👿 Dressing For Revenge

Relish this feeling because we are truly in the thick of it now. Bay Hill was an excellent host to a deserving winner. Now we go to the TOUR’s crown jewel and get massive events seemingly every few weeks until football season. You’ll miss it when it’s gone and it’s going to go fast.

Enjoy and win a little money along the way!
Rick

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🏆 Last Week’s Optimal Lineup

Scottie Scheffler: $11,300 | 122.5 PTS
Wyndham Clark: $8,500 | 110.0 PTS
Shane Lowry: $7,500 | 100.0 PTS
Sahith Theegala: $8,100 | 87.0 PTS
Russell Henley: $8,000 | 86.0 PTS
Brendon Todd: $6,400 | 78.5 PTS
TOTAL: $49,800 | 584.0 PTS

🦆 The Mallet Era

The long National Nightmare is over — Scottie Scheffler has won a golf tournament.

Scheffler has entered his Mallet era and he’s 1/1. After switching to a TaylorMade Spider this week, Scheffler gained 4.347 strokes putting at Bay Hill which was the 6th best putting performance of his career.

Of his Top 10 putting performances ever, Scheffler has won 5x and never finished worse than T12.

🍻 This One’s On Me

ICYMI: Underdog and I wanted to run a promo for this week and they asked me who would "best resonate with my audience?"

Yeah -- no brainer!

Once Viktor tees off on Thursday, you win.
Secure it: https://bit.ly/3TeF4G1

🎁 The Gift and the Curse

It’s not fair being the best player in the world, but I guess that comes with the territory. Over the last two years, Scottie Scheffler has been subjected to both ends of the criticism spectrum

The most recent, of course, was — ‘Scottie doesn’t win enough’, ‘he’s wasting a historic stretch’, etc etc.

Well I’m old enough to remember when Scottie was winning enough. Maybe too much! So much that every major golf publication boiled his four wins in six starts down to “a heater”.

So which is it? He doesn’t win enough but when he does, it’s just a heater.

To me, the truth is — we way overvalue winning in golf. Beating a field of 70-150 golfers regularly is nearly impossible to do. I don’t know how anyone wins. It’s so hard. Yet — that’s all anyone cares about.

It would be like ranking the best baseball players by number of cycles they’ve hit.

The chart above shows every player in the world since January 1st, 2022. It includes all wins (PGA TOUR, Korn Ferry, LIV, Asian Tour, DP World Tour) and guess what?!?! Scottie has more than everyone — by two!

Not to mention the insane level of consistency by finishing inside the Top 5 basically half the time. Scheffler has more Top 5s than Max Homa, Tony Finau, and Wyndham Clark combined. What’s that worth? I think a lot.

🥊 Just A Hiccup

A truly bizarre hiccup for JT to miss the cut at Riviera. His two worst rounds in a long time coming back-to-back. Everyone knows that Thomas has been really good since the Wyndham Championship of last year, but I don’t think we realize how good he’s been.

He’s the second best player in this field since the Wyndham — behind only Ludvig Aberg (sick!). The other 13 players listed above have combined for 14 wins while Thomas remains trophy-less. Which seems like a matter of when, not if.

☠️ Prepare For Carnage

This event is one of the most difficult to handicap because of the volatile nature of the results, year-over-year. Sticky course history, this is not!

It’s well known that no golfer has ever successfully defended their PLAYERS Championship which most certainly has more to do with the water lurking, difficult conditions, historic wave advantages, and the depth of the field.

Scottie Scheffler’s win last year came after a 55th in ‘22 and MC in ‘21.
Cam Smith missed the cut twice, finished T56 and T17 before his ‘22 win.
Justin Thomas has a win and a T3 but no other Top 10s in eight trips.
Rory McIlroy’s last five: MC, T33, MC, 1, MC, T35
Webb Simpson finished T16 after his ‘18 win but has missed (3) straight cuts.

I could go on and on, but you get the point. Course history hasn’t necessarily been a good predictor of success year-over-year.

📈 But There Are Exceptions!

There are some golfers who have defied the stats and logic with consistently great performances at TPC Sawgrass. Below are all golfers in the field, minimum 12 rounds, along with how often they’ve gained strokes to the field and how often they’ve gained at least one stroke.

You’re reading that right. Adam Scott has been better than the field average in 75% of his 76 career PLAYERS Championship rounds. That has converted to 1 win - 1 podium (that win) and (4) Top 10s.

Jason Day has the same slash line and percentage of rounds in which he’s gained strokes to the field. But he’s only accomplished the feat for half the amount of rounds as Adam Scott.

3️⃣ Give Me Your Best 3

This is your LAST CALL!!

For the first time ever, I’ve partnered with Splash Sports to create a “3 & Done” for THE PLAYERS and the Majors.

• Pick 3 golfers for each event, can only use them once.

• Payouts for full length and for each tournament.

• Fully legal in 40+ states

💪 March Is For Studs

One throughline between recent winners has been elite form from January 1st of the year they won THE PLAYERS until the week of the event. This is especially relevant since THE PLAYERS moved back to March from May.

