Beating the Book: The 87th Masters Betting Preview

Two of the three members of the long Shots podcast, which, if you're not familiar, is Veson's golf dedicated podcast, which is co hosted by Matt Brown, Wes Reynolds, and Kelly Bidlin. Matt too much of a diva to show up for this one, because you guys have a live Masters long Shots performance coming up at about an hour after this show. But Kelly and Wests are here. Thank you, gentlemen for being here. I appreciate it. Thank you for having Mattelie

shows up for the big stuff. Gil. Okay, come apparently, so back your expectations. Good bye. So now, so when people by the time people listen to this, and we'll probably have already happened. But on the off chance that people listen just before it happens, you guys are doing a live long Shots at eleven am Pacific two pm Eastern today. Yes, but it will also be in the normal long Shots podcast feed. So everybody listens to us weekly, go go find podcasts wherever podcasts can be found, head

Visa dot com. You'll find a whole right up. We've got the Master's Guide out that we all took a part in as well as Matt Humans, so definitely go check that all out and this will be yes in our normal long Shots podcast feed. We've gotten a few questions about that on Twitter and for people who are listening to this, be like, wait a minute, but if I'm listening to this, why do I have to go listen to long Shots pod. Well, you'll get to hear all of Matt's picks as well, and you guys probably

are holding something back for that show as well. Yeah, I would say that, And uh, West, I don't know about you, but I kind of expect these shows to be led differently from what with Gill versus Matt Browns. We're gonna be okay, Gills will be slightly more jewish er. So what he means, I think it's we don't. We don't really like your Cohn coming down to Augusta Guil. I know you want to join us for the Masters, Okay, So let's begin with And we've talked about this already

a myriad of times on a numbers game. I'm sure you've talked about it West on different shows as well. But let's just start with the weather, because that's an issue here. First of all, the Master's pool of players is always like a ninety player pool kind of thing, and then there's a lot of like sort of dead money players of one masters, you know, in the during

the Eisenhower administration, Larry Mises of the world, Jose Mariela Thaboles. Yes, So it's what makes this tournament so awesome because it's a small pool of players, smallish compared to others, and it's the most predictive of all golf courses, Augusta is from year to year. So you start with that as a baseline. But we are throwing in the weather here. So it's eighty percent as we look at the weather forecast, and you know weather forecasts go and West will start

with you. So it's eighty percent chance on Friday, one hundred percent chance on Saturday, sixty cent chance on Sunday. We're doing this Tuesday morning. Do you let that affect your handicapping? Yes and no. I think I think, look, you have to with the draw bias. You know, you could try to handicap that as much as you can, but sometimes you're just at the mercy of the weather guides here. But just when I'm looking at Okay, how

is the weather going to affect play? I think where it affects play is the fact that, look, you have elevated tea boxes on most of these holes, so that's

going to add to the impact of the wind. I'm worried more about the wind than I am about the rain necessarily here over the past ten days, I believe leading up to the event, as we record on Tuesday, about a little over two inches of rainfall is what we've seen on this course, and we're probably going to get that over the weekend at some point or one or the other. So what I think it's going to do is how is it's going to affect the course.

It's going to affect the course. It's going to soften up the fairways, so that makes the course actually play even longer because this is seventy five five, so this is not a short course. By any stretching, it actually plays a little bit longer because it's more hilly. That's why you know when Tiger came backing right, Yes, a part of that, and plus the fact Tiger coming from the injury, that's why it was so such a struggle for him to see him get around because this is

a big course. This is not like a flat course like in the desert where even if it's seventy five hundred seventy six hundred yards, where it's easy to walk and easy to manage. Plus getting the cooler temperatures here on the weekend, the ball's not going to travel as far. So this is why, at least from what I did, you want a little bit more bombing off the tea and whether you're using those for outright bets or maybe top ten, top twenty placement market bets. I think distance

is really going to matter this year with this weather forecast. Yeah, completely agree. They're often tee always important at the Masters. I think maybe a little bit more this week. We heard a couple of the guests mentioned that on the numbers game as well. I do think the one thing to keep in mind with the Masters is I have that I just looked up the subair system where they have this like a filled air filtration system to get the water out of the out of the greens and

even the fairways. They're one of the few places in the world lest I think that actually has that running in the fairways and not just the greens. So you've heard some different reports over the past couple of days of the rain being bad, but they expect them to dry out pretty well here over the next couple of days,

so we'll have to see. I think my advice always with weather betting is okay if you're betting first round leaders like I do, basically every tournament is absolutely something that you need to keep in the front of your mind, and you should be putting those first round leader bets in basically up until the last minute that you can and when you really have the best feel for what the weather is going to be, like well your guy

is playing beyond that, I think you can. Often golf betters often get themselves in trouble by trying to predict stuff. That's what I was trying to get because we've seen it before, Gill. Sometimes sometimes the weather changes, sometimes a lot of times it changes. You've noticed that right, especially get to the open right, that's where you get like the pronounced draw bias at the Open Championship, and sometimes

you're just at the mercy of it. You're just on the bad side of the draw and none of your gays contend. The biggest thing, though, is I think if the weather is people don't think about this one enough. If it gets really bad, and you brought this up earlier, I think one hundred percent right what we're looking on Saturday Saturday. If it gets really bad, sometimes you just get reined out for the rest of the day and they pick up their balls and start again the next day.

