCAR team is THE best in the biz!
Course Breakdown:
The Honda Classic takes place at PGA National Golf Club in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. PGA National is a Jack Nicklaus redesign (Tom Fazio original) and features the famed “Bear Trap”. The “Bear Trap” named after the Golden Bear (Jack Nicklaus) is a tough three-hole stretch of the par-3 15th, par-4 16th, and par-3 17th holes. The Bear Trap were all in the top 50 toughest holes on the pga tour last year and collectively played more than a stroke over par for the tournament.
PGA National is a 7140-yard par 70 that is going to test the mettle of the field this year. There are not many scoring opportunities, and while last year was a bit of an anomaly with is playing 2.3 strokes over par, it typically still plays about a stroke over par. The weather is almost always a factor here with the wind. We will see a typical sea breeze pattern off the coast with winds being lighter in the morning and progressing throughout the day. Right now its EARLY but it doesn’t look like much wind on Thursday and Friday. That being said it could change drastically. Here’s the closest tower to the course if you want to keep an eye on it. Windfinder – North Palm Beach
If the wind isn’t a factor, this course is fairly gettable. It’s not crazy long, but it does require accuracy and precision not only off the tee, but into the greens as well. At 6400 sq feet, the greens are a bit on the small side, and they are fairly sloped making them difficult to hold. We get a return to Bermuda grass on the greens this week which most players will be thankful for, but since we are so early in the year, it’s typically not fully grown in yet and makes the surface not as pure as some would like.
The 18th hole has been lengthened about 50 yards and while players still laid up last year, its going to be near impossible to get there in two this year. 18 gave up the second most birdies in last year’s event and now that number will likely be cut in half, making a hard course even harder.
When we look at the ‘Tournament Summary’ tab in the research station you can see that this is a DIFFICULT course. We have 65 courses in our database and it ranks 59th in average score, 56th in greens in regulation%, 52nd in Eagles/round, 59th in birdies/round, and 61st in double bogeys/round. Check out the six courses that average a more difficult score.
All major championship venues. This is a stern test and while it looks like the wind won’t be much of a factor, if it does whip up at all, we could see a similar situation to last year where the cut was +6!
The key to success at this course is typically fairways and greens. Think your way around the course and put yourself in a position to take advantage of pin placements when you can. That being said, what we saw last year was, that if you can bomb it and get yourself close enough to the greens, you are able to attack them from the rough that wasn’t as penal as it had been in years past. While others may tout accuracy off the green this week, the reality is that if you hit it far enough, a good approach game can make up for missing fairways. Last year Luke List and Justin Thomas ranked 65th and 60th respectively in fairways hit, yet were 2nd and 4th in driving distance. They were able to bomb it out there, and fire at pins from the rough and as such, finished 1st and 2nd.
That’s not to say that short hitters are dead in the water here. Alex Noren finished 3rd after being 37th in driving distance and 8th in fairways hit. There are multiple ways to get around this course, but especially if there is wind I want to target the bombers here as they will have shorter yardages to deal with into these tricky greens that are made more difficult by the wind.
Speaking of water, water comes into play on 16 of the 18 holes, with 4 and 10 being the only holes without water (and 13 really doesn’t have water, you technically have to hit it over water off the tee, but it’s not ‘really’ in play). Being able to avoid the water will be huge, and likely why the double bogey % is so high here. It’s not enough that I’m going to focus on accuracy off the tee, but I think you can give a bit of a bump to SG: Approach since players need to hit greens that are protected by water and bunkers. Though without any forecasted wind, we might not see it be as big of an issue this week.
As with any par 70 courses, par 4 scoring will be vital. The players will get three fairly easy holes in a row to start their rounds on the front nine and then they essentially have to hold their breath until 18. With the difficult par 3’s here it may worth looking at par 3 scoring as well. Double Bogey avoidance will be massive too. Being able to handle a bad shot or drop and not make a huge number is often the difference between making the cut and heading home on Friday night.
Are you using the Domination Station to build lineups? If you are building more than 20 lineups and aren’t using it quit wasting your time! Check out the tutorial to learn how!
–>Domination Station PGA Tutorial <–
What is a Chalk Donkey?
First, let’s break down what I consider to be ‘chalk’. Let’s look at each price range and what is considered chalk there. (DK pricing is used for a guide)
Over 10K: >25% Anything over 25% in this range is considered chalk, and could even go down to 20%. Some weeks ownership is pretty evenly spread in this range, and some weeks one player gathers all the ownership and becomes a Chalk Donkey.
