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DFS Golf: Chalk Donkey – BMW Championship – DFS Army

It’s the second event of the FedEx Cup Playoffs, the BMW Championship at Medinah Country Club! 

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 for DFS golf 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!

What a great start to the playoffs! Patrick Reed finally got the win he was trending towards for a few weeks, all-time nice guy Harold Varner III had his best finish ever on tour, and we have guys taking shots at Bryson Dechambeau on twitter for his slow play! Solid week overall, and now the top 70 in the FedEx Cup standings move on to the BMW Championship!

Maybe my favorite DFS Army Win of ALL-TIME! Trippnup2 accidentally enters the $1 winner take all instead of the 20 max, and TAKES IT DOWN!

The BMW Championship is hosted at Medinah Country Club this year in Medinah Illinois just outside of Chicago. The top 70 in the FedEx Cup standings tee it up with the top 30 after Sunday moving on to the Tour Championship at East Lake.

PGA Preview Video:

With Medinah Country Clubs #3 course only hosting one stroke play event in the last 15 years, we don’t have a ton of information and data points to go off in terms of what type of golfer to target, but there are some things that I pulled together in my PGA preview to hopefully give us an idea of what sort of test this golf course will be.

Course Breakdown:

  • Medinah Country Club, Medinah, IL
  • Par 72 -7657 yards
  • Greens: Bent Grass
  • Fairways: Bent Grass
  • Rough: Kentucky Blue Grass (4 inches)
  • Designer: Rees Jones Redesign (Tom Bendelow original)
  • Course Record: 63  Harry ’Lighthorse” Cooper (1930 Medinah Open)

Medinah’s #3 course has hosted multiple majors and most recently, the 2012 Ryder cup. 

Previous Winners:

2012  Europe (Ryder Cup)

2006  Tiger Woods (PGA Championship)

1999  Tiger Woods (PGA Championship)

1990  Hale Irwin (US Open

Comparable Courses: Augusta National, Crooked Stick, Muirfield Village, Torrey Pines South

This course is LONG. There are only three courses that they have played in the last few years that are longer, Erin Hills, Corales Golf Club, and Torrey Pines South. That’s pretty crazy when you think about it. And not only is it long, but with the thick rough, tree-lined fairways, and the number of doglegs, players will actually have driver taken out of their hand quite a bit. Which means that you will see lots of long irons into some smallish greens.

With that being the case, being an excellent iron player will be key. While we don’t have approach shot distribution from way back in 2006, I would imagine we will see more shots from 200+ yards than possibly any course on tour. Finding the fairway so you’re hitting those long iron shots from there instead of the rough will be key to hitting greens in regulation. The issue with hitting the fairway though is that you can still be dead due to the overhanging oak trees that peak out into all of these fairways. Driving accuracy will be key so you can get it in the right spot to attack the green.

Speaking of the greens, not only are they small but they are heavily bunkered. They also have the classic Rees Jones collection areas where balls will be funneled to. Any ball that is offline on the green will end up in these collection areas off the back of the green and it’s really difficult up and down from there for par. Most of these greens also have a big ridge running through the middle that will kick the ball left or right depending on where you land it. This will lead to some long putts that break a ton if you are on the wrong side of that ridge.

The rough is going to be thick. Medinah Country Club’s Director of Golf Marty DeAngelo, had this to say about it earlier this week. “That’s our real protector. It’s thick and it’s very gnarly. If the rough is up 4-plus inches, I would say my guess is probably going to be 15- to 17-under for four days” That puts an even bigger premium on hitting these fairways.

If we look back at 2006, we can see that while hitting fairways was important and you need to be in the top half of the field, the real key is hitting these greens at a high clip. Of the top 10, only Ryan Moore was outside of the top 20 in greens in regulation for the week.

Medinah’s a really exciting test of golf and I’m thrilled that the PGA Tour is heading back here. There will be birdies and we likely see a low score win this, but there are also going to be big scores on holes that will swing this golf tournament multiple times over the course of the tournament.

