Joaquin Niemann, Scottie Scheffler and Jordan Spieth have all won this year (and were picked by our expert).
Getty Images
How would you like to have an extra $12,400 sloshing around in your bank account? You woulda, coulda, shoulda if you’d been listening to Erick Lindgren.
GOLF.com’s expert prognosticator has been on a tear this season (and has picked winners in back-to-back weeks). Not even Scottie Scheffler has more wins. And he hasn’t been keeping his opinions secret, either.
Every week, we’ve been playing the same game with Lindgren: we provide him with a $1,000 gambling budget, and he supplies us with his top-five wagers for the upcoming event.
When we say it’s a game, we mean it; the budget we give Lindgren is just play money. But his tips are real. Here’s how things would look if you’d been following his advice throughout the 2021-22 campaign:
A Winter Windfall
After coming up empty in his first few events, Lindgren cashed his first win of the season in January at the American Express, in La Quinta, where he had Francesco Molinari to finish in the top 10. At 12-to-1, the $200 wager paid $2,400, giving Lindgren a net profit of $1,600 for the week.
A month later, at the Genesis Open, at Riviera, Lindgren singled out a sleeper in a deep field when he bet $200 on Joaquin Niemann to win. At 50-to-1, the bet paid $10,000. Net profit for the week: $9,200.
(Looking to play any of these bets yourself? We teamed with BetMGM and the online sports book is offering a Risk-Free Bet of up to $1,000.)
Getting Warmer
After a near-miss at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, where he had eventual runner-up Viktor Hovland to win, Lindgren rang in spring with a ca-ching at the WGC Match Play, in Austin. His $100 wager on Scottie Scheffler to win paid 20-to-1, or $2,000, giving Lindgren a net profit of $1,200 for the week.
The following week, at the Texas Open, nothing hit for Lindgren. But the dry spell was short-lived. Our gambling guru got right back to it at Augusta, where he went with Scheffler once again, placing $300 on the newly anointed World No. 1 to win the green jacket. At 16-to-1, the bet paid $4,800, giving Lindgren a $4,000 net profit for the week.
Back-to-Back Wins
Fresh off a big week at the Masters, Lindgren padded his profits by picking Jordan Spieth to win the RBC Heritage. At 40-to-1, the $100 wager paid $4,000. And that wasn’t Lindgren’s only smart play at Harbour Town. Three of his five picks paid off. Lindgren also had $200 on Matt Kuchar to finish in the top five, at 9-to-1, and $200 on Scott Piercy to finish in the top 20, at 20-to-1. Those wagers paid $1,800 and $2,000, respectively. Combined with the Spieth win, they yielded a net profit of $7,400 for the week.
Lindgren’s running total for the season is now plus-$12,400.
A golf, food and travel writer, Josh Sens has been a GOLF Magazine contributor since 2004 and now contributes across all of GOLF’s platforms. His work has been anthologized in The Best American Sportswriting. He is also the co-author, with Sammy Hagar, of Are We Having Any Fun Yet: the Cooking and Partying Handbook.