Rickie Fowler on the 16th hole during the final round of the Phoenix Open golf tournament, Sunday, Feb. 7, 2016, in Scottsdale, Ariz. (AP Photo/Rick Scuteri)
DFSR is proud to bring you, Chris Durell. He'll be bringing weekly PGA picks, analysis, and breakdowns to help you cash on DraftKings and FanDuel. As every week in DFS PGA changes with the course setup, field of players and weather, Chris will be providing a range of different picks for cash games as well as upside plays for tournaments. If you have any questions to lineup lock you can reach him a variety of ways. Leave your question/comment below in the comments section, find him in the DFSR Chat room or hit him up on Twitter(@Jager_Bombs9). You can also grab a copy of Chris's free DFS PGA Weekly cheatsheet which includes course history, current form, stats, and much more.
Welcome back golf fans. This week the PGA Tour heads to Mexico for the OHL Classic at Mayakoba which is hosted the El Camaleon Golf Club. This week's field is a little beefier than last week as we the 10th ranked player in the world, Rickie Fowler, teeing it up with eight other Top 50 players including former winners of this event, Charlie Hoffman(24th in the OWGR) and defending champ Pat Perez(18th in the OWGR).
From a statistical perspective, I will be weighing Off the Tee a little higher than Approach this week with an emphasis on Accuracy as the course has some tight landing areas combined with many hazards including trees in the fairway, large bunkers, mangrove wetlands and more. Those who spray the ball off the tee will have a ton of trouble saving par and finding their way up the leaderboard that has seen an average winning score of -18 over the past five years. With low projected scores like that, you will also see Birdie or Better % weighed high in my model. Below, you will also see a hole by hole breakdown which shows five of the 11 Par 4's fall in between 450 and 500 yards so I will be looking closely at that on Fantasy National this week. I will also be weighing Par 5 Scoring quite high this week as looking at the hole by hole stats tab on my cheatsheet, you will see that at least 34% of all birdies at El Camaleon come have come from those three holes(5th, 7th, 13th) over the past five years.
Let's now take a look at the course snapshot, some top trends, and then jump into the course history, current form and top stats picks for the week.
El Camaleon Golf Club - Playa Del Carmen, MEX
**Click here or the image above to check out the course breakdown from PGATour.com**
The above image is from Fantasy National Golf Club showing us the makeup of each hole by length. As you can see Par 4 Scoring from 450-500 yards is going to be key with almost half the holes falling in this range. Below are the leaders in this department this season and the last 50 rounds of last season.
2017-18 Season Leaders in Par 4 Scoring from 450-500 Yards
2016-17 Leaders in Par 4 Scoring from 450-500 Yards(Last 50 Rounds)
Gary Woodland
World Golf Ranking (#50)
Vegas Odds (22/1)
Draftkings ($9,400)
FanDuel ($9,000)
He played here for the first time last year but came out of the gates flying with a 64, 65, 66 before slowing down on Sunday with a 70 leaving him with a runner-up finish to Pat Perez. The one knock on him this week is the form as he hasn't recorded a Top 10 finish since the RBC Canadian Open but it doesn't worry me at all seeing as he went into this event last year with a T56 at the CIMB and T47 at the WGC-HSBC Champions. He ranks #1 in my overall model which is helped by his stat rankings(to the field) that include a 4th in Strokes Gained: Approach and 6th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking(combination of 2016-17 and 2017-18 stats). All things considered, I will be using Woodland in all formats this week.
Russell Knox
World Golf Ranking (#66)
Vegas Odds (55/1)
Draftkings ($8,500)
FanDuel ($6,800)
In terms of cash games, Knox is not on my radar this week as the form is just not there with a T63 and T72 to start the new season but for GPP's I think he makes an upside play at a course/event where he has had a ton of success in the past. After finishing inside of the Top 40 for three straight years, he found "it" with back to back Top 5's here at El Camaleon. I mentioned above that I will be favoring accuracy this week and Knox fits the bill as he ranks 10th on my sheet in Drivin Accuracy and finished last season ranked inside the Top 45 when looking at Strokes Gained: Off the Tee. Although he currently ranks near the top of the tag count on FanShareSports(12), his sentiment rating is split down the middle and I believe the current form will open up an ownership gap.
Chesson Hadley
World Golf Ranking (#86)
Vegas Odds (20/1)
Draftkings ($9,900)
FanDuel ($7,400)
He made the article last week for the Shriners Open didn't let us down at all. Even after a rough start where he opened with a 74, Hadley fought back with three rounds under 70 to finish with his third straight Top 5 finish to open the season. I will continue to ride the wave until he falls off completely and by the looks of his stats, that isn't coming anytime soon. His missed cut here in his rookie season(2014) takes him down a bit in my model but still ranks #9 overall and I will be using him in all formats, especially on FanDuel where he comes in the mid $7K range.
Chez Reavie
World Golf Ranking (#88)
Vegas Odds (28/1)
Draftkings ($9,200)
FanDuel ($8,200)
Reavie isn't a player I will bet outright as I just don't think the upside is there but feel he is an excellent core play in cash games almost every week he tees it up on Tour. He has finished Top 25 in all four events so far this season and he hasn't missed a cut on Tour since mid-May last year(15 events ago). He also fits the stat model in a big way as he ranks #1 on my sheet in Driving Accuracy, 9th in Strokes Gained: Approach, 2nd in Good Drive %, 4th in Par 4 Scoring, and 6th in Bogey Avoidance. On top of all that, after a disappointing T74 here in 2015-16 Reavie bounced back and finished with a Top 5 last year.
Rickie Fowler
World Golf Ranking (#10)
Vegas Odds (10/1)
Draftkings ($11,800)
FanDuel ($10,300)
Making his first trip to El Camaleon and the OHL Classic, Rickie is the favorite to win and like I mentioned in the intro, is the only Top 10 player in the World Golf Rankings in the field. He ranks #3 in my stats model this week behind Hadley and List despite ranking 23rd and 21st in Strokes Gained: Off the Tee and Approach. The reason shows up is his elite Top 10 ranks in Par 4 and 5 Scoring, Birdie or Better %, Bogey Avoidance, Scrambling, and Strokes Gained: Putting. He is also coming off a very successful season where he picked up a win, two runner-ups, 10 Top 10's and 16 Top 25 finishes. I don't think it's worth paying that far up in cash games but he provides huge upside in a weaker field and is my top GPP play of the week.
Luke List
World Golf Ranking (#120)
Vegas Odds (40/1)
Draftkings ($7,900)
FanDuel ($6,400)
For value this week, I will be turning to Luke List in all formats as he ranks #4 in my overall model and #2 in my stats model this week. Much like last year, he is having an excellent start to the season with a T37 at the Safeway Open and has followed that up with three straight Top 25 finishes including a Top 5 at the CJ Cup two weeks ago. Looking at the cheatsheet, he ranks 2nd in Strokes Gained: Off the Tee, 7th in Strokes Gained: Off the Tee + Approach, 7th in Proximity from 200+ yards, 5th in Par 5 Scoring, and 5th in Birdie or Better %. During that terrific start to last years fall season, he also finished T7 here after missing the cut the year before. Lock him into your lineups as he has turned into an early season gem for fantasy.
**Weather Update**
Chris Durell has been playing Daily Fantasy Sports for five years and fantasy in general for more than a decade. He is active player in college football, NFL, MLB, NASCAR, NHL and of course PGA. He lives in Saskatchewan, Canada with his wife and two daughters. You can follow him on Twitter at @Jager_Bombs9 for advice, strategy, answers to any PGA questions and how he copes with the winters up north.
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