The golf world was treated to an all-time major championship as Cameron Smith won the 150th Open Championship at St. Andrews. This week, the PGA TOUR heads to TPC Twin Cities to play the 3M Open for the fourth consecutive year.
An Arnold Palmer design, TPC Twin Cities is a 7,431-yard, par-71. The course is extremely flat throughout and features Bentgrass greens. The fairways are more accessible than the TOUR average, but 13 of the 18 holes have water hazards in play.
The 3M Open will host 156 golfers this week, with the top 65 players and ties making the weekend. Some notable golfers making the trip to Minnesota include Hideki Matsuyama, Jason Day, Tony Finau, Sungjae Im, and Davis Riley.
For contests on DraftKings, I will be breaking down the key stats (past 24 rounds) and selecting golfers from different price tiers to provide flexibility for a DFS lineup.
And if you missed it, we added two new metrics in our models — Perfect% and SimLeverage. You can find an explainer on those metrics here.
The cliff notes version is that you can use SimLeverage to quickly find leverage plays in tournaments, while Perfect% is excellent for finding the best price-considered plays for cash games.
For large-field tournaments, you can utilize our Lineup Optimizer to effortlessly create up to 150 lineups, or use our Lineup Builder if you like to hand-build your lineups.
This analysis may reference Strokes Gained, a set of proprietary metrics generated by the PGA TOUR using millions of data points to calculate how many shots, on average, it takes a player to get the ball in the hole from every distance and situation.
Strokes Gained is now available in the FantasyLabs PGA Models.
Strokes Gained: Off The Tee
In 2019, we saw two of the longest drivers in the game — Matthew Wolff and Bryson DeChambeau — go at it down the stretch at TPC Twin Cities, showing that distance is a significant factor. Last year, one of the longest hitters in the game, Cameron Champ, hoisted the trophy. With plenty of hazards in play, a total off the tee game will be paramount.
- High-end target: Cameron Davis— $8,900 (12th in Strokes Gained: Off The Tee)
- Mid-range target: Brendan Steele— $8,300 (1st in Strokes Gained: Off The Tee)
- Value target: Hayden Buckley— $7,100 (7th in Strokes Gained: Off The Tee)
Strokes Gained: Approach
In 2020, ball strikers were all over the leaderboard at TPC Twin Cities. The 3M open will require sharp iron play, as evidenced by Michael Thompson‘s +7.4 strokes gained on approach in his victory.
- High-end target: Tony Finau— $10,500 (5th Strokes Gained: Approach)
- Mid-range target: Brendan Steele— $8,300 (2nd Strokes Gained: Approach)
- Value target: Tyler Duncan— $7,100 (7th Strokes Gained: Approach)
Birdie or Better: Gained
The green in regulation percentage at TPC Twin Cities is much higher than the TOUR average. Making par isn’t going to be enough to get it done at the 3M Open. I expect ball strikers and birdie makers to hold a large share of the win equity this week.
- High-end target: Cameron Davis $8,900 (6th Birdie or Better: Gained)
- Mid-range target: Nick Hardy— $8,000 (3rd Birdie or Better: Gained)
- Value target: Justin Lower— $6,900 (15th Birdie or Better: Gained)
Par 4: 450-500
The most common par-4 distance on the course will be from 450-500. Golfers who play these holes well should be able to separate themselves on the leaderboard in Minnesota.
- High-end target: Tony Finau— $10,500 (1st Par 4: 450-500)
- Mid-range target: Troy Merritt— $7,400 (9th Par 4: 450-500)
- Value target: James Hahn— $7,000 (2nd Par 4: 450-500)
Opportunities Gained
Opportunities gained is similar to birdie or better but doesn’t include whether or not the golfer converted the putt for birdie. Thompson had a great putting week in 2020, gaining 7.3 strokes with the flat stick. Champ got the putter rolling as well, gaining 8.5 strokes putting on his way to victory. Louis Oosthuizen came in second and gained less than a stroke putting. 2019 was similar as Wolff and Morikawa both gained less than 1.0 stroke putting that week.
Golfers will need to give themselves as many birdie putts as possible to get into contention.
- High-end target: Tony Finau— $10,500 (5th Opportunities Gained)
- Mid-range target: Brendan Steele— $8,300 (3rd Opportunities Gained)
- Value target: Vaughn Taylor— $6,600— (7th Opportunities Gained)
