If you look at the leaderboards of recent Wells Fargo Championships versus the leaderboard of the 2017 PGA Championship, one will find a much heavier dose of bombers on the regular May Tour stop and plenty of accuracy-based plodders filling up the results from eight years ago.
SG: Off the Tee is basically a modern-day iteration of Total Driving, a golf statistic measuring a combination of distance and accuracy off the tee. This is a huge piece of the handicap pie for me at Quail Hollow. SG: Approach is also important, of course, as well as Hole Proximity from 175 yards to over 200 yards. Over 50 percent of the approach shots this week, including the Par 3s, will come from 175 yards or more.
I also looked at Scrambling, Bogey Avoidance, 450-500 yard Par 4’s, SG: Putting (Fast Bermudagrass), and SG: Total in recent major championships.
The comparable courses to Quail Hollow, I believe, provide a strong connection, and carry noteworthy relevance this week. Torrey Pines (South) is probably my No. 1, as it is similar in many different ways to Quail Hollow, most notably with its emphasis on Total Driving. Other “Big Boy” courses that are driver-heavy are Golf de Chapultepec, where the WGC-Mexico was held between 2017 and 2020 and which is now a part of the LIV rotation, and similar historically to Trump National – Doral in the Miami area. I also used another Fazio design, Congaree, and looked at last year’s PGA venue, Valhalla, and that in 2020, Harding Park, and finally Winged Foot, host of the 2020 U.S. Open.
We broke down our Masters selections into Contenders and Longshots and I am going to do the same here. Since moving to May, the list of past PGA champions all cashed at relatively short prices, (other than Phil Mickelson in 2021) in the neighborhood of 18 to 35 to 1. I’ve played four players in this range and four at much longer odds.
Contenders
Bryson DeChambeau (+850)
I stewed over this one for a while last weekend, wondering if I should pull the trigger at 12-1 odds. Money came in heavily on DeChambeau on Monday, so missing the better number was frustrating but eventually I decided that I had to make the move as I just don’t see many golfers that make more sense this week than the defending U.S. Open champion and a guy who has played in the final pairing on Sunday in his last four starts. Over the last 36 rounds, he is No. 1 in this field for Driving Distance, SG: Off the Tee, and on the 450-500 yard Par 4s. If he were still a member of the PGA Tour, DeChambeau would rank 21st on Tour for Driving Accuracy. He is third in this field for SG: Putting (fast Bermudagrass) over the last 36 rounds and also third for Bogey Avoidance. DeChambeau won at Winged Foot in 2020, was runner-up last year at Valhalla and in 2020 at the WGC-Mexico. His last three trips to Trump Doral have resulted in 10-7-5 place finishes. He finished fourth at Harding Park in 2020 and took fourth and ninth here at Quail Hollow during his PGA Tour days. At last look, DeChambeau is the No. 1 biggest liability at BetMGM and that is not a situation I prefer to be aligned with, but so was Rory McIlroy last month at Augusta, and like I said, I had a hard time leaving Bryson off the card this week. I have to believe he is going to be in the mix.
It is worth mentioning that Scottie Scheffler has only played this golf course before at the 2022 Presidents Cup and he went 0-3-1 in his matches that week. With the rain this week, his practice rounds could be limited too. As for McIlroy, I’m not sure the pressure, expectation, aligning of the stars — whatever you want to call it — could be any greater on him than it is this week. Off of what will likely be the greatest accomplishment of his entire life, the Masters and the career Grand Slam, he arrives at a golf course where he’s won four times before. I just think all of this is piled on too thick for McIlroy this week and in the continuing battle of Rory vs. Bryson, I’m going with the American in Round 3.
Xander Schauffele (16-1)
One can find better numbers on the defending champ as it stands now. I played this a month ago or so but still definitely like the selection. He’s been runner-up here two years in a row at the Wells Fargo and if you look at how his season has been this year, albeit interrupted by injury, it looks like he might be primed to fire now. He hasn’t missed a cut all year and his last four starts have been 12-8-18-11. That eighth- place finish came at the Masters, and that is significant. In the five Masters played immediately prior to the PGA Championship, since the switch in 2019, four of the five PGA winners had finished top-10 at Augusta a month earlier. Both Schauffele and DeChambeau meet that criteria. Schauffele was fifth at Winged Foot in 2020 and has three top-10 finishes at Torrey Pines, including a runner-up and a seventh in 2021 for the U.S. Open.