9K: >20% Again, any time over 20% of the field is on a player in this price range we would consider them a chalk donkey.
8K to 7.5K: 15%-20% This is a little trickier in this range, but I consider anyone over 15% chalk. DK has been jamming a bunch of guys in around 7.5k lately and we’ve seen guys get up there in ownership.
Below 7.5K: >10% Players are priced here for a reason, and oftentimes one or two become what I call DFS Darlings and garner a ton of ownership While you usually have to eat this chalk in cash, you want to swerve it any chance you can in GPP’s.
One thing to remember as you construct lineups, players are ‘Chalk Donkeys’ for a reason, they are perceived to be good plays. Don’t fade the ‘Chalk Donkeys’ just because they are going to be highly owned. Very rarely does no chalk hit, and often times you find some of these ‘Chalk Donkeys’ in GPP winning lineups. Fading the chalk is strictly a leverage play, in that if that player plays poorly you are in much better shape not playing them.
Key Stats this Week:
In this section, I’ll cover what I feel are some of the key stats this week. We get lots of questions in slack about what to look for in the RS and here are some of the things that I’ll be focusing on this week for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-AM.
Before we get into the stats this week, I wanted to provide you guys with a link to some info about Strokes Gained Data. Strokes Gained is a confusing topic and DFS Army member (And Milly Maker winner) @redkacheek has put out a great article explaining how they work better than I ever could over at his site Fantasy Golf Bag. I normally don’t link other sites but this is just too good not to share. Give it a look here! How Do Strokes Gained Stats Work?
Value Tab:
The first thing I look at every week when I open up the RS is the Value tab. Who is popping as a value this week? This is pretty easy to find as the better the value, the darker the green box. The value tab is basically a formula that takes our projection for points this week x 1000/their salary. So essentially its points per 1k.
Whoa! For the first time this year we don’t have the highest priced golfers popping here as values, in fact, no one over 8k on Draftkings is popping as a value. That’s crazy and typically what happens when the field strength isn’t that great. With players like Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods skipping this event this year, we don’t have near as strong of a field as years past.
Jason Kokrak leads the way here as the most obvious misprice on DK’s part. He opened at 60-1 and while he has drifted negatively a bit he is still the best value in his price range bar none. Kokrak hasn’t played here in a couple of years and really hasn’t had a ton of success when he did, but the Jason Kokrak we’ve seen over the last year or two is a much different golfer, he’s consistently making cuts and competing, he hasn’t missed a cut since last year’s British Open.
Oh man, our boy Sungjae Im. Hopefully, the week off benefited him and his game because I’m so pot invested at this point that I have to play him. Last year’s Web.com money leader has been fairly consistent on the tour up until his past two events where he missed the cut. This is a picture perfect course for him and one I would expect he excel at. At this price, you need to play him (or at least I do) and he’s likely the best pivot off a chalky Kokrak.
In last week’s article, I talked about how it appears Russell Knox is back to his form of yesteryear where he was a consistent cut maker and contender. He didn’t do much to sway me off that opinion here and I think he presents a pretty good value this week, even at a bit of an elevated price point. His form has been pretty poor for about two years coming in and as such MC’d here in back to back years. Before that, though he had a runner up and a third. I’ll trust his ability to get it around here.
An exact opposite situation for me is Michael Thompson. Thompson has been fantastic so far this year and is a former winner of this event. He’s had four straight top twenty finishes and is coming back to a course he is clearly comfortable at. So slam dunk right? Not so fast. Thompson is known to be a massively streaky player. He top twenties or MC’s, which is interesting considering that he never really makes a big number. My issue is paying 8k for Michael Thompson. Maybe I need to get over that, but I just don’t see him as an 8k player regardless of field or course we’re playing at. He’s done nothing in his career outside of a win here to justify that.
Finally, Scott Langley pops a similar situation to Thompson in that he’s playing fantastic golf right now, but is priced appropriately at 6.8k. The concern with Langley is his length off the tee. He’s so short and really doesn’t gain any strokes off the tee compared to the field. He’s worth a few shots in GPP though because he seems to have been able to contend lately regardless of length of course.
Double Bogey Avoidance:
There were 256 double bogeys at this tournament last year and the course ranks 61st out of 65 in double bogey average. Being able to avoid a big number is massive here.
