Hello everyone, and welcome to the Betting Pros PGA Podcast. I'm Pat Fitzmorris. I'm joined by mister bau mcbrair and this is a brand new show where we are going to be going through each tournament from a betting perspective throughout the PGA Tour season in twenty twenty four, and that season kicks off this week with the Century the season opening tournaments. Well, I guess there's a soft opening to the season in the fall, but we know this
is the real start of the PGA Tour season. So yeah, we're going to be bringing you the betting perspective, our takes who we like, and we're also going to throw in a one and done pick at the end of each show for those of you who are in one and done pools. So bo, it's always good to see you, my friend. Happy New Year to you and your family. Juveny golf related resolutions for New Years.
I would love to play for golf, Pat.
Just play more Golf's that's the gist of it.
Yeah, it's I don't think I think it's been at least six months since I even picked up a stick, So I got any better than that?
Yeah, definitely mine is a volume of golf has not been that big a problem. I live right next to a golf course and I'm out there a lot, but I do need to approve the game around the green, the chipping, the short pitches, the bunker play. It just has been kind of atrocious. Well it's actually gone from like I was the worst chipper in the world to now I'm just merely bad. But I could take it up yet another notch. I'm also in this one and done pool, like the most elaborate one and done pool.
It's just me and a friend head to head, except we have to pick two golfers every week and try to saddle the other guy with the worst golfer in the field and add that to his stroke score for each thing. But it's like we do it match play, and he's beat me three straight years. So it is
a resolution to finally beat him, Frenzy. If you want a chance to win a free one year premium Betting Pros subscription, you need to subscribe to the Betting Pros YouTube channel right now, comment below on this video and that's it. We will be announcing a winner right here on the channel, so make sure to turn on those notifications so you can be alerted when new episodes are up and to claim your prize. All right, let's get
to it bo. The PGA season kicking off this week with the Century formerly known as the Century Tournament Tournament of Champions. As always, this event will be played at the Plantation Course at Kapalua, located on the island of Maui in Hawaii. The format has changed. It used to be that only the players who had won a tournament in the previous calendar year were the only ones who could get in. Now it's winners in the previous calendar year plus anyone who finished inside the top fifty in
the FedEx Cup standings from their previous year. So, yeah, this is the latest instance where the PGA Tour is trying to get us to care about the FedEx Cup standings. We really don't. I don't know if that's ever going to change, but yeah, so that that does affect qualifying for this They're going to be fifty nine players in this week's field, and as always, there's no cut in this event, so everyone is going to play four rounds
at Kapalua. As for the venue, the Plantation Course, like nothing else on tour, massive fairways, huge expanse of greens. I believe this is the only par seventy three course on tour and at just a smidge under seventy six hundred yards. It's a long course, but a lot of the longest holes played downhill, including the par five eighteenth, which is a joy to watch, one of my favorite holes tour. No danger to the right of hall and
out of bounds to the left. So love watching guys hit those big sweeping draws with their second shots with you know, long irons or fairway woods, fairway metals.
In the fifty yards of rollout.
Yes, yes, absolutely, it's it's just a great haul. Bermuda greens at Capeluo tend to be on the slow side, so players can be aggressive with Birdie Potts, and it's Hawaii, so there's going to be win. The only question is whether it's breeze or a gale, And if it's a breeze only scores are going to be low the winning scores the last three years for this tournament minus twenty seven,
minus thirty four and minus twenty five. But if the players do get strong wins this week, as we saw back in twenty twenty scores are going to reflect it. Justin Thomas won the winds Swept twenty twenty installation of this tournament with the score of minus fourteen. So what are some of the keys to playing Kapalua well? Helps to be a big hitter because playing the par fives and getting your playing the power fives well and getting
your pro shots close are critical. And because of the ultra wide fairways, the bombers have a bigger margin for error with their drives, so hitting approach shots close as
I mentioned, so iron play is big less important. Scrambling players are just hitting these massive greens at such a high rate that it doesn't really the importance of things like chipping in bunker play is kind of muted at the century, So bo any thoughts you might have on the course and its effect on which players you're going to be buying into this week, Well.