So if you have this whole strategy in mind of which you know which wave I'm gonna play and how this is gonna work out, then all might be shot to pieces by the time they blow that horn and then they're done for the rounds. True. So when Drew Dinsick, Dan Weston and I do our tennis slam pods, and we also do any in welles, we're always trying to

time it right after the draw. Sometimes we even get lucky at it's happening while we're on You guys were waiting to see where the tea Times were we're Tuesday, We're forty eight hours before this thing starts, and you guys were like, where are the tea times and West

they just came out just now. They did just come out. So, you know, you always get like different types of players because you know, you mentioned that you have former champions here, you have a few amateurs here from all over the world, and you have guys that you know, now with the live thing, you have live players mixed in with different type of players. So it's always interested to look at

those storylines who's paired with who? But just looking at this, you know, kind of on the once over, nothing really like strikes me. You know, like I didn't really see any you know, two guys that hate each other or anything like that. Like I didn't see Rory wasn't paired with Phil Mickelson. They didn't play or anything like that. Yeah, they didn't put Patrick Red with Rory or one of like the PGA Tour loyalists here. So yeah, so yeah,

you're getting these these tea times. You know, early on, obviously the three honorary starters player Nicholas and Watson hit the first shot and then I believe eight Eastern is the first tea time goes all the way to two Eastern, which the last group I believe is Jordan Spief, Tommy Fleetwood, Tony Fee now for the Thursday group and then inverted

obviously on Friday. All right, let's so yeah, go ahead. Well, I was very I was looking for these as quickly as humanly possible for a very very specific strategy of Hell, I'm playing this tournament. Um, now, I could save that for when we go over bets or if you want me to launch until it right, let's hear that now like that, Gil, it's a guy that you're on in

this tournament and you love him. Scotty cheff Yes, everything that I all of my research and West we're gonna be hitting on this a bunch, but running the models and everything. Scheffler is so by far my number one rated guy in this field and not even really that close. Um defending champion and usually that doesn't happen back to usually does not happen. But we saw what he did last year. I think he's in the best form of those big three right now. Between Rory and Ram. I

wanted to see one thing. Is he going to be earlier is he going to be late, because if he's an early tea time, I might have to fire before this tournament begins, and I don't really want to fire at seven No. One, but if I can wait now, I'm gonna approach this from a live standpoint, because as West told me, he is what one of the later ones, he is the third D last group, third D last groups.

So what you can do now? And we even have a book that offers us in Vegas or two books, but if you're outside of Vegas, you're Colorado, Jersey, whatever, DraftKings, MGM fan to all these all these books will keep up outright markets throughout the round. So all I'm looking forward to someone to go out early and post a low number. Go low, and Scheffler's odds should get longer before he even teas off. So that is what I'm hoping to do is actually grab a piece of Scott

and Scheffler before he teas off. The same applies, by the way, to Rory McElroy. You mentioned Cherry up third to last group, Scheffler, Holmes the amateur, Sam Bennett, the US Amateur champion, second to last group, Tom Kim, Rory McElroy and Sam Burns, so two of the top three along with John rom that you're seeing anywhere seven to one, eight to one, nine to one. Like Kelly said, you can wait and then you get that double digits because like I'm more partial Rory McElroy, I don't want to

bet him necessarily at seven to one. I want to wait a little bit that I like that strategy. Who are the two books? I'm gonna guess one of them Caesar's. Who is the other book in Vegas that leaves them up? Boyd? Okay, boy boyd? And in Caesar's that was the only one. I'm kind of unsure because I've seen them do it. Yeah most of the time. I think they're doing it all the time now. But well, because I could do there's there's like pillars of offshore, right, bookmaker, let's just

say who it is. Bookmaker will not they do it a little more for the majors, but like on a Thursday, they're not leaving those things up during the round. I don't believe it's interesting draft Kings will leave them up the entire course they will. Yeah, that's it's It's not like we'd be allowed to bet there anyway, right, exactly, but that for everybody listening right that might be outside

in the vata. These are those things though that it's how do you I don't want to say manipulate the markets, right, but it's looking for different way. How do you manipulate that number where you don't West doesn't want to bet seven to one or a or you have to think about these ways if you want to attract more value out of those golfers. All right, let's let's start with your outrights and then all sort of cherry pick golfers

is gonna want to ask you about specifically. But West, let's start with your with your outrights that you have in pocket currently. Yeah, and look with the masters. I usually because these are up so much longer, Gil, because these are up you know come the winter time, right, you're gonna probably have more outrights than you would usually have on like an average tournament or like US Open or PGA, and you're gonna have them a different number.

So there's gonna be a segment of the audience that's gonna be like, yeah, so I'll get like my antipost what they call it overseas out of the way a couple I bet we'll tell us if you'd still bet them at current numbers as well. Camera and Young. Yes, in the thirty range where I'm seeing him. I got him at forty five to one. I bet him during the dull match play and look he went to the final loss to Sam Burns. Obviously, Cameron Young, I would still bet Jason Day, which I have at forty I

probably would not bet I'm I got very lukewarm. This was before Jason Day had that little bout with vertigo or had the dizzy spell that he oftentimes has, and I had bet him before that, and he was three up against Scottie Scheffler in the match play, and then that's when it happened. I was like, oh, no, here we go again. Because Jason Day, the poor guy. I'm a big fan of his, but he's made a glass,

he's always injured, he's always sick. So no, I'm not going to bet him in the twentiesh range this week. Absolutely not, okay, but Cam Young is one of yours that Cameron Young, I would still be willing to sponsor in the low to mid thirties. Okay, those are all that you have. That's what I had free A couple of weeks ago, but the ones I added this week. I did go with Jordan Spief, which I found a little over twenty in the market here in town. He's had a couple chances to win already this year. He

was fourth at bay Hill. You know that that very condensed leaderboard where they're about eight guys in. Kurt Kiddiama was the first guy to make a pot on seventeen and one. Jordan Spief could have easily won that. He probably should have won in Tampa before he hit a ball in the water on sixteen. You could argue he should have three green jackets here instead of just the

one in twenty fifteen. He definitely should have that second one. Yeah, sure, But with Danny Willett, Yeah absolutely, Danny Willet was able to steal it from him in the end, but possession nine tenths of the law of course, second in strokes getting around the green over the last thirty six rounds. What's that it is, Danny Willett. Danny Willet's not saying no, don't invite me Champions dinner, so I'll hold it at

my house. Yes, twenty one to one. For speed, he's second and strokes getting around the green, which I think is going to be important this week, considering only about a sixty percent rate in terms of greens of regulation.