I didn’t include anyone that had less than 20 shot link rounds as that really isn’t a great sample so are missing a few of the rookies from this list but it is a good start of players who have been able to avoid the big number.
Billy Horschel is a pre-tournament target of mine at first look as he has had a ton of success in here in the past and though I don’t love the price tag on DK, I think he’s a fantastic Fanduel play at 9900. Billy does a great job of avoiding doubles and he is one of the more streaky birdie makers on tour. He gets hot this week and he can easily win.
For a few dollars more though you can pay up for Webb Simpson who has pretty similar statistics. Webb played here last year for the first time in a few years and finished fifth behind a strong putting performance. The putter hasn’t been as good this year, but a return to Bermuda grass will benefit him. I like him to not only contend, but I fancy him for a chance to win this thing this week. The Carolina boy has had a ton of success in Florida and I expect that to continue.
An interesting name on this list though is Kevin Tway as he doesn’t really fit the narrative of a player who avoids bogeys since he bombs it and doesn’t have a very high fairway %, but he clearly does a good job avoiding big numbers. He’s played well lately while not necessarily contending and has a 27th here. He’s an excellent long par 4 and par 5 scorer and that should be big here this week. He’s piqued my interest in this price range.
Projected DK Score:
Projected DK Score (formerly Projected Course Score)is one of our best stats. This takes the current course into account. The FP/H averages by each hole type on the course are added up to create a raw per round FP scoring projection. It’s a good way to find out who is a course fit here and statistically should have success.
No surprises here that some of the best players on tour pop, but I am a bit surprised that Joaquin Niemann continues to show up. He’s a stat darling and with his recent form, he will have ZERO ownership. I like that. We know he’s talented and we know he can contend. For him to pop as the 4th best DK projection, and 6th best-projected round score definitely means something for me and makes me want to get involved a bit. I think a return to Bermuda will benefit him as well.
If we expand this a little we can see some other players add to our pool.
I have a feeling Cam Smith is going to be the chalk of the chalk this week. He’s a nice discount on the top guys and has been absolutely on fire.
A name that pops here again is Johnson Wagner. Wagner has good double bogey avoidance and now pops in projected course score. At almost min price he’s interesting, but he’s literally never made the cut here. He was second last week in Puerto Rico so it’s possible his game is coming around. Worth a shot for sure.
Webb Simpson, as stated earlier is definitely in my player pool and so is Sungjae Im. But a player not mentioned that I love this week is Emiliano Grillo. I’m a Grillo apologist and am holding out for him to turn on his putter like last spring and really take off. He has an affinitey for this course having played many junior golf tournaments here and was rewarded with an 8th place finish last year. The price is a bit much considering I can get up to a few other guys, but I love him this week.
I’m also a big-time believer in J.T. Poston but holy misprice. I’ll play him on Fanduel.
Fantasy Points Gained: Long Par 4’s.
With 5 Long Par 4’s this week and an increased number of long iron shots into greens, seeing how players score on these holes will be huge.
I left the golfers with small sample sizes in there as I think they are still viable, regardless of how big the sample is. Fowler Thomas, and Koepka pop as the big names here that are all great par 4 scorers. An interesting name that shows up though is Kevin Streelman and at $6700 I think he’s definitely viable. He hasn’t played here since 2013, but was 41st then and has started to pick up his game a bit. He hits fairways and greens and that seems to be the trick around here if you aren’t overly long.
Wyndham Clark is a young player who has made every cut since the Sony Open and finished T10 last week at the Puerto Rico Open. He’s priced up a bit, but he absolutely bombs it and is an excellent putter. Worth a shot here in a weak field.
One thing, that puts us at a huge advantage is the Domination Station. If you aren’t using it to build lineups you’re crazy! Check out how it works here! Domination Station PGA Tutorial
Who are this week’s DFS Chalk Donkeys?
In this section, each price range’s (Above 9K, 7.5k-9K, and Below 7.5K) Chalk Donkey will be identified, and a few pivots will be offered. I use DraftKings pricing since that is where I usually play, but their pricing is usually similar to FanDuel and when a player pops as a value on one site but not another I’ll make sure to mention it.
It’s important to remember that just because someone is going to be highly owned, doesn’t mean that they are a bad play, but if we can gain an advantage on the field by fading a player owned by 25% or more, typically that’s the right move. There are typically 156 golfers in an event (though only 134 this week, making it more important to get 6/6) and only 70 and ties make the cut. Essentially you have to look at the ownership of a player and decide if the odds of him missing the cut are equal to or greater than the ownership. If that’s the case then a fade is typically the right play.
