2020 Waste Management Phoenix Open - Value DFS Picks

Based on the statistics on Golf Predictor for the 2020 Waste Management Phoenix Open, here is my analysis of the tournament for DFS (DraftKings) purposes. Anyone can pick the top golfers for their line-up, but it's the roster fillers that can make or break your chances. Therefore, I will concentrate on low and mid salary picks and exclude any golfers above $7600. Of course, you are free to disagree and log in to Golf Predictor to make your own informed choices for the event!

Approach

To maximise your scoring potential, it's important to get as many of your line-up through the cut as possible. Therefore, I will look for golfers with a good recent record in each of the stats examined. This generally means relatively long cut streaks, although in some cases, I allow one aberration if the golfer's record is good otherwise. Golfers with shorter streaks of good results will also be listed. For this tournament, the stats I will look at are current form, course/tournament form and same region form.

Current Form Golfers

The following golfers have relatively good recent records or long cut streaks in their salary bracket:

Mark Hubbard (excluding one event) - $6200
C.T. Pan (excluding last event) - $6500
Brian Stuard - $6600
Kevin Tway (excluding one event) - $6700
Talor Gooch - $7000
Matt Jones - $7000
Max Homa - $7100
Scott Piercy - $7100
Denny McCarthy - $7200
Tom Hoge (hot last 3 events) - $7400
Andrew Putnam - $7500
Vaughn Taylor - $7500
J.T. Poston (excluding one event) - $7600

Course/Tournament Specialists

The following golfers have relatively good records in their salary bracket at the tournament itself:

Chris Kirk - $6300
John Huh - $6400
Brian Stuard - $6600
Martin Laird - $6700
Brian Gay - $6700
Matt Jones - $7000
Zach Johnson (excluding last event) - $7300
Charley Hoffman - $7400
Brendan Steele (excluding last year) - $7500

Same Region Performers

The following golfers have relatively good recent records or long cut streaks in their salary bracket in the same region as this week's event:

Mark Hubbard - $6200
Trey Mullinax - $6500

Kevin Chappell (excluding last event) - $6500
Sam Ryder (excluding last event) - $6600
Brian Stuard - $6600
Max Homa - $7100
Scott Piercy - $7100
Emiliano Grillo (excluding last event) - $7300
Zach Johnson (excluding last event) - $7300
J.T. Poston - $7600
Russell Knox - $7600

Summary

Brian Stuard looks like a great choice as he features in all three lists. Scott Piercy, Max Homa, Matt Jones, J.T. Poston and Mark Hubbard all feature in two of the lists, so they might be worth considering as low and mid value picks this week.

2020 Saudi International - Value DFS Picks

Based on the statistics on Golf Predictor for the 2020 Saudi International, here is my analysis of the tournament for DFS (DraftKings) purposes. Anyone can pick the top golfers for their line-up, but it's the roster fillers that can make or break your chances. Therefore, I will concentrate on low and mid salary picks and exclude any golfers above $7600. Of course, you are free to disagree and log in to Golf Predictor to make your own informed choices for the event!

Approach

To maximise your scoring potential, it's important to get as many of your line-up through the cut as possible. Therefore, I will look for golfers with a good recent record in each of the stats examined. This generally means relatively long cut streaks, although in some cases, I allow one aberration if the golfer's record is good otherwise. Golfers with shorter streaks of good results will also be listed. For this tournament, the stats I will look at are current form, course/tournament form and same region form.

Current Form Golfers

The following golfers have relatively good recent records or long cut streaks in their salary bracket:

Ashley Chesters (excluding last event) - $6300
Joakim Largergren (excluding last event) - $6700
Matthieu Pavon - $6800
Scott Hend (excluding last event) - $6900
Calum Hill (excluding last event) - $6900
Haydn Porteous (excluding last event) - $6900
Jorge Campillo - $7000
Richie Ramsay - $7000
Nicolas Colsaerts (excluding one event) - $7000
Jack Sing Brar - $7200
Benjamin Hebert (excluding one event) - $7200
Sam Horsfield (excluding last event) - $7300
Marcus Kinhult (excluding last event) - $7500
Lucas Herbert - $7600

Course/Tournament Specialists

As this is only the second running of the event, there isn't much to go on. However. the following golfers played relatively well at the tournament itself last year:

Victor Dubuisson - $6800

Scott Hend - $6900
Alex Levy - $7000
Renate Paratore - $7200
Zander Lombard - $7300

Ryan Fox - $7400
Brendan Steele (excluding last year) - $7500

 

Same Region Performers

The following golfers have relatively good recent records or long cut streaks in their salary bracket in the same region as this week's event:

