PGA DFS Core Plays - DraftKings & FanDuel: U.S. Open
Top-ranked DFS player, Notorious, breaks down his favorite PGA DFS plays at various salary ranges for the coming week’s golf tournament. Who should you be building around? Find out below.
U.S. Open
The PGA Tour has been under a lot of pressure with the LIV Tour starting up, but they ran about as well as possible with the outcome last week at the RBC Canadian Open. The leaderboard was absolutely stacked on Sunday. The final group featured three superstars and they put on a show. To top it off, Rory McIlroy has been against the LIV Tour from the start and he ended up winning last week (while also taking a shot at Greg Norman). The tour is hoping to sustain some of that momentum and it shouldn’t be too difficult with the year’s third major on tap this week. Yes, the U.S. Open is not run by the PGA Tour, but the LIV Tour members in the field are likely to face a lot of scrutiny and there’s a great chance the winner comes from someone that plays regularly on the PGA Tour. Can you imagine if Phil Mickelson or Sergio Garcia won this week? All hell would break loose.
The U.S. Open changes venues each year and we should have a treat on our hands this week. The event will be held at The Country Club at Brookline. This is a classical golf course that has held three U.S. Opens (none since 1988), a Ryder Cup, and the 2013 U.S. Amateur. While this course certainly has an old school feel to it, there have been renovations done to make it more modern — tree removal and lengthening of holes being the most notable. On the scorecard, the course is a Par 70 that measures 7,264 yards. While that doesn’t look overly daunting on the surface, there is a Par 4 that measures 310 yards and a Par 3 that measures 131 yards. These shorter holes help hide the true length of the course. There are eight Par 4s that measure over 450 yards and three Par 3s that measure over 190 yards.
The talk all week will be about the rough length and the size of the greens. We have already seen golfers post videos of the thick rough and while it certainly looks unplayable to the casual golfer, we see this videos leading up to every U.S. Open. The greens are a mix of poa annua (75%) and bentgrass (25%) and are only 4,400 square feet on average. For reference, the size of these greens are comparable to Pebble Beach and Harbour Town. If you are extremely errant off the tee or on your approach shots, you might miss the thick rough and end up in the tall fescue. It’s a game of chance at that point, as you could potentially draw a better or worse lie than in the thick rough. This course is very hilly and will force golfers into a lot of blind shots, both off the tee and on approach.
While the U.S. Open changes venues every year, I will be factoring in event history this week. The USGA tends to set up the courses the same way each year — it will play long, it will play difficult, there will be a premium on hitting the fairways, and the greens will be difficult to hit. You will hear a lot of bomber narratives this week and while I don’t disagree that distance will play a role, I will sacrifice a little bit of distance for accuracy. I am including distance in the model, but have higher weights on strokes gained off the tee and total driving. Approach play is always critical, scrambling will be important, and bogey avoidance is high on my list of stats to target. Remember, pars are good at the U.S. Open.
Tournament Info
Field Size:
- 156 golfers
Cut Rule:
- Top 60 and ties
Key Statistics for the Week
- Strokes Gained Off the Tee
- Strokes Gained Approach
- Bogey Avoidance
- Strokes Gained Around the Green
- Strokes Gained Putting (Emphasis on Bent/Poa)
- Proximity w/ Long Irons
- U.S. Open Experience
Weather Forecasts
Hole Yardage Specialists (based on holes at The Country Club)
- Jon Rahm
- Justin Thomas
- Patrick Cantlay
- Rory McIlroy
- Scottie Scheffler