It comes down to the bombers typically don't necessarily make this tournament. We've seen despite all these adjustments the PGA Tours made to penalize people who are bomb and gouge type players, we don't see as many of these players qualify for this tournament, let alone dominate this tournament like John Ram won two years in a row. He's not in this field. He's a long hitter, but he's not among the longest hitters. He's just has good distance. He's
a power player, but his strength is on approach. And you have guys like Justin Thomas who won this when it was really windy. He's not in this field either. It's Cam Smith who won a twenty seven hunder two three years ago, not in this field. So the Live Tour and its presence has definitely taken effect on this tournament because, of course, a lot of the champions from previous years are somewhere else. They're playing golf on other parts of the world, and for me, it's gonna come
down to making birdies and avoiding three putt bogies. When it comes down to that, you're gonna have lots of opportunities to score here, especially if the wins are calm. From what I can tell, the forecast is pretty iffy. It looks pretty blustery and rainy coming up Thursday through Sunday so far is what they're calling for. So I think that it's gonna come down to who makes the most birdie putts and it's gonna be the equalizer among all these guys are gonna be hitting to the same areas.
A lot of these shorter hitters aren't gonna be dominating as much as your top golfers that are long enough. It's not gonna take a bomber to win this tournament. It's just gonna take being long enough to put yourself in position to make birdie putts, make eagle putts. So with all these par fives, there's only three par fours or sorry, three part three's on this course, which is why it's a par seventy three birdie birdie or better
percentage par four scoring, par five scoring. It's gonna be approach and putting For me, it's that's gonna be where the money is made in this tournament of fifty I'm golfers s, which is the most they've ever had because of that new caveat.
Yeah, normally it's right around thirty. And so even with this bigger field, we are not going to see either of the last two champions you just alluded to it bo the big Spaniard John Rahm joining the Live Tour
taking the Live money. Two years ago, Cam Smith won this tournament also on the live tour, so bo, I don't know how much longer we're going to have this bifurcation at the highest levels of professional golf, with some of the best players in the world taking huge sums of money to go and play live on a tour that gets a fraction of the attention and the TV
ratings that the PGA Tour gets. You know, the PGA Tour Live tour dynamic reminds me a lot of the dynamic between the NFL and the old USFL from the nineteen eighties. I'm an old Coger, so I can remember the USFL and remember watching some of those games. It was an interesting novelty at first, but eventually I stopped caring about the USFL when I was a kid and
only watched the NFL. But the USFL did manage to have some of the best football players in the planet on the planet in their league at the time, Reggie White, Steve Young, Jim Kelly, herschel Walker. The difference is that the USFL owners eventually realized the league was never going to be a moneymaker for them, But the Saudi money that bankrolls the live tour probably isn't going to dry up anytime soon. So I don't know bo any any salient takes on the situation with LIV and the PGA tour.
I think long term, the health of professional golf is fine. This investment by the Saudi Public Investment Fund.
It's alarming.
In the short term, we're seeing a lot of We're seeing a lot of concern with the people worried about the health of the sport as a professional. But if you just follow the dollar signs, both sides of this argument care about the game of golf. The Saudi Public Investment Fund is an investment fund. They weren't going to invest in something they didn't feel like they could get a return on in the in the short to the
semi short to long term. So whether whatever deal happens down the road, I think it's just going to be a means to an end. Right now, it's all up in the air in Limbo. But I think after a couple of years of this, we're going to start to see more serious talks of merging, kind of like what you said with the USFL. I'll go back even farther to the AFL, where the AFL and the NFL were
co existing entities. And they eventually merged, and right now the merger looks dicey at best because of antitrust lawsuits and all that that have a lot of merit.
But at the end of the.
Day, these guys are all free agents. They're all independent contractors. They can play where they want to play. They can get paid by whoever wants to pay them. When you reach the pinnacle of a sport like golf, where the level of talent between a PGA Tour professional and your club pro is astronomically, it's a chasm of talent. We're talking about, just a huge gap to leap to get
to where Jen ram is. So take your money, man, It's short term and in three years when everybody's going to joke about, hey, remember when the Live Tour sniped all these top golfers for hundreds of millions of dollars, And we're back under one umbrella. Whether it's called the PGA Tour or whatever, it's still.