These are hard greens to hit. And the guy who's been the best in strokes getting around the green, Justin Thomas and Kelly and I have had this conversation a lot, Gil, especially with the top ten to fifteen players in the world, you can have target numbers on these guys when they drift to a certain number. Justin Thomas's number for me is anything north of twenty five to one. It's like an autopl man point ye, yeah, absolutely, And look he you know, has never really been right in the hunt here.

He's got a couple of really good finishes. The approach plays dipped a little bit, but he's been great around the green this year. He also has Bones McKay, Jim Bones McKay on the bag who won this thing three times of course with Bill Mickelson. So Justin Thomas, once he got up to above twenty five, he was an AutoPlay for me. Tony Fee now who I have just a little bit less than thirty to one, Top five, all four majors, top ten in actually ten, top tens

in the twenty six that he's played. The difference with Fee now now and Matt Brown, Kelly and I talk about this on long shots all the time is win equity. Who wins? You know, who gets you some wins? And I know Kelly has played a lot of Sam Burns and a lot of Max Homa because they have win equity. Will so does Tony Fee. Now he's won three times since the Open Championship last summer. This is a new thing.

We can say, yeah, because remember he didn't win for like five years after he won that Puerto Rico opened. So Tony Fee now twenty nine. Colin Marikawa, who I got at thirty four to one at Cercin. He's still drifting upwards so apparently not drawing a lot of interest. He has friendless in the market as our friend Dan Weston. Yes, yes he is, but I'll be his pal. He has not won in eighteen months anywhere. He won in Dubai for the DP World Tour Championship at the end of

twenty twenty one. But one of the world's best iron players. Second on approach, fourth on ball striking, fourth tee to green last thirty six rounds. So Colin Maracawa for me, Sun jay N that was one that I had just bet on a drift. I got him at forty four to one. Hasn't really done anything wrong this season, but just hasn't contended except at Tory Pines, where he was fourth earlier this year ye but second on debut here

in twenty twenty, was eighth last year. So, like you say, predictive course, go with guys that play well here every year, and soon Jam pretty much does. Another guy that does a Sideki Matsiyama, who I wasn't gonna bet, but I

saw him at fifty to one. I'm like, man, this could feel like a Matza Yama week, who is probably putting the best he's putted his entire career, and seven of his eight PGA Tour wins are on ben grass, so I think he's gonna like these greens and won this tournament with one of the more iconic moments ever with a nod from the caddy. Oh yes, one of my favorite moments of sports in sports. Yeah, look, and I know he's been battling a little bit of a neck injury, but it looks like he's good to go.

But Mazzi Yama is almost It's almost like Tom Brady with Bill Belichick. Like Tom Brady was always listed on the injury report, but you knew he was gonna play. I think that's the deal with Matsiyama. I didn't go if many bombs because the average price of the winner over the last ten years is like twenty seven to one, so you can't go that deep, even though I played

one deeper. Guy Men Woolee ninety five to one. Men woo Lee, he finished T fourteen last year, actually shot thirty on the front nine and then forty on the back, so he missed out getting a return invite by one shot, but he gets back in being in the top fifty in the world. So Men Wu ninety five to one at Circus Sports. If you're here in Vain, let me just before we get to Kelly's, and then I'll ask you about specific golfers. A couple of the names you mentioned.

Tony Fenew point out Joe pet who has been on this Master's Preview many years but was not really diving into golf these days. He did write the The Real the Bible on Analytics at Augusta, which is not which is not public domain information. It's proprietary. He had to do the digging on this and Tony Fenew in that twenty nineteen Tour guide was the guy who came out with the best metrics on this course. So that's a

nod for your Tony Feedelle pick. And the other one is Kelly and I talked about that this morning on a Numbers game. Dave Tindall who's been on this Master's Preview before at Dave tindal Golf on Twitter, who writes for Betfair. He does his like we do our college basketball formula West he does his Master's formula where he goes through the age of the golfer the world, ranking their appearances and their placements at Augusta before how what

their recent form is, their lowest Augusta around. You know, Strokes gained around the Green on and on with his different categories. And Jordan Spieth was the guy that came up as the main guy just nipping Rory. So shout out to your Jordan Spieth call as well, Kelly, what do you got? Yeah, I'll start, I'll start right right

where WestEd with Justin Thomas. This was a it's not a smaller, it's not a bigger bet for me this week, and it is a little bit of a smaller for an outright, but West, I can't say much more perfectly than West. Twenty five to one is about my breaking point where I was. I was kind of tracking them all week. Do I have him way to blow a few other guys? Yeah, but he drifted to twenty six to one here at Circle in Town. I finally pulled the trigger last night. It's a bet I had to make.

I think he summed it up all pretty well. West, not not exactly so many times he could have. It felt like he could have finished better here at the Masters. But he's still if you just look at it long term, still one of the best, most consistent players at this course when we talk course history for all these guys, he was top thirteen all the models I ran. Not really, as you point out, West, not really nice spiking anywhere consistently with some of the stats that we often look at.

