What You Need To Know
This is the seventh edition of the RSM Classic played at Sea Island Golf Club on St. Simon’s Island. Kevin Kisner set the 18-hole record (260) here last year in his first PGA Tour win — a six-stroke victory.
All players will play one round on the Plantation Course either Thursday or Friday and three rounds — including both weekend rounds — on the Seaside Course. Both courses are short with easy-to-hit greens: They ranked inside the top-10 for both hit fairway percentage and Greens in Regulation (GIR) last season with percentages of 70 or higher in both categories.
Countless PGA Tour pros call St. Simon’s Island home, so many of the golfers will be playing on their home track. Boss of the #SeaIslandMafia Davis Love III came close to becoming the first hometown winner of the RSM with his fourth-place finish in 2012.
Accurate drivers have previously excelled here, and this event can turn into a putting contest with greens that are easier than average to hit. This week we’ll shake things up by ignoring GIR and favoring Driving Accuracy (DA) and Adjusted Birdies Per Tournament (Adj Bird Avg).
Driving Accuracy
High-Priced Tier: $9,000 and Higher
Jim Furyk — coming off a disappointing missed cut last week — leads the high-priced tier and is 10th in the field with a 68.2 percent Long-Term (LT) DA.
Furyk’s 68.8 LT Adjusted Round Score (Adj Rd Score) ranks second in the field, but he did not play well last week. Furyk does have excellent course history here: He finished third and T11 in his only two appearances in 2011 and 2012.
Furyk may be lightly owned thanks to his performance last week, making him an option in guaranteed prize pools.
Mid-Priced Tier: $7,000 to $8,900
Roberto Castro is 12th in the field and tops among the mid-priced tier with a 67.7 LT DA percentage. Castro’s 69.6 LT Adj Rd Score is tied for 10th, and his 13.4 LT Adj Bird Avg is tied for 15th.
Golfers in this price range with LT metrics comparable to Castro’s have historically generated a +3.42 Plus/Minus on DraftKings with 56.8 percent Consistency.
#SeaIslandMafia underboss Zach Johnson is 18th in the field with a 66.9 percent LT DA. Johnson’s 68.9 LT Adj Rd Score is third, his 14.1 Adj Bird Avg ranks sixth, and his 28.6 LT Putts Per Round — a large part of Kisner’s win last year — is fifth.
Johnson’s game should suit this track well, but he has some seriously shaky history here. He has missed the cut three of six times but also finished 12th and 16th. Fire him up as a boom-or-bust GPP option this week, just in case he’s already started his offseason vacation.
Value Tier: $6,900 and Lower
Zac Blair ranks eighth overall with a 69.3 percent LT DA percentage. He has the best Recent DA percentage (72.9 percent) in the field.
Blair finished 42nd last week, putting up 70.5 DK points, and he has admirable history at Sea Island: His 69.8 Course Adj Rd Score ranks 15th among golfers who have made more than one start here.
Value-tier golfers with similar metrics have manufactured a very healthy +8.73 Plus/Minus with 64.5 percent Consistency.
Course & Field Adjusted Birdies Per Tournament
High-Priced Tier: $9,000 and Higher
Yet another #SeaIslandMafia underboss, Matt Kuchar leads the high-priced tier and is tied for third in the field with a 14.8 LT Adj Bird Avg. Kuchar’s 68.5 LT Adj Rd Score is the best in the field, and he’s tied for second with Brandt Snedeker with 5.3 percent Odds to Win.
Kuchar has played in five of six tournaments here and has never finished worst than 25th. He is as close as it gets to a lock for a top-25 finish this week and has the consistency DFS players tend to seek for cash games.
Chris Kirk has the highest Odds to Win (6.7 percent) and as a result is the highest-priced golfer this week. His 20.0 Recent Adj Bird Avg is tied for fourth in the field.
Kirk has been on fire recently: He has three top-10 finishes in four Fall starts, including a T2 at the Sanderson Farms Championship. His 68.5 Recent Adj Rd score is tied for fourth.
Kirk won this event in 2013 and has an average finishing position of 7.6 in his last three starts at this tournament. Kirk is in excellent form and has extremely good recent results at this track. He’s in play for all formats.
Mid-Priced Tier: $7,000 to $8,900
Anirban Lahiri leads the field with a 21 Recent Adj Bird Avg, and his LT Adj Bird Avg of 14.3 ranks fifth overall. He also has top-15 Adj Rd Scores in both the LT (69.7) and Recent (69.2) time frames.
Lahiri has two top-three finishes in his last four tournaments, and he finished 28th at last week’s OHL Classic.
Mid-priced golfers with comparable Recent metrics have previously produced a +4.26 Plus/Minus with 59 percent Consistency.
Value Tier: $6,900 and Lower
Web.com graduate J.T. Poston leads the field with a 15.8 LT Adj Bird Avg, and his Recent Adj Bird Avg (14.5) — more indicative of his play on the PGA Tour — is 33rd overall.
Value-tier golfers with comparable Adj Bird Avgs have yielded a +4.30 Plus/Minus.
Poston has held his own on the PGA Tour, making the cut in three of his four Fall events this season and finishing as high as 29th. Poston is a member of Sea Island Golf Club and makes for a very intriguing GPP play this week.
Good luck on the links!