Going to be the same. We're still going to tune in to the players we like.
I still like Jen Ram. I might even tune into a little bit more Live because of him being on that tour. Cam Smith did that for me so I just I just love watching golf. And if you love watching golf and you have your favorite golfers out there, don't hesitate to support them and whatever they do. It's not it's not the end of the world to like something that maybe you should have some second thoughts about.
I don't know, Yeah, no, I know. I mean, I guess my biggest hang up with this and not having these guys on the PGA Tour, Like I'm gonna miss seeing these guys play some of my favorite courses and some of my favorite venues, you know, like seeing not seeing John Rahm play Riviera. It's gonna hurt my heart a little bit this year. So all right, but let's let's get down to brass TCKs and talk about player
odds for the century. Scottie Scheffler opens as the betting favorite at plus five point fifty to win on DraftKings. Victor Hovland plus eight fifty, Max Homa and Colin Morikawa are both plus twelve hundred, and Xander Schoffley, Patrick Cantley, and Ludvig Aberg are all at plus fourteen hundred. All right, bo I know you're a big Scottie Scheffler guy. He is a phenomenal tee degreen player, which would seemingly make
him a great fit for this course. He finished seventh year last year, and the only other start at Kapalua he has had resulted in a thirteenth place finish in twenty twenty one. Is he worth backing at plus five point fifty.
No, I wouldn't say so, just because of what I said earlier. I'm putting a little bit more weight behind a birdier better percentage, and that's really where he lagged last year. That was what his poor putting brought us. Is we're talking about probably the top five ball striking
season in the history of golf. But when you come down to it, he's dead last in this field, er bottom five in this field and putting and that cost him a lot of birdies that cost him a lot of money, a lot of wins last season, and in a field this strong, I don't love him. At eleven to two, that seems really steep for a guy who doesn't measure up well with the Victor Holin's of the world, who put much better with similar to not quite as good ball striking, but still world class, and even even
Hovelin's odds give me pause. So at eleven to two or plus five fifty, however you want to say it, I think Scotty Scheffler is is a no go unless you just absolutely believe that he's gonna pull himself back together with the flat stick and pay off with a large bet.
Yeah, I'm with you, bo. I mean, supposedly Scotty has worked on the putting a lot in the you know, yeah, I know, man, like, you don't want to let ball striking like that go to waste. And you know, apparently in some of the fall events he was putting a little bit better. But yeah, he's he's got a ways to go if he wants to, you know, become as world class a putter as he is a ball striker.
Or what about Hoveland, bo, Like, he was just phenomenal last summer, going completely nuclear in the playoff back in August. I mean, I can't remember many instances where I've seen someone as hot as Victor Hoveland was like during late July and August. But he's played this event three other times, finishing thirty, first, thirtieth, and eighteenth. So not many signs of life at the Plantation course, any interest in Victor Hoveland at plus eight point fifty.
No, I really I was not impressed with his a few appearances after the playoff where you could tell he was kind of still languishing in that post victory hangover. I mean, if you win fifteen million dollars, I guess it's pretty natural for that to hecur I just think that he's going to take a little bit longer to
get into the swing of competitive golf. That's a big difference here is a lot of these guys like Rory McElroy not being in this field just simply because he doesn't he's not quite mentally prepared to start his season.
And I love Hobland.
He won me a ton of money last year writing him through the playoffs made me so much money betting him.
It was exciting for everyone involved.
But this is not the tournament where I'm going to be betting him less than ten to one odds. It's just not worth it, especially with how good this field is. This is one of the deepest invitational fields you're going to find on the PGA Tour, and the course is specially built for neutralizing the advantages of Victor. Hoblind has on difficult courses. Victor Hobland is the guy you want to bet at plus eight fifty at Augusta National or at Riviera, where like you're going to see guys grinding
to make pars. When we saw him in the playoff, the conditions were brutal, and he made it look easy. When the conditions are easy, it's easy for everyone. I don't love Victor Hovlind at those odds when everybody's dealing with a pretty pretty decent chance to go twenty five to thirty under par.
