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Welcome back RotoBallers! While most people were watching the Patriots hold off the Jaguars and the Eagles throttle the Vikings, Jon Rahm was duking it out with Andrew Landry. The young Spaniard eventually overcame the journeyman winning on the fourth playoff hole to capture his second PGA Tour event. Now, he looks to defend his title at the Farmers Insurance this week.
In this article, I will be providing you with my Farmers Insurance Open PGA DFS lineup picks for DraftKings. My goal as always is to help put together your optimal daily fantasy golf lineups. If anyone has lineup questions before the start of the tournament Thursday morning, feel free to contact me via Twitter @Seth_Fink.
Editor's Note: Our friends at Fantasy National have built some incredible DFS Golf lineup tools including a Lineup Optimizer, Stat Engine, Ownership Projections and Course Breakdowns. They are by far the best daily fantasy Golf tools in the industry. Seriously. You can read all about them here and see screenshots.
Farmers Insurance Open
The PGA Tour heads down the coast to beautiful La Jolla, San Diego, CA, to compete at Torrey Pines. The big storyline will be Tiger Woods's return to golf. It is so exciting just to see Tiger back on a golf course, but please do NOT pick him in your lineups. I will be fading him in all of my lineups. We'll all be rooting for him, but his ceiling is a 20th-place finish.
As for the course, the tournament will be played on both the North and South courses. Players will get a round on both the North and South courses on Thursday and Friday, and then the weekend will be played exclusively on the South. Both are Par 72's with small greens. The North Course has historically been easier, but last year the difficulty was raised.
The South is the course that has hosted U.S. Open's and is therefore immensely difficult. It's a mammoth of a course with a length of over 7,600 yards. Hitting the green in regulation, scrambling, and driving accuracy will all be extremely difficult on the South Course. Players who tee off Thursday on the North Course will get off to the better start and build more confidence for the second round.
While researching I discovered some interesting factoids, thanks to the Fantasy National. Over the past five years, the top-5 finishers in strokes-gained total have finished in the top-5 of the leaderboard 20 of 25 times, and the top-20, 23 of 25 times. I know, there's a lot of five's in there.
My custom stat model will be focusing on good drives, SG:P, SG:Tot, scrambling, and driving distance. You need to be accurate on this course and if you aren't you better be able to scramble to save par. Using my custom stat model with 25% weighted toward good drives, SG:P, 20% towards both birdies or better and SG:Tot. I even threw 10% towards driving distance due to the fact we've seen Rahm, Jason Day, Tiger Woods, and Bubba Watson, all long hitters, win here in the past seven years. These stats account for the last 24 rounds at Torrey Pines and all courses. After the results, I keyed on the following players.
Fantasy Golf Lineup Picks for DraftKings (PGA DFS)
High-Priced Players
There are four players this week priced above $10,000; Jon Rahm, ($11,800), Rickie Fowler ($11,400), Hideki Matsuyama ($10,800), and Justin Rose ($10,600). Tiger Woods isn't above $10,000, he's at $9,700) and I understand he's won a U.S. Open here and seven Famers, but this price is extraordinarily high. I hope he is the highest-owned player because I don't expect him to make the cut. But I hope I'm wrong.
Jon Rahm has to be in your lineup. He's not only the defending champion, but also off a win and runner-up at the Tournament of Champions. He can pound the ball, but he'll need to keep it consistent and stay out of his own head.
I also like Rickie Fowler in this spot, despite missing the cuts the past two years here. His best finish was sixth in 2013. If he's low-owned he'll provide great value, but if he's highly owned, like projected, then he doesn't offer value and I'd just put him in one lineup.
Middle-Priced Players
Jason Day ($9,400) - Day is my favorite player in this tournament. He's off a down year, after he had a spectacular 2016. This will be his first event of 2018 and returns to a place he's had success and failure. He's played in the past five tournaments here; ninth in 2013, runner-up, winner, and then missed cut the past two years. I really hope he isn't highly-owned because this price is too good to pass up. This may be his lowest-price all season.
