2020 Workday Charity Open Picks and Preview

For the next two weeks the PGA will play at the Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio. This week it’s the Workday Charity Open. The Workday Open is a one-time-only event created to replace the cancelled John Deere Classic. The following week the Memorial Tournament will be played at Muirfield, an event that has been played at MVGC since 1976. 

What to Expect at Muirfield 

This is Jack Nicklaus’ tournament. It is played on a golf course that Nicklaus designed. Nicklaus was born, raised, educated and has remained in the greater Columbus, Ohio area. Each year a golfer from the past is honored, hence the name “memorial,” and a plaque commemorating the chosen golfer is installed near the club house at Muirfield.

This is a par-72 course with four par-3’s and four par-4’s. The course rewards accurate driver hits. For golfers who miss the fairways, scrambling will be a challenge. The greens play fast. Expect birdies on holes five, six and seven. The cut-line on this course tends to be par. Patrick Cantlay ($47 on Yahoo DFS) won the Memorial in 2019 with a minus-19 score. A certain golfer, the one who ‘roid raged at a cameraman last week at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, won the Memorial in 2018. Jason Dufner ($20 on Yahoo DFS) won in 2017. Hideki Mastuyama ($45 on Yahoo DFS) won the Memorial in 2014. Matt Kuchar ($42 on Yahoo DFS) won the Memorial in 2013. 

An interesting side-note is that it will be possible for a golfer to do something called the “Muirfield Double,” winning the Workday this week and winning the Memorial next week. 

Below are my picks. 

The Muirfield Double

Yeah, I like Cantlay. I always like Cantlay. He’s one of my top-five favorites in the PGA. I am betting on Cantlay this week. I will bet on Cantlay next week at the Memorial. If I had to pick a golfer who could win here in two consecutive weeks, it would be Cantlay. Patrick “Muirfield Double” Cantlay. 

Here’s some other names I like on Yahoo DFS: 

Top Tier 

Justin Rose ($42 on Yahoo DFS) sucked two weeks ago at the Travelers Championship and missed the cut, but he was T-14 at the RBC Heritage three weeks ago and T-3 at the Charles Schwab a month ago. Rose also has great course history numbers at Muirfield, having played 46 rounds there with a cumulative strokes gained of +2.75. I am banking on course history this week, and Rose has great statistics here.

Xander Shauffele ($44 on Yahoo DFS) was T-20 at the Travelers, T-64 at the RBC Heritage, and T-3 at the Schwab. You have to consider how deep the field was at those events to put those numbers in perspective. The field at the Workday is weak in comparison. 

Hideki Matsuyama ($45 on Yahoo DFS) is my contrarian play. Other than a T-21 at the Rocket Mortgage last week, he hasn’t had his best game recently. I am looking for Matsuyama to turn it around at the Workday for a top-10 finish. Basically, in the Workday field Matsuyama is a top-class talent. His statistics at Muirfield are strong, having played 22 competition rounds here with a shots-gained score of +2.13.

Middle Tier 

Joaquin Niemann ($38 on Yahoo DFS) has played well in recent weeks. He was T-5 at the RBC Heritage and T-32 at the Charles Schwab. He has the game needed to compete at the Workday. 

Phil Mickelson ($34 on Yahoo DFS) has decent course history here, having played 39 competitive rounds at Muirfield with a strokes-gamed statistic of +1.54. The reason I like Mickelson at the Workday is because he is a world-class scrambler and that skill will come in handy at Muirfield. I might end up yelling at my television and watching Mickelson do his “old dirty grandpa” schtick as he misses yet another cut. But I like Phil here against this field. 

Jim Furyk ($32 on Yahoo DFS) has good course history here with 54 competition rounds and a strokes-gained number of +1.66. They call it gambling for a reason, and I admit that Furyk is a gamble, but I am going to put some Furyk in my DFS lineups and see what happens. 

Strategy

A respectable strategy in any golf DFS lineup is to match three top-priced golfers with three minimum-priced golfers. In order to make that work you must find value golfers with a chance to make the cut and compete. If you want to play lines with Cantlay and two other high-priced studs like Justin Thomas ($48 on Yahoo DFS) or Vik Hovland ($41 on Yahoo DFS) you have to match them with cheap players.

Lower Tier

Stewart Cink ($20 on Yahoo DFS) is a pick based upon two factors – he has good numbers at Muirfield and he has made the cut five out of his last six tries. 

Jason Dufner ($20 on Yahoo DFS) is another pick based upon two factors – he has good numbers at Muirfield and he won the Memorial there in 2017. 

Scott Stallings ($20 on Yahoo DFS) was T-6 at the Travelers. He has made the cut nine out of his last eleven tries. Stallings is the soft-priced player of the week. He’s a lot of golfer for a little price. 

© 2020 Mike McKenzie 

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2020 Travelers Championship Picks and Preview

Next up on the 2020 PGA Tour is the Travelers Championship at TPC River Highlands in Connecticut.  This is a private golf course built in 1928 that has hosted professional tournament play since the 1950’s. In 1982 the course was completely redesigned to meet PGA Tour standards by the most famous of golf course architects, Pete Dye.  Since 1984 the course has hosted the annual PGA Tour Travelers Championship.

