DFS Alerts
Continue to attack The North Course to gain an edge in showdowns slates
The trend of lower rounds on The North Course continued to take place during the first round of The Farmers Insurance Open. With a scoring average of 70.7, the North course played almost 3 shots easier than the South course on Thursday. In terms of DFS Showdown scoring the spread was much larger. Round one scoring average in DFS showdown points for the North course came in at an average of 35.5 while the South course finished at 24.6. It’s worth pointing out that this trend is not going without notice., as there was not one player on the South course that yielded an ownership level higher than 10% in showdown slates yesterday. With ownership weighing heavily on players from the North course we saw a large number of lineups with condensed ownership on players like Rory McIlroy and John Rahm. Both players were over 50% in ownership yesterday. The top five golfers in terms of price who start on the South course today all have work to do if they want to make the cut. It will be interesting to see if a strong course ownership bais plays out again in round 2. In the last five years from a scoring perspective, the North Course yields an average of 16 more rounds of 70 or better during round 2.
As reported by: Rob Bolton Twitter
Ten Minutes to roster lock, still time to double check lineups
There was quite a bit of pre-tournament field movement this week. While none of the players listed above are what many would consider being key pieces, please double-check lineups to make sure to remove these golfers. Good luck this week Grinders, resultsDb will be up and running a few minutes after lock.
Other tagged players: Rafael Campos, Matt Every, Adam Schenk Graham DeLaet is no longer in the field
Graham Delaet has pulled out of the Farmers Insurance Open with a bad back. He will be replaced by Josh Teater.
As reported by: Rob Bolton Twitter Other tagged players: Josh Teater Weather Update for The Farmers Insurance Open
For the second week in a row, it looks like the weather should not be an issue in picking your DFS rosters for the week. Kevin Roth’s weather report for this week’s Farmers Insurance Open is up in the main forum and golfers should have ideal weather to play in beautiful San Diego this week. With two courses in play this week there is however an edge to look at in terms of your showdown builds. As a general rule, you want to play golfers on The North Course and Fade those on the South Course for the first two rounds of play. In the last five years over the first two rounds of play, the South Course has played almost 2 shots harder than the North Course. Showdown golf is all about giving yourself exposure to low rounds so by playing golfers who are on the North Course you give yourself the best chance to that low round of golf. Over the last five years of play ( 10 rounds of golf), the North Course has yielded an average of 24.4 rounds of 70 or better, while the South Course only has an average of 9.5. There will be an occasional low round on the South Course over the first two days, but for the most part, golfers have an easier time playing the North Course.
Bubba Watson returns to Torrey Pines for the first time in six years
It’s not often that you see a former champion of an event like The Farmers Insurance Open not return year after year. When Bubba Watson tee’s it up on Thursday it will end a six-year drought of playing in this event. At this point in his career, Watson is almost an exclusive GPP boom or bust type play for most in the DFS community. Currently trending at sub 5% ownership this former Farmers Champion could end up being a great way to get off chalky players in the same price range. Watson has both the length and creativity around the greens to play this course well. Three top tens in eight career starts at Torrey Pines is a pretty solid course history to lean on. The low projected ownership number on Watson is more of a reflection of the uncertainty surrounding his game prior to this week. With as much upside as anyone in the game, Watson makes for a strong leverage play this week.
As reported by: DraftKings Projected Ownership Rafael Campos is no longer in the field
Rafael Campos has decided to take a pass on this week’s event and will be replaced by Ben Martin. For Martin, this is a chance to play in an event after not earning enough points through his major medical starts. Due to the timing of this move, we will probably not see Martin added to any of the pricing pools for the week. All other players who were added to the field after prices came out now have projections and salaries available to use in LineupHQ.
As reported by: Rob Bolton Twitter Other tagged players: Ben Martin, Wes Roach, Zack Sucher Not Sure Why, but this Golfer is Flying Under the Radar
Given the stars and scrubs nature of my builds, I will be looking for value plays that I think can make the cut. I’m really not sure how many of the cheap golfers will contend this week, so I’ll side with safety over upside when it comes to the cheap golfers. Sabbatini certainly fits the mold and it doesn’t look like he’s going to garner a lot of ownership. I’m not sure what I’m missing, as he’s made six straight cuts and 22 of his last 24 on tour. That’s extremely impressive for a golfer that is consistently priced as a value play. The best part about Sabbatini is that he doesn’t have a weakness in his game. He gains strokes off the tee, on approach, around the green, and on the greens. If you are a course history truther, he’s made five of six cuts here in the past. Other than this being a strong field, I can’t find any negatives with Sabbatini and will gladly be overweight on him at sub-10% ownership.
Form, Stats, and Course History All Align
One popular value play that I will be loading up on this week is English. He has four top six finishes in his last seven events on tour. His form has tailed off in the last two outings, but he had bad course history at the RSM Classic and he still managed to make the cut at last week’s American Express. The ball striking has been impeccable over the last few months and he’s always been one of the best putters on tour. We often think of him as a great Bermuda putter, but he actually has his best splits on Poa. If we throw out his missed cut here last year (when he was in truly awful form), he has some of the best course history in the field. Here are his finishes in the previous four years — T8, T14, T32, and T2. He offers a nice mix of safety with upside and feels underpriced compared to the names around him.
