Wednesday, September 13, 2023

Fantasy Golf: The Fortinet Championship Preview

In the movie The Cooler, William H. Macy plays a guy who radiates such a level of negative energy that a casino actually pays him to stand next to players on winning streaks to kill their mojo. Alec Baldwin plays the casino manager in true over the top Alec Baldwin fashion and Maria Bello is awesome as usual. It's worth a hundred minutes of your time between T.V. show binges but it's dark so don't watch it after a Breaking Bad or Handmaid's Tale or you might find yourself t-boning a Tesla in a Trader Joe's parking lot just to unload.    

Anyway, at some point around the first of July, I turned into the opposite of William H. Macy's character and it has continued to linger. (As best as I can tell, it was caused by the conjunction of Venus, Mars and Rickie Fowler's win in Detroit). Just today for example, the Orioles own the best record in the American League, my friend's racehorse won and my boss rolled-up to the office in a Bentley that would make 50 Cent go "hmmm . . . too much." It's like everything I touch turns to gold . . . for someone else.  

I'm sure this worm will turn as it always does but we're coming-off a Xander Schauffele runner-up pick at the Tour Championship so the streak is technically still alive. Let's see if we can keep it going this week but first . . . 

TWEET OF THE WEEK

I originally wrote this on Monday afternoon before Aaron Rodgers sustained a season-ending injury and I was going to switch it up out of some momentary misplaced feeling of sympathy but then I remembered how much I can't stand him.

My 16 year old daughter and I have been watching Hard Knocks together (because I raised her right) and, as Aaron Rodgers has been doing everything necessary to get his new coaches and teammates to fall for his con, I've made it clear to her what I think of him. Being a relatively new human, she didn't think anything was amiss with his behavior until one scene where he laid-on the "hey check out how cool I am before I stab you in the back" bullshit so thick you could smell it at which point she said, "ok now I see it." 

Wish I could remember exactly which scene it was but there were so many of them. Barf.   

GOLF ANALYSIS

I have no idea who's going to play well this week. Max Homa is the two-time defending champion but before him it was Stewart Cink, Cameron Champ and Kevin Tway. I defy you to draw a line of logic through those three winners. Believe me I tried. 

I'm lightly recommending Homa this week per the Steve Stricker Deere Run Theory but I have to believe that he and Justin Thomas have their minds on Rome at this point. So we're probably looking at a winner from a tier or two down and Sahith Theegala's time is coming so let's make it now. 

I'm also getting strong Doug Ghim vibes. He's been on a sneaky solid run since May and guys who were that good in college often find it right around the five year mark on tour. I just made that up after being inspired by a weekend of listening to football announcers say whatever stupid shit popped into their heads. (The winner hands-down was the announcer in the Tulane game who, when they were down by 10 with about 4 minutes left, said, "they just need to get points on this drive" . . . fucking shoot me).  

One and Done Pick: Sahith Theegala
"Hey you guys playing cards?"

Other Guy I'd Pick: Andrew Putnam

Sleeper Pick: Joel Dahmen

DraftKings Top Ten Values

Max Homa

$11,000

Sahith Theegala

$9,800

Andrew Putnam

$9,100

Alex Noren

$9,000

Justin Suh

$8,600

Taylor Montgomery

$8,400

Doug Ghim

$8,000

Mackenzie Hughes

$7,500

Martin Laird

$7,100

Joel Dahmen

$7,000


Email the Fantasy Golf Report at fgr@fantasygolfreport.com

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

Fantasy Golf: The Tour Championship Preview

Last week I played golf with my 19 year old son and two of his friends and it's probably the closest I've come to getting my ass kicked during a mugging in a dark alley (not really but for the sake of this story we'll go with it). Because I believe these are still the confidence building years and I interpreted the basketball scene from The Great Santini as more of a "how not to parent" guide, I let my son play as an 18 handicap. This despite the fact that he spends more time at the range than Vijay Singh in his prime and hits it about as far . . . when he hits it. 

One of the other sandbaggers also got the gift of 18 shots but it was the kid who claimed to be a 14 who was the menace. Look, we all know that the 12-16 handicaps can be the most diabolical because they have an uncanny knack of shooting 78's several times a year which is fine except the odds of it are something like 6,000 to 1. While he didn't shoot 78, he did have about 9 pars and a birdie and, under the ridiculous format I agreed to, that was plenty.