But we've seen JT do this before. He gets hot this week with those irons or with the putter, because even his iron plays been a little bit down, he gets hot with one of those. I think he's right up there. In contentions of twenty six to one is where I guess I started from the short end. I'm going short along here. Maxhoma, thirty six to one. Maxhoma, you and I were texting yesterday West if he wins or Gail will You and I were texting yesterday about it. If he wins, you might be gone for a while.

I might be gone for a while. Sean McColl might be doing a numbers game for a couple of weeks. And this mainly just because his number keeps drifting. I understand that this is a guy who has not had a ton of success at Augusta National three years. He's had two missed cuts. It was a t forty eight, I believe is what he finished yet forty eight last year.

But the one thing you have to keep in mind about Maxhoma is that he's thirty two thirty three years old, has been playing on the tour for a while now. But he is not the same golfer that he was three years ago. This guy's game has completely changed. He is elevated into an upper class of players on tour, and it as much as course in tournament history mean here,

I'm not throwing it out the window. I'm not saying that, But I'm saying this kind of number in a condensed field on what I consider one of the better golfers in the world. Is it's my favorite outright bet that's out there that's available. I think even we got thirty six to one here in Town of the Circa, I've seen thirties though East Coast. I think anything in the thirties, I think it's silly on a guy with this level of talent. Uh here he was, Um, you know he's one.

We're talking about win equity, the same thing between the Tony Fenel, the bast year and a half. The guy's won four times on tour. He's way he has more wins than he does second and third place finishes combined. And if you've followed my golf betting at all, you know how many second place finishes I have. So throw

those out the window. Let me get a winner. Actually, so he's the guy looking at He was third in my last twelve bottle third, third in the field and approach first first and h strokes game par fours can be very important this week. Um. So that is the two guys that I have bet where numbers are basically similar to what I grabbed Okay then as West and home Maxihoma and justin Tim just As West will lay

it out. This is Matt Masters betting. I think it's very important if you're a golf better like we are, to scoop up numbers along the way, as you see him. So I do have other bets at longer numbers you're not gonna be able to get now, Corey Connor's eighty five, I have. I have the two guys that won last week West, I have Brooks Keptka and Corey Connors. Somehow Corey Connors eighty five to one and Brooks Kepka ninety

nine to one made them forever. Yeah, Like, if you're betting Brooks right now at thirty three or thirty five to one, you're not. You're late to the part. Can't do that. You're You're late right now. So if you scooped it early, good on you. Brooks Kepta now the first man to win two live events. Obviously a short

sample size, but yeah, I think you're too late. Don't don't be late to the party in early for the funeral, as our buddy Will Hill likes to say, and I would say the same thing about Connors and then I and then the other one that I have is I mean, I love that I have this one is Jason Day and eighty five to one because I really grab that as he was kind of moving upward. But I'm with you, I would not bet him were his numbers at right now, with what we saw with the vertigo stuff him in

those low twenties. It concerns me he could he could easily go out and win this thing, or he could

be a w D after six holes of golf. I don't really know what Jason Day is gonna look like out here this week, So I'm just riding with that one out right with the only two that I have Scottie Chefler, I did take a pre flop number, not the best number, plus eight forty five, But I said a year ago on a numbers game, I feel like he's the one guy you should have every golf tournament in some form, and maybe your strategy of getting him

in tournament is better, but I won't remember. So I have him here, and then the other one is home at thirty five fifty but plus thirty five and a half to one. So because I think, just like you when you look around golf Golf's landscape. If it's not Scottie, Scheffler or John ram As the guys you can always count on Rory as well. Max Holme was on that shortlist. Right He's been unbelievable. He's in that next He's in that next crowded and we had a couple of guests

on numbers game dropping today on Tuesday. Drop drop another name that I kind of cringed when I hear when I heard it, because he just missed out on my outray card and I was kind of trying to decide between adding him or trying to do something with Scheffler, which I'm now going to go down the Scheffler road because I do think when you're betting guys at seven to one, you can only bet so many outrights, so

Patrick can't lay. I have rated very high this week, but he falls in the same kind of arguments as of Max Homa. He's not a guy that's necessarily come to Augusta and performed amazing year after year. Yes, he has some good finishes here here, but he's also had some bad finishes as far his recent form. Right now, he's he is right right blow Scottie Scheffler. He is one of my highest rated guys in this field, so

I didn't bet an outright on him. And I know we're gonna get to other bets, but I have a massive top twenty betal Okay, but I'm glad you said that about like you can't bet everybody for those who are new to golf betting. And Matt Brown even says, this is the host of your of your podcast long Shots, he went through a spell back in the day betting golf where he lost a lot of them, like he did the inventory on his golf bets. He's like, oh, I'm getting murdered because I have too many outrights. So

you're right, like, you can't bet everybody. You gotta pick and choose on this, so you can't like if you have HOMA and can't lay on everybody else, you're probably you probably got to edit that. On the other hand, right, like you eyes already talking about because this is my favorite question to ask of golf shows. There's a guy and I'll ask it of you right now as you guys are talking about Justin Thomas. In my head, all

