GOLF

PGA DFS: Top Cash Game Picks for Shriners Children’s Open

By Landon Silinsky @landonjake24
Oct 5, 2022

The PGA DFS Breakdown offers data-driven analysis for each week’s slate, using the FantasyLabs Tools and metrics to highlight notable golfers.

The TOUR heads to Las Vegas, Nevada this week for the third event of the 2022-23 season, as the TPC Summerlin hosts the Shriners Children’s Open. The course is a par 71, measuring 7,255 yards with bentgrass greens.

I’ll be highlighting the best cash game/single-entry plays on the DraftKings main slate, but these players are often great options in any contest.

My analysis will frequently 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.

There are a variety of Strokes Gained-related metrics, but the six main categories you need to know include:

Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee (SG: Off-the-Tee)
Strokes Gained: Approach (SG: Approach)
Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green (SG: Around-the-Green)
Strokes Gained: Putting (SG: Putting)
Strokes Gained: Ball-Striking (SG: Ball-Striking), which is SG: Off-the-Tee + SG: Approach
Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green (SG: Tee-to-Green), which is SG: Ball-Striking + SG: Around-the-Green

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 great for finding the best price-considered plays for cash games.

And don’t forget to utilize our various PGA DFS tools like our Lineup Optimizer, Lineup Builder, PGA Correlation Dashboard, and our Trends tool.

The following players listed are based on DraftKings scoring and pricing.

PGA DFS Core Picks

Patrick Cantlay ($11,100 DraftKings)

Play Patrick Cantlay at Cantlay courses, there isn’t really much more to say than that. He dominates at Memorial, Harbour Town, the Amex, and obviously here at TPC Summerlin. This will be his fifth career start at the Shriners, with his previous four resulting in a win, T2, T2, and most recently a T8 in 2020.

He averages 2.86 Total Strokes Gained per round at this course, .4 strokes more than the next closest guy (Sungjae Im). This will be Cantlay’s first start of the new season, but he ended the 2021-22 season quite strong, winning the BMW and then finishing T7 at the TOUR Championship.

Being from the west coast, we know Cantlay loves playing desert golf, and he’s head and shoulders the top play on this slate. He is not cheap, but there is no one who offers the floor/ceiling combination that he does.

Play the man.

Sungjae Im ($10,400 DraftKings)

I am keeping it simple this week with the field being so top-heavy. It is 100% feasible to start your cash game rosters with both Cantlay and the defending champion Mr. Im. Once you drop from the $10,000 range this week, the talent gap in golfers really takes a nose dive, which is why I like stacking the two best players in the field.

Im has been playing some of the best golf of his career of late, having posted three runner-up finishes across his past five starts. His history at TPC Summerlin is strong as well, making the cut in all three of his starts while posting a T13 and T15 in addition to the win. Max Homa could have been included in this spot, but his history at this course is egregious, so we will go with the defending champ instead.

Brian Harman ($8,900 DraftKings)

If you prefer not to spend all the way up in two spots, you could always drop to Harman as your second golfer, as he’s one of the more steady players in the field this week. He’s also played this course a bunch of times in his career while posting three top-18 finishes over his past four starts. There are a lot of ways to score at TPC Summerlin, but having an elite putter is at the top of the list, and Harman ranks behind only Brendon Todd, Patton Kizzire, and Rickie Fowler in terms of SG: Putting per round at this course.

Harman also played great down the stretch of last season, including a T6 at The Open Championship and a T3 at the FedEx St. Jude.

He is as rock solid as it gets this week.

PGA DFS Value Picks

Thomas Detry ($7,900 DraftKings)

Detry has been dominating the Fall Swing thus far, having finished T12 at the Fortinet before last week’s T9 at the Sanderson Farms. Over this stretch, he ranks seventh in this field in both SG: Tee-to-Green and Total Strokes Gained and 22nd in SG: Ball-Striking.

For some reason, DraftKings dropped him to $7,900 for whatever reason, so we are getting a nice discount here on one of the hottest players in the field.

Matt Kuchar ($7,500 DraftKings)

I am reluctantly going back to Kuchar this week after he’s shown some signs of life of late. He closed last season with a T35 at the BMW before opening the Fall swing with a T12 at the Fortinet two weeks ago. He gained strokes off the tee in all four rounds in Napa while gaining 5.4 on approach the first two rounds before falling off a bit over the weekend.

In three career starts at the Shriners, he’s yet to miss a cut while posting back-to-back top-35 finishes each of the past two years. We know Kuch can roll the rock, and he actually presents some sneaky upside in this spot at a very reasonable price.

Matthew NeSmith ($7,600 DraftKings)

NeSmith has some of the best course history in this field, posting a pair of top-18 finishes sandwiched around a T8 in 2020. He ranks third in SG: Total per round at this course behind Patrick Cantlay and Sungjae Im (of anyone with more than one start).

He’s coming off a great finish last week at the Sanderson Farms, where he finished T9 after shooting a final round 64. NeSmith ranks 25th in this field in SG: Ball-Striking over his past 48 rounds. He is a strong bet to make the cut this week and is very reasonably priced at just $7,500.

Joel Dahmen ($7,100 DraftKings)

Dahmen finally played well last week after missing four of his previous five cuts. He finished T13 at the Sanderson Farms and gained over 2.4 strokes tee-to-green on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Dahmen decided to show some signs of life just in time, as he’s got great course history at TPC Summerlin, having made four consecutive cuts with a pair of top-24 finishes.

If you are going to be playing the studs at the top of the board this week, you’re going to need some value in this range, and Dahmen should absolutely play well enough to pay off this salary at a course he likes.

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