We’re heading back to Riviera Country Club for the Genesis Invitational. This year’s field is one of the strongest non-major fields in recent memory with nine of the Top 10 OWGR making the trip. For a look at the Expected Birdies for this track, head over to yesterday’s article.
Buy or Sell
Rory McIlroy ($11,600) is, without exaggeration, breaking the PRK Score this week. Last week, for example, we had eight different golfers at 90-plus in the model. Because of the gap between Rory and the rest of the field, there are only two golfers joining Rory with that distinction.[1] He’s made 11 straight cuts. Over that span, he’s notched two wins and seven other top 10s. His worst finish was a T26 at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship. The most likely scenario, thanks to his price, is that he comes in even a bit under-owned relative to his chance of a top-five finish or a win. The simulator has Rory winning this event about 13.7% of the time. He’s an absolute buy for me and I’m actively seeing how far I can push my exposure to him.
We have another course history poster boy to chat about this week. Bubba Watson ($9,600) is a winner of this tournament a few times over at this point. He comes in with excellent form too. His last two starts have wound up as top-six finishes. If there’s one thing you need to know with Bubba … it’s that when he’s on, he’s on.
Over/Under
Justin Rose ($8,500) – o/u 16.5
I will take the over on Rose this week. This is one of the strongest fields we’ll see all year, and yes … Rose is technically still in the top 10, but I’m not impressed. He’s coming off of a missed cut at the Farmers and his best recent finishes have all come against weak fields. The simulator has Rose in the top 20 only about 29% of the time. His PRK score puts him in some brutal company too. Historically, golfers in the 60-70 range have missed the cut 46% of the time and have only hit the top 20 at a 19% clip.
Mid-Range Matchup
Adam Scott ($9,000) v Hideki Matsuyama ($9,300)
Even my head-to-head simulator is having a hard time with this decision. It’s basically neck-and-neck between these two golfers, but if we zoom out a bit to the PRK Score, maybe we’ll have better luck. Scott has a decent lead with an 88 compared to Matsuyama’s 81 in the PRK Score. They’re both in that same group between 80 and 90, but I’ll give the edge to Scott here, slightly.
Cash Locks
Another two-for-two week with the cash locks means that we’re over 80% made cuts and approaching 65% top-25 finishes.
This week’s cash locks are:
- Collin Morikawa ($8,100)
- Tony Finau ($9,100)
Model Results - Genesis Invitational
| Name | Salary | PRK Score | Own Proj |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rory McIlroy | 11600 | 100 | 17.7 |
| Jon Rahm | 11200 | 89 | 13.7 |
| Justin Thomas | 11000 | 86 | 18.1 |
| Tiger Woods | 10400 | 80 | 12.2 |
| Dustin Johnson | 10000 | 79 | 21.5 |
| Patrick Cantlay | 9800 | 92 | 20.2 |
| Bubba Watson | 9600 | 74 | 21.2 |
| Brooks Koepka | 9400 | 81 | 17.0 |
| Hideki Matsuyama | 9300 | 82 | 15.8 |
| Xander Schauffele | 9200 | 86 | 18.1 |
| Tony Finau | 9100 | 90 | 18.2 |
| Adam Scott | 9000 | 88 | 20.6 |
| Jason Day | 8800 | 78 | 6.4 |
| Marc Leishman | 8700 | 80 | 12.1 |
| Patrick Reed | 8600 | 81 | 12.2 |
| Justin Rose | 8500 | 65 | 18.2 |
| Jordan Spieth | 8400 | 68 | 7.8 |
| Phil Mickelson | 8300 | 62 | 6.5 |
| Abraham Ancer | 8200 | 76 | 13.7 |
| Collin Morikawa | 8100 | 84 | 19.2 |
| Sungjae Im | 8000 | 79 | 11.8 |
| Bryson DeChambeau | 7900 | 79 | 12.4 |
| Paul Casey | 7900 | 79 | 11.3 |