In a no-cut event, it takes on a little bit of a different spin. A chalky player at the top of the salary scale you have to ask yourself a few questions. Say he’s going to be 25% owned. “Is he going to win?” and “are the odds of him winning better than 1 in 4, equal to, or less?” If it’s less then I think a fade is in order. The same conversation can be had with chalk at the lower salary range. Will he be in the top half of the field? Will he be in the top 20? Etc.
And now, here my friends, are this weeks’ Chalk Donkeys:
Above 9K Chalk
Justin Thomas: DK $11,900/FD $13,000
Projected GPP ownership: 20%-24%
Justin Thomas is a stud. I love him. He’s a monster. (Sound familiar? I wrote this exact same thing last week). He’s a MASSIVE favorite in Vegas at 5-1 odds to win.
Here’s the scary part about JT, who has finished 16, 3, 2, 9 in his last four tournaments…he’s actually performing under his baseline in some areas. If we look athis last 50 rounds he’s performing under his baseline in SG: Approach and Putting (no surprise given they’ve been on poa a while). His off the tee game has been better though, so there is room for regression there, but think about how GOOD his irons have been the last few tournaments and while he’s close to the baseline, he’s not there yet, add in that he’s likely going to start putting better…scary.
Here’s the one knock on JT, if he didn’t win this event last year would he be here? With the change in the schedule, we have seen quite a few other of the ‘stars’ skip this event because of scheduling. How motivated is JT going to be to compete here? That’s a really hard thing to quantify, but if you are looking for a reason to fade him this week I can get on board with that.
Currently projecting him at around 20ish percent ownership, but his price tag on both sites makes it very difficult to afford him, especially given what the roster construction looks like with him in there. I think we could see him come in under-owned, especially compared to guys like Sergio Garcia and Adam Scott. If that’s the case it might be a spot to go heavily overboard on him.
Above 9K Pivot:
Billy Horschel: DK $9300/FD $9900
Projected GPP Ownership: 5%-8%
Billy Ho has seen a ton of Vegas money come on in yet that hasn’t seemed to increase his popularity in DFS as we are still projecting him to be single digit owned. I love Billy this week and he is a core play for me.
The thing with Billy is that not only does have good course history and pretty good recent form, but he is also going to revert back to the norm in multiple areas of his game, which is going to be a huge positive. His Off the Tee game has struggled a bit, but now heading to a course that demands an accurate tee shot, is going to hugely benefit him.
His approach was so good at the end of the year last year when he was firing at every pin (on the east coast mind you) and is likely going to come back to that at some point, even if it doesn’t it’ll still be better than the .18 strokes gained he’s had in his last ten. And he putted the lights out on bermuda grass at the Waste Management.
All these things point to Billy being a very solid play this week and he’s in consideration for my one and done pick. Another thing Horschel does really well? Avoid big numbers.
I just think this course sets up so well for Horschel, and apparently, so do the bettors because his line has consistently dropped since it opened. A grinder course that can benefit a hot putter? Sounds like Billy to me.
Other highly owned players (over 15%): Sergio Garcia, Adam Scott, Gary Woodland, Luke List, Webb Simpson
7.5K – 9K Chalk
Michael Thompson: DK 8000/FD $10,100
Projected GPP Ownership: 19%-21%
Michael Thompson is 8K on DK. And he’s going to be chalk. I repeat. Michael Thompson is 8k on DK and he’s going to be chalk. ABORT.
Seriously. I don’t know what to think about this. He’s played great over the last month on the west coast and now gets back to the east coast where he’s from at a course he’s had success at…but this is Michael Thompson. In 2018 he played in 23 events, missed 10 cuts, and had one top 10. He’s punching over his weight class at this point.
Here’s the deal. He could smash here and keep the good play rolling, but at high ownership on a volatile player who I don’t trust regardless of his last five events? No thanks. I’ll go elsewhere.
I’ve even seen guys in the industry say you can use him in cash! UNBELIEVABLE. He’s priced $700 too high regardless of form and if he has a missed cut or two earlier in the year he’s dead minimum salary. I’m not paying 8k for a guy who over the course of his career has missed about 45% of his cuts and has 13 top tens in 215 career events. If he smashes so be it, my process just doesn’t let me play guys like that.
