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Welcome back to my PGA DFS lineup picks for the Butterfield Bermuda Championship on DraftKings! Many golfers barely miss out on being mentioned here by a fraction of a percent, so if you have any questions about a particular player from a PGA DFS or PGA betting perspective, you can contact me on Twitter @Teeoffsports.
Once you are done reading the article, please check out my weekly spreadsheet in the link below to get started on your research. There you will be able to weigh the categories however you see fit once you make a copy.
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PGA DFS Rankings Wizard - Butterfield Bermuda Championship
We have a special treat for all you RotoBallers and golf enthusiasts. In addition to this article, be sure to also check out Spencer's PGA DFS Rankings Wizard - a powerful and interactive data spreadsheet that allows user inputs to create custom rankings and models for golf. If you want to create your own spreadsheet, you will need to make a copy under "file." We hope you enjoy!
Port Royal Golf Course
6,828 Yards - Par 71 - Greens: Bermuda
Ranking as the second shortest venue on the PGA Tour (behind only Pebble Beach), Port Royal Golf Course is positioned on the Atlantic Ocean coastline and experiences a lot of the volatility you might expect because of the weather. I am not going to get overly concerned with pinpointing specific tee times because of the erratic nature of wind when you play near water, meaning I'd prefer to weigh that category a single time in my model and go in with the mindset that you will always have to deal with steady breezes on a coastal course.
It should go without saying that the track plays straightforward with its 6,828-yard measurement, but the layout of the land provides a unique contextual experience when we look at the distribution of the yardage. Most of the hidden distance is baked into three of the four par-threes that range between 213 to 235 yards, and the group will rank as your three most challenging stops daily because of their 26.1% to 32.5% bogey or worse rate. The dispersion of historical finishes for top-10 producers over the past three seasons has shown that the par threes are the most impactful range to finding high-end success, but that does flip when looking at just cut-makers, suggesting earning shots on the par-fours or fives will be most crucial in making the cut, while being able to separate from the pack on par threes will give golfers the push they need to compete for the title.
Ten of the 11 par-fours play under 450 yards, but it is questionable not to include the sole outlier in the 400-450 yard range since it just misses the section at 458. The three par-fives are extremely gettable at 507, 517 and 533, and the par-five seventh accounted for 17% of DK points in 2019, allowing 242 birdies to go along with 25 eagles. If you aren't scoring on these three holes, your weekend will probably get cut short, and despite having one less than your standard Par 72, I am always going to weigh the category when we are talking about eagle rates ranging between 1.2 to 4.1%.
Let's Look At The Stats
| Stat | Port Royal | Tour Average |
| Driving Distance | N/A | 282 |
| Driving Accuracy | 52% | 62% |
| GIR Percentage | 64% | 65% |
| Scrambling Percentage | 59% | 57% |
| Average Three-Putts Per Round | 0.56 | 0.55 |
Key Stats
Let's quickly run through how I built my model.
SG: Total Wind (15%)
SG: Total Short Courses (12.5%)
SG: Total Slow Bermuda (10%)
Weighted Par-Three (17.5%)
Weighted Par-Four (12.5%)
Par-Five BoB (10%)
Ball Striking (22.5%)
I will dive deeper into what went into these totals later in the week on my podcast. If you aren't doing so already, you can follow Bettor Golf Podcast on Twitter.
Fantasy Golf Lineup Picks for DraftKings (PGA DFS)
We have tons of great weekly PGA articles, DFS analysis, tools and DFS advice. Be sure to read our other fantastic articles regarding this week's event.
High-Priced DraftKings DFS Players
***There are six players priced above $10,000. Please remember that my DFS article is always a first look at the field. Opinions might shift as the week goes on, and I am more than happy to discuss anyone further on Twitter.
Early thoughts on the group:
Thomas Detry ($10,500) - I'd have to imagine we aren't to see anyone get overly popular near the top of the board since it seems complicated to find a golfer that is head and shoulders above the field, but my general thought process this week will be to try and avoid any ownership pitfall mistakes. That means decisions at this point of the week are more affected by the uncertainty of the public than by the weather at the course, and I will cautiously maneuver through the next few days before sticking my flag in any area.
The early returns of Thomas Detry being sub-13 percent and the number one golfer on my board is somewhat appealing from a game theory sense, but I still would like that ownership to dip since we have a cluttered board with most of the value names between Detry and Patrick Rodgers looking very similar. The Belgian golfer ranks inside the top 15 of this field in seven of the eight metrics that I looked into for the Bermuda Championship, but the par-five scoring of 87th does present concerns since the ability to produce on those holes has been the number one statistical datapoint for likelihood to make the weekend. Between the chaos of the wind for the field and the potential inability to score on the critical holes, we will need more information before making a decision on Detry.
Denny McCarthy ($10,400) - I put Denny McCarthy into the consideration pile because he does warrant cash-game discussion, but I will be out in GPPs at his current ownership mark.
Numbers aside, I do think the American brings the best combination of current form and long-term metrics to the table for anyone teeing it up at Port Royal, but McCarthy reminds me of a glorified Adam Hadwin in the eyes of the public, giving us a golfer where the ceiling is lower than their perception, but the floor should still be good for a top 30 finish. That would be fine if we were taking a shot on him at $8,000, but the $10,400 mark enters us into new territory, and I am fine going into the week with the mindset that any finish outside the top five doesn't return proper value for his going rate. I believe he is arguably the safest option in this section, but I like upside in GPP contests, and I am willing to take a stance against him producing anything that warrants the price tag.
