The PGA TOUR continues its Fall Swing with a trip to Las Vegas for this year’s Shriners Children’s Open. Last week’s Sanderson Farms Championship was packed with plenty of drama and plot twists throughout the weekend with Mackenzie Hughes ultimately claiming his second career PGA TOUR win by edging out Sepp Straka in a playoff.
Like last week’s event at The Country Club of Jackson, this week’s tournament should feature plenty of extremely low scores. In fact, this week’s course, TPC Summerlin, usually ranks among the easiest relative to par of all the par-71 tracks on the PGA TOUR. Last year’s winner Sungjae Im ($10,400) fired a Final-Round 62 to finish 24-under par, four strokes ahead of Matthew Wolff. The winner has gotten to at least 20-under in 10 of the past 12 years.
TPC Summerlin sets up plenty of birdie and chances for players, so it’s important to focus on players who are ready to be aggressive and convert those par-breakers. It’s also important to target players who excel on easier courses relative to par. Due to the altitude and course setup, driving distance is not a requirement to contend in Vegas, and the course also typically is set up with manageable rough so players who are inaccurate off the tee still have a chance to recover. There are three par-5’s and all are very accessible for eagles for almost all players. With so many chances to “go low,” fantasy golf scores are typically very high at this event.
The event typically draws a pretty solid field, and this week continues that trend. Patrick Cantlay ($11,100) and Max Homa ($10,600) join defending champion Im to give the event three players in the top 10 of the Official World Golf Rankings. Tom Kim ($9,700) is playing his first tournament since stepping into a much bigger public spotlight at the President’s Cup, and Taylor Montgomery ($9,500) will be looking for his first PGA win near where he went to school at UNLV. The field also includes many of the recent graduates to the PGA TOUR from the Korn Ferry Tour, as the Fall Swing is a great chance for those new members to adjust and excel before taking a break for the holidays.
In this weekly post, we’ll be focused on players who make strong plays for GPP contests. One example is the DraftKings $300 K Pitch + Putt which pays out $100K to the winner. In larger contests like this one, it is critical to try and target players who have a chance to outperform salary expectations.
Using players with lower ownership projections and high ceilings can give your lineup plenty of leverage opportunities and a better shot to take down the top prizes. The players highlighted will be good options if they deliver in all formats, but they typically aren’t the safest plays, which should be the focus of lineups in cash and double-up contests where finishing in the very top spot isn’t quite as important.
To help pinpoint the top options for all formats each week, be sure to use the FantasyLabs PGA Models, which use stats and simulations to highlight different players’ strengths and weaknesses. A couple of key new stats to specifically use for GPP play are Perfect% and SimLeverage, which are further explained here.
For the most part, I prefer the Stroked Gained Model, which is very predictive of results. I also tend to lean into players that gain shots on approach since week-to-week putting performance is volatile.
As you dig into the numbers, you can enjoy the many tools that FantasyLabs offers, including the Lineup Optimizer which effortlessly create up to 150 lineups. Alternatively, you can use the Lineup Builder if you prefer a more hands-on approach.
It should be a fun week in the desert with plenty of eye candy at the beautiful TPC Summerlin with some great fantasy golf to enjoy.
Check out my top picks in each price range listed below.
High-Priced PGA DFS Picks
Aaron Wise $9,900
The top two golfers by almost every measurement are also the two most expensive options in Cantlay and Im, but since they are so far above the rest of the field, they also are expected to come with high ownerships, projected to be well over 20% each by our models. You probably don’t need more analysis on why both are great plays and good picks to contend this week, so let’s look at an option that is projected with lower ownership and a high ceiling.
Wise is priced a little lower, checking in for just under $10,000. Wise will be playing for the first time this season, but he finished with a run all the way to the TOUR Championship last season with three top-15 finishes in his four most recent events. He also has a great history at this track with three top 10s in six trips to the Shriners, including a T8 last season.
Wise brings the highest SimLeverage of any player in the field and is always a threat to content due to his SG: Approach. He has the third-best SG: Approach in the field over the past 50 rounds and the second-best SG: Ball-striking. If his putting doesn’t hold him back, he should continue to out-performed his salary expectation.
He has beat salary-based expectations 70% of the time over his past 10 tournaments, and he brings a high enough ceiling to be a pivot consideration in Vegas.
