Fantasy Golf: Dell Technologies Championship

In the interest of full disclosure, I feel compelled to mention that the DraftKings account of the guy making these picks has been drained down to $3 over the past six weeks. Don't worry FGW, I withdrew and banked most of the big score I had in 2015 which has since been spent on Chick-fil-A, coffee and Cliff Bars because they're healthy right? (No? But what about the mountain climber on the wrapper?). We'll see how long my account keeps a pulse while maintaining a $3 balance and never playing because 2017 cannot end fast enough for the Fantasy Golf Report.    

Unfortunately, however, I made a commitment to myself and my small but loyal following that I would continue to crank-out picks this season even if it has become more painful than watching HGTV with the aforementioned FGW and being repeatedly told that "we could do that" when I know that (a) "we" most definitely could not do that and, more importantly, (B) I don't want to fucking do that. So this week's picks are a few lines down and all I will say in their support is that I spent less time researching them than I did the picture next to them. As always, you're welcome. 

The One and Done Pick: Who Gives a Shit?*

Not even I could fuck this up.

Ten DraftKings Picks to Avoid Like Ebola   

Rory McIlroy	$9,800
Rickie Fowler	$9,700
Paul Casey	$8,900
Patrick Reed	$8,500
Webb Simpson	$8,200
Jason Dufner	$7,800
Brian Harman	$7,400
Patrick Cantlay	$7,200
Jhonattan Vegas	$7,000
James Hahn	$6,700

Footnote

* I'm actually going with Kevin Chappell this week because he's about the best I've got left. Also, I kind of like my ten picks but lately I've been the cooler.

Email the Fantasy Golf Report at fgr@fantasygolfreport.com. 

Fantasy Golf: The Northern Trust Preview

Traditionally this is the time of year when the Fantasy Golf Report puts-out a full blown FedEx Cup playoff preview where we futilely try to predict which players will finish in the top thirty. (Let me guess, you're not doing that this year). Correct! Unfortunately all of that research and writing time has been clipped by other worthy distractions. For example:

On Sunday, I spent several hours watching arguably the most clutch three hole stretch of golf in the history of the game. In case you missed it, Clemson's 19 year old Doc Redman (yes, a 19 year old named "Doc") won the U.S. Amateur after being two down with two to play by making a 60 foot bomb for eagle on the 35th hole, sticking his approach on the 36th for a winning birdie and then taking the title with a conceded birdie on the 37th hole. His opponent, Doug Ghim, just checked-in to the Matt Kuchar Clinic for the What the Fuck Just Happened.

At least I'm in good
company. Or something.

On Monday, I watched the sun get blocked-out of the sky so that was cool and of course I initially glanced at it without the glasses because the lesson as always is that I'm an idiot. I did it because, when I walked outside, I wasn't exactly sure where it was so I took a peak. In my defense, next to your keys and a parking spot at the mall on Black Friday, a giant fireball in the sky may be the hardest thing to find.    

(GAME OF THRONES SPOILER ALERT!) And finally, on Monday night, I watched about a thousand zombies pull a dead dragon out of a lake in what will absolutely go down as one of the most seminal moments in television history. Anytime you can create a fantasy show that causes a 48 year old man to lean forward on the couch and exclaim, "Oh my God now he's got a fucking dragon!", you've accomplished something. (Not sure what but something). The only question now is whether that thing will breathe fire or ice. It's gotta be ice right?

So it's been a big week for the FGR and this was all on the heels of a trip that saw me play 92 holes in 52 hours on one of the best golf courses I've ever played. And the "ambience" of eight guys in a cottage sitting around eating steak in their underwear only adds to the experience as I'm sure you can imagine. (You're welcome ladies). 

Suffice it to say that I am toast but maybe that's the mindset I need to finally get some picks right. At least that's what I'm telling myself. For what they're worth, here they are. Obviously slim pickings left for my one and done pick. 

The One and Done Pick: Jason Dufner

We miss you Amanda.

The DraftKings All Value Team

Justin Thomas	$9,400
Brooks Koepka	$9,100
Matt Kuchar	$8,700
Patrick Reed	$8,600
Kevin Kisner	$8,000
Kevin Chappell	$7,700
Jason Dufner	$7,600
Brian Harman	$7,000
Bud Cauley	$6,900
Danny Lee	$6,800

Email the Fantasy Golf Report at fgr@fantasygolfreport.com. 