Scottie Scheffler had gained 2.53 strokes per round from Jan. 1 2023 until the week before THE PLAYERS.

Cameron Smith checked in at 1.97/round.
Justin Thomas was the worst at 0.87/round — still quite good.
Rory McIlroy was gaining 2.77/round the year he hoisted Gold Boy.

So let’s call it 2.0 strokes/round. That’s where you have to be if you want to win this week. If true — this is your list of potential winners:

1. Scottie Scheffler +2.28/round

2. That’s it.

3. Good luck to everyone else, you are all screwed.

If we allow the 1.40/round golfers into the party:

1. Scottie Scheffler +2.28

2. Xander Schauffele +1.52

3. Rory McIlroy +1.51

4. Justin Thomas +1.49

5. Matthieu Pavon +1.49

6. Sam Burns +1.41

h/t to my buddy Kyle Porter who often uses this concept for The Masters.

🥶 Ice In Your Veins

There are 10 (!!) different holes at TPC Sawgrass that have a Missed Fairway Penalty of 0.33 strokes or more. That’s … a ton.

There’s two main reasons for this:

1) The 3.5” thick rough will be nasty.
2) There’s water in play everywhere.

SG: OTT has been very highly correlated to success at TPC Sawgrass, so much so that it’s almost impossible to win without driving it well.

That said — 14 of last 15 winners have gained strokes off-the-tee with the exception of Cameron Smith who off-set those losses by gaining 11.54 strokes putting.

The average winner has gained 2.25 strokes OTT for the week at TPC Sawgrass.

🎯 The Biggest Bang For Your Buck

With a $4,500,000 top prize, this is the single highest amount you can earn in One & Done all season. It’s likely the most important selection we will make all year, so let’s get it right.

Above is a screenshot from the PoolGenius tool that I consulted on and I recommend you check out.

I’ve already used Scottie in this league, but not last week 🙄. My highest graded golfer is Rory McIlroy but there is a wrinkle in this league that makes me want to hold him for awhile (that’s all I’d like to say because I know people in that league are reading this).

Do I have much confidence in Xander Schauffele or Viktor Hovland right now? Not exactly.

My eyes really dart to Max Homa who is tied as my third highest grade for this week. There are 10 courses where Homa has played at least 10 rounds and gained at least 1.0 stroke/round.

Of those 10 natural fits, seven have already passed! That leaves Muirfield Village, Quail Hollow and TPC Sawgrass.

Muirfield Village will be a massive purse and smaller field but I’ll still have plenty of great options there. I would also hope that Hovland starts playing better by then and Matsuyama could emerge as much viable than expected.

✅ Good Grade
✅ Good History
✅ Playing Well
✅ Last Spot or Two To Play Him

I’m trending on Max for this week.

💣Last Man In

The 144th spot in the field has been filled — by Jimmy Stanger. Let’s give him a deep dive:

This is his first full season the PGA TOUR and he’s made 4/6 cuts, highlighted by a T14 at The American Express and a T3 last week in Puerto Rico.

He’s weapon is the driver — ranking 9th in SG: OTT this season thanks to being inside the Top 60 in both Driving Distance and Driving Accuracy.

He’s starting to show signs of improvement on the second-shot and this will be a home game for the Jacksonville resident.

👎🏻 Get Ready For Some Bogeys?

Last year, only five holes played under par for the week — the (4) par-5s and no. 12, which is a 369 yard par-4. But here’s the thing — even three of those “easy holes” had a bogey or worse rate over 11%.

There were ten other holes that had a bogey or worse rater over 21%. There’s just a lot of ways to make a crooked number. So with that being said, here are some of this week’s props that stood out to me:

Feel free to tail or fade: http://bit.ly/UDRick
(This entry is a 11.22x return, but you can split them up however you’d like).

Rory McIlroy R1 Bogeys or Worse: 2.5 (Higher) ⬆️
McIlroy has been making more big numbers than usual lately. He’s currently 136th in bogey avoidance this year, making a bogey or worse on 15.19% of his holes.

Matt Fitzpatrick R1 Bogeys or Worse: 3.0 (Higher) ⬆️
Really struggling right now. His once consistent game has fallen off a cliff and he’s losing strokes throughout the bag. Currently 125th in bogey avoidance.

Adam Scott R1 Score: 71.5 (Lower) ⬇️
I’ll go down with the ship on this one. The advanced metrics are great and he’s been able to defy logic and reason at TPC Sawgrass. He’s the most consistent gainer at this event in a ridiculous number of rounds.

Russell Henley R1 Score: 71.0 (Lower) ⬇️
Quietly having a great year — highlighted by a pair of T4 finishes (Sony and API). Since getting to the Florida Swing, his putter has headed up — gaining over 12 strokes in eight rounds.

Tail or Fade: bit.ly/UDRick

This is what I’m going with, wish me luck!

⭐ Before You Go …

• Please join me on YouTube for THE PLAYERS Championship Live Chat on Wednesday at 3PM ET.

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