Flag Hunting: PGA Betting Picks - 2024 Olympics

Between Monday's Course Preview piece (found right here on RotoBaller), and last night's podcast (currently posted on our X page), we've given all of you every possible trend, key stat, and player take needed to make the most educated betting decisions possible this week at Le Golf National. This Wednesday article will now serve as a final bow to wrap up a jam-packed week of PGA content at Flag Hunting. No fluff, no rants or superfluous soliloquies, just the entirety of our 2024 Olympics outright betting card.

The four names on this betting card are aimed at returning about six times our investment. Because of the inflated odds associated with the outright market, it becomes even more imperative to remain disciplined when setting your unit allocations from this article's picks. Golf outright betting is a notoriously fickle beast, and multiple month-long droughts are very much within the range of outcomes. However, at these prices, one single hit can pay off many weeks of poor decision-making.

In the over two-year history at Flag Hunting, we've been fortunate enough to cash a total of 25 outright winners (a 20.3% hit rate) for a profit of nearly $16,000 (betting roughly $350 per week) and an aggregate ROI of 36.3%. The volatility of the sport means I can't promise you a winner in any given tournament. But if you're willing to bet methodically and stick with the process, outright golf betting has the potential to be one of the most profitable (and enjoyable) betting sweats in the business. But I suppose I'd better keep my word about the necessary rants, so with no further ado, here's every bet I've made for the 2024 Olympic Games!

Olympics Betting Card

Collin Morikawa (16-1)

How awesome was this pitch shot from Collin Morikawa? A running shot that stops on a dime is so good 👌🏻

pic.twitter.com/J7HZA8u4fu

— Tour Pro 🏌️‍♂️ (@OfficialTourPro) June 22, 2024

I managed to stay away from my guy in spite of a dream course fit due to heavy winds forecasted around Troon’s ultra-positional layout, but I don’t anticipate the same difficulties facing Collin Morikawa this week in Paris. Collin has seemingly been on the precipice of something great since his surprising stint at the top of the leaderboard in April’s Masters: recording 10 consecutive finishes of 16th or better (including five finishes of inside the top four), since coming third at Augusta National.

His traditional calling cards of precision off the tee and elite iron play are tailor-made for Le Golf National's penal design, as Morikawa leads this field in both Fairways Gained and Good Drive Percentage over the course of the 2024 season, and comes into the Olympics riding some of the hottest approach form of anyone on the planet: averaging +3.5 Strokes Gained per start with his irons over his last seven events (third in this field).

However, the facets of the game that really raised the week-to-week baselines of the World No. 6 player have been the very same bugaboos that used to haunt him in his formative years. Morikawa has made tremendous strides both on and around the greens in 2024, jumping 47 spots in the PGA Tour's SG: Putting rankings in the last 12 months and a whopping 86 spots Around the Greens!

In fact, over his last 36 rounds, Collin has become a top 30 entity on the PGA Tour in both short-game categories and has gone 10 straight starts beating the field average in the aggregate on and around the greens. It's not a stretch to say that statistically, this two-time Major Champion and seven-time winner around the world is playing the best all-around golf of his entire career. Although everything hasn't yet come together to find his way to victory lane, all the signs point to him as a legitimate top-four or five player on the planet. I believe he's got every chance to finally cash in on this rich vein of form and make it back-to-back stints at the top of the Olympic podium for Team U.S.A.

Jon Rahm (18-1)

Jon Rahm is flushing it today. He’s had 3 birdies in 4 holes to have a 2 shot lead at LIV Golf UK. A win would be his first on the league and first anywhere since the 2023 Masters!

pic.twitter.com/x5LMQDCDCk

— Flushing It (@flushingitgolf) July 28, 2024

We've seen Jon Rahm carry stellar runs of form into each of his first two Major Championship victories, and with the recent life he's shown over the last month, it's possible we could be seeing the warning signs of another another legendary run from the Spanish No. 1.

2024 has been far from the age-29 season we'd have envisioned for the Jon Rahm at the top of the golfing world just a couple years ago, as the Spaniard has endured scathing public backlash from his decision to switch Tours, a mysterious foot injury that took him out of July's U.S. Open, and a strangely ragged start to his Major Championship season (T45 at Augusta; MC at Valhalla). Since pulling out at Pinehurst, however, Rahm has yet to finish outside the top 10 in any of his last four starts.

Rahm initially gained his momentum with a Friday 63 at LIV Nashville: eventually propelling him to a third-place finish. He then led the field in Greens in Regulation at LIV Andulucia three weeks later: finishing at even-par and a tie for 10th before recording an impressive T7 at the Open Championship from the same side of the draw that sunk the hopes of Rory McIlroy, Tommy Fleetwood, Ludvig Aberg, and many other promising hopefuls. And finally, last week, Rahm broke the seal on both his LIV Golf (and worldwide) winless drought -- out-dueling Cameron Smith, Tyrrell Hatton, and Joaquin Niemann in a one-shot win at JCB Golf and Country Club.