Yeah, some really good points. I'm with you. I'm not that interested in betting the Norwegian in Hawaii here. So what about some of the other guys. What about some of the other guys with shorter odds, the aforementioned Max Homa, Colin Morikawa, Xander Schoffley, Patrick Cantlay, Ludwig aberg all either plus twelve hundred or plus fourteen hundred. Does anyone in that group?
Interesting?
Yeah? I love Patrick Cantlay at twelve to one. That this this field is built for Patrick Cantlay to just fly under the radar. He's a great ball striker, he's even better at making birdie putts. And that's that's what I can see him minimizing mistakes. You're not going to see Patrick Cantlay three put mini birdie opportunity and turned birdies into bogies. He's not going to be grinding for pars when everybody else is.
This is for me.
Can't Lay and Morikawa are my two favorites here for the simple fact that Maricawa's ball striking combined with how hot he looked the last time we saw him, and Patrick Can'tley is just he's as good as it gets. He's consistent every single time we see him play. When he doesn't win, he's always right there to have a chance to win. So those two guys at the top of the board for me, with a little bit of preference to Patrick Can'tley and.
He concerns it all that can't Lay. I don't think he played in any of the fall events right just got married. Has he done much at all since the Ryder cop and do you care?
I don't care in the slightest. The fall season's kind of a joke anyway. The courses are so easy, the fields are so easy, So.
Yeah, I call him.
Marikawa won his last appearance going away, but he was the class of that field from the beginning, and we obviously cashed in there because it's so obvious. But can't Lay taking the time off. He's the type of guy you could just picture rolling out of bed, not even doing his hairy just brush his teeth real quick, hit the first tea with no warm up, and shoot a
sixty five. And so I have no qualms about playing and putting money behind Patrick Can'tley because he's not the type of guy that needs a lot of lead up.
Yeah, you are getting me interested in can't Ley. I really like the other guy at plus twelve hundred, Marikawa, just because he is, I mean, like such an elite ball striker, maybe the best Irons player in the game, and the history on this course, like he loves this course, seventh, seventh, fifth, and second. He's basically done everything but win here. So yeah, scoring average on this course is sixty eight point one,
second best over the last five years. I really like him. Yeah, before we get to some of the guys with slightly longer odds, I would encourage all of you out there to download the Betting pros app for iOS and Android, sink your sports books in less than a minute to automatically track your bets across all sportsbooks in one spot. After sinking, you will enjoy access to detailed bet analytics, buy sports and bet type, including game picks, props, and parlays.
You'll also get insights and personalized recommendations for props, game picks, and more. Taylor Geer interests. To enjoy the benefits of sportsbooks Sync, download the Betting prosapp by visiting Bettingpros dot com, slash apps or search Betting Pros in the app store. All right, bo, guys in the plus twenty two hundred two plus thirty five hundred range, there's some interesting names here.
Jordan Speith, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Tony Fenow, Tommy Fleetwood, Sung JM, Ricky Fowler, anyone you like in this range.
So I was hoping to see Ludwig Obeg in this group, but he's a shorter odds. I think he's he's trending at fourteen hundred right this very moment, but that's down from twelve. Tommy Fleetwood is the guy that I'm really honing in on because of his ability to just put together a crazy low round, especially if the winds freshen up a bit there, Like if we get that Thursday through Sunday trade winds blowing something fifteen to twenty mile an hour constant, which it's very liable to do in Maui.
It's we're talking to it's an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
There.
It's at the mercy of pretty much every squall that could blow through there, especially right now where all the there's a lot of weather patterns setting up in the Pacific, and we're probably gonna get some weather here. Tommy Fleetwood and weather on a course that's gonna kind of neutralize distance. I really like how he lines up, both in my
statistical model and just fitting the course. So where I don't like the odds on Obert, even though he's one of my favorite golfers coming up this season, I'm going to predict him to win a lot of tournaments.
He's just too short for this field.
Tommy Fleewood, A twenty eight to one is fantastic odds for how well I think he matches up here.