Fantasy Golf: The Wyndham Preview

It's Tuesday. It's raining. It's like 250 days until the Masters. The last major of the year is over. I had Justin Thomas available last week. I thought about picking him. It came down to him and Thomas Pieters. I picked Pieters. He missed the cut. Thomas won. Fuck.

Now I've got to pick-up the pieces and rally for the FedEx Cup but, before I even try to generate that modicum of motivation, we've got to wade into the Wyndham Championship where good players like Bill Haas, Brandt Snedeker and Webb Simpson always play well but random players like Si Woo Kim, Camilo Villegas and Davis Love, III circa 2015 always seem to win. At least they do recently.

I was kind of big deal
around here in 2010.

You have to go back to 2011 through 2013 to get a run of quality winners at the Wyndham Championship when Simpson, Patrick Reed* and Sergio Garcia went back-to-back-to-back. Before them, Arjun Freakin' Atwal shocked everyone when he rolled into town with one top ten in his previous sixty-three events, won the tournament, and then carried that momentum to three top tens over the next seven years. Let's hope that he didn't invest all of those 2010 winnings in BlackBerry, Blockbuster or the Opti-Grab.

It's time for the Wyndham to take a baby step back towards its illustrious ways of 2011-13 and put Bud Cauley in the winner's circle. Bud's been solid since April and he just had a very respectable 33rd place finish at Quail Hollow. Bud finished tied for 10th here last year and he took 3rd back in 2012 when he was one of the best young players in the game. Bud is the pick this week for all of those reasons but, more than anything, he's the pick because I like saying "Bud." Bud Fox, Bud Grant, Bud Light . . . the list goes on. If you don't like Bud, then hey Bud, what's your problem? . . . Bud.

But not Bud Light Lime!!! That swill is
for squash players and sorority pledges.

The One and Done Pick: Bud Cauley

The Arjun Atwal Pick: Hunter Mahan

The DraftKings All Value Top Ten

Bill Haas	$10,200
Webb Simpson	$10,000
Keegan Bradley	$9,500
Bud Cauley	$9,200
Lucas Glover	$8,400
Robert Streb	$7,700
Richy Werenski	$7,400
Daniel Summerhays	$7,100
Tyrone van Aswegen	$7,100
Ryan Blaum	$6,900

Footnote

* Among the ways I like to ruin my golf watching experience is to participate in a season long league where you buy six players at auction to start the year and then you're stuck with them for the most part except for the dregs who people drop and add week to week (this year's most recycled players seemed to be Tommy Fleetwood and Danny Lee). I was smart enough to spend a chunk of my cap on Jordan Spieth and then dumb enough to spend a smaller chunk on Patrick Reed. This led me to Sunday where I needed him to do exactly what he did to win me some cash. The whole rooting experience made me feel dirty and led me to tweet the following (self-promotion time): 

Having a financial stake in Patrick Reed is like investing in a company that makes asbestos toys. #PGAChamp

— J.S. Elliott (@FantasyGolfRep) August 13, 2017

Email the Fantasy Golf Report at fgr@fantasygolfreport.com.

Fantasy Golf: The PGA Championship Preview

There's a been a lot of chatter lately about who will be the next player to complete the career Grand Slam (who or whom? whom the fuck knows?). Thanks to his win at Royal Birkdale, Jordan Spieth has put himself in position to do it this week. Standing in his way, however, may be the toughest gauntlet anyone has ever had to run to take down a major. (That's right. I said it. Cue the cries of protest "BUT HAGAN, SARAZEN AND JONES . . . BUT THE BIG THREE . . . BUT TIGER . . . BUT BUT BUT . . ."). But nothing. 

Check-out the current golf landscape. There are seventeen major winners ranked in the top sixty-four who could win another one at any given moment . . . or at least any given moment that coincides with the final day of a major. That number would be eighteen if you included Danny Willett, however, he's currently starring in the Ian Baker-Finch documentary and we're getting to the part where he considers becoming a full time broadcaster. Or at least he should be.

Might be time to slap a
CBS logo on that blazer.

There are also eight or nine players in the top twenty who would surprise absolutely no one if they won their first major this week led by Hideki Matsuyama, Rickie Fowler and Jon Rahm. That means that to win one of these things, you not only have to play crazy great golf, you also have to hope that someone doesn't pull a Henrik Stenson at Muirfield or a Spieth at Royal Birkdale and beat you on your best day. The problem now is that there are about twenty-five guys who can pull that off and that's assuming we don't run into a Shaun Micheel/Rich Beem type situation which would suck considering the top level talent at our disposal.   

