Scouting the Routing: 2024 Genesis Invitational

If last week's WM Open was representative of the green-colored beer we've all guzzled down at a St. Patrick's Day bar crawl (fun, communal, and made for the everyman), Riviera stands out like a bottle of Napa Valley Cabernet (nuanced, layered, and refined). This George C. Thomas design stands as one of the few Golden Age designs we get to visit annually on the PGA Tour, and for the golf course junkies among us, there may not be a better week of viewing all season.

If you're interested in romanticizing one of the most revered layouts in American golf, there are 200-page volumes written solely about the magnificence of this George C. Thomas design. However, our job here at RotoBaller is to cut through the glamorization and provide you with actionable information as you head into your week of golf betting.

This piece will break down every key trend and statistic I'm weighing to project a player's viability. It will serve to set you up to make the crucial decisions necessary before the market shifts later in the week. Without further ado, here is my comprehensive scouting report on Riviera Country Club and the 2024 Genesis Invitational!

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The Golf Course

Riviera Country Club - Par 71; 7,322 yards

Past Champions

• 2023 - Jon Rahm (-17) over Max Homa
• 2022 - Joaquin Niemann (-19) over Cameron Young and Collin Morikawa
• 2021 - Max Homa (-12) over Tony Finau (playoff)
• 2020 - Adam Scott (-11) over Kuchar/Brown/Kang
• 2019 - J.B. Holmes (-14) over Justin Thomas
• 2018 - Bubba Watson (-12) over Kevin Na and Tony Finau

 

Riviera by the Numbers (Off-The-Tee):

• Average Fairway Width -- 34.2 yards; 14th widest on the PGA Tour
• Driving Accuracy -- 51.5%; 3rd lowest on Tour
• Average Driving Distance -- 286.5 yards; 13th lowest on Tour
• Missed Fairway Penalty -- 0.23; Lowest on Tour
• Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee Difficulty: -0.028; seventh hardest on Tour

When projecting one of the more strenuous driving tests in professional golf, you probably wouldn't picture a golf course with 35-yard-wide fairways and a rough penalty of just 0.15 strokes (fourth lowest on the PGA Tour). However, with its tight, tree-lined corridors and fiery fairways, Riviera carries with it a historical driving accuracy percentage of just 51.5%, the third lowest on the PGA Tour over the last 10 seasons.

In order to deal with Riviera's claustrophobic corridors and narrow effective landing areas, players will be required to shape the ball in both directions off of the tee. You'll likely hear a bevy of Augusta National comparisons this week, and nowhere is this more apparent than off of Riviera's tee boxes. Of course, George C. Thomas was a renowned admirer of Alister McKenzie's work, so it shouldn't be considered a coincidence that some of the sport's most preeminent shot-makers have found success at both courses (Bubba Watson, Phil Mickelson, Justin Thomas, etc.).

The operative word you're likely to hear if you delve deep into the archives of literature surrounding Thomas's iconic layout is "options." Riviera is far from the 7,800-yard behemoth we saw last month at Torrey Pines, where distance was practically the only driving metric worth weighing. Nor is it akin to Pebble Beach, which largely aims to even the playing field off of the tee with a multitude of forced layups.

Instead, Riviera gives players of various profiles the option to play their own way through its meandering routing. Through the years, we've seen bombers like Cameron Young, Rory McIlroy, and Viktor Hovland put on airshow-like exhibitions of speed en route to top finishes around this classic layout, while in the very same events, the likes of Matt Kuchar, Max Homa, and Marc Leishman have all found repeated success with a more positional approach.

Of the two schools of thought, however, I would lean more toward distance as the prevailing driving metric to use in our modeling. Over the last 24 competitive rounds held at Riviera, the top five largest gainers in Strokes Gained (SG): Off The Tee (OTT) have been Rory McIlroy, Patrick Cantlay, Gary Woodland, Viktor Hovland, and Cameron Young. All of these golfers ranked inside the top 25 in Driving Distance in that sample, while only Cantlay and Young beat the field average in Driving Accuracy during that span.

At least for now, it would seem as if the best in the world have found the skeleton key to unlock Riviera CC. With a very limited rough penalty, and zero hazards or penalty areas to worry about (0.6% penalty fraction; second lowest on Tour), length off of the tee seems to be the path of least resistance to gaining strokes driving this week.

 

Riviera by the Numbers (Approach):

• Green in Regulation Rate -- 55.5%; Lowest on the PGA Tour
• Strokes Gained: Approach Difficulty: +0.008; 15th easiest on Tour
• Key Proximity Ranges:
  • 150-175 yards (accounts for 26.8% of historical approach shots)
  • 175-200 yards (22.8%)
  • 200+ yards (23.1%)

Although Riviera isn't known for its microscopic green complexes a la Pebble Beach or Harbour Town, things won't get any easier for players on their second shots. The firm turf conditions, extreme contouring, and abundance of middle to long irons required to access these pins make this layout one of the most difficult iron tests on the PGA Tour.

