Collin Morikawa has already won one Open Championship.
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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 Open Championship, which gets underway Thursday in Troon, Scotland. 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.
The final major championship of the 2024 golf season is upon us, and my favorite of the four majors is here. It is the 152nd playing of the Open Championship and it will be held at Royal Troon with 158 players scheduled to tee it up on the coast of Ayrshire, Scotland, on Thursday.
The last time we saw The Open at Troon was in 2016. There was a severe weather bias between the early and late wave start times on Thursday and Friday and Henrik Stenson and Phil Mickelson took full advantage. They were the final pairing on Sunday and no other player in the field was even close. Stenson beat Mickelson in the best “Ali vs. Frazier” type duel I’ve ever witnessed on a golf course. Stenson bettered Lefty by three shots to win it. J.B. Holmes finished in third place, 14 shots off the pace.
Popular golf course renovation specialist Martin Ebert has been Royal Troon’s consulting architect for quite some time. He’s gotten his hands dirty on at least a couple of occasions on this property, most recently adding roughly 200 yards of length versus what we saw in 2016. This true seaside-links design is a par 71 and now stretches to 7,385 yards. The first handful of holes are chances to score as they typically play with the wind. The middle stretch becomes more difficult as the golf course turns to put the wind into the players, and then there is the final stretch where one will want to hang on for dear life and gladly welcome making par.
There are penal pot bunkers everywhere. The fairways are undulated, offering very few flat lies, and off the fairways one will find rough, wispy heather grasses and gorse bushes. On top of all that, the greens are small. The eighth hole is known as “The Postage Stamp” for its extremely tiny putting surface. It is only a 125-yard par-3, but 3 will be a good score all week.
I looked at Strokes Gained: Off the Tee this week as well as Fairways Gained. I favor Driving Accuracy this week over distance but a good “Total Driver” is ideal. I looked at Strokes Gained: Approach and Greens in Regulation Gained. With the extra small putting surfaces, hitting the greens in regulation will be key – and that also leads us to look hard at Scrambling for when these greens are missed. I also looked at Bogey Avoidance – and don’t forget the putting. The greens will be much slower than we are used to on the PGA Tour.
Courses that compare this week is a little bit tougher than usual because it is not all that often we have a full-blown links design in play. I used Pebble Beach for its coastal, links-type style and small greens. Last year’s Open venue, Royal Liverpool, is similar and has also been worked on by Ebert. Southern Hills (2022 PGA Championship) has some similarities in the layout as do The Summit Club (2021 CJ Cup) in Las Vegas and St. George’s Golf & Country Club (2022 Canadian Open). When Stenson won in 2016, he was incredibly accurate off the tee and one of the premier iron players/ball strikers in the world. That crosses over with TPC Scottsdale in my mind. And finally, I took into account Hamilton Golf & Country Club, host to the 2019 and 2024 Canadian Opens, as it too has seen extensive renovation work put in by Ebert.
So, who will it be that leaves Scotland this week as the Champion Golfer of the Year? Here are my picks.
Rory McIlroy (+850)
The timing would be incredible were this to happen, and I believe it is very possible. Yes, he had a brutal finish last month at the U.S. Open but let’s also look at it like this: he was right there and should have won. He defended his title admirably last week at the Scottish Open, finishing fourth. In his career, McIlroy has finishes of 3-1-5-4-2-3-6 at The Open, with the last two being sixth and third. He was fifth here in 2016 and his lone win happens to have come at Royal Liverpool. Over the last 36 rounds, he ranks top-5 in this field for SG: Off the Tee, SG: Approach, SG: Ball Striking and Bogey Avoidance. He is 11th in Scrambling and 10th in Hole Proximity from 150-175 yards. McIlroy has also won at Hamilton and St. George’s in Canada, and at The Summit in Las Vegas. I believe he is going to be right there once again and feel his chances of converting are better than once in 8.5 tries. In addition to the outright win, I also played a top-10 finish.
Collin Morikawa (19-1)
I made this wager a few weeks ago and the number has since come down, which I am OK with. It looks as if pricing around 16-1 is still available. Morikawa has seen a resurgence in his career this season. His attitude, his determination to win again, to be there with the Schefflers and the McIlroys, he has been truly impressive ever since finishing third at Augusta. He feels very similar to Stenson of 2016 with the ball striking, scrambling ability and accuracy off the tee. Of course, he has an Open Championship to his name and that came at Royal St. George’s, where Ebert also serves as a consulting architect. Given what we have seen out of Morikawa since April, he has to be on my card for an outright win and a top-20 finish.
Tyrrell Hatton (28-1)
The Englishman won for the first time in over three years less than a month ago on the LIV circuit in Nashville. He finished fifth here at Royal Troon in 2016 and has since recorded finishes of sixth, 11th and 20th coming last year at Royal Liverpool. He is one of the finest wind players in the world and has the short game to hang with just about anyone. Hatton took 18th at the 2021 CJ Cup, 13th at the 2022 PGA Championship and has finished sixth and 15th at TPC Scottsdale. I believe we are getting a very fair price on a guy that has a real shot this week. I played the top-20 finish here as well and on the rest of my selections too.
Tommy Fleetwood (30-1)
I mentioned this last week, that I already had a ticket on Fleetwood. The price has since come down on him as well. Anything better than 20-1 is pretty good and 25-1 or better is ideal. The man has been knocking on the door quite a bit at this championship with finishes of 10-4-2-12-27. He’s made six cuts in a row at The Open and has finished 10-4-2 in his last three trips. He also has a win earlier this season on the DP World Tour at the Dubai Invitational. He also fits the Stenson mold well with elite iron play in windy conditions and incredible accuracy off the tee. Over the last 36 rounds, he ranks eighth in this field for Scrambling, 16th in Greens in Regulation Gained, 13th in Hole Proximity from 125-150 yards and 10th from 175-200 yards.
The Irishman won the Open Championship on his home soil at Royal Portrush in 2019. Fleetwood finished runner-up, by the way, and Portrush is another course in The Open rota that also leans on Ebert as an architectural consultant. Lowry fits the formula here of accuracy off the tee, iron play, elite scrambling ability and one of the best in the wind. Lowry has finishes of sixth and 16th at TPC Scottsdale, 23rd at Southern Hills and 14th at Pebble Beach. He was runner-up at the Canadian Open at Hamilton in 2019 and 10th at St. George’s in 2022. He ranks No. 1 in this field over the last 36 rounds in Hole Proximity from 125-150 yards.
Corey Conners (60-1)
The Canadian doesn’t jump off the page as a links player but he is an elite ball striker and his results on this side of the world have been improving. He just finished 13th at the Scottish Open last week and has now made the cut at The Open three straight years, finishing as high as 15th in 2021. Putting and short game have always been the issue for Conners but The Open tends to bring all types of putters into the mix with its slower green speeds. Stenson was never a great putter and of course did just fine here eight years ago. The ball striking, greens in regulation, approach play numbers are all top-10 in this field for Conners. I believe a top-20 finish has a great chance and if that’s the case, an outright win is very possible.
Emiliano Grillo (300-1)
Conners might be a long shot but this is truly a “long bomb.” Grillo has always been one of the better ball strikers in the world and he’s improved his putting dramatically in the last few seasons – so much that across all the putting stats this week over the last 24 rounds on slow greens, Grillo ranks second in this field. He finished 12th here in 2016, 12th again in 2021, and was sixth last year at Royal Liverpool. I would not be surprised by another top-20 finish for the Argentinian.