7.5K – 9K Pivot:
Lucas Glover: DK $8800/FD $9700
Projected GPP Ownership: 8%-10%
There aren’t a ton of low owned golfers in this range and the ones that are are likely full fades for me, so I settled on Lucas Glover who is one of the better players traditionally on the Florida swing. He’s also just a smash play at the price on FD.
Glover is 5 for 9 in tries here making the cut, including making the last two and finishing in the top 25.
His recent form is absolutely on fire too. Going back to the Safeway open in the fall, he has 6 top 20s, and one missed cut. That’s a pretty incredible run of form.
He is picture perfect for this course. Isn’t short by any means, but not necessarily long. Hits fairways. Hits a TON of greens in regulation and does a good job scoring. I can’t believe we’re going to get him at a bit of a discount this week. I wasn’t initially on him, but am moving him into one of my core plays here.
Other highly owned players (over 12%): Russell Knox, CT Pan, Graeme McDowell, Scott Piercy, Kiradech Aphibarnrat
Check out my Preview Article for my full betting card!
–> UpNorth’s PGA Preview – WGC Mexico <–
Below 7.5K
As I start to see ownership trends come into play this week, what I originally thought might be a stars and scrubs week with the top being so heavy and the middle being somewhat overpriced, what its looking like though is that the majority of ownership will go to balanced builds (outside of JT/Michael Thompson builds which will be somewhat popular).
What that means is that that lot of these players are going to under-owned. The chalk in this area will be Sungjae Im (10%-12%) who I’m going to be heavily invested in at that price. Brendan Steele (9%-11%) Jason Kokrak (9%-11%), and Trey Mullinax (7%-9%).
Like last week, I’m going to highlight a couple of players down here that will go way underowned that I have some interest in.
Wyndham Clark: DK $7400/FD $8700
Clark has been playing some fantastic golf this year and while priced up a bit I do really like him here. He absolutely bombs it (avg. driving distance 315.0 yards) and should be able to find himself close to the hole with a wedge in his hand firing at pins. He’s 5th n the field in long par 4 scoring, 14th in Short Par 5, and 2nd in long par 5. I think he’s a smash play this week the only thing holding me back is his lack of experience here.
Harold Varner III: DK $7300/$8600
I really thought HV3 would get more buzz this week, but he hasn’t accumulated as much as I had thought. He’s struggled here a bit, but has made the cut in all three tries. His approach game is fantastic and not only does he crush par 5’s, he’s top 30 on long par 3’s, meaning that he likely won’t have too much trouble on the bear trap. I’d pay 8k for a guy with HV3 talent here most weeks and at $7300 I have to get involved.
Nick Watney: DK $6900/FD $8900
Watney just makes cuts here. He’s got great course history and while current form leaves a bit to be desired, I’ll get involved with a guy who hasn’t missed a cut here at this price on DK. More of a fade on FD. He’s surprisingly a really solid par 4 scorer.
Adam Svensson: DK $6000/FD $7600
Svensson has three wins here over his career. Two in college and once as a professional at Web.com Q school. Should be extremely comfortable and at min price? You can get involved.
Back to back at the Guy Harvey Invitational while at Barry University and the Final Stage of Web Tour Q-School in 2015
— Adam Stanley (@adam_stanley) February 27, 2019
Other low owned cheap players I’m interested in: Stewart Cink (Cash game lock for me), Scott Langley (great current form, course might be too long though), Lukas Bjeregaard
GPP Core:
Want to know who is my GPP Core? How bout Taco or Brody’s? Check it out here on our brand new Coaches Notes page.
Final Thoughts:
Great week to get back involved fully after a no-cut event. I think going stars and scrubs is likely going to be the best GPP strategy as people will shy away from playing some of these ‘uncomfortable’ plays down low. Most of the ownership is likely to go in the balanced range.
As ownership trends start to finalize this week, I’ll post some updates in my coaching channel and make sure to join in and ask any questions. This is going to be a great week and I can’t wait to see some of those green screens and winning lineups!
Join us in our coaching channels this week and let’s win some money! I’ll be there off and on all week, but will be in helping build lineups from 9:00 to 10:00 PM CST on Wednesday night getting you guys ready to take down some huge GPP’s!
Also, give me a follow on twitter @dfsupnorth as I’ll be posting updates there as well as useful retweets leading up to this weeks event!