Ricardo Santos (excluding last event) - $6100
Gaganjeet Bhullar (excluding one event) - $6300
Grant Forrest - $6700
Alexander Bjork - $6800
Jeff Winther - $6800
Jorge Campillo (excluding last event) - $7000
Nicolas Colsaerts - $7000
Scott Jamieson - $7100
Ross Fisher (excluding last event) - $7300
Jordan L Smith - $7400
Lucas Herbert - $7600

Summary

No one features in all three categories, which is unsurprising given the paucity of course/tournament history.  However, Colsaerts, Herbert, Hend and Campillo appear in two, so they might be worth considering as low and mid value picks this week. Given that Herbert's maiden win was only a few days ago on Australia Day, it might be best to avoid him this week though! 

2020 - Week 5 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the Saudi International (European PGA Tour) and the Waste Management Phoenix Open (US PGA Tour) are now available on Golf Predictor. It's the last week of the Desert Swing (for now!) on the European PGA Tour and a strong enough field has been somehow lured back to Saudi Arabia! Meanwhile, the US PGA Tour has made the short hop from California to Arizona, where the raucous fans can cheer on a quality field, with seven of the top twenty in the world rankings teeing it up!

2020 - Week 4 Winners

Lucas Herbert (ranked 65th by Golf Predictor) won the Omega Dubai Desert Classic on the European PGA Tour. The 24 year old Australian won his first European Tour tour title on Australia Day in Dubai. With many of the leaders struggling in the conditions on the tough layout, Herbert finished level with Christiaan Bezuidenhout after the duo shot best of the day 68s to finish on nine under par.  Herbert overcame a water ball on the first extra hole to salvage a par with a great wedge. That allowed him to take the title on the next with a two putt birdie after he got on the par five eighteenth in two. Our top ranked player, Tommy Fleetwood, started and finished poorly, but still finished tied 11th. Overall, we had eight of the top sixteen (8/22) in total in the testing conditions.

Marc Leishman (ranked 10th by Golf Predictor) won the Farmers Insurance Open on the US PGA Tour. The 36 year old Australian  made it a great Australia Day for professional golfers with an impressive closing round at Torrey Pines. Trailing Jon Rahm by four strokes overnight, Leishman shot a fine 65 (-7) to edge the slow starting and fast finishing Spaniard by a single shot. Rahm was our top ranked player and we had nine of the top sixteen plus ties (9/20) in total.

Field Rankings (Field) Page Added to Golf Predictor

Composite image of the Field Rankings (Field) page for the 2020 Farmers Insurance Open.

As mentioned in the post on the site going free, I am pleased to announce the addition of donor only advanced functionality to Golf Predictor. This useful new page shows the field ranks of the entire field in various metrics at a glance and is available from the 'Predictions' menu in the Member section. As can be seen in the screenshot above for the 2020 Farmers Insurance Open, these field ranks are colour coded and the average value is calculated for each golfer. This new page will allow you to easily spot the relative performance of the golfers in the field in these metrics. The field rankings visible for the field on this page are:

1. GP season average
2. Last 5 events average
3. Similar length course average
4. World ranking
5. Wins in current GP Season
6. Top tens in current GP Season
7. Wins in last 12 similar events
8. Top tens in last 12 similar events
9. Course average
10. Tournament average
11. Last 12 similar event average
12. Same Region average
13. Cut streak
14. Winless streak

Some notes on this new page :

1. As this new page is computationally intensive, this data restricted to the current week's events, and is available after the field stats are created and before the results are input into the system. This is approximately from Monday evening to Sunday evening (GMT) of the tournament week.
2. Further to the above point, you cannot change the GP Season in the drop down box.
3. To keep things manageable, there is no sorting on the field rank data. However, you can sort by GP Rank and golfer name.
4. To ensure even the longest names can appear in the space available, the golfer names are displayed in the Lastname, Firstname Initial format.
5. Golfers with no data for a metric are assigned "n/a" in the table and are skipped for the average calculation. These metrics are colour coded brown, as shown in the screenshot above.
6. Hovering over a golfer name will show a summary of the rankings in the various metrics. This is shown above for Jon Rahm.
7. Hovering over a field rank in the table for a golfer will show more information and show what the column header means. This is shown above for the WS (Winless Streak) column for John Rahm.
8. There is a key table at the bottom of the page explaining the column headers.

I hope this new page will prove useful for deciding on good picks for upcoming tournaments. As this is a donor only feature, free site users will only see the data for golfers ranked 11-25 by the GP algorithm. However, you can donate after you log in to see the data for the entire tournament field. So, please consider donating today to reap the full benefits of Golf Predictor, the premium professional golf statistics site.

