For the fourth consecutive year, the PGA TOUR heads to Detroit Golf Club to play the Rocket Mortgage Classic.
A Donald Ross design, Detroit Golf Club is a 7,370-yard par 72. The course is extremely flat throughout and features Bentgrass greens. The front and back nines present quite differently, with the front being tree-lined and the back being a wide-open layout. The event will very likely be a low-scoring affair considering the course has offered little resistance in the first three editions of the tournament.
The Rocket Mortgage Classic will host 156 golfers this week, including Patrick Cantlay, Cameron Young, Max Homa, Will Zalatoris, Tony Finau, Sahith Theegala and Keegan Bradley.
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
Most of the holes on the back nine at Detroit Golf Club are wide open, which really favors the bombers. Big hitters in the mold of Bryson DeChambeau, Matthew Wolff, Joaquin Niemann and Cameron Davis have had plenty of success at the course.
- High-end target: Cameron Young— $10,100 (1st in Strokes Gained: Off The Tee)
- Mid-range target: Taylor Pendrith— $7,500 (8th in Strokes Gained: Off The Tee)
- Value target: Hayden Buckley— $6,900 (10th in Strokes Gained: Off The Tee)
Strokes Gained: Approach
Using approach in our statistics will be a good indicator of current form, as it almost always is. At a course where most golfers will be playing from the fairway, proximity to the hole will be the separator.
- High-end target: Max Homa— $9,900 (4th Strokes Gained: Approach)
- Mid-range target: Scott Stallings— $7,700 (1st Strokes Gained: Approach)
- Value target: Tyler Duncan— $6,900 (11th Strokes Gained: Approach)
Birdie or Better: Gained
The Rocket Mortgage Classic will be a birdie fest this year. Two of the three events here have eclipsed -20, and last year got close, but a windy round three kept it just below. It will take birdies in bunches — and potentially a few eagles — to win this event.
- High-end target: Cameron Young $10,100 (1st Birdie or Better: Gained)
- Mid-range target: Davis Riley— $8,600 (7th Birdie or Better: Gained)
- Value target: Stewart Cink— $7,100 (5th Birdie or Better: Gained)
Strokes Gained: Par 5
With four par 5’s on the course that all average under par, taking advantage of these easy holes will be a requirement to contend.
- High-end target: Patrick Cantlay— $10,700 (2nd Strokes Gained: Par 5)
- Mid-range target: Sahith Theegala— $8,700 (1st Strokes Gained: Par 5)
- Value target: Cameron Percy— $6,500 (4th Strokes Gained: Par 5)
Strokes Gained: Total Donald Ross Designs
Detroit Golf Club is a Donald Ross design. Many golfers who play Ross designs well do so on a regular basis.
- High-end target: Cameron Davis— $9,700 (17th Strokes Gained: Total Donald Ross Designs)
- Mid-range target: Kevin Kisner— $9,100 (2nd Strokes Gained: Total Donald Ross Designs)
- Value target: Rory Sabbatini— $6,600— (3rd Strokes Gained: Total Donald Ross Designs)