Yeah, oh Berg. The other thing, like first timers not traditionally strong track records at this turn whatever reason.
It's kind of strange, but it lines up where first timers here just don't compete for the title.
Yeah, it just seems like you need to get your get the lay of the land at this place. It's definitely a different kind of golf, and like it seems like you have to adapt to it a little bit. What about some of the long shots bore anyone you fancy?
Further down the list, there's a couple that I'll be laying smaller bets on you get down to forty five to one. Wyndham Clark seems to match up well with this place because he's a long hitter with kind of sketchy accuracy off the tee, which is kind of It's okay, it's fine by everybody here because the fairways are eighty yards wide in some spots the greens are gigantic. So Wyndom Clark is a world class putter. He's top five in the world putting, and with his distance and not
having to worry about missing fairways here too much. I like his upside at forty five to one, and then going down another great putter with decent off the tee metrics that I can see winning here, Danny McCarthy at sixty to one. Those that's about as deep as I'll go here because of how strong the top of this field is.
And I think McCarthy had a couple of top tens in the fall events. I know, you know, we like you. I don't put a lot into the fall events ball, but it's not bad to get a guy like that who is kind of in good form coming into this. And man Wyndham Clark, now you're now you're intriguing me with a big hitter who can put it well and like he has some pedigree to him, going to get him at forty five to one, that that does seem like a pretty intriguing value. So yeah, kind of, So what's a.
Lot of people compared to this, to to the elevation, changes in the distance, compare this place to Augusta National, obviously with lower stakes at hand. I kind of like the comparison to the PGA Tours or the PGA Championship Course last year where we saw we saw Window win, we saw Kurt Kitty Yama one at finished fourth in
that where he's he's my deep shot. I'm gonna throw a couple of bucks on Kirkittyam at one hundred and thirty to one, just because he's a bomber suspect accuracy off the tea again, but one of the best long iron players in the world. And it just so happens that they're going to seventy six hundred yards to traverse. You're going to see some long iron approaches on a lot of holes. And I just like that archetype of player here, where get a hot putter. Just get a
hot putter, and that you can win this tournament. John Ram not necessarily known for his putting, but you could tell when he got here he got real comfortable in a hurry.
And it doesn't hurt that Kirk Kidiama is a fellow Northern California guy.
Bo.
I mean, my bias always shows when I pick him, but I don't pick him as often as you would think. I picked him three times last year, and one was at bay Hill when he won at two hundred and fifty to one. He finished fourth at the PGA when I picked him to I picked through a couple dollars on him to win, and I ended up double dipping at top five and top ten picks there. And then I picked him in another tournament where he lined up well like that, but he missed the cut.
So you don't.
Always go after these guys, even if they're from the same home town. I love rooting for him. This is the kind of place where, I mean the first time are you're not expecting to make any noise. But his odds are cheap enough for you. You can just say, hey, let's root for him. With a little like five bucks on the line. Who cares if he wins, you get more than a thousand dollars payoff. I just love doing those little those little dime drops in there, just to just have some extra rooting interest.
So what is on your betting card right now? The odds have been up for less than twenty four hours. I believe on draftings. But what have you jumped on right away?
Subject to change? But I have can't lay at twelve to one. I have half a unit bet on Xander Shopley at fourteen to one, but I'm gonna bet heavier on his top five I think he's a top five lock. And then Tommy Fleetwood at twenty eight to one. Then I'm gonna throw some Wyndham Clark.
And of course my guy Kirk Kitty.
I'm one hundred and thirty to one is a quarter unit bet for me is five bucks.
Yeah, I think I'm going to piggyback you with a little Wyndham Clark wager here.
It's a fun one because you love Bruton for the guy. He's one of the best people out there.
Yeah, good dude, And like you said, I mean the game seems to suit this course pretty well. I am betting Colin Morikawa plus twelve hundred not only to win, but also to finish top five at plus twe plus two to eighty, so you know again the force Yeah four starts seven seventh, wait, seven, seven, five and two, and just the elite ball striking just fits this course so well. You know, I'm not sure the wind is
a great thing for him. If it's you know, I've if I'm terrified by the weather report, I might pull back a little bit, But as of now, I think I've got half a unit down on him. Jordan Speith, I like it plus twenty two hundred bow the wide fairways helping one here he's won here, and the wide fairways helping the gate. The biggest achilles heel in his game the arrantee shots, which can come out at any time. Although I'm not sure if.