Weather:

At first glance, there doesn’t really look to be any issues with the weather for this event. Mid 70’s and a light breeze on Thursday/Friday with Saturday and Sunday having chances for sporadic showers and a little more wind and heat, particularly on Saturday. May be something we look at for Showdown slates, but no weather draw as it looks right now.

Medinah Country Club Weather 

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 BMW Championship.

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 former 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.

Oh, baby, I love when we get some cheap guys at the top for value! Ryan Palmer leads the way here and while he struggled a bit on the weekend at Liberty National, he did find his putter for one round which saw him go low. From a Fantasy Scoring perspective, he is a perfect fit for this course. He just missed out on the list above that showed players with over 300 yards average driving distance and over 60% of fairways (299 and 59%) I love him as a flyer this week. He played here in 2006 and made the cut but didn’t do much with it. Either way at this price I have a ton of interest in Palmer and his fantasy scoring prowess.

I’m finally starting to come around on Joaquin Niemann which means he’s probably going to blow up this week. I don’t know that his game is consistent enough to ever contend like a Sungjae Im but he scores like crazy which is what we want in DFS. If he can avoid the big numbers here he’ll be in good shape. His approach game has been outstanding and while he’s putting above baseline, he should be able to keep it going this week on bentgrass.

Speaking of Sungjae, of course, I love him this week. That price is crazy.

Webb was a bit of a letdown with only an 18th place finish, but he continues to string together strong results and $9400 is a pretty fair price in this field. Tommy Fleetwood similarly has continued to string together solid results but gets a price decrease after a disappointing 43rd at the Northern Trust.

Finally, Andrew Putnam is a guy we’ve been riding for a while and looks like a great value again this week. The concern with Putnam though is how short he is and this is a beast of a course.

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.

Justin Thomas leads the way in projected DK points per round for by a pretty fair margin. He was top 5 in the field last week in average strokes gained approach but continues to struggle with the putter. Bent is his best surface though so maybe this week he finally gets hot.

Collin Morikawa burned a lot of DFS players with a disappointing 52nd place finish. He’s seen a price drop accordingly and this looks like a perfect spot to jump on as everyone gets off that got burned.  I have concerns about him going up against the best in the world, same as I did last week but with this price drop and likely ownership drop, I think it makes a lot of sense in GPP.

This is a perfect storm for Brooks Koepka though. A course that requires accuracy off the tee and length, excellent iron play, and just average putting seems like the exact type of course he can crush. The price is high which could keep his ownership down and there’s so much value in this 70 man field that the price isn’t something that scares me off. His long irons are so good as evidenced by his fantasy scoring stats on long par 3’s and 4’s.

SG: Approach L25

As we’ve talked about with the smaller greens here at Medinah, and what we saw with the 2006 results,  there’s going to be a premium placed on iron play.

Emiliano Grillo is a REALLY interesting play this week. His approach game has been incredible. He crushed it tee to green last week at the Northern Trust, but he can’t putt or chip to save his life. The issue is it doesn’t look there’s anything to suggest that he’ll have any sort of positive regression. If he does, he’ll crush, particularly at this price. Definitely worth a flyer in GPP.

Talked about Morikawa in the section above and he’s a very interesting play here.

Paul Casey didn’t play last week after contending at the Wyndham Championship and knowing he was safe. As such, everyone forgot about him. This is a crazy low price and he’s an excellent course fit. He’s fairly long and VERY accurate with this driver. He’s one of my favorite plays here this week.

Patrick Cantlay also checks a lot of boxes here with his excellent iron player. He’s going to hit a lot of fairways and greens and put himself in a position it’s just capitalizing on those opportunities when they arise.

Driving Accuracy/Driving Distance

So we know that we need to be accurate here and hit fairways, but distance is also an advantage, so I used the Research Station to find out which players average over 300 yards off the tee, and 60% driving accuracy.

