The PGA TOUR has been the center of plenty of attention and controversy over the past few weeks, but the on-course drama has been outstanding as well. There are so many storylines coming from so many different perspectives coming into this year’s third major championship. The U.S. Open is always a thrilling week of golf, and this week the stage is set for an especially compelling contest.
In the earlier majors this year, Jon Rahm won the Masters, and Brooks Koepka claimed the PGA Championship. They’ll both be looking to get their second major of 2023 this week, but they aren’t the only players coming in with momentum. Last week, Nick Taylor got a huge win for all of Candad at the RBC Canadian Open, and the previous week Viktor Hovland won at the Memorial in a playoff to get his first win in an elevated event.
As always for a major, all the top players are teeing it up this week in an extremely strong field. Matt Fitzpatrick is playing well coming into his title defense, while golf’s current “Big Three” of Rahm, Scottie Scheffler, and Rory McIlroy have all had positive signs over the past few months as well. Every single one of the top 10 players in the world and the top 10 in the current FedExCup standings are planning on playing this week.
The 156-player field was rounded out on Monday with the final additions of Emiliano Grillo, Pablo Larrazabal, and Adam Schenk as fully exempt players and amateur Bastien Amat, Michael Kim and amateur Maxwell Moldovan who were the top three alternates from final qualifying.
The elite field will be taking on a first-time host course located in metro Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Country Club is a unique and challenging par 70. For more on the course and best fits, check out Matt Vincenzi’s stats preview.
In this weekly post, we try to focus on players with lower ownership projections than their potential performance. Finding these high-leverage plays with low ownership is critical for GPP lineups. I’ll try to highlight ways to go against the grain and take advantage of golfers, who many fantasy players may overlook or pick against due to risk factors.
Since these are GPP picks, we also can accept a little more risk if it raises the ceiling of the lineup. High-risk, high-reward options with low ownerships create the “boom-or-bust” style lineups that usually lead to large-field success.
This weekly post focuses on players who are strong plays in GPP contests. These contests usually have large numbers of entries and pay out big prizes to the top few percent. This week the largest GPP on DraftKings is the $$3M Fantasy Golf Millionaire that awards a cool million dollars to the top finisher. In addition to $1M, the winner will also earn a semifinal ticket to compete for another $1M top prize in early 2024. In large contests like this one, it is critical to try and target players who have a chance to outperform salary expectations and come with low projected ownership.
The players highlighted will be good options if they deliver in all formats, but they come with risk factors that usually keep them from being the safest plays. Safety and reliability should be the focus of lineups in cash and double-up contests, where finishing in the top spot isn’t quite as important. On the other hand, GPPs call for high-risk, high-reward options with high ceilings and low projected ownership. To find specific guidance for all the different kinds of contests, check out our full Daily Fantasy Golf coverage each week.
No matter what type of format you prefer, be sure to use the FantasyLabs PGA Models to help you make the best choices. These models 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.
Usually, I rely on 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 can be extremely volatile, even for the best players on the PGA TOUR.
As you dig into the numbers, you can enjoy the many tools that FantasyLabs offers, including the Lineup Optimizer, which effortlessly creates up to 300 lineups. Alternatively, you can use the Lineup Builder if you prefer a more hands-on approach.
Check out my top picks in each price range listed below.
Editors note: SimLeverage and Perfect% numbers may change after this piece is published. Be sure to check the PGA Models for any updates to the sims.
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High-Priced PGA DFS Picks
Patrick Cantlay $10,300
As usual at the top of the salary structure in elite fields like this, the top of the salary structure is loaded with great options. Scottie Scheffler has been so dialed in tee-to-green that it’s hard to pick against him, but he is also a chalky option with a projected ownership of over 20% (one of only two players over that mark).
Of the 12 players priced over $9K, it’s easy to make a strong case for any of them to emerge as the winner. Based on the ownership projections, though, it looks like Cantlay is the top option getting overlooked. He is projected for just 11.7% ownership, offering 82% leverage, the most of any player priced over $9K.
Cantlay should bring plenty of course knowledge to this track since the UCLA product was one of the earlier players to check out the new look and layout. He shot a 62 at this venue in the PAC-12 Championships and will definitely have plenty of crowd support if he’s in contention on Sunday.
The eight-time PGA TOUR champ hasn’t won this season, but he has still been in great form. He finished runner-up at the Shriners Children’s Open and has four other top fives, including one at the Genesis Invitational, which is held nearby in L.A.