Success at Riviera oftentimes isn't just about a player's ability to hit a shot, but more so in a player's ability to know when to go for it, and when to play more prudently. Firing at flag after flag around this layout is a strategy more likely to send you home on Friday evening than it is to allow you to climb the leaderboard, so once again, experience around this setup will be paramount in my handicapping process. Each of the last nine champions here had gained at least 3.5 strokes on approach in a prior start at Riviera before their victory.

From a more general standpoint, this is another week I'll be honing in on players who raise their baselines on golf courses that require you to hit a large percentage of your approaches with a middle or long iron. Nearly three-quarters of historic approach shots have come from >150 yards at Riviera, so it's no surprise that we've seen the likes of Collin Morikawa, Tony Finau, Xander Schauffele, and Viktor Hovland routinely climb to the top of the yearly SG: APP leaderboards here.

Luckily, we have gotten to a point in the season where we can draw recent samples from places like TPC Scottsdale and Torrey Pines (both courses that feature similarly skewed distributions of 150-plus yard approaches), but once again, be careful looking too much into an off week around the likes of Pebble Beach, Kapalua, or PGA West. I project a much different test for these guys coming into the greens at Riviera this week.

 

Rivera by the Numbers (Around the Greens):

• Scrambling Percentage -- 60.64%; 3.2% above Tour Average 
• Sand Save Difficulty -- (-0.062); 2nd toughest on Tour
• SG: Around the Green Difficulty: +0.009; 16th easiest on Tour

The difficulty we've outlined around Riviera from a ball-striking perspective all comes to a head when we assess the importance of a player's short game this week. Since 2015, players have hit just 55% of their greens in regulation -- a mark that laps the next lowest mark on the PGA Tour by two percentage points, and last season, only seven of the 68 players who made the cut at Riv exceeded the season-long Tour GIR average of 66.3%.

Even an iron player of Xander Schauffele's stature (who gained a remarkable 5.9 strokes on approach for the week), was forced to scramble for par on 39 of his 72 holes last year. Collin Morikawa hit a paltry 58.3% of his greens in 2023's rendition (down over 12% from his season-long mark), and runner-up Max Homa (who finished top 20 in the field on approach), finished two shots off of Jon Rahm despite hitting just 36/72 greens in regulation.

This long-winded diatribe is only meant to outline that even the best ball-strikers in this field will be forced to scramble at a well-above-average rate compared to a normal week on Tour. Throw in the fact that Riviera routinely ranks as one of the toughest courses to putt on from inside 15 feet (more on that later), and we'll see an even greater strain on a player's ability to manufacture par saves.

Eight holes along Riviera's routing feature bogey or worse rates north of 20%, so tap-in pars will be worth their weight in gold on many occasions this week. Bunker play in particular has been extremely correlative to success at Riviera, which isn't surprising when you consider these sand traps are the second most difficult set of bunkers to scramble from on the PGA Tour.

As such, this is not a typical week of using Par 5 scoring as a stand-in for short-game prowess around a benign PGA Tour layout. SG: ARG, Bogey Avoidance, and Sand Saves will be among my most highly weighted metrics in this week's modeling, and for one of the only times all year, a player's short-game acumen will supersede even his driving projection when assessing overall viability in the outright market.

 

Riviera by the Numbers (Putting):

• Average Green Size -- 7,500 sq. feet
• Agronomy -- Poa Annua
• Stimpmeter: 12.5
• 3-Putt Percentage: 3.45%
• Strokes Gained: Putting Difficulty: -0.018; third toughest on Tour

For the final time in the 2024 PGA Tour campaign, we'll see the best players in the world go head-to-head with California's infamous poa annua greens. Like Torrey Pines and Pebble Beach before it, Riviera also presents some of the most difficult green complexes to navigate on the schedule.

By nearly every metric since 2015, Riviera rates out as a top-five course on the PGA Tour in terms of putting difficulty. From five to 15 feet in particular, Riviera has never ranked outside of the bottom five in make percentage over the last 10 seasons. This will be a key range to hone in on with the volume of putts I expect to come from five to 15 feet, particularly as players attempt to continually scramble from out of position.

Of course, as we've come to learn week over week during the West Coast Swing, poa annua putting is often more about mindset than it is technique. We've heard many proficient poa putters outline a certain acceptance you need to possess that not every putt is going to roll exactly how you'd like. Lose this acquired indifference, and this surface can tank your confidence like no other green type in the game.

As such, I'll continue to place most of my weekly putting weight on long-term splits on similar poa annua surfaces, as well as a player's historic proficiency from 15 feet and in. I suspect that whoever finds himself posing next to Tiger on Sunday evening will have had to hole at least a few crucial mid-range par putts down the stretch to attain that title.