I'm thinking is, man, these two are right. If Justin Thomas wins this, I'm going to hate myself because he's the one guy that I consider betting in addition to the two that I already have, and I haven't pulled the trigger on it yet, so less I want to ask you the question which I love asking, which is which is the guy that, if he wins this tournament will create the most self loathing in you, Like you

just don't have bets. You're not going, as far as you can tell right now, you're not going to have bets on him. Maybe Zander Shole exactly what the answer we got this morning from Sia, who I have bet you know, many many times, and I'm a big fan of his, and he's got he's got a lot of like backdoor top ten's. He's been at least in the mix a couple times to win a major, and that's one thing like Patrick Cantley, who is eventually going to

win multiple majors, hasn't done. Max Homer, I think could be fair to point out with him, he's never really been right there. The win equity thing, Yes, it's that, and it's also the fact of just having experience at major's having a little bit of pain because I think you know, it's very rare that a guy like wins, you know, your first time out in a major, like kind of like Marikawa did at Harding Park a couple of years ago for the PGA. He's just destroyed. Everybody

was waiting for him to collapse, and he never did. Usually, you know, you got to have a little bit of pain, you got to come close and then fail before you can end up winning. So Xanderschofle won for me because it's been like, I bet this guy so many times and majors and he's got top fives and top tens out the wazoo, but he's never won. So I think

that's the one that scares him. That's a pretty common answer that question, I would imagine I'll ask you Kelly too, But the Morikawa thing sticks out too, because why is it like one of my biggest memories of that is just what you're talking about. After the tournament, he's like, I've played Harding Park a million times and it's just

like any random parking lot. Right in He's out there with his girlfriend sitting on the back of his car after he just won a Harding Park like it was anothering Like how did you not get nervous about any

of this. Ye, who's your guy for that question? Yeah, I'm loving that everybody's bringing up Xander because, Okay, well, I think it's fair to say that if everything that I just said about Patrick can't lay and if I end up going down the Scottie Scheffler route and not betting him, yes, it might answer then has to be can't lay if he wins and I don't have an outright bet on him. Now again, I have bet him in other ways, but missing out on that outright would suck.

But I'm right there with the rest of these guys that the other answer would be Xander. Softly, because you have sat here week after week is I've gone through my golf bets and Xander has made my card almost every week for the past few months. I finally, finally, you know, he got away from him the past week or two when his plays kind of been on the downside. You know, I'm pretty I stick to my model as

a fair amount. His last twelve last twelve round model I ran, he is fiftieth in it five zero eight. He is usually like top ten in everything that I run. So it just speaks to a little bit of so I mean it was nineteenth of players, thirty ninth at the API, thirty third at the Genesis US losing strokes off. The team has past two events. That concerns me at the Master's where that's a place you need to be gaining.

He's not the longest driver of the ball. That always helps here, but still he's got his game is so good, Yeah, that it would not surprise me if he went out in one. And I'm not going to have a bet on him, and in nothing that anybody says will change my mind on him. And I'm glad you mentioned that too because of modeling, and I think we'll get into this more on long shots with Matt Brown. This was a tough event to model, yep, simply because you have

eighteen live players. Yeah, and you don't have a ton of data. I know our friend Rick Gaiman at Rick run Good has some live data, but it's more of an estimate. It's not something that live actually puts out. So that was the big other MAC question we asked on a Numbers game this week, which is what do you do about the live golfers without that kind of data, Like you just mentioned, brooks Chepicast just won an event that's his second live win, but he just wanted he's

had great obviously great success here. That's an understatement here at Augusta. Do you read into that or do you just kind of like, I got my number, that's great. But anybody who's taken into this number now like it's too dicey for you to do that. There's not enough

to go on. I approach the live guys basically. I don't think I have an outright on any of them, but I approach or I am going to approach them more in like the placement markets, and I've did a couple of prop markets too, because you get a lot of props this week of course nationality prop low Amateur, low left hand or low debutante. And I did play

one live player this week. I played Meto Pereira for low debutante and low South American, which means he basically has to beat his bellow Chile and Joauque Nieman because the third guy is an amateur. So that's what I played. Because I looked at Mito Perera, I was like, hey, this guy's guy, you know, a six and a fifth and his two of his last three live events. So at least he's up there. Because that's the thing about live what we've seen so far, you don't get that

consistency with a lot of guys. Every once in a while, DJ is going to show up and be right there, and every once in a a while he's going to be in the middle of the pack. So you can never really know, I think, because you just don't get that consistency that you get on the PGA Tour if you're playing week after week, or the DP World Tour for that matter, where it's like top ten, top fifteen, top ten, top five. You know where you're putting all those strings.

That's I think why both of us ended up Bett and Jason Day at various points because he was like in the money on the first page of leaderboard, like every every week. Yeah, but you don't get that with a lot of these live guys because the schedule is so erratic. All right, let's let's do some of the other Oh I was just for live for me, I'm I'll say a couple of things just real quick. Yeah. West has Look, I'm sure there are more others that

have watched more out there. West has probably watched twenty times more live golf than I have. And that's if he spent twenty minutes watching it. He's right because that's about what I spend this week getting to be honest with you. But let me do the math. Kelly has

watched one minute, I got got it. So what's fascinating to me is I think mostly everybody I've talked to that that I respect in the golf betting community has pretty much had similar answers of the look, hey, unless unless numbers really drift on guys I'm staying away from because there's just not enough. There's not enough data. There's not enough that's data. Even if we had data supplied by by liv Right, we don't even get that statistical data,

but they just don't. We haven't even seen these guys play that much. So it's even if you're trying to do the eyeball test, I think it's tough to do. But Gilt's the number one question I have gotten tweets about over the past two weeks. What you know different props are listed for live golfers and the masters, all these things. It's the number one subject I've been tweeted about, asking questions about how I'm approached because nobody knows the answers.

