PGA BMW Championship

With only 50 golfers competing, the FedExCup tournament has moved from Memphis, where Lucas Glover won his second consecutive event and gave us our second consecutive winner, to Chicago. This week the playoffs are in a Chicago suburb called Olympia Fields for the BMW Championship.

The Olympia Fields Country Club has a great golf course called the North Course, considered one of the top 50 courses in the United States. This course was designed by Willie Park Jr. in 1923 and has a classic layout with trees and open spaces. It's been changed a bit over time, but the main design and strategy are still the same. The course has hilly areas, narrow fairways, and a creek that winds through several holes.

The BMW Championship has usually been played on easier courses in the past decade. Last year, the winner finished with a score of 14-under par, and the year before that, the winner scored 27-under. In seven out of the last 11 championships, the winners scored 20-under or even better.

However, Olympia Fields is a different kind of challenge. It's one of players' toughest courses in the last five years. When it was played as a PGA Tour event in 2020, the winner scored just -4, and only five players finished with scores under par. On average, players scored 1.82 strokes over par on this course, making it the fifth most challenging course in that period.

The course has thick rough, strategically placed sand bunkers and tricky greens. Players who don't perform at their best will struggle in various ways. It's like a test similar to the U.S. Open, examining all aspects of a player's game. Making bad shots will have serious consequences. Although it was supposed to be firm and fast, recent heavy rains, have softened the course and made it longer.

The model breakdown for this course is as follows
Driving Distance 28%
Putting 17%
Driving Accuracy 17%
Around The Green 14%
Approach 24%

Since the model was updated before the PGA Championships, it has returned a 39% ROI. We are risking .312 units this week.

The emphasis is on the last 24 rounds the golfer has played. These are the best values, not necessarily the best golfers this week. As always, I play these bets to win 1 unit. It limits your risk, which is what we want to do on longshot futures types of bets.


To Win

Here are the top 20 golfers from my model this week in order from best to worst.

1. Rory McIlroy
2. Rickie Fowler
3. Scottie Scheffler
4. Viktor Hovland
5. Wyndham Clark
6. Lucas Glover
7. Patrick Cantlay
8. Jon Rahm
9. Tommy Fleetwood
10. Tyrell Hatton
11. Keegan Bradley
12. Justin Rose
13. Xander Schuaffele
14. Russell Henley
15. Jordan Spieth
16. J.T. Poston
17. Lee Hodges
18. Corey Conners
19. Max Homa
20. Collin Morikawa