WWTC: The PGA Tour heads south of the border this week for the World Wide Technology Championship, an event that has existed in some form since 2007 but is only in its second year at the current venue, El Cardonal Golf Course at the Diamante Cabo San Lucas Resort. It’s really your quintessential Fall Series event — low stress, middling field, and a venue that makes it feel like half vacation/half golf tournament. You’ll notice that the schedule this time of year is very much designed with wives, girlfriends, and good times in mind, with stops in Vegas, Cabo, Bermuda, Sea Island, and the Bahamas. Such is the life of a PGA Tour player. Keep practicing, kids.
This week’s venue, El Cardonal, is a par-72 that measures 7,452 yards from all the way back but plays shorter than the listed yardage due to its firm and fast nature. It’s a layout that is relatively flat and wind-exposed, with heavy bunkering and waste areas lining most of the holes. Water comes into play on just one hole and the rough isn’t particularly thick, so the bunkering, mounding, and unique green complexes will provide the bulk of the challenge. You know what that means: birdies and low scores galore. Erik van Rooyen reached 27-under last year, and nine players finished the week at 20-under or better. The most notable thing about the course is that it was designed by none other than Tiger Woods and is in fact Tiger’s debut design. Something tells me, though, that by the time Tiger’s course architecture career is finished this one won’t be one of his most celebrated works. But we shall see.
Van Rooyen is back to defend and is currently trading at 50.0 on the BETDAQ Exchange, which seems like a pretty fair price until you realize it’s been five months since his last top-10. In a birdie fest like this, I want guys who have been playing well and making birdies. Simple logic for a simple man, I suppose. With that in mind, here’s what I’m thinking:
WIN MARKET
Recommendations to BACK (odds in parenthesis)
Harris English (36.0)- English has always been a streaky player, going long stretches without contending before finding a groove and burning bright for a few weeks. When he’s good, he’s really good, with 4 PGA Tour victories on his resume and three top-10 finishes in the U.S. Open this decade. He had been struggling for much of this season, going nearly four months without a top-25 at one point, but he seems to have found a little something in recent weeks and has been playing some beautiful golf, logging top-10s in back-to-back starts and shooting a combined 33-under in those tournaments. While he’s yet to tee it up at El Cardonal in competition, he did win this event back in 2013, when it was held at Mayakoba, so he’s certainly comfortable playing in Mexico and surely has some good vibes down there. Combine that with the “vibes” that come from shooting 68 or better in 7 of your past 8 competitive rounds and you’ve got a dangerous-feeling player, especially at a price like 36.0.
Jhonattan Vegas (48.0)- When it’s birdie-making time, you could do a lot worse than calling on Johnny Vegas, a man who may not have the game suited for some of pro golf’s most strenuous tests (he has nine missed cuts and zero top-20s in 15 major championship appearances) but can make some serious hay when the only challenge is who can make the most birdies. In his four PGA Tour victories he’s posted scores like 27-under, 21-under, and 17-under, the last one coming at the 3M Open less than 4 months ago. He’s pretty much stayed hot since then, making six straight cuts and finishing T11 at the ZOZO Championship two weeks ago, his last start. While he didn’t play this event last year and therefore hasn’t seen El Cardonal in competition, he’s a native of Venezuela who has a lifetime’s worth of experience playing golf in South and Central America, so this should feel like home to him (and yes, I realize Mexico is in North America. But if you’ve ever traveled there you know it feels a lot more like Colombia than Minnesota). Vegas feels like a nice value this week at nearly 50/1.
Nate Lashley (86.0)- After struggling for much of 2024 Lashley has finally turned it around, making four straight cuts and finding the top-30 in back-to-back events, including a T16 at the ZOZO Championship last time out. He fired a third-round 63 at the ZOZO and posted two 65s at the Shriners the previous week, so he been going low recently and should be ripe for some fun at a course like El Cardonal, where there are birdie opportunities galore. As a matter of fact, he teed it up here last year and played quite well, posting 19-under for the week and finishing 10th. With his game coming around and a course that he knows and likes in front of him, Lashley looks like a live one at 86.0.
