The Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort in Palm Harbor, Florida, plays host to this week’s Valspar Championship. This tournament routinely plays as one of the toughest non-Major events on the PGA Tour. Last season, only 17 golfers finished the tournament with a score under par. Charl Schwartzel defeated Bill Haas in a playoff to hoist the trophy in 2016. An interesting nugget from pgatour.com: Just three of the 16 defending champions of this event have finished in the top-10 the following year.
The closing three holes — known as the “Snake Pit” — will make things interesting for those sweating cuts on Friday and trying to win on Sunday. Speaking of sweating, no sweat is truly complete without the FantasyLabs Ownership Dashboard, where you can monitor your ownership compared to the field’s across several different tournaments and buy-in levels.
With birdies extremely tough to come by here, I’m looking for golfers who rate well in Scrambling (SC) and Greens In Regulation (GIR).
Let The Big Dogs Eat
Justified
Justin Thomas ($11,900) couldn’t finish the job last week after entering the final round with a one-shot lead over eventual champion Dustin Johnson, but he sets up well for a rebound here at Copperhead, where he has finished 18th and 10th in the past two years. Thomas’ 68.5 Course Adjusted Round Score is second among golfers who have made more than one start here.
Thomas’ 69.0 LT Adj RdScore and 14.9 LT Adj Bird Avg both rank sixth, his 302.5 yard LT Driving Distance is tied for 13th, and his 66.9 LT GIR percentage is very respectable in this week’s field. JT’s 8.3 percent odds to win are the second best in the field.
Thomas crushed his salary-based expectations (+20.7 Plus/Minus) here when his salary was just $7,000 but came up short last year when his price increased to $10,000. In fact, all players priced above $10,000 at this track have historically managed a Plus/Minus of +6.28, but nearly 70 percent of the 19 golfers have failed to exceed their salary-based expectations. Choose your high-value investments carefully at the Snake Pit.
W.T.F.H.
After Henrik Stenson ($11,700) withdrew from a no-cut event on Thursday of last week, approximately 33 percent of all DraftKings owners (and 42 percent of high-stakes owners) were mumbling something like “What the f*ck Henrik” before the sun rose on Friday. Keep in mind, the same things that made Henrik a top play last week — elite GIR skill and birdie-making abilities — make him a top play this week.
In fact, last week’s withdrawal makes him an even better play in guaranteed prize pools (GPPs), where his ownership is likely to see a significant dip with many of last week’s owners holding grudges. Allow me to remind you that just last June, Stenson withdrew from the U.S. Open after one round and promptly went on to win the BMW International Open the very next week, when he scored 122 DraftKings points and produced a mammoth +52.24 Plus/Minus.
Stenson’s 68.0 Long-Term Adjusted Round Score (LT Adj Rd Score), 75.2 percent LT GIR, and 17.1 LT Adjusted Birdies Per Tournament (Adj Bird Avg) all lead the field this week. Henrik has finished in fourth and 11th place here at Copperhead the past two years, and his 67.7 Course Adj Rd Score leads the field among golfers with more than one start at this track. Stenson’s current 9.1 percent odds to win the tournament are the best in the field.
The Bump and Run
Choke up and take a narrow stance.
Charles Howell III ($9,400): Howell’s 69.1 LT Adj Rd Score and 60.2 percent LT SC are both tied for ninth, and his 68.7 LT GIR percentage is tied for 23rd. Prior to a 52nd-place finish at the Honda Classic, Howell hadn’t placed outside the top-15 in four tournaments this year — his 68.2 Recent Adj Rd Score is second overall. CH3 has ripped off three straight top-15 finishes at Copperhead, including a fifth-place finish last year. He was the runner-up in 2009.
Bill Haas ($9,200): Haas’ 68.9 LT Adj Rd Score is tied for third, his 65.4 LT SC percentage is second, and his 68.2 LT GIR percentage ranks 32nd this week. Haas has finished outside of the top-20 just once in his last seven starts dating back to October of 2016, and his 68.3 Recent Adj Rd Score is tied for fourth. He lost in a playoff here last year.
Gary Woodland ($8,900): Woodland’s 68.9 LT Adj Rd Score is tied for third, his 69.2 percent LT GIR is 17th, and his 61.5 percent LT SC is tied for 15th. Woodland won here in 2011 and finished eighth in 2014. He has finished inside the top-five in two of his last three tournaments.
Graham DeLaet ($8,400): DeLaet has been playing well recently: He’s finished T9, T17, and 10th in his three most recent starts. He has also played very well at Copperhead with a fifth-, eighth-, and 17th-place finish in his last three starts at this track. DeLaet’s 69.4 Course Adj Rd Score ranks 12th among golfers with more than two starts here.
Steve Stricker ($7,400): Stricker has looked good in limited action this season: His 75.7 Recent GIR percentage ranks third and his 67.7 percent LT SC ranks sixth. Stricker has three top-10 finishes in his last three trips to Copperhead, including a seventh-place finish last year.
Nick Watney ($7,100): Watney’s 70.2 LT GIR percentage is ninth and his 66.1 Recent SC percentage is 13th. Watney has made the cut at Copperhead in seven straight attempts with four top-25 finishes during that time.
Martin Flores ($6,500): Flores has not been good here with three missed cuts in four attempts, but his game sets up nicely to surprise as a low-owned GPP flyer. His 72.2 percent LT GIR is third, his 61.3 percent LT SC is tied for 19th, and his 302.1 yard LT DD is tied for 15th in the field.
The Levitanimal
Adam Levitan created a course history model, which I’ve adjusted slightly. Jim Furyk ($7,200) is the model’s top golfer and this week’s Levitanimal. Furyk won here in 2010 and was a runner-up in 2012; he has finished in the top-20 in five of the past six years. Furyk’s 69.2 LT Adj Rd Score is tied for 14th, and his 68.1 percent LT GIR has historically kept him out of trouble around this difficult course.
Humpnostication Prognostication
Luke Donald ($7,800) has a win, two fourth-place finishes, and one sixth-place finish here since 2010, and he finished 22nd in this tournament last season. His 68.5 Course Adj Rd Score is the best score among players who have made more than two starts at Copperhead. Donald’s 63.0 percent LT SC percentage ranks fifth overall and will likely help him get around this course well again. Donald comes into this event with three top-30 finishes, and his 69.0 Recent Adj Rd Score is tied for 19th overall. Coors Lights on me.
If you’re into high-risk/high-reward #LocalNarratives, Lee McCoy ($7,300) — who placed fourth last year as an amateur — grew up playing Innisbrook and claims he has played the Copperhead over 1,000 times.
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Be sure to visit our suite of Tools to research all of the golfers. Good luck this week!