One more thing to add on this too, because I asked Jeff Davis, who's the head golf odds make or at Circus Sports here in Las Vegas, and he said, you know, that's a good question about these live guys. But DJ is getting support. Yeah, Like DJ's getting the benefit of the doubt, of course, because he won a green jacket here in the COVID the November Masters of twenty twenty. But yet with Cam Smith, he says, we can't write a bet on him, which we're not getting

any which is pretty fast. So I heard, I don't know how much have you watched some of the Masters press conferences yesterday? Tip of the cap to Cameron Smith for being the only live golfer that would speak to the mass the mass media press conference. Okay, but he admitted, like, you know, it's I think some of these guys are being more open and honest about hey, what this money

does to you and changes your life. And he talked about taking a very long time off of golf here recently and enjoying time with friends and family before they kind of started up the new live season. That concerns me for a guy, you know, when some of these guys on the PGA Tour have been playing week in and week out for the past three months. A guy

like that taking that much time off concerns me. Matt Brown fired back on me a couple of weeks ago when I brought up, well, I'd probably looking at some of the younger guys who've got a long career ahead of them, like a Medo, Pereira, Walking Nieman and Abraham answer. But you know, his retort to that was, well, or those guys are just collected fat cash and they're young mid twenties living the life now, Like, what's the motivation for them to be out on the driving range every day?

I think it's a fair point, absolutely, Tiger Tiger brought that up. What's the incentive to practice? Yeah, yeah, what's the incentive to really get in the dirt when you're getting that kind of money? But simply based off of historical perspective from the masters, like West said, if I had to bet one, it would be DJ. What do you This is a complete speculation because there's no static answer to this, and it probably depends on who the golfer is. But what would it take like for each

of these guys talking about like in tournament bets. Now, Like, if DJ is lurking, let's use a broad term like that, lurking after the second round, are you jumping in right there on him? Or do you tend to wait till

the final day? Obviously they say Saturday's moving day AUGUSTA, but there's nothing like but a tournament is one on the back nine on Sunday, right, So like, is there is such a tough question to answer, But is there a moment that you think is optimal to jump in on some of these guys or is there no way to answer that? Oh, you're just talking live outright. So I think that, I mean, I think for any golfer, I actually traded pretty similar to my NBA live betting.

I think it's that kind of second quarter, third quarter times, the second round, third round time more in golf is a little later, I would say, after the cut is made, after the second round, start looking at it then. So after the second round or in the third round is a great time to look at guys live. But that's just a blanket statement on everybody. I don't think the live guys will make me think any more or less

amount that. Yeah, then this won't be a Kiddi Yama situation where you're like, I can get him at plus three fifty, there's only two more holes of there won't be that available, probably correct. Yeah, And also if like golf outright, golf golf outright, like live betting, you do want to bet with the momentum oftentimes, and like your other sticking ball sports like basketball, like football, you want

to play against the run. Sometimes I see people all the time, including people we know, it's like, okay, there was a big rush of points right away, over over over, and it's like, oftentimes you want to play against that. You know, you want to play against runs because all of a sudden you're getting that right number. Whereas in golf, you want to play on a guy that's maybe a little bit off the pace or a few holes ahead, and that's where you want to jump in on a guy.

And I think it's gonna be tougher to do that this weekend because we're probably gonna get a lot of stops and starts. We're probably gonna get a lot of intermittent to play, and you know where this could go into Monday, So it's gonna be a lot harder because different guys deal with the weather differently. Like we were

talking about Patrick Cantley. I just saw a tweet from our friend Jeff Feinberg, and he goes, I love Patrick Cantley, but my concern isn't the major's right, it's the fact that he often looks miserable when he's playing out there, and how is he gonna be when it's cold and wet? Patrick kiss some of these guys are gonna be like, Man, have we ever had a Masters go to Monday? A few years ago? I believe we did. I don't remember when the last one was. I'm trying. I don't remember

it offhand at all. Yeah, because there did the COVID year go to Monday? Oh you know what, I would never if it didn't. Well, twenty twenty. I thought he ran away with it, didn't he, Dustin Johnson? He did, But we have a delay. Maybe you're right, Yeah, because I was trying because I felt like we've had one in recent years. So, uh, yeah, we don't. We don't get it necessarily. All that off, All right, Kelly, give whatever derivative bets you want to give here and then

save some for long shots. Yeah, I'll roll through. Uh, look, can't lay top twenty. I already brought off. I'll just I'll just give I mean, I'll give him all out here. I don't really care. I think we're gonna have some different audiences. Um, can't lay Top twenty big, Tony Top twenty Big. I didn't play the outright, but I absolutely agree with what everybody's saying about fen Now. I actually think somehow he's like flying under the radar heading into

this event too. Like he look back. He's still playing well. You know, I might not be winning events every week, but he's still been playing well. So I did play him. Top twenty Maxima, Victor Hovlin, Top twenties, Big on Homa and big on Hovel. I love Hovlin this week. I think he's another guy like Tony Feenow who's had good finishes here at Augusta. His game fits pretty well for it as long as he doesn't get too much in trouble around the green. Um. I think he's a good

top twenty bet this week. I am staying away from betting out rates on him until I see him win an event, but I think he's a good top twenty play this week and then I did Keith. Mitchell's a guy I approached a little a little interestingly. He was very high up there in by Bottles, which he's been playing great, especially off the tea here this season, and

I've bet him a few different times. He's only played the Masters once, so he doesn't really have that history here, so I'm trying to tread lightly and I'm kind of just going bigger going home with him. So I played a top ten on him at seven to one, and I played him in a couple of matchups. I played him over Kirk Kiddy Yama never played here before. I

played him over Medo Pereira as well. So those two I played Keith top ten and then those two matchups I just mentioned other tournament matchups, I played Victor Hovland over Matt Fitzpatrick. Matt Fitzpatrick another guy. I don't want to say I'm necessarily fading this week buying betting on him, and I do think there are some matchup opportunities to bet against him. I don't think this is a perfect fit for his game. We've seen him struggling a little

bit more here recently. I think that's a good matchup bet MAXI hooma, I took over Cameron Yell. I think Cameron Young's it's just another number playing on maxihlma though. I think Cameron Young's a good golfer. But I'm getting plus one twenty five on a tournament matchup on Homo

over him. I gotta go with that bet. And then one you're gonna laugh at Yell, Gary Woodland minus one h two over Jatz posting I really didn't play it on having and then Tom Debutante, I don't know how he rated out for you Wes Taylor Moore, I bet I bet it over seven to one he. I was shocked actually, and how how Hiley he was rated in by models. They they've been getting support down at Circa for Taylor more because I asked about the rookies here so to speak, and they've been getting support by the

way to clean one thing up. Nineteen eighty three was the last Monday finish that was Sevey seven four shot win over Tom or Tom Kit and bryand Crenshaw. So that surprises me that long ago for a Monday finish. Yeah, um, I have I'm gonna cherry pick golfers West. What derivatives have you been debutante. Why do we never have a debutant market in any other tournament but this one? I know,