 

Key Stats Roundup: 

• Driving as a whole will be slightly deemphasized in my modeling (mostly to compensate for the added weight I'm placing into the short game), but I'll specifically be looking at positive off-the-tee history here at Riviera, with driving distance being a more general fall-back stat.
• Another week where we're heavy on Proximity/Strokes Gained splits on approaches from 150 yards and beyond. Special emphasis on prior iron success around Riviera and recent approach splits at Torrey Pines/TPC Scottsdale.
• Maybe the biggest week of the year for short-game metrics like SG: Around the Green (ARG), Bogey Avoidance, and Sand Saves. Top five finishers here on average have gained more strokes Around the Greens than they have Off The Tee, so adjust models accordingly.
• Like Torrey and Pebble before it, Riviera will once again place a heavy emphasis on navigating poa annua green complexes. Special attention will be placed on putting splits from five to 15 feet, as I expect a ton of crucial par putts to come from that range.

 

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The Sunday Shortlist

Before the odds come out on Monday morning, here are two to three names I’ve identified as significant targets upon my initial research.

Wyndham Clark

Despite winning his third elevated title in less than nine months two weeks ago at Pebble Beach, Wyndham Clark was still unable to grab oddsmakers' attention the next week in Scottsdale. In a field that included just nine of the OWGR's Top 25 when play began, Clark could readily be found in the 40-1 range on outright odds boards, even at a venue he finished 10th at the year prior.

This week, in one of the most competitive fields we project to see all season, it wouldn't surprise me at all to see Wyndham priced well into the 50/60-1 range when lines open. Clark's resume in the Golden State has taken a sizeable leap forward over the last six months, but before he was winning U.S. Opens and Signature Events with $20 million prize pools, Clark showed some early signs of the player he'd inevitably become right here in Pacific Palisades.

Wyndham recorded finishes of eighth and 17th in his two opening starts at Riviera (2020-2021) and found a particular affinity for these tricky poa annua greens. He gained 4.1 and 5.7 strokes putting in those two starts, and just eight days ago, Clark put together one of the craziest putting performances in recent memory to card a 12-under 60 on Pebble Beach's similar complexes.

More excitingly still for Wyndham's prospects this week is the progression he's taken as a ball striker, particularly with his middle and long irons. Since the start of last season, only Scottie Scheffler, Xander Schauffele, Viktor Hovland, Jon Rahm, Rickie Fowler, and Collin Morikawa have gained more strokes per shot on approaches from 150-200 yards, and of that group, only Xander, Scottie, and Collin gained more from 200+.

This progression is exemplified by Clark's recent approach splits at other mid/long-iron intensive courses (Quail Hollow, Innisbrook, Bay Hill, Muirfield Village), but particularly, last week at TPC Scottsdale, where Clark had his best approach week (+4.29) since the 2023 Scottish Open last July.

Wyndham also rates out as a top-10 bunker player, he's top-five in SG: ARG, and his immense distance off of the tee has proven to be a cheat code utilized by some of Riviera's most prolific recent drivers (Cameron Young, Patrick Cantlay, Will Zalatoris, etc.). I believe Wyndham has every tool required to win another big-time event in quick succession, similar to how he stacked titles at the Wells Fargo and U.S. Open in back-to-back months last summer. If we can get a number bordering on 50-1, Clark would be among the first priorities on my outright card.

 

Cameron Young

If we've learned anything from Cameron Young's tumultuous last 12 months, it's that the mercurial American is capable of popping up and contending at almost any time (regardless of recent form). Last summer, Young registered finishes of sixth and eighth in back-to-back weeks at the John Deere Classic and Open Championship despite entering that stretch with only one top-40 finish over his previous seven starts.

More recently, Cam has recorded a third (Dubai Desert Classic) and eighth place finish (WM Phoenix Open) in quick succession, despite logging finishes of 70th and 33rd in limited fields at Pebble Beach and Kapalua on either side of these results. Young has been among the most maddening prospects to forecast on a weekly basis for golf bettors, but if there was ever a venue to trust his baseline projection, it would be right here at Riviera.

Young has finished second and 20th here in Pacific Palisades in the two years since he's come onto the PGA Tour, and more impressively, he's done so while logging the best ball-striking splits of anyone in this field in that time frame. In eight competitive rounds around Riviera, Young has racked up a whopping 8.7 strokes OTT and 8.4 on Approach to the field average, beating the next highest mark (Viktor Hovland) by over three shots. He comes into this week on the back of his best driving performance in 11 months around TPC Scottsdale (+4.0 SG: OTT) and also rates out as one of the better long-term iron players from our key approach ranges (ninth in Weighed Proximity over his last 12 months).

If the putter continues to cooperate as it did in Scottsdale this past week, Cam could well be in for another golden opportunity at his first PGA Tour victory. At his current price of 40-1, I'll be sprinting to the window to get myself a ticket on the wagon.

 

 

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