Welcome to our weekly PGA Tour gambling-tips column, featuring picks from GOLF.com’s expert prognosticator Brady Kannon. A seasoned golf bettor and commentator, Kannon is a regular guest on SportsGrid, a syndicated audio network devoted to sports and sport betting. You can follow on Twitter at @LasVegasGolfer, and you can read his picks below for the 2025 Zurich Classic, which gets underway Thursday in Avondale, La. Along with 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 where you can win cash and prizes with each round and tournament.
It feels like the perfect time for a trip to New Orleans. Coming off one of the most thrilling Masters finishes in history to a Signature Event (and playoff) on Hilton Head Island, now we’re at a place and tournament where we can unwind and have some good old-fashioned golfing fun – a team event in The Big Easy.
It’s the Zurich Classic of New Orleans, an event that has been a regular on the Tour calendar for nearly 70 years. TPC Louisiana in Avondale, La., a Pete Dye design, has been the tournament venue since 2005. In 2017, the format changed from a standard stroke-play event to a two-person team competition, and while the acceptance was not immediate, the tournament has since been embraced by players and fans.
From a betting standpoint, I like to treat it as a “fun” event and dumb down the risk quite a bit. It is hard enough to pick one individual to win a golf tournament. Now you pair two players together, two skill sets together and two different formats of play together — alternating every other day over the four days – and it makes for a far less definitive handicap.
There are a total of 160 players in the field, making up 80 teams. The top 33 teams (and ties) will advance to the weekend after the 36-hole cut. On Thursday and Saturday, teams will play four-balls, meaning each team member plays their own ball and the lower score of the two is recorded as the team score for each hole. On Friday and Sunday, the game will be foursomes, which is commonly understood as alternate shot. Foursomes is the much more difficult format of the two. It is not uncommon for a team to shoot 10 under in four-balls and shoot even par a day later in foursomes.
Nothing really of note as far as the weather forecast in New Orleans yet. Temperatures in the low to mid-80s with winds anywhere from 5-15 mph is what we are seeing Thursday through Sunday.
TPC Louisiana is a par 72 that stretches to slightly over 7,400 yards. The skill sets I looked at this week were pretty limited or simplified, if you will — Strokes Gained: Tee to Green, Strokes Gained: Approach, Scrambling, Birdies or Better Gained, Par 4 Scoring (450-500 yards) and Strokes Gained: Putting (Bermudagrass). Ideally, one would like to find a pairing in which both players excel in all areas. I often like to look for teams that complement one another’s skill sets – one player does A, B and C at a high level and the other player does D, E and F very well – in theory, making for a very strong entry.
But much of the work we are doing this week is qualitative and not quantitative. Team chemistry can also be important.
The tournament has been won by the favorites as of late. In four out of the last five editions, the winning team’s odds were 20-1 or less. Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry are the defending champions – but they won in a playoff over huge longshots, Chad Ramey and Martin Trainer. If you look at past leaderboards, plenty of longshots do contend. So while we may be aided by the fact that the better players tend to win here, it is also true that plenty of teams come out of nowhere to surprise.
We can also point to correlated courses this week like we always do. With TPC Louisiana being a Dye design, form on Dye courses is a plus. Specifically, I looked at the Stadium Course, where the bulk of the rounds are played at the American Express in La Quinta, Calif. I also considered Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club, home to the Zozo Championship, PGA National (Cognizant Classic), Detroit Golf Club (Rocket Mortgage Classic) and TPC Twin Cities, host of the 3M Open.
We successfully broke the streak of picking runner-up finishers last week but unfortunately went the wrong direction with Daniel Berger, finishing third at Harbour Town and not first. Personally, I am not playing this week’s selections for the usual top-20 finish in addition to the outright win, but that is up to the individual. I would not say it is a bad idea to only play the selections for a top-20 finish this week. Again, we are dumbing down the risk for what can be a very enjoyable but also very unpredictable golf tournament.
Keith Mitchell & J.T. Poston (20-1)
This will be the first time these two players have ever teamed up for this event but both have had some success here in the past, most notably Mitchell with recent sixth- and fourth-place finishes. Poston has only missed one cut all season and comes in off an 11th-place finish in Hilton Head. Mitchell’s last three starts have been 18th, 12th, and runner-up last week at Corales Puntacana. I mentioned the complimentary skill sets and I believe we have quite a bit of that here with Mitchell being one of the best in the game off the tee and Poston possessing the magical short game.
Wyndham Clark & Taylor Moore (22-1)
This is another pairing that is a new one but also one in which both players have had excellent success here in the past, collectively accounting for four top-10 finishes. Their success at the correlated courses is also outstanding and I also feel we get the complimentary skill sets with Moore thriving off the tee and Clark being at his best on and around the greens. Both players also make a lot of birdies. Over the last 24 rounds, Clark ranks 17th in this field for Birdies or Better Gained and Moore is sixth.
Ben Griffin & Andrew Novak (25-1)
One of our recent runner-up selections was Novak. He did it again last week at the RBC Heritage. Obviously, the current form is extremely strong. Maybe having a wing man will help him get across the finish line. It has been a very good season so far for Griffin too, who has top-10 finishes at two of our correlated courses, a seventh at the American Express and a fourth-place finish at the Cognizant Classic. Once again, complimentary skill sets are in play with Griffin being the exceptional iron player (14th in this field for SG: Approach last 24 rounds) and Novak having the touch around the green, ranking fourth in this field for Scrambling.
Doug Ghim & Chan Kim (50-1)
This one stood out to me as a couple of premier ball strikers who have been decent at this event in the past and often fly under the radar in week-to-week, standard stroke-play tournaments. It could be one of those longshot pairings who make some noise. Ghim specifically has had great success in the past on Dye designs. Over the last 24 rounds, Kim ranks 23rd in this field for Birdies or Better Gained and Ghim is 18th on the 450-500 yard Par 4s and 11th in SG: Tee to Green.
Ryan Gerard & Danny Walker (60-1)
Gerard has really been fantastic in his PGA Tour rookie year, having missed only one cut all season and putting together two top-10 finishes in his last three starts. Walker, another rookie, turned heads back in March at the Players, when he finished sixth. Both players make birdies in bunches. Over the last 24 rounds, Walker ranks fourth in this field for Birdies or Better Gained and Gerard is 10th. They both reside in the top-30 in this field for SG: Tee to Green. If a hot putter emerges between the two of them, this is another longshot entry that could be a factor.
To make your own Chirp picks and win amazing prizes, download the app here.
