Fantasy Golf: The PGA Championship Preview

The PGA Championship returns to Quail Hollow Club for the second time in nine years which could lead one to believe that the owners of that joint have something on someone. The golf course's only credentials appear to be: (1) Hosting the Wells Fargo Championship which is the golf tournament equivalent of a beige Volvo, (2) being ranked the 7th best course in the state of North Carolina, and (3) hosting a Presidents Cup in 2022 so unremarkable that even those in attendance cannot remember with any certainty whether it actually happened.    

Not to belabor the point but that's what we do around here. Obviously the PGA Championship doesn't have the gravitas of the U.S. Open and the access to elite courses that comes with it but Quail Hollow twice in less than ten years? It starts to make sense when you consider the same visionaries who brought it back here have also scheduled just one tournament on the West Coast since 1998 while playing three complete snoozers at Oak Hill since 2003. It's like the PGA of America is too lazy to find a new restaurant and Quail Hollow is Applebee's.    

The lameness of the course notwithstanding, we still have the best field in golf and any time the defectors return to play four rounds of completive golf while wearing pants, it's a good thing. Who knows? Maybe the chef will get adventurous, throw some extra salt into the mozzarella sticks and we'll get the good kind of heartstopper like we had at Augusta and not the kind that finds you staring-up at a stoned busboy hoping he knows CPR. Let's proceed before it gets weird. (Too late).  

GOLF ANALYSIS

There are only two premises you could pitch me to justify not picking Rory McIlroy at the height of his game on a rain-soaked course where he's won four times: 

(1) Scottie Scheffler's "A" game is that much higher than Rory's to the point where he can beat him at his own game on the course he essentially owns; or 

(2) We're due for a ripple in the matrix after a current major championship run of Brooks Koepka, Scottie Scheffler, Bryson DeChambeau, Xander Schauffele, Xander Schauffele (again) and Rory McIlroy. 

To put that into some kind of perspective, the last time there were fewer than two first-time major winners in a season was 2014 and now we've only had one since Brian Harman at the 2023 British Open. We've stumbled into a golden age of golf and I fucking love it. 

I'm sticking with my preseason pick of Rory but Scottie scares me in a teardrop tattoo and "maybe he really did try to run over that cop on purpose" kind of way. Outside of those two, it's looking very chalky here at the FGR with defending champion Xander Schauffele and Justin Thomas who won it here in 2017 as the other prominent picks. And speaking of chalky, Corey Conners will remain a top ten fixture on this site until he stops racking them up.   

As far as potential first-time major winners this week go, I'm not seeing many. We know that will change eventually but the two best current candidates are Ludvig Aberg and Viktor Hovland who aren't playing that great. Then you have the usual suspects like Patrick Cantlay, Joaquin Niemann and Tyrrell Hatton who've played a combined fifty-eight majors since the start of 2020 and posted a grand total of four top tens. I'd be less surprised to see a ballsy player like Si Woo Kim or Robert MacIntyre pull off the upset.   

The doomsday scenario would be a LIV player winning and the absolutely apocalyptic scenario would be Patrick Reed moving closer to the career Grand Slam than Scottie Scheffler. Oh my god that's going to happen isn't it? Let's just quietly get to the next paragraph. No sudden movements. Maybe he didn't hear us.  

It is the PGA Championship so you know we're going to get a couple guys from the bottom half of that chart down below making a run and there are a lot of strong candidates from Harris English all the way down to Seamus Power. We like Denny McCarthy because we always like Denny McCarthy even as he rarely returns our affection, however, we really like Bud Cauley who has barely letup since his stellar showing at the Players. We even made a new top thirty line for him with a special color. Don't judge.   

Place	Player	Odds
Winner	Justin Thomas	+2200
Top 5	Tyrrell Hatton	+700
Top 10	Corey Conners	+450
Top 10	Patrick Reed	+500
Top 20	Denny McCarthy	+330
Top 30	Bud Cauley	+255

One and Done Pick: Rory McIlroy

The reality we won't let ourselves
consider or accept is that Rory
may absolutely run away with it.

Other Guy I'd Pick: Justin Thomas 

Sleeper Pick: Denny McCarthy

DraftKings Top Ten Values

Rory McIlroy	$12,200
Xander Schauffele	$10,700
Justin Thomas	$9,900
Tyrrell Hatton	$9,000
Corey Conners	$8,300
Patrick Reed	$8,100
Sam Burns	$7,700
Davis Thompson	$7,300
Denny McCarthy	$6,700
Bud Cauley	$6,200

Email the Fantasy Golf Report here.

It's not a true Historical Performance Chart this week because the course has gone through some changes and will be setup differently than a regular tour event but we'd already done most of the research so . . . 

THE GOOD ENOUGH FOR QUAIL HOLLOW

HISTORICAL PERFORMANCE CHART

Among those "also getting votes" this week were Tommy Fleetwood, Sungjae Im and Sepp Straka but I had to make room for a couple of LIV players on the top ten list. Trying to do my part to avoid jinxing the whole experience for everyone.