Rory McIlroy, Joaquin Niemann, Gary Woodland, Jon Rahm, Xander Schauffele, Brooks Koepka, Keith Mitchell, Jason Day, Jason Kokrak, Justin Thomas, Justin Rose, Bryson DeChambeau, Sung Kang, Patrick Cantlay. 

14 players, that’s a pretty good start to a player pool for this week! Should be noted that Dustin Johnson just barely misses out at 59.2% accuracy and Adam Scott misses the other way averaging 299.2 yards off the tee.

FedEx Cup Standing:

This literally doesn’t matter and you shouldn’t let it influence you and your lineup decisions.. The idea that players on the outside of the top 30  with a chance to make it to the next round are more motivated to play well and in fact in some touts eyes, more likely to play well, is the biggest bunch of you know what I’ve ever heard. Making the jump from 70th – 30th isn’t impossible and it happens every year, but players who do it don’t have some sort of ‘extra motivation’ propelling them forward, they just ran into a course that fit their skill set or played well that week.

Last week only 4 guys jumped into the top 70 who were previously outside of it.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t play guys who are outside the top 30, in fact,  you should because there are quite a few golfers who are excellent course fits down there, but don’t play them because you think they will be ‘extra motivated’ to move on.

Don’t fall into this narrative trap this week. It’s all the Golf Channel will be talking about and it drives me insane.

Other key stats to consider: Fantasy Points Gained, Birdie or Better %,  Double Bogey Avoidance,  SG: Long Par 4, Driving Accuracy %

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

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. 

 

Our Domination Station Optimizer is ALWAYS improving and recently it went through a big update.

Check out our fearless leader Geek breaking down how to use it for PGA!

 

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 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 $10,000/FD $11,500

Projected GPP ownership: 22%-24%

Last week, Justin Thomas projected as the highest owned player on the slate, and everyone pivoted off him and he ended up coming in around 8%-9% less than projections. This tends to happen quite often, ownership projections come out, everyone sees the highest player and goes ‘oh I need to pivot!’. Following a pretty impressive performance last week (though he still can’t putt) I would be surprised to see JT end up coming in below 15% again this week.

JT can’t putt. but if we dig a little deeper, we find that it’s actually getting better, he actually gained strokes in rounds 1 and 2 last week. The difference is likely that he’s returned to bentgrass which is a surface he’s more comfortable on. I would think that this trend continues this week on bentgrass again.

JT ranks out extremely well for us, he’s number in projected DK points/round because he absolutely crushes par 5’s. He’s number one on short par 5’s, and 3rd on long par 5’s. He’s a tremendous iron player and that is bore out in the scoring stats. His recent fantasy scoring hasn’t been great so if you think that sort of trend continues then he’s a great fade this week. Personally, I think he’s trending in the right direction and the putter is coming around.

In GPP this week, I’ll be playing about the field average with JT. 18%-22%. If he ends up coming in under-owned because of his projection then I’ll have some leverage on the field. If not, I’m more than happy to be field average in ownership of him as he’s a great play here.

Above 9K Pivot: 

Dustin Johnson:  DK $10,700/FD $12,000

Projected GPP Ownership: 9%-11%

This article is shaping up to look EXACTLY like last week. JT the chalk and DJ underowned.

DJ crushes the two key hole types I’m focusing on this week, long par 3’s and 4’s. He’s long so he’s not playing a hybrid or 3 iron into a lot of these holes, he’s playing a 5 or 6 iron. That’s a huge advantage, particularly at a course like this where you have small greens that are difficult to hit.

Last week DJ was a world-beater in the first two rounds and lost it off the tee in rounds 3 and 4. That was really out of character for him. He very rarely loses strokes off the tee, and almost never back to back where he loses over a full stroke. I have to imagine that he bounces back here. The rest of his game was solid, he crushed his irons, good around the green, the putter was poor but that isn’t anything new.

I’m willing to take a chance that last weekend was a blip on the radar with his off the tee struggles. This is a perfect set up and if he plays as he did in rounds one and two last week he can win this event by 3-4 strokes and at this sort of ownership he can be a GPP winner for you.