This win may not move the needle for Rahm in terms of his career accolades, but for a player in his prime who still has aspirations of etching his name among the game's greats, this win will do wonders for his confidence heading into an event that does have the power to shift the current narrative. A win for Rahm on this stage, against this field, and for his beloved country of Spain would certainly shut up a lot of the critics that hassled him so ardently throughout this recent stretch of frustration. I guarantee you won't find a player in this field more motivated, and if the last eight years of his professional career are anything to go by, 12-1 on Jon Rahm in a short field has proven to be a winning play in the long term.

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Final 2023 Golf Betting Results:
(Individual breakdowns of all sections in thread) @RotoBaller

2023 (+16.634 Units)
2022 (+67.485 Units)
2021 (+68.846 Units)
2020 (+37.015 Units)
2019 (+27.743 Units)
2018 (+55.88 Units)
2017 (+54.26 Units)

Overall: (+327.863 Units) pic.twitter.com/tuaDfwFXlo

— Spencer Aguiar (@TeeOffSports) November 21, 2023

Sepp Straka (55-1)

Sepp Straka's winning moments from one of the biggest odds comebacks we've seen this season. 😤🏆

+6500 to start the round.
-7000 thru 16 holes.
-300 after finishing with double bogey on 18.

62 (-9) was still enough to get the win by 2 strokes.

(Odds by @FDSportsbook). pic.twitter.com/9AgwkpgIwm

— Golfbet (@Golfbet) July 9, 2023

Another player who excels in keeping the ball in play, it should come as no surprise that Sepp Straka has delivered time and time again on golf courses with both a positional driving ethos and a heavy penalty for missing the fairway. His maiden win on the PGA Tour at PGA National was followed shortly thereafter by top 10s at TPC Sawgrass and Harbour Town, as well as a heartbreaking playoff loss to Will Zalatoris at TPC Southwind.

Since that breakout 2022 campaign, Straka has earned himself a spot on last year's victorious European Ryder Cup Team and seems primed to make his third consecutive trip to Eastlake as a top 30 points-earner on the PGA Tour. He's continued to make a living at the aforementioned Sawgrass and Harbour towns of the world while also showing himself as a bit of an Open Championship ringer (logging finishes of 5th and 22nd on two of the most penalizing Open layouts in recent memory). With top-10 finishes recorded at the likes of Oak Hill, Quail Hollow, and Muirfield Village over the last two seasons, the 31-year-old Austrian seems primed to reach yet another level from his current standing as the 26th-ranked player in the world.

Like Morikawa, Straka relies on two main calling cards on a week-to-week basis. He sits just behind Collin in many of the season-long driving accuracy stats (2nd in both Good Drive Percentage and Fairways Gained over his last 50 rounds) while also ranking 4th in Greens in Regulation Percentage, 10th in Strokes Gained: Approach, and 2nd in Approach Proximity from 150-200 yards. While he doesn't enter the week with the same short-game baselines as Collin, Straka does carry a reliable long-term floor: ranking inside the top 20 in Bentgrass Putting over the last three seasons. Notably, he also put forth the most impressive putting display of his career on this surface last summer: gaining 6.8 strokes to the field on the greens in a runaway win at the 2023 John Deere Classic. If you're looking for a dark horse to emerge out of this star-studded affair, look no further than the Austrian No. 1 priced in the neighborhood of 50-1.

Corey Conners (59-1)

Corey Conners 🇨🇦 laces the best tee shot of the day on the gettable 3rd hole.

If a drive can stop this close, we're officially on par 4 hole-in-one watch... 👀 pic.twitter.com/BuIZJiuJp5

— U.S. Open (@usopengolf) June 15, 2024

I've long called Corey Conners the "Triple-A" version of Collin Morikawa, and funnily enough, over the same stretch where we've witnessed Collin's short-game progression, his Canadian counterpart has made significant strides of his own. Conners has gained a whopping 4.0 strokes per start with his chipping and putting since the Canadian Open last June (five event sample), and at the same time, he continues to be one of the more metronomic ball-striking entities in the sport.

From Good Drive Percentage, Fairways Gained, Strokes Gained: Approach, Greens in Regulation, Birdie Chances Created, and Weighted Proximity, it's difficult to find a pertinent stat in which Conners doesn't rate out inside the top 10 in this field. He's routinely returned his most prolific tee-to-green splits on the Tour's most positionally-intensive venues (Sawgrass, River Highlands, Wai'alae, Bay Hill, San Antonio, etc.), and zooming in for recent form: the Canadian No. 1 hasn't finished outside the top 30 since the start of May (an eight-start stretch that included three Major Championships, two Continents, and only one event outside of the PGA "Signature Series."

It's clear that these recent short game gains have elevated Corey's week-to-week floor, and I remain bullish on his chances to build on his professional trophy case should this progression continue. You won't find a better spot than in this shortened field -- on a golf course that should play perfectly to his suitabilities. I know Collin Morikawa is my personal player comp him, but Conners' game would fit in snuggly right alongside the Tommy Fleetwood's, Henrik Stenson's, and Francesco Molinari's that so iconically conquered this venue for Team Europe in 2018.

Best of luck, guys, and happy hunting!

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