PGA DFS Core Plays: Texas Children's Houston Open
Top-ranked DFS player, Notorious, breaks down his favorite PGA DFS picks at various price ranges on DraftKings and FanDuel for the Texas Children’s Houston Open. Whom should you be building your lineups around? Find out below!
Welcome back! I hope everyone had a good week at the Valspar Championship. At this point, getting 6 of 6 golfers through the cut feels tougher than climbing Mount Everest. I wasn’t able to accomplish the feat last week, but I still had a great week of DFS. My main lineup had 5 of 6 and some high-end finishes (Matt Fitzpatrick, Jordan Spieth), and I had four solid days of Showdown results. If I could replicate that every week, I would be a very happy man.
We are two short weeks away from the start of the Masters. After this week’s event, the top 50 in the Official World Golf Rankings will qualify for Augusta National. For those currently outside the top 50, they will need an excellent week here in Texas. The only other path into the year’s first major is winning next week’s event (or getting a rare special invite from Augusta National). While that’s a fun narrative to chase this week, I’ve never been one to believe added pressure makes you play better golf.
Editor’s Note: For more tournament notes, recent form, and course notes for the Texas Children’s Houston Open, check out this week’s PGA DFS First Look. To get access to Noto’s PGA DFS Model Breakdown & Download link, which allows you to create your own projections, click here.
The Houston Open has been held at Memorial Park Golf Course five times (2025, 2024, 2022, 2021, & 2020). The winning score has ranged from -10 to -20 during that stretch. The difficulty of the course largely hinges on the wind and how soft the course is. The current forecast doesn’t look too bad, so I am expecting somewhere around -15 to get the job done this week. This course is a Par 70 that measures 7,475 yards. On a par-adjusted basis, it’s one of the longest courses on TOUR.
The fairways here are wide (34 yards on average), the rough is minimal, and the driver usage rate is high (83%). This is one of the best bomber courses that we will see all year. This doesn’t mean a shorter hitter can’t have a great long iron week and contend, but there’s certainly a big advantage for those who can bomb the ball. The greens here are large (7,000 square feet) and feature poa trivialis overseed. This is a unique Par 70 layout in that there are 5 Par 3s and 3 Par 5s.
I’m looking for strong tee-to-green golfers who are also long drivers of the ball.
Top PGA DFS Picks on DraftKings & FanDuel for the Texas Children’s Houston Open
Core Plays
Adam Scott
Noto Rating: 77.2 — Cash Rating: 77.9 — GPP Rating: 66.7
DraftKings: $9,000 / pOWN%: 13%
FanDuel: $10,300 / pOWN%: 11%
Course History L5 Years: 54
Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee: 30
Strokes Gained: Approach: 3
Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green: 59
Strokes Gained: Putting: 48
With Scottie Scheffler withdrawing after salaries came out, the pricing is extremely soft this week. We can easily fit three of the favorites into builds without sacrificing the bottom of our rosters. Scott checks a lot of boxes this week. He’s long and straight off the tee, one of the best iron players of all time, an elite Par 3 scorer, and 2nd in the field in strokes gained per round in Texas over the last 4 years. He’s made 12 straight cuts worldwide and has 3 top-7 finishes in his last 8 starts.
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