I know, because it's such a smaller feeling too. There's there's eighty eight because they don't have debutants necessarily in the US Open, because you're oftentimes getting random qualified. You have to qualify. That's yeah, yeah, so that's tough to do. But I played two in the debutante. One was Meto

Pereira at six to one. Look in the last three live events fifteen, six and fifth, he's been top seven and driving distance in all of those events, fourth, second and first for greens and regulation in those last three events. And then I did play one longer one Adrian moronk at twelve to one, just because if you look, driving distance is gonna matter, and both Meto be Adrian Moron

can absolutely bomb it off the tea. So I think that he takes better to see in this course the first time than the favorite, who is Tom Kim in the market. But Tom Kim looked a lot of things he does well, but he's not a real long hitter, right, so I think he might struggle the first time here. A couple other prop markets I played. I played a low amateur and I got it at plus one sixty five. The nineteen year old NCAA champion, Gordon's sergeant, who I made bet as a top forty two to make the cut.

I think we actually have a chance with an amateur to make the cut here. Number one world amateur in the world plays at Vanderbilt right now. So Gordon's sergeant I played also played Brian Harman plus one ninety five for top lefty and it's a four player mark left. Yes, Yes, Harmond, Phil Carmen, Phil, Bubba Watson and Mike Weir are the four left Anders in the field. Harmon, by the way, two years ago a second after thirty six holes and

then ended up finishing twelve. You know, I wouldn't consider Bubba, I wouldn't consider Weird. The only one I would consider against Harmon maybe is Phil. But then you look at Phil last week at the live of it, and he was like forty five? Is at a forty eight players? Is Mike Weir? And I apologize Canada for this, but is Mike were the most random of all Masters winners? He is? Look, he was a pretty solid player in

those early two thousands. But this is a guy that I would have thought would have won more on the Champion PGA Tour Champions. Yeah, and he hasn't. Yeah, and that's why I went ahead and ignored him in that lefty market this week. But all I've done our props and outrights right now, the players round leaders, no, not yet, the placement markets and the matchups. By the way, depending on when you listen to this, yeah, I'll have out wednesday morning. Oh yeah, and that's I'll bring it up

everywhere I bet first round leaders almost weekly. Feel free if you want to tweet at me and get and get those out, no problem, send them to you. I usually wait, though, until later on Wednesday, when I really have that weather kind of figured out. So at Kelly Bidlin, hit me up, I'll get those to him. Okay, last questions, We'll do it rapid fire on these. I'm just gonna cherry pick golfers and you're gonna give your quick thoughts

on them. One of the live golfers who has won this tournament, which we may have given I'm not even sure if it was here that we gave him a mention, or maybe it was on a numbers game. Patrick read nothing. You don't like any Patrick read here in a placement market, perhaps because he has at least shown, unlike some of the live golfers some form. Remember he was second at the Dubai Desert Classic and Rory made that put fifteen

feet birdie. Because we were all catty, those of us that were insomniacs and up in the middle of the night watching this thing on Golf Channel. We were hoping we were going to get that Rory and Patrick Reid playoff, just for the tension, because of course that Rory was served lawsuit by Patrick Reed didn't really appreciate that. So it's like, yeah, you know, I'd love to see that tension,

but Rory won. So Patrick Reid in a placement market, I think absolutely like top twenty, top thirty, but nothing for an out right I mean, he's a guy who's won here before twenty eight. I'm not going to be shocked if he did. He plays well when everybody is against him. Yes, well, yeah, you know, he tends to do that. I don't know if you coughed a note this morning. I guess he played a practice round by

himself this morning. So I think Patrick Reid's approaching this it's not just live against the world, it's me against the world, right, So he is very ligitious. So that's probably why a lot of people don't like him. That sends to do it. You know, I'm just Columbia me with all the rest of the live guys. I haven't done anything with him, but I would not be shocked to see him in the mix real quick, just a few more Bryson Deshambo, who famously a couple years ago

said I'm playing this like a par sixty seven. Obviously he is not in form. Nothing with Bryson, No, no, not at all, even though he did finish in the top half of the field last week in Orlando. But the last thing he's really been in the mix to win was the Long Drive Championship well, and he seems to be more interested in that than you know, being a great golfer. Is he still regularly doing that? I remember when he started, I didn't know if he was still doing he was in I think of his last

fall he was second in the World Long Drive Championship. Yeah, he's a guy gil I haven't I didn't even consider um, and I think the sports books are pricing him absolutely correct, Like there's one twenty five to one. Yeah, even spots where I would try to look to play against him in matchups, but it's like he's he's playing another fellow bum I'm bringing I'm bringing him up only because of the long distance in the weather and just because he needs to be mentioned a couple more. John Rum we

have not mentioned once. I know he kind of seems to be of the three favorites, the one that's coldest on the board between Like you could totally argue for Scottie Scheffler, you could really really make the argument for Rory, and I think he still can for Rom. But about Ram, he has good finishes here, but he's never really been

quite there in the mix. It's always been kind of like a battle of attrition where he's out a few groups ahead, or he contends early and then all of a sudden, you know, he shoots like a sixty seven on Sunday and it looks like he's right there where he was right in the mix to win, and he has dipped a little bit from his form. Because we talked about this in January February. It's like this guy's gonna win like ten events. Yeah, but he has just dipped a little bit, and I just think that that

that's what it is right now. So I'm not going to discount as chances at all. He's got a huge chance highest finish here fourth the year that Patrick Reid won in twenty eighteen. Yeah, I still think he is. I still think he's the best golfer in the world, with the best, most well rounded game going. Right now, I'm a I'm just a little I'm a little hesitant, and look, those three guys long at the top where they're at. He still is a part of those big three.