Adrian Meronk ($10,300) - Of everyone we have talked about in the first three names, Adrian Meronk is the most appealing to me if he enters the Bermuda Championship at sub-five percent. I don't have enough data on my end to take a firm stance one way or another on what we are getting here for the 61st-ranked player in the world, but the difference between a potential 10th-place finish for Meronk from Denny McCarthy is that the leverage we create by getting it with the Polish golfer is a natural separator between our builds and other lineups.
None of that suggests I am 100% going that route on Monday afternoon since a percent here and there will make a big difference when I naturally have better data on a player like Aaron Rai at just a few percentage points higher, but consider this one of those blind leverage chances where the long-term form of the golfer will exceed the metrics I have on record.
Seamus Power ($10,200) - I spent much of the CJ Cup finding routes to fade Seamus Power, and while I still like the upside if the ownership remains low enough for the week, the ball-striking returns have gone south over the past few months.
Power lost a horrendous 7.4 strokes to the field with his irons at Congaree, providing the sixth straight start where he has failed to gain strokes with his approach game, but if enough people in the space take a similar stance of him not being able to return value, I am willing to deviate from my opinion and bet on the long-term upside since the numbers will love him on a short course. Let's see if we can get this closer to seven percent than his current mark of over 11, but I still think there is too much volatility currently.
Aaron Rai ($10,100) - If Adrian Meronk isn't the best pivot in the $10,000+ section, it likely will go to Aaron Rai. My numbers believe he is a top-10 golfer in this field, which we see with him generating the top-ranked output in my model when combining total driving + GIR percentage. As always, it will come down to how he handles his irons for the week, but his ability to find success on the par-three holes from this extended distance is enough for me to lean toward him over any golfer in this section. Some of the limited data in my model will make running numbers more challenging on specific players, but if we are looking at golfers $8,000 or above to place in the top 10 for weighted par-three scoring, we get options such as Alex Smalley, Austin Eckroat, Aaron Rai, Thomas Detry and Patrick Rodgers. It is worth noting that our next choice just missed the cutoff by one spot.
Mark Hubbard ($10,000) - If you have followed my articles over the fall, you will know Mark Hubbard is a golfer I always tend to like over public expectation. The American ranks number one in this field for strokes gained tee-to-green over the past 24 rounds, and his top-25 baseline for putting will only add to the intrigue. Add that to the fact that he is among only two golfers to rank in the top 30 for every category this week, and we have an interesting profile to consider, even if he goes off the board as one of the popular selections.
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Mid-Priced DraftKings DFS Players
$9,000 Range
Alex Smalley ($9,500) - Alex Smalley was my first click in the outright section, and we finally get a venue for him that diminishes par-five importance and enhances his top-ranked ball-striking returns. I feel like I have been beating this drum for weeks now that the first time Smalley draws either a Par 70 layout or a track with reduced expectation in par-five scoring that we were going to attack, and that moment seems to be here for the surging American.
Keeping in mind that I am dealing with limited data on most of these golfers, Smalley joins Thomas Detry, Michael Gligic, Erik Van Rooyen, Austin Smotherman and Kevin Yu as the only players in this field to place inside the top 15 for total driving and weighted proximity, and his less than 10 percent ownership return on Monday has me excited about his upside.
Mid-Priced DraftKings DFS Players
$8,000 Range
Adam Long ($8,900) - When comparing most of these names to their counterparts, we can get similar value in the $7,000s, but I do like the GPP upside Adam Long presents at reasonable ownership.
Like Alex Smalley, Long has a similar profile that enhances his win equity when we remove par-five scoring importance, and the 13-spot increase in weighted proximity here versus a random track is a nice boost for a golfer that ranks top-six in wind production and par-four scoring to mimic Port Royal.
Erik Van Rooyen ($8,000) - I don't necessarily trust Erik Van Rooyen over four days of golf, but the price tag is too cheap at $8,000 for his talent, and if the popularity doesn't want to correct itself over the next few days, I will be a buyer at these numbers.
Van Rooyen is one of the top ball-strikers in this field, and the data on slow Bermuda has been solid, ranking inside the top 30 over his past 50 rounds on the surface.
Low-Priced DraftKings DFS Players To Consider ($7,000+)
The list removes all players outside the top-60 in overall or upside rank + negative totals against their DraftKings price, upside and ownership. We will break this list down more as ownership continues to trickle in over the next few days.
*** The names showing would be my early leans that I am going to take a deeper dive on over the next few days.
We need to be careful about trusting some of the short-term data on a few of these players, but that will be the initial condensed list of $7,000 golfers that I am diving deeper into over the next few days.
Sub-$6,000 Options To Consider
All the players below were inside the top-65 in one of the two iterations and positive during either the differential against DraftKings price or ownership. You can use my model to get a complete field breakdown, but this condensed things nicely as a first run.
It is a hard section to love, but Scott Brown, Camilo Villegas and Andrew Novak were the names that looked most appealing to me at an early glance.
Early Lean For Favorite Player in Each Range:
$10,000 - Aaron Rai ($10,100)
$9,000 - Alex Smalley ($9,500)
$8,000 - Adam Long ($8,900)
$7,000 - Tyler Duncan ($7,400)
$6,000 - TBD
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