GENESIS OPEN: The West Coast Swing wraps up this week at venerable Riviera, which has been a PGA Tour stop for 54 years and counting and always draws a top-notch field. This year is no exception, as eight of the world’s top ten players will tee it up in what is now known as the Genesis Open.
Riviera is an old-style course that tests nearly every facet of a player’s game– it’s a par 71 that measures a beefy 7,322 yards, but the narrow fairways and penalizing rough challenge players who get too aggressive off the tee. Finding the undersized greens from the sticky kikuyu rough is not easy, and scrambling for pars is only possible if you’re missing it in the right spots. This is probably why we’ve seen so many classy veterans triumph here; it’s a course that requires both precision and patience. Length doesn’t hurt, either, as the two par-5s on the back nine are only reachable in two by the longer players.
Bubba Watson got the job done last year, as he did in 2014, and if you like his chances of successfully defending you can currently get him at better than 40/1. That may sound like a pretty tasty price for a guy with his type of course history and championship pedigree, but we should keep in mind that Bubba has been struggling for the past few months and is coming off a missed cut in Phoenix. A lightning-strike win this week, while certainly not impossible, would be quite extraordinary and is not an outcome I’m willing to bet on.
Last week’s winner, Jordan Spieth, heads BETDAQ’s Win Market at 8.8. (This is the part where a less-modest tipster would mention that he tipped Spieth last week at 10.0, picking up the first ‘W’ of 2017 and a nice little pile of cash. But that’s not me. No, I’m far too classy for that sort of thing) Spieth has an excellent record at Riviera and is surely full of confidence, but back-to-back wins is a difficult feat to pull off and the price is awful short, so I’ve decided to look elsewhere.
Here are my recommendations:
WIN MARKET
Recommendations to BACK (odds in parenthesis)
Dustin Johnson (9.2)- This marks the second straight week we’ve chosen from the very top of the market, a rare occurrence for me, but it worked out pretty well last week and Johnson is just too tempting here. His spectacular record at Riviera includes a pair of runner-ups and five top-4 finishes, and his 3rd-place showing at the AT&T last week was his third top-6 finish in his last four PGA Tour starts. The rain that is expected to fall throughout this week will make the course play even longer, an advantage for a bomber like Johnson, and he’s been known as one of the better bad-weather players on Tour ever since his rain-soaked win at Pebble Beach back in 2009. I know the price is a bit short, but sometimes the favorites are favorites for a reason. Back DJ with confidence here.
Phil Mickelson (48.0)- While I’m steering clear of Bubba Watson this time around, there’s another left-handed two-time champion lurking right in his same price range who I think may be worth a shot. Mickelson is nobody’s underdog, even at age 46, but he seems to be flying way under the radar this week despite his brilliant history at Riviera, which includes a pair of runner-up finishes to go along with his two victories. He’s played a lot of golf over the last month and it’s mostly been solid, as he finished 21st or better in three consecutive events (Palm Springs, Torrey Pines, Phoenix) and made the cut at the AT&T last week before playing poorly on Sunday. The birdies have been flowing, as usual, and if he can just clean things up a bit off the tee he’ll be playing championship-level golf. He’s spoken about how he loves the “sight lines” at Riviera and he certainly knows where he can and can’t miss it, so maybe this is the week he avoids the landmines and picks up his 43rd PGA Tour win. At nearly 50/1, he’s surely worth a bet.
Byeong-Hun An (92.0)- An has established himself as a world-class player and has been loudly knocking on the door of his first PGA Tour win, reaching a playoff in New Orleans last year and letting a Sunday lead slip away in Phoenix just two weeks ago. He’s long off the tee, averaging over 301 yards per drive this season, and great with the putter, ranking 11th on Tour in Strokes Gained: Putting. That’s a pretty good combination and is probably why An has had success on several different continents, different tours, and different styles of courses. While he may not yet have a a PGA Tour win, he did win the Europen Tour’s BMW PGA back in 2015, so we know he can get it done on the biggest of stages. This will be his first appearance at Riviera, which explains why the odds are so long, but An is fast developing a reputation as a sort of “first time specialist” due to his record of success in debut appearances, the Phoenix Open two weeks ago being just the latest example. I’ll gladly roll the dice on him at a price like 92.0.
TOURNAMENT MATCH BETS
Sergio Garcia (1.76) vs. Adam Scott (1.93)
Sergio is one to watch this week– he loves it at Riviera, as evidenced by a record that includes three top-10s and seven top-25s; he’s coming off a win in Dubai just two weeks ago, and he seems to be in great spirits after his recent engagement. I nearly backed him in the overall market, and I think he’s a good heads-up bet against just about anybody in the field not named Spieth, Matsuyama, or Johnson. Scott hasn’t played much over the past few weeks, and his putter is always a question mark. Recommendation: Garcia at 1.76
Justin Rose (1.91) vs. Justin Thomas (1.91)
Thomas’ back-to-back wins in Hawaii were beyond impressive, but it’s anybody’s guess how the 23-year old is going to handle the sudden jolt of success. He’s off to a slow start in that department, missing the cut in Phoenix two weeks ago, and he’s yet to find his footing in two career appearances at Riviera, finishing outside the top-40 both times. Rose doesn’t have a spectacular record here, either, but he does have three top-20s in ten career appearances and he’s been playing some terrific golf of late, logging two top-5s in his last three starts. Recommendation: Rose at 1.91