The guy getting way too much love this week (the "GGWTMLTW") is Rory McIlroy who has finally started showing signs of life after changing everything but his gender. And he really digs this year's venue to boot. Although Spieth gets the first crack at closing-out the career Grand Slam, current odds would indicate that Rory is going to beat him to it. They'll be playing at Quail Hollow Club in North Carolina (hold off on that gender change Rory), the site of the annual Wells Fargo Championship and the last five times Rory has teed it up on this track he's gone, T4th, Win, T8th, T10th and T2nd. Oh yeah, the year he won, he shot a 61 in the third round and then coasted to a seven shot victory. This is why every "respectable" golf ranking resource from PGATour.com to CBS Sports is picking him. Also, because they have no imagination.

Well apparently neither do I because you'd be a fool not to make Rory a key part of your wagering plan. The same goes for Hideki Matsuyama and Rickie Fowler, one of whom should be the next first-time major winner now that Matt Kuchar went and got the British Open swiped-out from under him. Beyond those three guys and the man playing arguably the best golf on the planet (Brooks Koepka) there is a bunch of value in the DraftKings $7,000 - $7,500 range. Out of about a dozen viable candidates at that price, I'm going with Thomas Pieters (bomber who can putt), Kevin Kisner (all-around stud), Lucas Glover (dark horse who has won at Quail Hollow), Xander Schauffele (best young player named after a brunch buffet item) and Zach Johnson (because Zach Johnson at $6,800 and $99 flat screen T.V.'s are going to get someone killed in a Black Friday stampede at Walmart). 

And then there's Phil Mickelson. Here's what we learned at last year's British Open. Don't fuck with forgotten Phil and forgotten Phil is the guy who will be teeing it up this week. He hasn't won since the 2013 British Open and he's coming off a missed cut at Royal Birkdale, a DNP at the U.S. Open and a non-factor T22nd at the Masters so you know he's feeling left-out. But here's why you really have to like him to add some flavor on Sunday. He's got five top five finishes at Quail Hollow since 2009. FIVE! And his three other finishes during that stretch are T9th, T11th and T26th. Suffice it to say, he's comfortable with the layout. So keep Phil in the mix this week if for no other reason than he will relish sticking it to you if you don't.         

The One and Done Pick: Thomas Pieters

We've tried everything but a Belgian
this year and Pieters fits with the brunch
theme because you know . . . waffles.

The DraftKings Top Ten Values

Rory McIlroy	$11,800
Rickie Fowler	$10,700
Hideki Matsuyama	$10,500
Brooks Koepka	$9,200
Phil Mickelson	$8,500
Thomas Pieters	$7,500
Kevin Kisner	$7,000
Lucas Glover	$7,000
Xander Schauffele	$7,000
Zach Johnson	$6,800

Email the Fantasy Golf Report at fgr@fantasygolfreport.com. 

Fantasy Golf: The Bridgestone Preview

Lame ass Wednesday afternoon tournament previews are what happen you when kick-off your week by taking an Uber home on Monday night. Kind of starts a domino effect of non-productivity but hey, at least it followed a nice win that advanced me and my partner to the Elite Eight of a six month match-play event. (Go ahead, ask me how I played. I played great. Thanks for asking).

Out of necessity, we're going with a fairly simple approach this week based on our read that all of the big names are currently flawed except for Jordan Spieth and Brooks Koepka. Meanwhile, there's a ton of value in the field's lower mid-section with guys like Kevin Chappell, Kevin Kisner and Jimmy Walker who finally appears to be healthy and is way undervalued. If you're looking for a one and done pick and, like me, you've already wasted all of the top talent elsewhere, take a hard look at Rafa Cabrera-Bello and Charl Schwartzel. Then again, the way I'm going this year, I just doomed them to missing the cut in a no-cut event so maybe take a hard look and the pick someone else.

The One and Done Pick: Charl Schwartzel 

A picture for every occasion.

The DraftKings Top Ten Value Picks

Jordan Spieth	$12,000
Brooks Koepka	$11,100
Justin Rose	$9,900
Adam Scott	$8,800
Rafa Cabrera-Bello	$7,900
Lee Westwood	$7,700
Kevin Chappell	$7,500
Charl Schwartzel	$7,200
Kevin Kisner	$7,100
Jimmy Walker	$6,500

Email the Fantasy Golf Report at fgr@fantasygolfreport.com.