While the course isn’t exactly equivalent to Riviera Country Club, it is expected to play very similarly to past U.S. Opens in terms of difficulty. Cantlay has never missed a cut in seven trips to the U.S. Open and has notched top 15s in the past two years. He also has been in the top 15 in each of the four most recent major championships, including a T9 a few weeks ago at the PGA Championship.
Cantlay has shown he can beat top fields with wins at three FedExCup playoff events and two victories at the Memorial. He grades out extremely well in just about every system of measuring and leads the PGA TOUR in all around. He has also become one of the best drivers on the PGA TOUR this season, with at least 3.5 SG: Off-the-Tee in seven of his past nine starts.
His long-iron play and short-iron play have also been tight lately, and his putter continues to be one of the best of the top players in the field. As a result of his strong play throughout the bag, he has been remarkably consistent across all competitions. He does definitely have a preferred putting surface, though, since many of his best finishes have come on bentgrass, which is what he’ll get to play on this week.
Cantlay has the fifth-highest median, ceiling, and floor projection, so getting him at the 20th-highest ownership projection is a potential steal. It isn’t quite the same thing as a Canadian winning the RBC Canadian Open, but it will have similar celebratory vibes if Cantlay claims his first career major while playing such a home game.
Jordan Spieth $9,200
Another player who has proven he can win on the biggest stage but hasn’t claimed a victory yet this season is Spieth. In fact, his most recent win came in a playoff against Cantlay at the RBC Heritage in 2022. He has 13 PGA TOUR wins in his career, including the 2015 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay and two other majors.
Spieth’s salary and ownership come in a little low for this tournament due to a recent wrist injury. He comes with a little more risk as a result but is only projected for 15% ownership. He’s outside the top 10 in projected ownership but in the top 10 in median, ceiling, and floor projections. He’s also in the top 10 in Vegas odds to win and to finish in the top 10, coming in eighth in each of those categories.
Like Cantlay, Spieth has been piling up high finishes recently, even though he hasn’t gotten a victory. On the Florida Swing, he was trending up with top-five finishes at the Arnold Palmer and the Valspar before adding another top five at the Masters. He finished runner-up at the RBC Heritage and then had a few rougher weeks, possibly due to injury.
He did play through the issue at the PGA Championship and shot progressively better rounds to finish T29. After a surprising missed cut at Colonial, he looked very sharp in his tie for fifth two weeks ago at the Memorial, where he ranked fourth in SG: Tee-to-Green and fifth in SG: Off-The-Tee
Spieth usually excels on courses with similar profiles to this one and can stand out when creativity and shot-making are at a premium, as expected this week. His short game has looked up to his usual standard lately, and if his putting comes around, he could definitely contend this week.
Mid-Priced PGA DFS Picks
Sungjae Im $8,400
In such a deep field, there are lots of great options in the mid-priced tier, and several come with ownership projections under 10%, making them attractive options for GPP lineups.
The highest leverage of the group comes from Im, who ranks in the top five in leverage for the entire field at 80%. He’s projected for only an 8.3% ownership, but he ranks even with or even ahead of the surrounding options from multiple perspectives.
Im has the third-highest ceiling and median projections of all players under $8.5K and the second-highest floor projection. He is projected for over 7.0 Points/$1,000 of Salary, which puts him near the top of that category as well.
One of the reasons he comes in a little off the radar is that he uncharacteristically missed the cut recently at the PGA Championship and the Charles Schwab Challenge. He bounced back with a made cut at the Memorial but faded with a 79 on Sunday to only a T41. Still, it seemed like a step back in the right direction that could signal a return to form.
Prior to those struggles, Im had seven straight top-25 finishes and four top-10 showings, highlighted by a T6 at THE PLAYERS and a T7 at the RBC Heritage.
His past performance in majors has been a little hit-and-miss, but he did post a top 20 at the Masters earlier this season. He doesn’t have the length needed to contend on some layouts, but his creativity and shotmaking should give him a chance to shine on this par-70.
After a few quiet tournaments, this seems like a good bounce-back spot to target Sungjae this week.
Corey Conners $7,800
Conners is one of the premier ball-strikers in golf but has struggled at U.S. Opens in the past. His game seems like it’s in a good place for him to flip that script this year on a course that should reward his strong short game.
Most of the projected ownership in the lower mid-tier price range is concentrated in chalky options Tommy Fleetwood and Justin Rose after strong showings last week. Both those players are projected to have over twice the ownership of Conners, who comes in under 9%.
He was a popular play last week at his home country’s RBC Canadian Open and finished in the top 20. He was in contention at the PGA Championship a few weeks ago but stumbled down the stretch to finish just outside the top 10. Often times in majors, players need a few near misses like that before breaking through, so hopefully, the experience serves him well this week in Los Angeles.