Ludvig Aberg (18-1)
This is another one in which I have seen the number get substantially better. I grabbed it back in January, immediately after Aberg won the Genesis Invitational, held at Torrey Pines this season. He’s cooled off a bit since and his number has drifted. Not to worry though, as it was just last month he finished seventh at the Masters. Over the last 36 rounds, Aberg is fifth in this field for SG: Off the Tee, fourth in Hole Proximity from 200+ yards, 31st on the 450-500 yard Par 4s, and is 25th for SG: Putting (fast Bermudagrass).
Joaquin Niemann (30-1)
Niemann ha yet to crack finishing top-15 at a major championship but there are too many positives here for me to avoid him. First, I feel like the PGA is the major best suited for his game. He is extremely long off the tee and above average as far as accuracy. It was just a few weeks ago that he took down DeChambeau to win LIV-Mexico City at Chapultepec, giving him his third LIV victory this season in only six events. He’s been as high as 18th at Quail Hollow, ninth at Doral, and sixth at Torrey Pines. Over the last 36 rounds, Niemann ranks 29th in this field for SG: Approach, eighth for SG: Off the Tee, 12th on the 450-500 yard Par 4s, and is fifth in Bogey Avoidance.
Longshots
Tyrrell Hatton (60-1)
Hatton has two top-10 finishes on the LIV circuit this season, including a fifth-place finish a few weeks ago at Chapultepec, a place where he notched three top-10 finishes in four starts as a member of the PGA Tour. He was third here at Quail Hollow in 2023, has been as high as fourth at Doral, finished runner-up at Congaree in 2021, won the Hero Dubai Desert Classic back in January and was 14th last month at the Masters.
Jason Day (80-1)
We always run the risk of injury with Day, unfortunately, and we are seeing some of that take place here just days before the championship. This was a bet I placed back in January. I have seen the number dip to as low as 60-1 and now to over 100-1 with his WD from the Truist Championship last week, sighting neck issues. My thought (and hope) is that last week’s withdrawal was precautionary, wanting to make sure that he was entirely ready for this week. The PGA is the lone major he has to his credit and Quail Hollow is also a golf course at which he has won before in addition to finishing top-10 three times. His record at Torrey Pines is one of the best ever with two outright wins. He was fourth at the PGA at Harding Park in 2020 and took eighth last month at the Masters. He has yet to miss a cut this season and was also eighth back in March at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Day is a bit of an older version of what our theme here is this week, a bomber off the tee who often carries a hot putter. If he is in good health, I believe he contends.
Sungjae Im (95-1)
It has been a while since Im has won and a while since I have bet on him to do so, but in trying to uncover some players who might make some noise this week, I have landed on the young Korean who has fared quite well in some key areas we are looking at this week. He’s finished fourth and eighth in the past at Quail Hollow and fourth twice and sixth at Torrey Pines. At the President’s Cup here in 2022, Im went 2-2-1 in his matches and was tied for the top scorer on the International side. He is not a bomber like the others but still ranks 20th in this field for SG: Off the Tee over the last 36-rounds and is 26th on Tour for SG: Putting this season. He doesn’t appear to be in peak form currently but the results are there with three top-10 finishes this season, including a fifth at the Masters, followed by an 11th at the RBC Heritage the following week. He fired three rounds in the 60s last week in Philadelphia before slipping in the final round on Sunday.
Harris English (200-1)
When you dive in deep, English has really been an incredible player with quite the career. We landed on him correctly earlier this season when he won at Torrey Pines. He’s also finished eighth, runner-up, and third there in 2021 at the U.S. Open. English was fourth at the U.S. Open at Winged Foot, 19th at the PGA at Harding Park, 18th last year at Valhalla, and finished third at Quail Hollow at the 2023 Wells Fargo Championship. He fell just outside the top-10 last month, taking 12th at the Masters. He has one of the best short games in the entire field and ranks 24th on Tour in Total Driving.
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