TPC River Highlands features mature trees and a variety of lakes and ponds.  The final four holes on this course are challenging and generate golf drama in the closing stretch.

While I generally take a grim view of America’s private golf club elitist culture, I will temper that opinion here with some upbeat notes.  Since 1952 the tournament has generated over $42 million in charitable giving with 100 percent of the net proceeds from the tournament donated to charity.  In 2019 the tournament distributed $2.1 million to 150 regional charities. The course is also certified in the Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary Program for golf courses.  Thus, the course is managed with ecologically sound practices and with a commitment to protect wildlife habitat.

Hometown Heroes

I had a hard time identifying a hometown hero for this tournament.  I will read almost anything that I can find when I am researching players.  I even read the bogus, picks-for-sale dribble that CBS Sports publishes.  For the Travelers I was looking for current PGA players who attended the nearby University of Connecticut but found no active PGA players amongst the college’s alums.  I also tried to find pros who are members of TPC River Highlands and again came up empty.

So, without a true hometown hero, I had to settle for players who have excelled at the Travelers in the past.  Two names are on top of the list – Jim Furyk ($29 on Yahoo DFS) and Patrick Cantlay ($41 on Yahoo DFS).  Furyk shot a single-round course record 58 in 2016.  Cantlay shot a collegiate course record in 2011 with a single-round score of 60.

Last week at the RBC Championship my hometown, South Carolina favorite was Matthew Nesmith.  While Nesmith had no prior professional course history at the RBC Championship, he played golf at the University of South Carolina.  He also proposed to his wife on the 18^th hole of Harbor Town Golf Links.  That’s the kind of narrative that befits hometown heroes.

In Yahoo Daily Fantasy lineups Nesmith was minimum priced.  Nesmith made the cut at RBC and was in the mix throughout the tournament.  He ended up tied for 33^rd at RBC – a solid performance for a minimum-priced player.  I am looking at Mathew Nesmith ($21 on Yahoo DFS) to be competitive again this week. 

Stacked Field

Most of the best golfers in the world competed in the Schwab Challenge and the RBC Championship.  The field for Travelers is just as strong.  While it makes for highly competitive golf, it is difficult to pick the outright winner in such a strong field. 

Of the 150 or more golfers in the Travelers player field almost any one of them could be on top of the leaderboard on Sunday afternoon.  The short odds favor the biggest names in professional golf – such as McIlroy, Dechambeau, Thomas, Simpson, Rahm and Cantlay – at the highest per-player DFS prices.

Strategically, in order to load up on big names, you will have to choose value and minimally priced players to round out your lineups.  Here are some ideas from the middle and lower tiers of the player pricing pool:

Bubba Watson ($36 on Yahoo DFS):  Watson won the Travelers in 2018, 2015 and 2010.  He was tied for 52^nd at the RBC Heritage last weekend and he was T7 at the Charles Schwab two weekends ago.

Abraham Ancer ($31 on Yahoo DFS):  Ancer had a strong showing at the RBC, placing T5.  He was solid two weeks ago, coming in T14 at the Charles Schwab.  Basically, the guy is hot and should come to the Travelers looking for his first PGA Tour win. 

Brian Harman ($27 on Yahoo DFS):  While Harman probably won’t win, he’s a good bet to make the cut and compete for a spot in the top 20.  In his last five tries at the Travelers he has scored three top 8’s there.

Max Homa ($27 on Yahoo DFS): Prior to the corona virus shutdown, Homa was playing fantastic golf with top 10 showings at the Farmers Insurance Open, the Waste Management Phoenix Open and the Genesis Open. 

Vaughn Taylor ($27 on Yahoo DFS): Taylor tops the field in competition rounds played at the Travelers with 56.  He has made the cut on the PGA Tour 11 times in his last 15 tries.  While not a genuine threat to win, Taylor is a solid pick to make the cut and potentially be in the top 30 at the Travelers.

Harry Higgs ($20 on Yahoo DFS): Higgs is a bargain basement, minimum-priced player at the Travelers.  He has made the cut in 13 of his last 17 PGA Tour starts.  While he is not a model of consistency, if he makes the cut at the Travelers he could easily come out in the top 40, which is about as much as you can ask of a minimum-priced player.

Soft Pricing

Soft Pricing is an economics term meaning that the price of something is stagnant, falling or subject to negotiations.  In professional gambling the term means that a player’s price is disproportionally low when compared to similarly players in the field.  On DFS sites player prices don’t always reflect the true value of the player.  Some players are over priced and some players are under priced.

Of the picks made above, I would assert that on Yahoo DFS Nesmith, Ancer, Harman, Homa and Higgs are priced lower than what I would perceive their value to be. All are priced below the average player’s salary.  These are the type of players one must identify in order to build winning lineups this week on Yahoo DFS.

© 2020

Mike McKenzie

McKenzie Golf Research

Portland, Oregon

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A fool and his money are quickly parted.  Gamble at your own risk.