2023 Sentry Tournament of Champions DFS Golf Picks, Fades & Pivots

The Sentry Tournament of Champions has gone by a few different names, but it has always celebrated last year’s champions by giving them an easier shot at a payout in a small field. The tournament is held annually at Maui’s Plantation Course, an easier venue that encourages lower scoring and won’t stress the players much. The sprawling, par-73 course features four par 5’s — three of which are very reachable in two — but just three par 3’s. Golf DFS players should target the pivots and avoid the fades listed below.

Readers should heed the below DFS golf advice for their DraftKings and FanDuel daily fantasy lineups. Stokastic’s expert rankings and projections can help DFS players identify the best PGA DFS golf picks for the Sentry Tournament of Champions.

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PGA DFS Fades & Pivots | Sentry Tournament of Champions

This week’s field will top out at 39 players, giving each a great chance to get their season off to a fast start with a decent finish. The weather conditions look mostly calm (wind is this venue’s best defense), so another winner with a score of around 30-under par feels inevitable. Younger players have dominated here recently, as six of the last seven winners were 29 years old or younger. However, a then-32 Harris English took home the trophy in 2021, and this trend says more about the number of great young players in the game than anything else.

The hilly terrain and humid weather may have something to do with the list of younger winners, but any player in this field who shows up this week with a hot flatstick and solid ball striking could pour in a ton of birdies.

Plantation Course Stats and Info

Justin Thomas won his second title at this venue in 2020 and is the only winner over the last six years to gain fewer than 2.5 strokes from putting.
The field typically averages well over 70% of the fairways hit, which is far higher than the tour average.
Greens are also easy to hit — they are oversized compared to average tour greens — but scrambling is tough and generally falls under or around 55%, lower than the tour average.
This year’s weather is expected to be tame — check out the PGA First Look for a full weather forecast and deeper statistical analysis.

Sentry Tournament of Champions 2023 DFS Golf Fades and Pivots

High-End Fade: Will Zalatoris

Projected PGA DFS Ownership: DraftKings: 13.8% | FanDuel: 23.5%

Zalatoris may struggle on this course. He tends to perform better in events where the scoring is lower and elite tee-to-green games can flourish more easily. Zalatoris leads this field in strokes gained from ball striking, but he ranks only 33rd (out of 39 golfers) in strokes gained from putting. That serves as a stark reminder that even if he had a great week with his long game, he could get lapped by a few players on the greens. Worse, Zalatoris suffered a serious back injury in the FedEx Cup playoffs last year and couldn’t compete this fall.

With Stokastic’s projections putting Zalatoris below five other golfers in the $8,000 range on DraftKings, where he costs $8,900 this week, he becomes an easy fade, especially since his name recognition alone will garner him some ownership. Better days are ahead for Zalatoris, but golf DFS players should fade him at this lower-scoring event.

Pivot: Cameron Young

Projected PGA DFS Ownership: DraftKings: 22.0% | FanDuel: 26.5%

Young is close to Zalatoris’ polar opposite in terms of both style and form. His last start of 2022 saw him grab a third-place finish at the Hero World Challenge, which took place at another expansive and wide-open course. While Young has the distance to compete on any kind of venue, he has shown an affinity for slightly lower-scoring events by grabbing second-place finishes at St. Andrews and the Rocket Mortgage Classic last year.

Young also projects out as the far more solid play in this range on Stokastic. He has the highest projected top-six probability and ceiling projection of anyone in the $8,000 range on DraftKings. Even if he is close to chalk, Young makes a good pivot for those looking to avoid Zalatoris this week.

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Mid-Range Fade: Brian Harman

Projected PGA DFS ownership: DraftKings: 11.4% | FanDuel: 15.2%

Harman is an interesting DFS target for this event. He doesn’t boast a massive ownership projection at the moment, but he should attract some additional action because of the form he showed this fall — Harman recorded multiple runner-up finishes in a row to end his season. Aside from his likely above-expectation ownership, Stokastic’s projections don’t favor Harman here. He owns just an 11.2% top-six probability rating, the lowest mark of all the players on DraftKings in the $8,000 range.

In an event where gold DFS players want to get exposure to at least two — and potentially three — of the elite names up top, spending $8,000 on Harman seems unwise, especially with better values at a similar price. He may enter this tournament in strong form, but next week’s venue makes for a better spot to attack with Harman from an upside perspective.

Low-End Pivot: Corey Conners

Projected PGA DFS ownership: DraftKings: 8.2% | FanDuel: 11.2%

While Harman is likely to see his ownership projection rise, Corey Conners probably won’t draw much heat. He will play in just his second Tournament of Champions after finishing just 19th in his last attempt. Conners has shown solid upside in elite field events before, though — he posted top-6 finishes at the Masters and FedEx St. Jude Championship last season.

From a player pool perspective, he owns a better top-six probability rating than Harman, comes cheaper and could have half Harman’s ownership. It’s The Tournament of Champions makes for a great spot to use Conners as a mid-range value and save a few dollars while picking up some leverage on the field.

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Low-End Fade: Seamus Power

Projected PGA DFS ownership: DraftKings: 21.5% | FanDuel: 12.9%

Power ended last year well by winning in Bermuda and scoring top-five finishes in his last two starts. Power also has the kind of skillset to target this week because he has crushed it with his putter recently and has performed well at lower-scoring events. Power isn’t without faults, though, and the fact he ranks just 38th in strokes gained on approach in this field is a little concerning.

Stokastic’s projections have Power ranked top-five in projected ownership. If that number weren’t so high, using him at his paltry $7,200 salary on DraftKings would be fine. Unfortunately, the combination of a cheap salary and some superb results in weaker fields to end last year has him as one of the most heavily targeted players in the $7,000 range. Several other players offer far better returns at that cost. Fading him from a game-theory perspective and projection standpoint makes perfect sense this week.

Low-end Pivot: Adam Scott

Projected PGA DFS ownership: DraftKings: 11.1% | FanDuel: 12.5%

People will certainly aim to pay down in this price range, so doubling up on slightly more expensive players may create some leverage. Adam Scott doesn’t necessarily jump off the screen in Stokastic’s projections, but he slots in ahead of Power in terms of top-six probability at 11.2%. More importantly, his ownership projection is nearly half of Power’s.

Scott played extremely well at the end of last year. He posted top-five finishes in two playoff events and grabbed a runner-up finish in Australia. Scott has had some success in Hawaii before at the Sony Open, but given his success at the Tournament of Champions in general, Scott makes for a solid pivot this week.

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