Brandt Snedeker ($9,000) - He missed the cut at the CareerBuilder last week, but returns to a course he loves to play at. He's won here in 2012 and 2016, was runner-up in 2013, 19th in 2015, ninth last year, and missed the cut in 2014. He is inarguably one of the best putters on tour and these Poa Annua greens will suit him well, "I love poa annua so I think I have an advantage on poa annua because, for whatever reason... To love poa, you’ve got to love days like today where you hit good putts and they don’t go in and that’s just part of it."
Shane lowry ($8,800) - This will be his first event of the year and first time ever competing at the Farmers. My stat model likes him a lot.
Tony Finau ($8,700) - He had a nice showing a two weeks ago at the Sony Open shooting three rounds in the 60's finishing T-32. This is a player that can just pound the ball. This course is perfect for him and each year he's improved upon his previous finish; 24th in 2015, 18th in 2016, and fourth last year.
Patrick Reed ($8,400) - Hopefully his ownership is down after missing the cut last week. 2013 was his only time playing here and he finished 39th.
Charles Howell III ($8,300) - He has the most SG:T over the past five years including three top-10's. Two weeks ago he was T-32 at the Sony Open and last week placed 20th.
Xander Schauffele ($8,100) - One of my favorite young players on tour plays his hometown course (he was born in La Jolla). He was so so good last year and kicked off his 2018 with a 32nd at the Sony Open. He's missed the cut the past two years here, but that trend will end this week.
Alex Noren ($7,800) - This will be his first tournament of 2018 and there are zero stats to show for, but I'll follow CBS Sports's projection model.
Brendan Steele ($7,800) - He had a nice T-20 finish last week with three rounds in the 60's. He missed the cut here in 2012, but made it the last five years never finishing higher than 20th or than 49th. He's a reliable play that you shouldn't expect much of. However, he does like playing here and loves the greens, "I grew up on this kind of surface, so for me it’s really comfortable."
Jhonattan Vegas ($7,700) - He finished T-11 last week and T-7 at the Tournament of Champions three weeks ago. He's made his past five of six cuts here with two top-20's.
Jimmy Walker ($7,600) - He's missed his past five cuts dating back to 2017 (that includes the CareerBuilder and Sony the past two weeks). And that means he'll have extremely low-ownership. Walker is extremely hit-or-miss here the past six years with two missed cuts, 2017 and 2014, and four top-10's.
J.J. Spain ($7,500) - Despite being cut last week, my stat model loves him. He did finish ninth here last year.
Kyle Stanley ($7,400) - He kicked off the year with a 30th place finish at the Tournament of Champions and last week was T-10, and would have been better if not for a final round 71. Stanley was runner-up here in 2012, missed the cut the next two years, then was 67th, 25th, and 14th last year.
J.B. Holmes ($7,400) - This will be Holmes's first tournament of 2018. He's missed the cut here in 2012 and 2013, was 23rd in 2014, then runner-up, sixth, and 33rd last year.
Aaron Baddeley ($7,300) - I really can't believe I'm making him one of my picks, but his stats are pretty good. Over the past six years, he's had two missed cuts, and two top-10's.
Richy Werenski ($7,300) - I honestly had never heard of this guy before plugging my stat model in and seeing him ranked 17th. He missed the cut two weeks ago, but was T-29 last week. I can't imagine being more than 3% owned.
Low-Priced Players
Charley Hoffman ($7,200) - Don't you just have to take the hometown guy who's played on these types of courses his entire life? This will be his first event of 2018 and it's just the perfect spot. His price is nice considering he's only missed one cut the past six years. However, his highest finish was seventh in 2014.
Lucas Glover ($7,100) - Who remembers when Glover won the U.S. Open in 2009? I sure don't. Well, he hasn't been so relevant since. He was T-29 last week. At the Farmers over the past five years, he's missed two cuts with his three other finishes, 24th, 29th, and 33rd last year.
Stewart Cink ($6,800) - He's steadily improved in 2018 after a T-32 two weeks ago and a T-20 last week. In the past six years, he's had three missed cuts and his highest finish was 20th.
K.J. Choi ($6,800) - He missed the cut at the Sony Open two weeks ago, but has had great success at the Farmers with two runner-ups in 2014 and 2016.
Best of luck RotoBallers!
Custom Stat Model - DFS Golf Advanced Tools
Here are the players I wrote about and their correlating stats with my custom stat model.
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