Steith is going to be like on a cliff side.
On one of these shots.
He was like, let's tune in with Jordan Speith. Here is on the flip side, hanging on.
For dear life.
I was gonna say, I'm not sure even the Cappelloua fairways are wide enough for Jordan Speed to stay on them all the time. Sung jm intrigues me at plus three thousand em has played this event three times, finishing fifth, eighth, and thirteenth, and since twenty eighteen, no player has a better scoring average at Capelua than Sung Jim with his sixty seven point seven stroke average and then one weird little bet I kind of like Shamous Power at plus
ten to one to finish top ten. Power has finished fifteenth and twenty fifth in his two other appearances at Kapalua, but with a really respectable scoring average of sixty eight point six. I feel like ten to one is a pretty good price for a top ten, so I'm gonna throw a lot, well half a unit down.
It's a little irishman bias going into that too.
Maybe maybe, Hey, you've got Kurt Kittyama, I've got Seamus Power. What are you gonna do? And you know, like for those of you out there who like parlays and props, just gonna throw a couple out there. I have not played any of these, but I'm intrigued by a top five parlay with Scotti, Scheffler and Colin Morikawa at plus eight hundred, so you need both of those guys to finish top five. And another one I'm considering is a
triple chance parlay where you get three guys. One of the three has to win with Scheffler, Morikawa and your guy can't lay. That one is plus four point fifty, so you get any of the three at plus four fifty. That's pretty juicy.
That's right set of odds right there.
Yeah, not too bad, all right, Baul? How about a one and done pick for the people out there in one and done pool. So we're gonna keep track of these. We're not gonna repeat guys, use them and lose them. But who do you like in a one and done this week?
Oh?
I think I'll stick with Can'tley. That's because I think that as far as this course is concerned, he's gonna have other opportunities to be a repeat guy. But again, he's so consistent that I don't mind burning him early. It's not you're not gonna regret him coming because it's not like you have like, oh, I'm gonna wait for Detroit for to play Tony Fenow because that's smart thing to do.
Is what you want to do in a one and done is kind of line.
Up which golfers you'd like to play at every single tournament. Just line up all the thirty six or whatever tournaments and put a group of guys next to that event. Patrick Cantley is not a guy that she's specifically pigeonhole into a specific event. So I don't mind burning him right off the bat, because I know he's going to be consistent. I'm not going to be yearning for him later in the season.
Yeah. With me, I've got a guy who does play certain events pretty well, Ricky Fowler. I'm gonna go with this week, and he's he's always good in Phoenix, He's always good. Oh man, what's the course in Charlotte. I'm blanking on the name right now. Quail Hollow. He's going to a really good Quail Hollow player. But you know, I want to take Fowler because we have seen him come completely off the rails before for a long stretch
of his career. I want to get him early while he's playing well, while he is still in really good form. And oh, by the way, his last three finishes in this event fifth, fourth, fifth, so he's traditionally fared well. And the Strokes gained metrics at at Kapaalua. So and I'm gonna grab him bow before things go haywire with his game. So all right, yeah, So Patrick cantleigh for Bau McBrayer and Ricky Foller for Pat Fitzmorris. So that is going to do it for this installment of the
Betting Pros PGA podcast. We will be back next week to go over the Sony Open, as the tour stays in Hawaii for one more week. And good luck to all of you this week. Enjoy those of you like me who are in the extreme upper Midwest, enjoy watching guys play golf in short sleeves this week, because you know it'll be us soon enough, in like five months. So thanks again everyone, so long. We'll see you next week.
Thanks for listening to the Betting Pros Podcast. If you love the show, the best freeway to support us is by leaving a positive review. On Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Follow us on x and TikTok at Betting Pros and Instagram at betting Pros NFL.
Also subscribe to our
YouTube channel at YouTube dot com slash Betting Pros