PGA DFS Core Plays: Sony Open
Top-ranked DFS player, Notorious, breaks down his favorite PGA DFS picks at various price ranges for this week’s tournament. Who should you be building lineups around? Find out below!
How did everyone fair in the first event of the season? I had some close calls on the main slate but made up for it with some great Showdown lineups in Round 3 and Round 4. As noted last week, this is going to be a huge year for the RotoGrinders golf community. I plan to crush 2025, and I hope you do as well. As we start rolling, send in those screenshots, and we’ll give you the props that you deserve on X (Twitter). If you aren’t in the golf channel in the RotoGrinders Discord, what are you waiting for??
PGA DFS Picks: DraftKings & FanDuel Core Plays for the Sony Open
The PGA TOUR stays in Hawaii this week for the Sony Open. The location of the courses and the grass type are about the only things the courses have in common. The Plantation Course at Kapalua was a Par 73 that measured nearly 7,600 yards, while Waialae Country Club is a Par 70 that measures only 7,044 yards. Last week was all about hitting driver on every hole and making as many birdies as possible, while this course is more of a technical track that you have to think your way around.
While we’ve seen a lot of shorter and more accurate hitters perform well at this event over the years, the importance of hitting fairways seems to be diminishing each year. Perhaps it’s because the nature of professional golfers is to be as aggressive as possible these days. I certainly wouldn’t rule out the longer hitters this week. The fairways here are 36 yards wide, and the missed fairway penalty isn’t high, so aggressive drivers of the ball are viable. With that said, shorter hitters can always contend on these short courses.
The greens at Waialae are quite large (7,100 square feet) and feature bermudagrass. They are easy to hit on average (69% GIR last year), but around-the-green play is a little more important than it was last week. While this course won’t play as easy as Kapalua, it’s still on the easier side of things when it comes to TOUR averages. I’m looking for golfers who are solid on approach, are good bermudagrass putters, and play well on short Par-70 courses.
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Sony Open Field Size
- 144 golfers
Sony Open Cut Rule
- Top 65 and ties
Noto’s PGA Model Download & Video for the Sony Open
Weather Tools to Help with Sony Open PGA DFS Picks
- PGA weather report from Chief Meteorologist, Kevin Roth
- Windfinder
- Accuweather
Waialae Country Club for the Sony Open
- Location: Honolulu, Hawaii
- Seaside: Par 70 — 7,044 yards
- Course type: Coastal
- Recent winners: Grayson Murray (-17), Si Woo Kim (-18), Hideki Matsuyama (-23), Kevin Na (-21), Cameron Smith (-11)
- Difficulty: 2024 (27th), 2023 (34th), 2022 (41st), 2021 (45th)
- Green type: bermuda
- Green size: 7,100 square feet
- Fairway width: 36 yards
- Missed fairway penalty: average
- Holes with water hazards: 5
- 2023 tournament averages:
- - Driving Accuracy: 57% (TOUR average: 59%)
- - Driving Distance: 292 yards (TOUR average: 293)
- - Greens in Regulation: 69% (TOUR average: 66%)
- 2023 approach shot distributions:
- - 50-75 yards: 3%
- - 75-100 yards: 3%
- - 100-125 yards: 8%
- - 125-150 yards: 20%
- - 150-175 yards: 27%
- - 175-200 yards: 22%
- - 200-225 yards: 1%
- - 225+ yards: 6%
Tournament and Course Notes for the Sony Open
- We have another event in Hawaii, but this course is very different from the Plantation Course at Kapalua
- Waialae Country Club is a tight technical track, whereas last week was extremely open
- Waialae is a Par 70 that measures only 7,044 yards
- Historically, shorter, more accurate hitters have had more success here
- However, in recent years, the importance of driving accuracy has diminished
- Difficulty of the course hinges on the weather, but this is much less of a birdie fest than last week
- Not that this is a difficult track; we can still expect plenty of birdies to be made
- 70% of approach shots were hit from 125-200 yards last year
- Greens are fairly easy to hit (69% GIR last year)
- The greens are large and feature bermudagrass
What to Look For
- Strokes Gained: Approach
- Strokes Gained: Off the Tee
- Birdie or Better %
- Strokes Gained: Putting (emphasis on bermudagrass)
- Strokes Gained on short Par 70 courses
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Core Plays
Russell Henley
DraftKings: $9,900 / pOWN%: 20%
FanDuel: $11,400 / pOWN%: 21%
Strokes Gained Off the Tee: 31
Strokes Gained Approach: 9
Strokes Gained Around the Green: 8
Strokes Gained Putting: 22
Birdie or Better %: 61
Bogey Avoidance: 9
To be honest, I like all three of the most expensive golfers this week. Since nobody is overly expensive, rostering two of these three is a very viable strategy and one that I will employ in MME. My favorite of the bunch is Henley, who always shines on these short Par 70 courses. He is accurate off the tee, is an elite iron player, and has really improved his putting over the last 12 months. He won here in 2013 and has finished in the top 5 in 2 of the last 3 years.
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