Being ever the entitled private school opportunists, the boys proposed that the three of them play me and my usually reliable 6 handicap three against one straight-up. When I started bogey-bogey-bogey-bogey, it was over faster than Tyson-Spinks and twice as ugly. In related news, I've officially hit that tipping point of the season where hitting a golf ball no longer fascinates me. It got so bad that I traded putters with my son and now mine is in a Memphis dorm room. Frankly, we're both looking forward to the time apart.     

TWEET OF THE WEEK

If you asked me to depict my sense of humor in cartoon form . . . 


GOLF ANALYSIS

Let the stupid commence. I mean seriously, are we still doing this shit? Maybe the blessed end to this playoff format will rise from the shit pile of the PGA/LIV mash-up but until then, we'll keep trying to gamble on it.

I usually save Xander Schauffele for this week and the reasons are fairly obvious as the 2017 champion has finished top 5 here the last four years and never worse than a T7. It sucks that he's starting seven shots back but my other options are Lucas Glover and Wyndham Clark so this ain't rocket surgery. 

From a 6-player pick standpoint, the fundamental question is whether anyone can catch Scottie Scheffler and I think the answer is "yes." Last year twelve players would've beaten him without the handicap including Tom Hoge and J.T. Poston. I know that's a big "would've" but I have to believe that someone from the chasing posse of Viktor Hovland, Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm, Patrick Cantlay and Max Homa are going to make a move on him. My money is literally on McIlroy and Cantlay. 

From there we just try to identify the best values in light of the starting positions. Guys like Collin Morikawa and Tyrrell Hatton seem obvious while Russell Henley has been on an underrated heater that has made him a dark horse Ryder Cup pick. At least we have that to look forward to after this dog and pony show.

One and Done Pick: Xander Schauffele
Welcome to the new and improved
FGR buddy. Enjoy all the winning.

Other Guy I'd Pick: Rory McIlroy 

Sleeper Pick: Tyrrell Hatton 

DraftKings Top Ten Values

Rory McIlroy

$13,000

Patrick Cantlay

$10,800

Xander Schauffele

$10,500

Rickie Fowler

$9,000

Sungjae Im

$8,500

Russell Henley

$8,300

Collin Morikawa

$7,700

Tyrrell Hatton

$6,900

Sam Burns

$6,100

Adam Schenk

$5,200


This week we honor the great Robbie Robertson. I know music documentaries can be a tough sell but, if you want one of the best to throw-on in the background while folding your laundry or shucking corn or whatever the fuck you do, I'd highly recommend The Last Waltz directed by Martin Scorsese. I can assure you that it will move from the background to the foreground pretty quickly. 

                                       THE VIRGIL KANE MEMORIAL
                                 HISTORICAL PERFORMANCE CHART 

We've got a lot of fresh faces this year and you know someone from that bottom four is going to over-perform. I threw a blind dart and it landed on Adam Schenk. It was either him or Taylor Moore but, at this point, my faith in "Taylors" is still limited to Swift and ham. 

 

DK Price

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

Scottie Scheffler

$13,400

T2

T22

5th

DNP

DNP

Rory McIlroy

$13,000

1st

T14

T8

1st

T7

Viktor Hovland

$12,500

T15

T5

T20

DNP

DNP

Jon Rahm

$11,600

T15

2nd

4th

T12

T11

Max Homa

$10,900

T5

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Patrick Cantlay

$10,800

T7

1st

DNP

T21

T21

Xander Schauffele

$10,500

4th

T5

T2

2nd

T7

Matt Fitzpatrick

$10,000

T15

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Lucas Glover

$9,700

DNP

DNP

DNP

T29

DNP

Brian Harman

$9,500

T21

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Wyndham Clark

$9,100

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Rickie Fowler

$9,000

DNP

DNP

DNP

T19

T7

T. Fleetwood

$8,800

DNP

DNP

DNP

T16

T11

Sungjae Im

$8,500

T2

T20

T11

DNP

DNP

Russell Henley

$8,300

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Keegan Bradley

$8,100

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

T26

Corey Conners

$7,900

26th

T22

DNP

T26

DNP

Tom Kim

$7,900

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Collin Morikawa

$7,700

T21

T26

6th

DNP

DNP

Jason Day

$7,400

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

18th

Si Woo Kim

$7,200

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Tyrrell Hatton

$6,900

DNP

DNP

7th

DNP

DNP

Jordan Spieth

$6,700

T13

T20

DNP

DNP

DNP

Taylor Moore

$6,500

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Sam Burns

$6,100

24th

T18

DNP

DNP

DNP

Emiliano Grillo

$5,700

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Sepp Straka

$5,400

T7

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Adam Schenk

$5,200

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

Nick Taylor

$5,000

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP

DNP


Email the Fantasy Golf Report here.