It has been quite some time since we were able to talk golf, but the return is right around the corner. The tour heads out to Colonial Country Club down in Fort Worth, Texas, for the Charles Schwab Challenge. This course has been in the rotation since the 1940s. It’s a par 70 that plays just a shade over 7,200 yards. Colonial features relatively small greens (4,500 square feet) that are bentgrass. The field will have to navigate their way around 85 bunkers and four water hazards. To see an in-depth course breakdown, head over to last year’s preview article.

Checking the Chalk

As of right now, it looks like we will have five golfers soaking up most of the ownership. At the top of the salary scales, we have Rory McIlroy ($11,800) and Jon Rahm ($11,000) projected for 20% or higher ownership. Rory has the top salary and the top PRK score, so it’s not much of a shock that people will be looking to click his name. We’ve also seen him play meaningful golf more recently than most of the guys in this field. Rahm is nipping at Rory’s heels for the No. 1 spot in the OWGR.^[1]And could overtake him with a win on Sunday. Nobody will fault you for playing either of them. Over the last three years, there have been 42 golfers to hit 18% or higher ownership. Of that group, 19 (45%) have scored 80-plus DK Points. The issue, as always, with playing one of these guys is that you need to go dumpster diving to fit them in. I’ll have more on that in a bit, though.

In the $9,000 range, we have two golfers who were staples in most of these articles prior to our sudden break from sports. Webb Simpson ($9,800) and Sungjae Im ($9,300) were in plenty of my lineups in January through March. Simpson has ranked strongly in PRK since its creation last year. Im has been one of the most consistent golfers we’ve seen lately making 18-of-19 cuts and notching his first victory back at the Honda Classic. Golfers in the $9,000 price range that see 15% or higher ownership haven’t been the sure things that most people would expect them to be. Just 48 of 125 (38.4%) of golfers fitting those criteria have scored 80-plus DK Points. On the other hand, golfers in the $9,000 range that are lower-owned (under 10%) have actually had a better hit rate. Of that group, 39-of-82 (47.5%) have hit 80-plus DK Points. 

Down in the $8,000 range, we have another one of my favorite golfers who will likely be popular. Scottie Scheffler ($8,400) just seems too cheap regardless of how strong this field actually is. Unfortunately, it seems like plenty of people are noticing that. He comes in with the seventh-best PRK Score despite having just the 19th-highest salary. Unfortunately, we’re not great at picking the best golfers in this range. Only about 30% of golfers in the $8,000 range that hit 15% or higher ownership end up scoring 80-plus DK Points. 

Picking Pivots

Bryson DeChambeau ($10,100) is the most natural pivot off of the chalk at the top. He comes into the week with an 84 in the PRK which isn’t significantly worse than Webb at 87. The bonus, though, is that DeChambeau will come at almost half the ownership. If you head over to the PGA Sim Scores and Pivots app and go to DeChambeau’s recent sims, you’ll see some guy with the last name McIlroy as his closest comp. 

Scheffler is going to be one of the higher owned golfers on the slate, but there’s a golfer nearly $2,000 cheaper that’s a perfect arbitrage. Sticking with the pivots app, if we plug in Scheffler and look for golfers in this field, Jhonattan Vegas ($6,700) makes an appearance. The putting is a bit of a disaster. But … welcome to PGA DFS! We pride ourselves here on finding good ball-strikers and hoping to catch a hot putter. Vegas is a great GPP option.

Cash Locks

• Collin Morikawa ($9,100)
• Viktor Hovland ($7,900)

Model Results and Ownership Projections - Charles Schwab Challenge