Author: Brady Cannon August 27, 2024
Our experts believe that Xander Schauffele has a good chance of winning this week.
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Welcome to our weekly column of PGA Tour gambling tips from GOLF.com expert prognosticator Brady Cannon. An experienced golf bettor and commentator, Cannon is a regular guest on SportsGrid, a syndicated audio network dedicated to sports and sports betting. You can follow him on Twitter. Las Vegas Golferand you can read his predictions below heading into the TOUR Championship, which begins Thursday in Atlanta, Georgia. In addition to Kannon's recommended plays, you'll also see data from Chirp Golf, a mobile app that features both free-to-play and daily fantasy golf contests, with the opportunity to win cash and prizes for every round and tournament.
If winning the FedExCup is the definitive indicator of a PGA Tour season champion, this tournament should be a two-way matchup featuring two of the best players in the world in Scottie Scheffler and Xander Schauffele. It's hard to accept that Keegan Bradley, with just one win this season and no top 20 finishes in three months until last week, managed to catch up with them and win this week.
Yes, the system is flawed and I think everyone is well aware of that. The hard part is fixing it, but I'm not here to pontificate on how to do that, because I don't have the answers. I'm loving the first two weeks of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. The drama, the fight for places, the attempts to slip into the top 50 and eventually the top 30. I thought the high-elevation golf course last week offered some great new twists and turns. East Lake is great; now newly renovated and a par-71 monster, but it lost the drama of what should have been the grand finale. The Tour Championship is anticlimactic to say the least. Of the 30 players who will play, I think only the top 10 in starting strokes have a chance.
Speaking of starting strokes, they are awarded according to the FedEx Cup points ranking this week. Scheffler is in first place and will start the tournament on Thursday at 10 under par. Schauffele is in second place and will start at 8 under. Matsuyama is in third place and will start at 7 under. This pattern continues for the next rankings. The final five players, 26th through 30th, started the week at even par, 10 strokes behind the leader, and are basically just playing for pride and to win as much money as possible. This tournament is going to be very entertaining for the handful of players at the top. After that, it feels a lot less appealing and less of a bet.
Andrew Green was brought in to restore Donald Ross' original features to East Lake Golf Club. He reshaped the greens, bunkers and fairways. He added and relocated bunkers. He altered some of the runoff areas around the greens and changed the grass on the fairways and greens to different varieties of Zoysia and Bermuda respectively. Over 100 yards were added to the golf course and it now measures just under 7,500 yards, a par 71 course.
2024 Tour Championship odds: Last week's runner-up is a big favorite to win at East Lake By Kevin Cunningham
Many of the approach shots at East Lake are hit from 200 yards or further out. All four par-3 holes are over 200 yards. Most of the 11 par-4 holes are pretty close to the 400-450 yard range. Scrambling is key. Driving accuracy is probably more important than driving distance. Avoid the pesky Bermuda grass rough, both around the green and off the fairway. Avoiding bogeys is probably more important than making birdies. Of course, approach play and hitting the green in regulation time goes a long way towards winning the Silver Cup and the $25 million that comes with it.
I think the list of relevant courses is pretty long this week. TPC Potomac and TPC River Highlands make a lot of sense to me. I think Sedgefield is another Ross design with some crossover. There are similarities with Royal Troon, site of the recent British Open. Muirfield Village (Memorial) also has an emphasis on second shots, driving accuracy and scrambling. TPC Southwind certainly has some differences, but has the same combination of zoysia grass fairways and Bermuda grass greens. And finally, Innisbrook, the Copperhead course where the Valspar Championship is held.
That being said, I am back where I started: I believe this is simply a competition between two people.
Brady's best bets at East Lake
Before we get too deep into it, there is a market to bet on the player with the lowest 72-hole score (like in a traditional golf tournament, i.e. without starting strokes). Outside of the “Big Two,” I think Aaron Lai has a good chance to win in this market at odds of about 50 to 1. Hideki Matsuyama is reasonable at about 18 to 1, but I am concerned about his health after withdrawing from the BMW Championship last week. I think former FedExCup champions Viktor Hovland (15 to 1) and Billy Horschel (35 to 1) are great picks. And finally, in the long bomb, Christian Bezuidenhout is my pick as a flyer at about 70 to 1.
But I'm betting on the Strokes market, and I've been arguing for a month that Xander Schauffele (+225) is the favorite to win the FedEx Cup. He's been the best horse on this course for the last few years. He won here in 2017 and has been runner-up three times. He was last in 72-hole scores in 2020 and 2023 as well. In his seven appearances at East Lake, he has never finished lower than seventh.
He's won at TPC River Highlands and Royal Troon. He's got three top 15s at the Memorial, including an eighth-place finish earlier this season. Schauffele is about even with Schauffler this week — 1-2 or 2-1 by any standards — but he's the better player on this golf course and twice the price.
I believe Schauffler will be named the PGA Tour's Player of the Year, and he certainly deserves it, but I'm betting Schauffele will take home one more honor this week at East Lake.
Who will Chirp Golf players pick this week?
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