Willing to Overlook Fowler's Bad Course History
We often speak in hyperbole when it comes to DFS, but there’s a decent chance this is the lowest Fowler will be owned in any tournament over the next few months. There are two reasons contributing to the low ownership — bad course history over the last five years (T66, MC, MC, MC, T61) and the fact that he had the 36-hole lead last week at the American Express and couldn’t close the door. While I will agree that he’s not the best closer on tour, we’ve seen him put together some impressive Sunday finishes when he’s chasing the leaders. I am essentially throwing out his bad course history because he has traveled to Abu Dhabi the week before this tournament in years past. He changed his schedule this year and decided to play in the American Express. We don’t have to worry about travel or fatigue this year and for what it’s worth, he posted four straight top 20 finishes at this event from 2010-2013. He has five straight top 20 finishes on tour and is a great fit for the course on paper. Along with Tiger, Fowler is one of the best on tour in terms of proximity from 175-200 yards and from 200+ yards and they will be hitting plenty of those shots. He’s also a great putter on fast greens and these puppies are extremely quick. At under 10% ownership, I can’t pass up this opportunity in DFS.
The Masses Can Keep Fading the GOAT
I will always preface this selection with a warning that I am the biggest Tiger homer of any DFS player out there. I have played him in my main lineup every time he’s teed it up over the last two years with only three exceptions — two coming off of wins and another when he admitted his game wasn’t where he wanted it to be. He’s actually been quite forthcoming in his press conferences. While it sounds like he took some time off after the Presidents Cup, he’s been practicing the last two weeks and said there wasn’t much rust to shake off. He did note that he’s been testing out new woods, but said that he’ll use his old ones if he doesn’t get the new ones dialed in by Thursday. For some odd reason, everyone in the industry expects Tiger to be highly owned every week because the “casual player” will just click his name. I have a secret for you — the “casual player” that doesn’t pay attention to golf isn’t going to be throwing 150 lineups into GPPs or playing anything high stakes. Woods consistently has low ownership and I laugh when people still make the argument that is obviously wrong. Anyway, he’s won this event six or seven times in his career and has back-to-back top 25 finishes here the last two years when he had no form to speak of coming into the event. This time around, he won the Zozo Championship, he finished fourth in the Hero World Challenge, and he was the only golfer at the Presidents Cup that didn’t lose a match. He’s arguably the best in the world with his long irons and has an incredible short game.
Matt Every is no longer in the field
Matt Every has decided to skip this week’s Farmers Insurance Open and will be replaced by Wes Roach. While there is not an injury associated with Every pulling out of the event, he did struggle during Sunday’s round posting a score of 82. Once Roach gets added to the player pool we will give him a projection and add him to LineupHq.
As reported by: Rob Bolton Twitter Other tagged players: Wes Roach Adam Schenk is no longer in the field
Just a few short hours after sites released salaries for this week’s event, Adam Schenk withdrew from the field. He will be replaced by Zach Sucher. No injury news has been released at this point. Sucher should get added to the player pool within the next 24 hours.
As reported by: Rob Bolton Twitter Other tagged players: Zack Sucher Round one of The American Express dominated by low owned value plays
Low scores were the theme of the day for the first round of The American Express. Much to the surprise of many in the DFS community many of these low scores were shot by players normally reserved as GPP plays only. Grayson Murray and Zac Blair share the lead after both posting rounds of 64. With 10 of the top 15 round one scores shot by golfers who are both cheap in price and low in ownership, there are quite a few unexpected names near the top of the leaderboard Thursday afternoon. If the weather pattern stays the same we will see more low scores this week, so those golfers who played well today will have to keep up aggressive play in order to keep pace.
As reported by: ResultsDB Other tagged players: Zac Blair Ten Minutes to roster lock, no major news to report
It’s all quiet on the news front this week. Joel Dahmen took an early pass on the week and has been replaced by Dominic Bozzelli. Greg Chalmers has a big red O by his name on DraftKings but is expected to play. Good luck this week grinders, ResultsDb will be up and running shortly after lock. Please check back to see how your lineups stack up against the field.
Other tagged players: Dominic Bozzelli, Greg Chalmers Weather update American Express
After battling the winds in Hawaii over the last two weeks golfers will face near perfect conditions for this week’s event. According to Kevin Roth, we can expect pretty much ideal golf weather this week. Even if the weather were to become an issue there is not much of an edge in terms of stacking tee times. With three courses in the rotation, golfers will tee off in a two-hour window. This limited time frame means that golfers will face pretty much the same weather over the first three days. If you are playing the showdown slate there is an edge however in trying to avoid golfers who play rounds on the Stadium Course. While all three golf courses will yield some low scores, The Stadium Course typically plays harder than either of the two courses in the rotation. Greens in regulation is a strong corollary stat to shooting lower scores, and The Stadium Course finished as the 28th ranked ( higher the number easier the course) course in the category last year. La Quinta and The Tournament course finished 38th and 39th respectably in greens hit in regulation. The same type of trend exists in most scoring categories for the three courses. While that does not mean a low score or two can come from The Stadium Course, we typically just see better overall scoring from the other two golf courses.
As reported by: Kevin Roth Weather Report