	DK Price	2024	2023	2021	2019	2018
Scottie Scheffler	$13,400	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Rory McIlroy	$12,200	1st	T47	1st	T8	T16
Bryson DeChambeau	$11,500	DNP	DNP	T9	DNP	4th
Ludvig Aberg	$10,800	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Xander Schauffele	$10,700	2nd	2nd	T14	DNP	T2
Collin Morikawa	$10,400	T16	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Jon Rahm	$10,200	DNP	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP
Justin Thomas	$9,900	T21	T14	T26	DNP	T21
Viktor Hovland	$9,800	T24	T43	T3	DNP	DNP
Brooks Koepka	$9,700	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	T42
Joaquim Niemann	$9,600	DNP	DNP	T18	T38	MC
Patrick Cantlay	$9,500	T29	T21	MC	DNP	DNP
Hideki Matsuyama	$9,400	DNP	DNP	DNP	T31	T76
Jordan Spieth	$9,300	T29	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Shane Lowry	$9,200	T47	MC	T65	DNP	T34
Tommy Fleetwood	$9,100	T13	T5	T14	DNP	MC
Tyrrell Hatton	$9,000	DNP	T3	DNP	DNP	T42
Russell Henley	$8,900	T10	DNP	T72	MC	MC
Jason Day	$8,800	T4	MC	MC	T24	1st
Will Zalatoris	$8,700	T60	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP
Min Woo Lee	$8,600	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Wyndham Clark	$8,500	T47	1st	T43	MC	DNP
Cameron Smith	$8,400	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Corey Conners	$8,300	T13	T8	T43	DNP	T42
Sungjae Im	$8,200	T4	T8	MC	T31	DNP
Patrick Reed	$8,100	DNP	DNP	T6	T28	8th
Sepp Straka	$8,000	T8	DNP	T54	MC	DNP
Justin Rose	$8,000	T52	DNP	DNP	3rd	DNP
Sahith Theegala	$7,900	T52	T56	DNP	DNP	DNP
Daniel Berger	$7,900	DNP	DNP	DNP	T54	T55
Ryan Fox	$7,900	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Tom Kim	$7,800	T47	T23	DNP	DNP	DNP
Maverick McNealy	$7,800	DNP	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP
Si Woo Kim	$7,700	T16	T43	DNP	DNP	DNP
Sam Burns	$7,700	T13	MC	DNP	DNP	T55
Max Homa	$7,600	T8	T8	MC	1st	DNP
Dustin Johnson	$7,600	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Matt Fitzpatrick	$7,500	T52	T35	DNP	DNP	DNP
Robert MacIntyre	$7,500	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Brian Harman	$7,400	T47	MC	T18	T24	74th
Tony Finau	$7,400	T52	T23	MC	T60	T21
Akshay Bhatia	$7,300	42nd	T43	MC	DNP	DNP
Davis Thompson	$7,300	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Byeong Hun An	$7,200	3rd	MC	MC	W/D	T63
Keegan Bradley	$7,200	T21	T35	T18	MC	T76
Cameron Young	$7,100	T34	T59	DNP	DNP	DNP
Rickie Fowler	$7,100	T43	T14	MC	T4	T21
Sergio Garcia	$7,000	DNP	DNP	DNP	T4	DNP
Thomas Detry	$7,000	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Adam Scott	$6,900	T29	T5	DNP	DNP	T76
Dean Burmester	$6,900	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Harris English	$6,800	T34	T3	T43	T54	DNP
Aaron Rai	$6,800	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Taylor Pendrith	$6,700	T10	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Denny McCarthy	$6,700	T6	T8	MC	DNP	MC
Alex Noren	$6,600	T24	MC	DNP	DNP	MC
Andrew Novak	$6,600	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Rasmus Hojgaard	$6,600	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Stephan Jaeger	$6,500	T21	T27	DNP	MC	MC
Nicolai Hojgaard	$6,500	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
J.T. Poston	$6,400	T60	MC	T26	MC	DNP
J.J. Spaun	$6,400	DNP	T27	T18	DNP	DNP
Jake Knapp	$6,300	T58	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Cam Davis	$6,300	T38	T59	T26	MC	DNP
Kurt Kitayama	$6,200	T34	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Keith Mitchell	$6,200	DNP	T59	T3	T8	T34
Bud Cauley	$6,200	DNP	DNP	DNP	T24	T67
C. Bezuidenhout	$6,100	T16	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Davis Riley	$6,100	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Nick Taylor	$6,000	T43	DNP	T26	T54	MC
Jacob Bridgeman	$6,000	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Tom Hoge	$5,900	T38	DNP	MC	T65	T76
Lucas Glover	$5,900	T16	MC	MC	T31	MC
Austin Eckroat	$5,900	63rd	T64	DNP	DNP	DNP
Gary Woodland	$5,800	T38	T14	5th	W/D	MC
Chris Kirk	$5,700	T43	T56	DNP	DNP	DNP
Taylor Moore	$5,700	T38	T27	DNP	DNP	DNP
Nick Dunlap	$5,700	T24	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Ben Griffin	$5,700	DNP	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Eric Cole	$5,700	68th	MC	DNP	DNP	DNP
Matthieu Pavon	$5,600	67th	DNP	DNP	DNP	DNP
Seamus Power	$5,600	T16	T18	T54	T13	T27
Mackenzie Hughes	$5,600	T6	MC	MC	MC	T59
Adam Hadwin	$5,500	T52	MC	MC	T38	T16
Phil Mickelson	$5,400	DNP	DNP	69th	MC	T5