| Sergio Garcia | 7800 | 59 | 10.3 |
| Matt Kuchar | 7800 | 76 | 10.2 |
| Matthew Fitzpatrick | 7700 | 78 | 9.0 |
| J.B. Holmes | 7700 | 61 | 9.8 |
| Kevin Na | 7600 | 68 | 12.2 |
| Ryan Moore | 7600 | 75 | 4.4 |
| Max Homa | 7500 | 73 | 5.6 |
| Charles Howell III | 7500 | 74 | 6.4 |
| Branden Grace | 7500 | 59 | 2.2 |
| Cameron Smith | 7500 | 62 | 3.6 |
| Scottie Scheffler | 7400 | 80 | 7.7 |
| Cameron Champ | 7400 | 69 | 5.3 |
| Brendon Todd | 7400 | 73 | 2.5 |
| Ryan Palmer | 7400 | 70 | 3.2 |
| Joaquin Niemann | 7300 | 75 | 14.7 |
| Alex Noren | 7300 | 74 | 10.7 |
| Keegan Bradley | 7300 | 65 | 3.6 |
| Rafa Cabrera Bello | 7300 | 58 | 3.7 |
| Nick Taylor | 7200 | 82 | 2.6 |
| Russell Knox | 7200 | 79 | 2.2 |
| Adam Hadwin | 7200 | 68 | 3.0 |
| Scott Piercy | 7200 | 76 | 2.2 |
| Jason Kokrak | 7100 | 65 | 8.5 |
| Danny Willett | 7100 | 67 | 2.2 |
| Matthew Wolff | 7100 | 68 | 3.8 |
| Chez Reavie | 7100 | 67 | 1.0 |
| Corey Conners | 7000 | 67 | 8.5 |
| Erik Van Rooyen | 7000 | 42 | 6.1 |
| Francesco Molinari | 7000 | 51 | 6.5 |
| Bud Cauley | 7000 | 74 | 0.7 |
| Jim Furyk | 7000 | 69 | 2.5 |
| J.T. Poston | 6900 | 71 | 7.6 |
| Matt Jones | 6900 | 71 | 0.7 |
| Rory Sabbatini | 6900 | 67 | 1.1 |
| Brian Harman | 6900 | 76 | 1.3 |
| Emiliano Grillo | 6900 | 64 | 1.2 |
| Carlos Ortiz | 6800 | 68 | 11.9 |
| Patrick Rodgers | 6800 | 63 | 4.2 |
| Jhonattan Vegas | 6800 | 62 | 1.2 |
| Andrew Putnam | 6800 | 70 | 1.4 |
| Lanto Griffin | 6800 | 68 | 3.7 |
| Nate Lashley | 6700 | 66 | 0.6 |
| Dylan Frittelli | 6700 | 58 | 1.2 |
| Aaron Wise | 6700 | 63 | 1.1 |
| Sung Kang | 6700 | 51 | 1.7 |
| Charley Hoffman | 6700 | 64 | 1.6 |
| Luke List | 6600 | 65 | 5.8 |
| Nick Watney | 6600 | 65 | 0.9 |
| Wyndham Clark | 6600 | 65 | 2.1 |
| Vaughn Taylor | 6600 | 69 | 1.3 |
| Denny McCarthy | 6600 | 67 | 1.6 |
| Martin Laird | 6500 | 58 | 0.9 |
| Joel Dahmen | 6500 | 68 | 1.6 |
| Pat Perez | 6500 | 59 | 1.0 |
| Sebastian Munoz | 6500 | 65 | 1.6 |
| James Hahn | 6500 | 59 | 0.9 |
| Cameron Tringale | 6500 | 71 | 2.7 |
| Danny Lee | 6400 | 57 | 1.0 |
| Scott Stallings | 6400 | 58 | 0.3 |
| Adam Schenk | 6400 | 68 | 0.4 |
| Michael Thompson | 6400 | 51 | 0.4 |
| Kiradech Aphibarnrat | 6400 | 48 | 0.9 |
| Kyle Stanley | 6400 | 61 | 0.6 |
| Peter Malnati | 6300 | 65 | 0.8 |
| Andrew Landry | 6300 | 62 | 1.0 |
| Adam Long | 6300 | 70 | 0.5 |
| Aaron Baddeley | 6300 | 70 | 0.9 |
| Talor Gooch | 6300 | 66 | 3.2 |
| Russell Henley | 6300 | 55 | 0.4 |
| Jason Dufner | 6300 | 61 | 0.4 |
| Kevin Chappell | 6300 | 52 | 0.8 |
| Sam Burns | 6200 | 68 | 0.8 |
| Bronson Burgoon | 6200 | 68 | 0.4 |
| Sam Ryder | 6200 | 61 | 0.3 |
| C.T. Pan | 6200 | 64 | 0.4 |
| Troy Merritt | 6200 | 56 | 0.5 |
| Jimmy Walker | 6200 | 53 | 0.4 |
| Harold Varner III | 6200 | 60 | 2.1 |
| Kevin Tway | 6200 | 68 | 1.1 |
| Tyler Duncan | 6100 | 56 | 0.3 |
| Matt Every | 6100 | 63 | 0.3 |
| Sepp Straka | 6100 | 52 | 0.3 |
| Brian Stuard | 6100 | 54 | 0.3 |
| Joseph Bramlett | 6100 | 56 | 0.3 |
| Si Woo Kim | 6100 | 30 | 0.3 |
| Brian Gay | 6100 | 59 | 0.3 |
| Steve Stricker | 6100 | 63 | 0.3 |
| Martin Trainer | 6000 | 0 | 0.3 |
| Sean Yu | 6000 | 0 | 0.3 |
| Jim Herman | 6000 | 35 | 0.3 |
| Kyoung-Hoon Lee | 6000 | 57 | 0.3 |
| Kyongjun Moon | 6000 | 42 | 0.3 |
| Roger Sloan | 6000 | 56 | 0.3 |
| Scott Brown | 6000 | 39 | 0.3 |
| Chris Stroud | 6000 | 50 | 0.3 |
| Ryan Armour | 6000 | 51 | 0.3 |
| J.J. Spaun | 6000 | 48 | 0.3 |
Image Credit: Michael Wade/Icon Sportswire. Pictured: Rory McIlroy.
Footnotes
| ↑1 | Patrick Cantlay and Tony Finau |
|---|
