TRAVELERS: After a grueling yet thrilling week at Oakmont, the PGA Tour resumes its schedule with an event that has been around since the 1950s and has produced some fantastic finishes over the years. Of course, no one would confuse this week’s test with the U.S. Open, or TPC River Highlands with Oakmont: one is a contest to see who can make the most birdies, the other is a contest of survival. Still, this should be a fun week, as this tournament has taken a significant step up in importance and intensity ever since becoming one of the PGA Tour’s Signature Events a couple of years ago. It’s now the final Signature Event of the season, featuring a $20 million purse, no cut, and a limited 72-man field, 63 of whom were at Oakmont last week. What was once a laid back post-major comedown that most of the big names skipped has become a high-profile cash grab too lucrative to miss.
The course, TPC River Highlands, is one of the shortest tracks on Tour, a par-70 measuring just 6,840 yards. That said, it’s not a one-trick pony, as a variety of different styles have won this tournament over the years, from bombers like Dustin Johnson and Bubba Watson to short and straight types like Chez Reavie and Russell Knox. And then there are those who hit it both long and straight, like last year’s champ, Scottie Scheffler (newsflash: long and straight works pretty much everywhere).
The greens at River Highlands are small and speedy and can be difficult to hold from the rough, so putting the ball in the fairway will be important this week, but if players are hitting their spots they can really take it low, as Jim Furyk proved with his record-setting 58 here back in 2016. Scottie’s 22-under 258 last year was the second-lowest winning score in tournament history, but he was the sixth champion in the past seven years to shoot 17-under or better, so you’d better bring your birdies if you hope to contend. River Highlands is a straightforward test that features plenty of wedges and short irons– the winner this week will be a player who gets on a roll and rides it, not one who perseveres through tremendous difficulties. This will be a far cry from what we saw last week at Oakmont.
The market leader, naturally, is Scheffler, who stands alone at the frightfully short price of 4.4. As much as I love betting on Scottie, that’s a tough one — even last year, when he was rolling and playing every bit as well as he is now, he needed to hole a bunch of putts and survive a playoff to get the win. I think I’ll be taking my chances elsewhere this week:
WIN MARKET
Recommendations to BACK (odds in parenthesis)
Patrick Cantlay (29.0)- Though Cantlay has yet to find the winner’s circle this season, he’s been his usual consistent self, racking up seven top-15 finishes and three top-5s across 12 starts, the most recent coming at the Memorial (T12) and last month’s Truist Championship (T4). He’s been dialed in with the irons, ranking 4th on Tour in GIR percentage and 15th in strokes gained on approach, and that ability will be the key to success at River Highlands, where it’s essentially target practice if you can find fairways. Cantlay has a terrific record at this event: in addition to shooting a PGA Tour-record 60 as an amateur, he’s posted seven consecutive top-15 finishes here, including a T5 last year and a T4 in 2023. River Highlands is effectively Cantlay’s backyard, at least he has treated it as such, and a victory is pretty much all he’s missing at this tournament. He’s a great value here at a price like 29.0.
Daniel Berger (56.0)- Though he hasn’t contended since his T11 at last month’s Truist Championship, Berger has had a nice year that’s included nine top-25 finishes and a pair of top-5s, with a runner-up in Phoenix. He had it rolling at Oakmont for a while last week until the course eventually caught up to him, leaving him in a tie for 46th, but he’ll face a very different sort of challenge at River Highlands — a challenge he should be well-suited for, given his past experience. While Berger hasn’t teed it up here since 2019, he definitely knows what it’s like to succeed at this tournament, finishing 5th back in 2016 and runner-up the very next year. Given his strong current form, I consider Berger a real dark horse threat to win this week and am fairly enthusiastic about him at the current price.
Tom Hoge (98.0)- A journeyman who struggled to keep his card early in his career, Hoge has emerged as a consistent player in recent years, and the fact that he’s exempt for tournaments like this speaks to that. He’s logged seven top-25 finishes and four top-10s this year, the most recent coming at the Memorial a couple of weeks ago, where he finished 7th. An excellent iron player who ranks 10th on Tour in proximity on approach and 16th in strokes gained on approach, Hoge’s game is well-suited for River Highlands, and he validated that last year with a 3rd-place showing here that included a final round 62, leaving him just two shots out of the playoff. With the way he’s been striking it recently, he feels like a must-bet at a price like 98.0.
