Welcome back to Golf News Net's weekly fantasy golf picks. Each week of the PGA Tour season, we'll present our top picks for that week's tournament and make recommendations for DraftKings' one-week fantasy leagues.
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Who saw that finish coming?! Wow, what a Masters we got.
Our picks last week looked pretty solid until there were six holes left, and that's when Danny Willett took the lead. He was a blind spot for us, a player doing well this season, but not one that screamed out above all others. However, we know two big things now about the Englishman: He does well on risk-reward courses (like Augusta National and Emirates G.C.) and he's a very, very good wind player.
This week, we move to Harbour Town and the RBC Heritage. Remember, we're playing a Pete Dye course this week, and he tends to have horses for his courses, perhaps more so than any other designer because his courses come up so frequently on the PGA Tour. Keep that in mind.
For GNN Plus subscribers, you can access our NEW searchable database of PGA Tour results from 2011-present, our top-15 finish chart and season-long trends on DraftKings valuations. They'll be available at your disposal as part of a growing set of tools to help in your research. Going forward, GNN Plus subscribers will also get access to the last five years of leaderboards for an event, namely the top 15 and ties from 2011-2015, the data that we use to define our horses for courses each week.
Now, on to the picks!
1. Jason Day -- Day was a big favorite going into the Masters, but he just didn't have a great week. Still, he hung in there throughout it all. Now he comes to a Pete Dye design. He won the PGA Championship on a Pete Dye design. He won the WGC-Dell Match Play on a Pete Dye design. Get where I'm going?
2. Paul Casey -- Casey finished T-4 at the Masters and has the kind of tee-to-green game that makes a lot of sense for Harbour Town. He's been on fire of late, with three top-10s in a row.
3. Brandt Snedeker -- Snedeker finished T-10 at the Masters, which was a good follow to a T-9 at the Match Play. He's won here, in 2011, and he has a good record otherwise on Pete Dye designs.
4. Matt Kuchar -- Kuchar was a modest T-24 at the Masters, but he's got a really good record here, including a win in 2014. Was T-5 last year in the defense.
5. Kevin Kisner -- Kisner was all jacked up to play in the Masters last week, and it kind of showed. However, he's really good from tee-to-green, his short game is amazing and he was a playoff loser here last year. Should line up well for him.
6. Luke Donald -- The ultimate horse (other than Davis Love III) for this course. Four top-15s here in the last five years, including three medal-stand finishes. Just gotta trust him here.
7. Charley Hoffman -- Hoffman has a pair of top-8 finishes here in the last five years, coming in 2012 and '13. He hasn't missed a PGA Tour cut since January. He's in a good groove.
8. Scott Brown -- Before a 71st place finish at the Houston Open, Brown had enjoyed top-10 finishes in three of his last four starts. Enjoyed a fifth-place finish here two years ago in his home state.
9. Billy Horschel -- Billy Ho is flying under the radar here, and I don't know why. He LOVES Pete Dye courses. He's a better NOLA pick, but he was T-9 here in 2013 and has missed just one cut all year.
10. Matt Fitzpatrick -- There's not much hard data here on Fitzpatrick and Harbour Town, but he finished T-24 here as an amateur in 2014. He was T-7 at the Masters and found a ton of GIRs, which is a great thing to know for these smaller putting surfaces.
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My DraftKings team for this week:
1. Bill Haas -- $9,100
2. Billy Horschel -- $8,900
3. Luke Donald -- $8,300
4. Graham DeLaet -- $8,200
5. Marc Leishman -- $8,000
6. Scott Brown -- $7,500
If you want to win at DraftKings daily fantasy golf, you have to figure out a way to find six golfers that play all 72 holes and earn roughly 85 points each.
You likely have to identify a couple of players in the top five, at least the top seven, and you'd ideally not have a player finish outside the top 20.
Doing that takes research, looking at a variety of factors, including:
- Finish trends, both in recent weeks on the PGA Tour and at that week's event,
- Salary trends, deciphering which players are showing value based on their performance, and
- Statistical trends, identifying the common threads among winners in that week's event
That's what Golf News Net will deliver each week to GNN Plus members in this space, offering a complete research package which dives into these three areas to find the players that should be in your lineup for this week.
To access this research hidden below and MANY more fantasy golf tools, sign up for GNN Plus to gain access to the analysis!
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