Other highly owned players (over 15%): Jon Rahm, Adam Scott, Rory McIlroy, Webb Simpson

7.5K – 9K Chalk

Ian Poulter: DK $8000/FD $9300

Projected GPP Ownership: 13%-16%

While he probably won’t be the highest owned in this range (likely Tony Finau) Poulter is the one guy that I have some concerns with in GPP as I think he could even get more popular than this projection.

Poulter has some undeniable great history here. He actually probably should have been higher than 9th in the 2006 PGA Championship with how well he struck the ball. He was 12th in Fairways hit and 4th in Greens in Regulation and he couldn’t putt to save his life. He was excellent here in the 2012 Ryder Cup as well.

My concerns with Poulter are that he’s not going to hit Fairways at that sort of clip again as his recent driving accuracy is terrible. He doesn’t score that well. And until recently, his irons have been just meh as well.

I have a hard time seeing past the history here, along with the recent form, but statistically, he’s showing up as a player that we could feel comfortable fading in this field.

7.5K – 9K Pivot:

Collin Morikawa: DK $7900/FD $9500

Projected GPP Ownership: 5%-8%

Morikawa sees his price drop $600 and his ownership drop around 10% after a 52nd place finish last week at the Northern Trust.

Morikawa wasn’t bad last week, in fact, it’s probably the sort of result I would expect from any rookie on tour in their first trip to the playoffs. He had two really poor rounds with his irons losing 4.1 strokes approach, and two really solid rounds gaining 3.5 strokes approach. He has been consistent off the tee, and he actually gained strokes for the week putting on bentgrass greens, despite leaving quite a few putts just short. He’ll see bent grass again this week which should benefit him.

I like him as a pivot off of the chalky guys like Jason Kokrak and Ian Poulter in this range as I think he actually has a higher upside than both and a similar floor.

Other highly owned players (over 12%): Paul Casey, Xander Schauffele, Tony Finau

Below 7.5K

With the soft pricing, we do actually have some chalk down here this week. All are good plays in their own right, but in an event like this I think fading them could be smart. Sungjae Im (I’m playing a ton of him, he’s core, chalk be damned), Corey Conners, Wyndham Clark and Emiliano Grillo are all projecting to be highly owned. Here are two solid pivots off the chalk that could really differentiate you in GPP’s this week.

Rory Sabbatini: DK $7400/FD $8200

Projected Ownership: 3%-5%

Sabbs burned everyone last week with a mediocre performance at the Northern Trust and as such got not only a fairly big price drop but is looking at big ownership drop as well. He smashes long par 3’s and short par 5’s, and can really score, as he has the best fantasy points gained of anyone below 7.5k. At first glance, his approach numbers don’t look great, but when you dive in you see it’s just one or two poor rounds that are masking some really solid iron play overall. Love him this week as everyone jumps off.

Keith Mitchell: DK $6300/FD $7000

Projected Ownership: 4%-6% 

At almost dead minimum price, on a course that requires you to bomb it off the tee, I have quite a bit of interest in Killa Keith here. He’s a ‘bentgrass specialist’ but all that really means is that he loses fewer strokes there any other surface because he’s a terrible putter. Similarly to Sabbs, he has one round that is really skewing his SG: Approach stats. He’s actually gained strokes in 6 straight rounds with his irons. Things are trending in the right direction for Keith and in a no-cut event at this price, I’m more than willing to take some shots because the upside is fantastic.

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: 

As always, there will be tons of ‘narratives’ this week and it’s best to just ignore them, particularly when it comes to FedEx Cup standings. Play good golfers and you’ll be fine. I think the key this week will be to find the best ‘all-around’ golfers and not just guys who get by on one particular skill set. You will hear lots about having to play ‘bombers’ this week but I think that if you put more of a premium on driving accuracy you will not only differentiate yourself in gpp but actually be playing the golfers with the best chance to win.

Remember, this is the last few weeks of really big money PGA contests until next year, so while we preach contest selection and bankroll management, don’t be afraid to go a little crazy!

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!