But when you're really picking, you know, we talked about already betting on one of them and then including other outrights, it's not like you can pick two put two of those guys, right, So he is. If I had a rate those three this week, he is probably third. Yeah, But I think there's like West, Maybe he'll disagree with me, but I think there he's another guy that's I don't think he's flying under the radar, because I don't think John rob Ever flies under the radar. Like I said

about Tony Feenou. I think he's being a little bit disrespected in the marketplace because Okay, what's he really done? He finished thirty ninth of the API, and then he had the w D from the players. Right, that's one reason I think why, But it was it was a stomach bucker something. Right. Well, so it's not like it's an injury. It's okay, he hit the can too many times.

I didn't want to play golf anymore. The can they can. Yeah, three wins and nine starts, by the way this year, and it does kind of feel like we're, you know, kind of like pushing himself side a little. So he withdraws from the players and then okay, he doesn't make it out of his grouping match play, but match plays a it's funky and it's it's not an easy environment. So I thought long and hard about that last night, Gil where I I just think the market isn't respecting

him as much as they should right now. But I'm going to be looking at Scheffler when we're talking about those short shots, all right. And then lastly, last person, because I'm contractually obligated and he appears on the screen in front of us. You brought him up early, Eldrick, Tiger Woods, any anything ever. It is the Masters after all, right, and look, you know, I was asked about this. I was doing an interview with that Nashville radio station yesterday

and they asked about Tiger. I said, I'm not going to bet it, but if you're asking me if he's gonna make the cut, yeah, he's gonna make the cut. He's made twenty three to twenty four. However, he's forty seven years old, and that just I don't know why that should have been obvious to me because we've been following him for over two decades, but it just kind of hits you. He's forty six seven like like that.

That's amazing to me. And you know, just looking, I was looking to say, Okay, who is his who are his matchups? He's matched up? I think in a lot of the markets with Sergio Garcian it's basically like a coin flip on the price. I think. Actually they had him against Bryson Deshambo down at CERCA as well. So I'm probably not gonna have hardly any Tiger this week. I may have him in a matchup maybe like a

top forty. I'm not gonna bet him to make the cut because he's almost two dollars yeah, yep, And that's a lot, and this weather can get funky and he could start hurting. And he's played one event this year. Granted he looked very good at Riviera. But I'm probably gonna avoid him all together. I will. I will say, no, you have to, of course you have to. And this is look I like these kind of terms where I'm probably not gonna have much action on him. So if he's in the mix at the end and I don't

have anybody there, I'll be rooting hard for Tiger. Makes a sport better, there's no doubt about that. I agree with what West just said. I mean, we would have never thought he was gonna do what he did in twenty nineteen, and he went went out and won the whole damp. His fifth Green jacket is fifteen. Itch is amazing, and he's dealing with all this injury stuff. We were all impressed with what he did at Riviera. Um, I can't bet the make miss price. I think that's price

pretty accurately here. If anything, I would lean to him making the cut or that was a big deal last year. Yes, Um, I would lean towards him making the cut, but I'm not laying I think it's one sixty five. I'm looking at DraftKings. Yeah, one sixty five, that's even too high

for me. Lower. Yeah, I'm not laying that. What I will do though, if he makes the cut, it's gonna probably be targeted against him in round three, round four and matchups, because that's when I'm gonna be concerned about, you know, all the injuries and surgeries he's had, Is that body gonna hold up for four straight days of all these all the time on the range, all the time on the course, and as West pointed out, this is another course where it's it's it's a little deceiving,

the elevation changes, and this is a lot of a lot of walking for him over a long, tough course. I think round three, round four is gonna be the time to bet against him in matchups. Yeah, if he's lurking after a couple of rounds, though, I would I would love to like put a microphone in all he really and I gonna bet against Yeah? Yeah, well Tiger, would you have to ask about him? West did this

whole podcast while wearing a green jacket. It should be pointed out, would you like to say jokingly that it was what year that you won the Masters nineteen eighty seven, because that's the year after Jack and no one remembers who Larry Miys, right, I, I you know, I think it was actually Larry mikes who, by the way, he is going to be playing his last Masters this year,

Larry Miys, I believe he and Sandy lysle are retiring. Yeah, it was Larry Miys who broke Greg Norman's heart, which never breaks my heart, which never when Greg Norman gets his heart. Yeah, man, he wanted a playoff against uh Sevy and Norman. Jeez. Oh, I was one of the iconic Masters finishes ever man. Yes from the bunker, right, yes, yeah, from the bunker Larry Mice All right, thank you guys.

I appreciate it. Let's get you ready for your show which is coming up in less than an hour Long Shots, which Kelly and West Kelly Bidlin, West Reynolds they are doing Live with Matt Brown live on Vison at eleven am Pacific two pm Eastern here on a Tuesday, but that will be put on their podcast feed at long Shots available where all podcasts are distributed. Thank you, boys, Thank you, appreciate you. Enjoy good luck with all your Master's bets. Thanks for listening,