2020 - Week 4 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the Omega Dubai Desert Classic (European PGA Tour) and the Farmers Insurance Open (US PGA Tour) are now available on Golf Predictor. The European Tour stays in the UAE this week, where the action moves to Dubai with eight of the top thirty in the world are teeing it up. Meanwhile, there is a pretty strong field in California, where twelve of the top thirty in the world are teeing it up at Torrey Pines, including Rory McIlroy and Jon Rahm. However, all eyes will be once again on Tiger Woods, who's making his 2020 debut on a course where he has had tremendous success in the past.

2020 - Week 3 Winners

Lee Westwood (ranked 26th by Golf Predictor) won the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship on the European PGA Tour. The 46 year old Englishman won his twenty fifth tour title with an impressive front running display in Abu Dhabi. Leading by one overnight, Westwood was never caught and birdied the final hole to win by two strokes from Matthew Fitzpatrick and the fast finishing Victor Perez and Tommy Fleetwood. Our top ranked golfer, Brooks Koepka, shook off the rust and finished tied 34th. Overall, we had nine of the top seventeen plus ties (9/20) in total.

Andrew Landry (ranked 97th by Golf Predictor) won The American Express on the US PGA Tour. The 32 year old American overcame a final day wobble to win his second tour title. Leading by four overnight with Scottie Scheffler, Landry led by six shots at one stage, before falling back into a tie with Abraham Ancer. However, he collected himself and finished with two birdies to defeat the Mexican by two shots. Our top ranked golfer, Paul Casey, finished in tied 21st and in a birdie fest where most of the bigger names failed to perform, we had only had seven of the top seventeen plus ties (7/20) in total.

2020 - Week 3 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship (European PGA Tour) and The American Express (US PGA Tour) are now available on Golf Predictor. It's the first event of the desert swing on the European Tour and once again, several big names have been lured to the Middle East. World number one Brooks Koepka, Patrick Cantlay and Bryson DeChambeau are joining a strong cast of Europeans hoping to get a winning start to 2020! Meanwhile, the US PGA Tour makes its 2020 debut on the mainland at La Quinta. It's got a new sponsor and name, but it will be the same old birdie fest in the desert!

2020 - Week 2 Winners

Branden Grace (ranked 6th by Golf Predictor) won the first event of the year on the European Tour, the South African Open. The 31 year old South African finally won his home Open with a great finish in Johannesburg to defeat defending champion Louis Oosthuizen. In doing so, Grace completed his set of wins in big tournaments on home soil. Despite an early bogey, he blew away the competition with a brilliant putting display in a closing 62 (-9). That allowed him to overcome a three shot overnight deficit and win his ninth tour title by three shots. Oosthuizen was our top ranked player and we only had five of the top fifteen plus ties (5/21) in the weak fielded event.

In the first full field event of the year on the US PGA Tour, Cameron Smith (ranked 15th by Golf Predictor) won the Sony Open in Hawaii. The 26 year old Australian won for the second time on tour and first individual title after Brendan Steele feel apart late on. Leading by three on the back nine and by two shots with two to play, Steele finished poorly to fall into a play-off with Smith. The Australian then prevailed with an easy two putt par on the first extra hole after Steele went over the green from an ideal position and made bogey. Our top ranked player, a tired Justin Thomas, missed the cut after winning last week and we had eight of the top twelve plus ties (8/20) in total at the weather affected event.

2020 - Week 2 Predictions/Statistics Online

The predictions and statistics for this week, the South African Open* (European PGA Tour) and the Sony Open in Hawaii (US PGA Tour), are now available on Golf Predictor. Local favourites Louis Oosthuizen and Erik van Rooyen headline the field in South Africa, which only has six of the top one hundred in the world rankings. Meanwhile, it's the second leg of the Hawaiian swing and the first full field event on the US PGA Tour in 2019. A pretty strong field has gathered again this year with eight of the top thirty in the world teeing it up at Waialae.

*The full name of this event is the South African Open Hosted by City of Johannesburg, which is a little too verbose for Golf Predictor!

2020 - Week 1 Winner

Justin Thomas (ranked 2nd by Golf Predictor) won the Sentry Tournament of Champions. The 26 year old American won his twelfth tour title with a second victory at the year opener in Hawaii. Trailing defending champion Xander Schauffele overnight, Thomas overcame a ropey finish to tie Schauffele and the fast finishing Patrick Reed after seventy two holes. Thomas then hung in there while Reed missed a few putts to win to take the title on the third extra hole. Our top ranked golfer, John Rahm, finished in tenth and we had fourteen of the top seventeen plus ties (14/18) in this restricted field event.

There was no event on the European Tour this week.