Fantasy Golf: The Canadian Open Preview

We'll have to get to a more comprehensive recap of the British Open later in the week as I had planned to sit down last night and put the finishing touches on it but was derailed when my partner and I blew a 3-up lead with four holes to play and got knocked-out of our two-man matchplay event. Not helping my post-round mood were the following: (1) There were forty-two total dots on the scorecard* with my partner having three of them and me having none (it looked like it had been blasted with pepper spray); (2) The round took four hours and forty-five minutes and we had to let two groups play through; and (3) I made bogeys from the middle of the 15th, 16th and 18th fairways. Suffice it to say that I replayed those three holes several times between 4:30 a.m. and 5:30 a.m. this morning. The only upside is that the FGW and FGKs are at the beach so there was no one there to hear my screams and muffled sobs.

With that bit of therapy out of the way, let's get some picks on the board. The Canadian Open is sporting a very strong field presumably because it's being played in Ontario this year which isn't far from Ohio where the WGC - Bridgestone Invitational will be played the following week. This tournament is played on a somewhat random rotation of courses so it's hard to compare results from year to year. However, the last two times they played at this year's site (Glen Abbey GC), the winners were Chez Reavie (2008) and Nathan Green (2009). The one thing I can say with complete confidence is that the winner of this year's Canadian Open will not be Chez Reavie** or Nathan Green.***

Last week I got a little adventurous, went with Nicolas Colsaerts and Branden Grace at the Open and it blew-up in my face so we're going with the chalk picks this time though this tournament has a history of producing random winners so be ready for anything. Also note that Graeme McDowell has been black-listed from the Fantasy Golf Report for the rest of the season based purely on past futility and not due to any sound reasoning.

Inspired by "Graham" DeLaet and of
course the Swingers reference below.

The Canadian Open Top Five

1. Matt Kuchar
2. Hunter Mahan
3. Brandt Snedeker
4. Graham DeLaet
5. Morgan Hoffman

Endnotes

* There's something inherently wrong with having to give someone who has full use of all of his limbs two strokes on a hole. The phrase "bogey net birdie" simply should not exist.

** One of the guys we lost to yesterday goes by "Chaz." I need to get past this. I'm starting to sound like Jon Favreau in Swingers.

*** Reavie has actually had a better year than I thought with $560,499 in earnings. Green on the other hand has declined steadily since his Canadian Open win and has only banked $86,053 in 2013 which is probably about the point where your caddie starts saying, "um geez Nathan I'd love to this week but you know I promised the wife I'd take her to see Grown Ups 2 on Friday night so um . . . catch you next time."