Welcome back! This week, we’ve got our first full-field, cut event of the 2019 PGA season. Below, I’ve listed some of Awesemo’s grades and values for The Sony Open. If you have a chance, check out some of the content below that we’ve added for the upcoming season.
Man, have we got some amazing golf content ahead for you this year. Our newest member, Jason Rouslin has a number of great articles out, ahead of this week’s action. Start off with Above the Cut for general thoughts, odds, and tournament information, which provides a His First Cut article is an excellent summary of the course and the tournament ahead; his Make the Cut article focuses on the players you need to roster to get that sometimes elusive 6 of 6 through; and his Against the Grain piece gives you some contrarian options to help differentiate those lineups.
I was blown away by how excellent his content is and I’d urge you to check it out.
If you feel like checking out some of our premium content, we’ve got a free seven-day trial going on right now at Awesemo.com. Just enter promo code “THEAPPROACH” for any non-Fantasy Cruncher package.
If you’re not a premium member, help keep some of this content free by sharing on Twitter or checking out our YouTube channel. Or give this article a like/share, we’d appreciate it!
If you’re a premium member, check out Awesemo’s rankings for both FanDuel and DraftKings.
As always, you can follow me on twitter @Nolan__Kelly.
We are back with our first full-field even of 2019. No need to take that Friday afternoon schvitz, because we’ve got the cut sweats instead. Last week wasn’t bad here at The Approach headquarters. Both our recommendations made the cut (just kidding). Bryson Dechambeau and Jon Rahm finished 7th and 8th respectively and ownership fade, Scott Piercy finished down in 19th spot.
The Sony Open
The tour switches Hawaiian islands this week, with a short jaunt over to Oahu. Though close in proximity, these courses are quite different. While the Par-73 Kapalua Plantation course was more of a bombers paradise, Waialae is a second shot course, giving a slight advantage to shorter, more accurate hitters.
Course information:
- Par-70, 7,044 yards
- 36-yard wide fairways
- Bermuda greens, Bermuda fairways
- Water hazards: two
- Medium-fast green speed: 11 stimpeter
- Difficult to hit fairways
- Non-punitive, short rough.
- 12 P4s, four P3s, two P5s
- 10 P4s between 400-500 yards (hello Gary Woodland!)
Tournament info:
- 140 golfers currently in the field
- Top-70 and ties make the cut
- MDF if more than 78 golfers make the cut.
Random facts:
- According to our own Jason Rouslin, of the roughly 5500 DK points scored at this event last year, 1870 were scored on the two P5s.
- Last five winners have played the week before at the ToC.
- FRL breakdown last eight years: 10 AM, 2 PM.
Slate strategy
There is some tight pricing on both sites this week. The Awesemo model is not a fan of a lot of these golfers in the bottom price range. On DK, and FD we don’t have a single “C” grade below $7400 and $8600 respectively. Those kind of ranks tend to imply a more balanced approach to lineup construction this week, but I also wouldn’t be surprised if a lot of DFSers went in that direction. The problem with the balanced approach is that the few players at the top are excellent in a excellent spot this week. I love both Thomas and Woodland and will try to fit them in as much as possible, without giving up too much on the bottom end.
Putting splits:
Putting splits aren’t the be all end all of finding success in DFS. I think we’ve all, at various times in our DFS development, placed too much emphasis on them. But they do make for a nice tie-break, and I tend to factor them in more when the results are extreme (duh).
Here’s a list of the extreme Bermuda putting splits over the last 50 rounds for this week’s field:
Positive:
Scott Langley: Bermuda +23.8 SG, -9.8 non-bermuda
Kevin Kisner: 36.1 Bermuda, +13, non-bermuda
Luke Donald: 36.1 on bermuda, 13.1 non-bermuda.
Steve Stricker: +33 bermuda, -2 non-bermuda
Jason Dufner: +8 bermuda,-16 non-bermuda
Marc Leishman: +23.2 bermuda, -4.8 non-bermuda
Andrew Landry: +17 bermuda, -5 non-bermuda
Negative:
Emiliano Grillo: -4.9 bermuda, +35.9 non-bermuda
Jordan Speith: -10.5 bermuda, +10.5 non-bermuda
Si Woo Kim: -13.5 bermuda, +12.5 non-bermuda
Patrick Rodgers: -12.8, +22.6 non-bermuda
Anirban Lahiri: -27.3, +21.1 non-bermuda
Kyle Stanley: -36.9 bermuda, +9.1 non-bermuda
Bryson DeChambeau: -7.6. +7.8 non-bermuda
The PLAYS:
Matt Kuchar: DraftKings: Grade: B, Value: B; FanDuel: Grade: B, Value: B
It’ll be interesting to see what Kuch’s ownership ends up at, because he feels under-priced in this field. A swing change late last season has led to improved accuracy off the tee – he’s never ranked inside the top-20 in driving accuracy on tour, but early in the 2019 season he sits 6th. Perhaps, in the near future we’ll see a return to the Kuchar of old, where DFSers were all but guaranteed a made cut, with a decent chance at a top-ten. Kuchar is the lowest priced “B” grade in Awesemo’s rankings.
Ownership: 15-16% on both sites.
The stats:
- 3rd in my mixed condition model which backtests various metrics that correlate with success here.
- 3rd in both ST and LT P4 scoring.
- 3rd in SG: TOT on P70 courses under 7,000 yards.
- 3rd in LT scrambling, 6th in ST scrambling.
- 16th in recent Birdie or Better.
Sungjae Im: DraftKings: Grade: C, Value: A; FanDuel: Grade: C, Value: A
We don’t have a lot of data to go on for the recent Web.com grad, but his stats last year were among the best on the feeder tour. His major weakness is a lack of distance off the tee, which shouldn’t be a major issue here and he more than makes up for it with his total driving (9th in good drives gained, 17th in total driving). His only major weakness is this season has been on the green, but he’s been a plus putter on Bermuda thus far, in a very minor sample size (.8 gained vs. -2.1 lost).
Ownership: DraftKings: 8%, FanDuel: 12%
Web.com stats:
- 4th in weighted scoring average
- 22nd in ball striking
- First in BoB – P5 scoring
- 2nd in all-around ranking
- 5th in birdies per round
Ownership fades:
FanDuel:
Week in and week on, FanDuel ownership projections are a chalk-fader’s dream. On FD, Justin Thomas is projected for 45% ownership, on DraftKings: 25%. I know FanDuel pricing is softer, but at that ownership, there is no reason to play Thomas, or any golfer. Too much variance. But this is why, with DFS golf more than any other sport, you should play both sites. Go over to DK, take the slightly worse value for 20% less ownership.
DraftKings:
I’ll admit I was looking to go back to Scott Piercy this week after he was around 20% owned last week, and probably didn’t win anyone any money. But the ownership is still there this week as well, so I’m going to have to fade again. Piercy is great and he never shuts up on Twitter about how much he loves this course, but there are equally good plays at 1/4 the ownership in that price for GPPs.
Low owned GPP fliers:
There’s a real dislove for Satoshi Kodaira in DFS circles, and understandbly so, because he has not performed well outside of his win at the RBC Heritage. But the guy is ranked ahead of players like Emiliano Grillo and Brandt Snedeker in the OWGR. Now that might cause you to say it’s a flawed metric — which it is — and that Kodaira doesn’t deserve to be ranked that high — which he doesn’t — but it’s still a pretty reasonable assessment of a golfer’s current talent relative to his peers. So I’ll take the 46th ranked golfer in the world at less than a half a percent owned. We all know he can pop out of nowhere.