Taylor Montgomery $9,500
Montgomery has been riding a hot streak with his putter, and the UNLV alum comes into this home game looking for his first PGA TOUR win. He has piled up six straight top-10 finishes, including last week when he ranked fifth among the field in SG: Putting after leading the tournament in that metric the previous week. The 27-year-old rookie ranks second on the PGA TOUR this season in SG: Putting and fifth in SG: Total.
Montgomery will be making his debut at many events this year, but TPC Summerlin should be a good spot for him with crowd support, course layout, and comfort in the conditions all in his favor.
Mid-Priced PGA DFS Picks
Tom Hoge, $9,000
Hoge leads the fields in Birdie or Better Opportunities Gained since the start of the 2021 season. During the past season, Hoge showed he can thrive in low-scoring conditions, including posting a 66-70-67-66 that was good enough for T14 last year at this event. He has now made the cut in five of his six appearances as well, finishing in the top 25 three times.
Last year, Hoge got his breakout win in a low-scoring contest at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, and he sets himself up well for when the putter comes through. In the entire field, he ranks fifth in SG: Approach over the past 50 rounds.
Taylor Pendrith, $8,800
Pendrith will be trying to make it back-to-back Canadian triumphs, seeking to follow Hughes’ example. He finished last season very strong but a rough week at the Fortinet Championship that coincided with a jump in his salary could have players looking elsewhere in this price range to options like Tom Kim ($9,700) and Cameron Davis ($9,200).
According to our projections, Pendrith has the highest ceiling rating of any player under $9,000 in this field. He checks the box in six of our Pro Trends, trailing only Im and his eight Pro Trends matched.
Pendrith posted five top 20s, including a top 10 in his final seven events last season, and after a week off following the Fortinet, he’s expected to be ready to ride this week.
Value PGA DFS Picks
Seamus Power $7,600
Power has the highest ceilings of any player under $8K, according to our projections, and the highest SimLeverage of any player in that price range as well. Power hasn’t played very often over the summer but knocked off the rust with a T30 last week at the Sanderson Farms Championship. He actually lost strokes on approach but made up for it with above-average driving, putting, and work around the greens.
In his past appearances at TPC Summerlin, Power has made the cut three times with a T24 last year his strongest results.
He was red-hot with his irons that week, and he has a shot to contend if his iron-play returns to that level in addition to the rest of his game which is already in top form.
Hayden Buckley $7,100
In his first full-time season on the PGA TOUR, Buckley made the cut in 17 of his 30 events with two top-10 results. One of his best showings came last year at this tournament, where he battled to a T8 with a Final Round 63. He also showed a strong finishing kick last week, going five-under over his final five holes to surge to T19.
He’s identified as having a high ceiling by our model, mostly due to his strong shots gained numbers. He ranks 14th in the field in SG: Ball-Striking and 24th in SG: Overall over his past 50 rounds. Buckley has made the cut in eight straight games, not counting the Wyndham, where he was forced to withdraw.
He brings a solid floor to go with his high ceiling, which is an added bonus for GPP games.
Sleeper PGA DFS Picks
Beau Hossler $6,900
Using the Strokes Gained Model, Hossler has the second-highest rating of any player under $7K this week. Hossler’s short game and putting along with his above-average driving distance give him the kind of versatile game that plays well at TPS Summerlin. In fact, Hossler has made the cut in all four trips to this tournament, including a T7 in 2017 when he tied with Tom Hoge, who is highlighted above.
Hossler finished T25 at the Fortinet Championship in his first event of the season, ranking third in SG: Approach. If he can keep his approach game dialed in, his putter should come around and could catapult him onto the leaderboard.
Nate Lashley $6,400
Throughout his career, Lashley has been a boom-or-bust fantasy option, but he typically does well in shallower fields with low-scoring conditions. His one win on the PGA TOUR came in 2019 when he shot a 25-under at the Rocket Mortgage Classic. Last season, he finished 112th in the FedEx Cup standings to earn his card for this year with the help of good showings at the Puerto Rico Open, Sanderson Farms Championship, and the AT&T Byron Nelson, which all took place with low scores available.
Lashley should also be comfortable at this event after making the cut three straight years at TPC Summerlin with his best finish a T35 last year. He comes in with good form for a cheap flier, having out-performing his salary expectations in each of his three most recent tournaments after returning from about a month off to deal with a toe injury. He looks to be past it and makes a good flier with the third-highest ceiling in our Models of all the players under $6,500.
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