PGA DFS GPP Breakdown: Valero Texas Open

Top-ranked grinder, STLCardinals84, will break down his top GPP golf targets for the coming week’s tournament, going over his favorite plays at various price ranges. Who better than PGA DFS master, STLCards, to help you on your way.

Valero Texas Open

Welcome, Grinders! As usual, it’s hard to believe that we are just ONE week away from The Masters! April is almost here! Baseball is here! You can feel the buzz in the Van Zuiden residence, for sure.

That said, we still have four more days of golf to get through before we can start to dig too deep into Augusta, with the Valero Texas Open on the calendar to get us warmed up. The week prior to a major brings us a weak field down in San Antonio, but that doesn’t mean this event is meaningless. The AT&T Oaks Course at TPC San Antonio will be the host course in an event that is often impacted greatly by weather. Wind can be a big factor in Texas at this time of the year, and this is one of the events where we often see an edge in the draw. One of the biggest weather edges ever in DFS golf happened at this event several years ago. Be sure to monitor the forecast as we get closer to Thursday tee-off, and be prepared to pivot if needed.

As for the course itself, this course is a lengthy par 72 that features a lot of long par fours, a few longer par threes, and three par fives that measure over 590 yards on the scorecard. Distance off the tee is a nice benefit as long as you aren’t too wayward with the driver. Scrambling and bogey avoidance are also important, as this course has a lot of runoff areas that make saving par difficult if you can’t hold the green on approach. However, it’s worth noting that the course has played easier in recent years, as we see with many PGA Tour venues these days. The golfers are just so good right now.

My key stats to target this week will be the usual ball striking, approach play, and scrambling, with a sprinkling of distance/total driving as well. I also don’t mind targeting par five scoring with this being a par 72 layout.

Let’s get to some of my favorite GPP picks for this week!

Corey Conners
DraftKings: $10,100
FanDuel: $11,900
Yahoo: $44

The short game is often an issue, but we can’t argue with the ball striking. His only missed cut since last September came at THE PLAYERS, and he didn’t look bad in last week’s match play event. He has made the cut in all four of his previous trips to this tournament, and all of them have gone for top 35 finishes. That includes a victory three years ago. With questions surrounding other top players like Hatton and Matsuyama, Conners is my preferred target over Fowler by a hair.

Ryan Fox
DraftKings: $9,000
FanDuel: $9,900
Yahoo: $38

I have been leading the Ryan Fox charge for a month now, and he has yet to let me down. He has played in three PGA Tour events this month, with a T14 at the Arnold Palmer and a T27 at THE PLAYERS in his two stroke play starts. Those were very strong field events, and now he gets much weaker competition this week. He really should have come out of his group at the match play last week, too. I love the trends with his game, and the fact that he’s priced up this week might scare some people away. Not me. I’m on board until he lets me down, as the all-around game has been very sharp of late.

Cameron Davis
DraftKings: $8,300
FanDuel: $10,300
Yahoo: $36

The course history for Davis isn’t great, but I do like his fit for this venue — and course history hasn’t been all that predictive at this tournament (after all, the weather draw often influences results, too). The good news is that Davis has turned a bit of a corner statistically. Over his last 36 rounds, he ranks 6th in this field in tee to green play and 13th in around the green play. That second stat could come in handy if the wind blows and the course plays as a difficult one. Davis has upside and is definitely capable of making noise in a weak field event.

Nicolai Hojgaard
DraftKings: $8,000
FanDuel: $9,700
Yahoo: $29

The Hojgaard brothers are potential up and coming players in the golf world. Both are sitting around 100th in the OWGR, and brother Rasmus was actually the first round leader at this event last year. Nicolai seems to be the more highly regarded at the moment, and he finished runner-up in last week’s alternate field Corales Championship. I like the talent, and I like the potential upside given the field strength. Nicolai is a very strong tournament option here, as his worldwide form has been very good. In addition to last week’s result, he has four top 15 finishes in his last six starts on the DP World Tour.

Taylor Pendrith
DraftKings: $7,700
FanDuel: $9,600
Yahoo: $36

The lower-mid tier is a spot that isn’t that strong this week, and it’s where the lack of depth in this field really shows. There aren’t a lot of players in good form down here, so I’m inclined to take a chance on players that have shown us some historical upside — and at least Pendrith has been making cuts. He ranks 9th in this field off the tee over the last 36 rounds; it’s just been the other elements letting him down. If he can get the approach play dialed in this week, there’s a sneaky ceiling here.

Akshay Bhatia
DraftKings: $7,000
FanDuel: $8,200
Yahoo: $20

I figured that Bhatia would be the chalkiest value of the week, but early ownership runs have him in the single digits on both FD and DK. Assuming that holds, this is the perfect time to take some chances on his talent. He has a runner up finish and a T24 in two of his last three starts, and there’s no reason he can’t keep that rolling in another weak field event. He ranks 11th in this field in total strokes gained over the last 24 rounds, and he’s extremely value priced on both sites, too.

Other Risk/Reward GPP Options – Thomas Detry, Will Gordon, Joseph Bramlett

Good luck this week!

Image Credit: Getty Images