QUICKEN LOANS NATIONAL: There’s no getting around it: tournaments conducted the week after a major championship always have a bit of a subdued vibe. The very best players in the world usually stay away, worldwide media shows little interest, and occasionally the winners are even regarded with slight disdain for not being able to produce the week of the Major, and instead playing their best once the pressure was slightly reduced (the run of success that Davis Love III enjoyed at the post-Masters Harbour Town event throughout the 1990s comes to mind).
That being said, a great golf course will always catch the players’ attention, and the name Tiger Woods still commands respect among the game’s elite. Tiger’s tournament, the Quicken Loans National, gets underway on Thursday at historic Congressional Country Club after a one-year stop at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club, so we’ll get to see U.S. Open-style golf on a U.S. Open golf course for one more week. A fairly strong field has turned out despite the tournament’s unfortunate place on the schedule, and you can bet that the return to Congressional– a tough-but-fair, ball-striker’s layout– has a lot to do with it.
This event was held at Congressional from 2012-14 and prior to 2010, so we have ample course history to guide us, and then there’s the 2011 U.S. Open, when Rory McIlroy took advantage of softened conditions and unmanned the golf course. Don’t expect it to be so easy this week– Congressional is very long (over 7,500 yards) and can be quite punishing tee-to-green, and the last time it played host to this tournament, in 2014, the winning score was a mere 4-under par, with Justin Rose outlasting Shawn Stefani in a playoff.
Rose isn’t in the field this week, and the absence of elite players has made the top of BETDAQ’s Win Market very crowded indeed. Rickie Fowler and Patrick Reed are the only two names sporting odds shorter than 20/1, and based on their play last week neither of those guys is deserving of such a price. So we have to dig a little deeper, maybe consult our crystal ball… you know, the ONE THAT HIT ON D.J. AT 17.0 LAST WEEK AND BERGER AT 32.0 THE WEEK BEFORE, MAKING ME (and hopefully you) A BIG PILE OF CASH. (you didn’t expect me to take the high road and not mention that, did you?) If there’s another golf handicapper who’s picked four winners on the PGA Tour this year, including both majors, I’d like to meet him. (okay, I’ll stop now)
Here are this week’s selections:
WIN MARKET
Recommendations to BACK (odds in parenthesis)
Marc Leishman (27.0)- Leishman went through a bit of a slump earlier this year but he’s now fully on the other side of it, posting top-20 finishes in each of his last three starts. Though a 3rd-round 77 prevented him from contending at Oakmont last week, he played beautiful golf over the other three rounds, with his 69 on Sunday featuring seven birdies. Leishman is both long off the tee and good around the greens, as he ranks in the top-20 on Tour in both scrambling and “strokes gained: putting”, and he’s had plenty of experience near the top of the leaderboard in big events, so he can be trusted if around the lead on Sunday. And, critically, he’s had success at Congressional, finishing 8th in this tournament back in 2014. There’s a lot to like here, and the price is fair.
Kevin Chappell (34.0)- I know, I know: Chappell has missed two cuts in his past three starts. This fact alone has driven most people away from him this week, but I’m not sure his recent performance warrants anything resembling panic. Yes, he missed the cut at Colonial last month after shooting 68-74. Big deal. One 74 is nothing to get too worked up about, especially when he followed up that performance with a solid week at The Memorial. As for his play at Oakmont last week, while I’m not going to argue that his two-round total of 149 was great golf, I do think it’s important to put it in context: Oakmont is a brutally difficult course that has flummoxed far better players than Chappell, and the freaky-fast greens with crazy undulation are not something that the players will have to deal with at Congressional. Speaking of Congressional, it was the site of Chappell’s first real success in a Major, when he tied for third at the 2011 U.S. Open. Here’s hoping those good vibes carry him to a surprise win this week.
Robert Garrigus (120.0)- As mentioned above, Kevin Chappell tied for third in the 2011 U.S. Open at Congressional. Well, one of the men he shared third place with was Robert Garrigus, a journeyman who is best known for his prodigious length (he led the Tour in driving distance in both the 2009 and 2010 seasons). Garrigus has been wildly inconsistent throughout his career, but he sure likes it at Congressional, as he followed up that top-3 in the Open with a 4th-place showing in this tournament in 2012 and an 11th-place finish in 2014. Furthermore, Garrigus seems to have it going at the moment, making the cut in each of his last four starts and notching a top-5 at the Byron Nelson last month. He may not be a household name, but at a price like 120.0 I think Garrigus is the best value on the board this week.
TOURNAMENT MATCH BETS
Patrick Reed (1.91) vs. Jim Furyk (1.91)
These guys have walked very different paths over the past few months: Furyk missed the first half of the season with a wrist injury and was rusty upon his return, missing two cuts and finishing no better than 35th in four starts, before breaking through with a runner-up finish at Oakmont last week. Reed, meanwhile, was busy lining his pockets while Furyk was sidelined, racking up seven top-10s on Tour this year and missing only three cuts in his last 19 starts. One of those missed cuts came at the Open last week, though, so feel free to overreact to that if you so choose. As for me, I’ll go with the guy who’s been getting it done on a weekly basis. Recommendation: Reed at 1.91
Brendan Steele (1.76) vs. Byeong-Hun An (1.91)
An has put together a couple of good weeks, finishing 23rd at Oakmont and 11th in his previous start (The Memorial), so he’s clearly found his game again after a couple of missed cuts. However– and this is a big “however”– he’s never played Congressional, and here we have him matched up against Brendan Steele, someone whose record in this tournament includes a T5 (2014) and a T16 (2013). Plus, Steele is playing well at the moment, logging top-20 finishes in four of his past five starts and missing only two cuts in his last 13 events. Recommendation: Steele at 1.76