Conners has been in good form most of the season, with a win at the Valero Texas Open at the beginning of April highlighting six top-25 finishes since the start of March. His solid SG: Approach production gives him a good ceiling for a player with ownership under 10%, and I’d be surprised if he doesn’t log his first career made cut at the U.S. Open this week.
Value PGA DFS Picks
Sahith Theegala $7,600
There are so many strong value plays that many players may go with the approach of stacking several plays from around $7.5K and cramming in as many superstars as possible. If you’re going with that lineup construction, there are some good differentiators available in this cheaper section to help your lineup stand out.
Theegala is a player that brings a very high ceiling and the potential to contend this week but only a 7% projected ownership. Theegala has missed the cut in his two previous U.S. Opens but has been performing very well in majors this year, making the cut at both the Masters and the PGA Championship and finishing T9 and T40, respectively. He has made the cut in 20 straight events dating all the way back to the Sanderson Farms Championship last fall. During that run, he picked up a win at the unofficial event at the QBE Shootout in December and posted a T6 across town at Riviera in February.
Theegala is another local product that knows the course well and should get plenty of crowd support. His short game and iron play can be among the best on the PGA TOUR when he gets hot, as he has shown with at least five strokes gained in four separate tournaments over the past year.
As a rising star still in search of his first official PGA TOUR win, never mind his first major, Theegala does come with plenty of risk this week. However, his ceiling is high enough that I think he’s a good “swing for the fences” play from this price range, especially on a track that feels like a home game for him.
If you’re looking for a safer play in this price range and don’t mind a little more chalk, Rickie Fowler, Adam Scott, and Si Woo Kim are also plays I like a lot in this range.
Ryan Fox $7,100
Fox has been a regular in my picks over the past few months, and the 36-year-old from New Zealand has typically turned in strong performances (aside from the week he had pneumonia). He came back from that with three straight top 30s at the PGA Championship, the Charles Schwab Challenge, and the Memorial, so he seems to be back in strong form and ready to resume his move to the PGA TOUR.
Surprisingly, Fox has an ownership projection under 5% this week despite seeming to come in underpriced. He comes in with significantly lower expected ownership than Denny McCarthy and Gary Woodland while bringing very similar projections and an almost identical ceiling.
Fox has exceeded salary-based expectations in eight of his past nine tournaments dating back to the end of January with an average Plus/Minus of 8.7 DraftKings points. His one underperformance during that run was at the Valero Texas Open, and his average Plus/Minus jumps to 16.0 DraftKings points if that letdown is excluded.
Fox matches five Pro Trends this week, which is the fourth-most of players in the $7K range.
The veteran of multiple tours has 16 career victories around the world, including seven wins on the DP World Tour, Challenge Tour, and PGA TOUR of Australasia. His most recent win was at the 2022 Alfred Dunhill Links Championship held at St. Andrews. He used those wins to move into the top 50 in the Official World Golf Rankings and secured Special Temporary Membership on the PGA TOUR earlier this year after the PGA Championship.
Fox has shown he has the game to navigate multiple styles of courses and should be able to use his strong short game to find success at this track.
Sleeper PGA DFS Picks
Michael Kim $6,900
Kim was one of the final additions to the field, but that shouldn’t make him an afterthought. In fact, he’s one of my top sleeper plays of the week and comes with a beautifully low projected ownership of under 2%.
Kim’s PGA TOUR journey has been a wild one since his breakthrough win at the 2018 John Deere Classic. He struggled and barely held onto his PGA TOUR card with some rough years that included a stretch of 25 straight missed cuts and just one made 36-hole cut over a span of two seasons. He has had an impressive comeback this year, though, after earning his return to the TOUR through the Korn Ferry Tour. He started the season slowly but made his first splash at Pebble Beach, where he finished T11. He added a fifth-place finish in Puerto Rico and has only missed one cut since then.
In his nine events dating back to Puerto Rico, Kim has exceeded salary-based expectations eight times, including a pair of top 10s at the Wells Fargo Championship and the Charles Schwab Challenge. In addition, he earned his spot in this field by being one of the top alternates from the U.S. Open qualifying, which isn’t even reflected in those results. He fired a 68-65 at Bent Tree Country Club and Northwood Club in Dallas to earn his way in as one of the top alternates.
Kim is another California kid to some degree since he played at UC Berkeley, where he starred alongside Max Homa. He should be comfortable on this course and actually has some strong, interesting history at this event since he finished T17 to secure low amateur honors all the way back in 2013.
The facts that he has local knowledge and experience on this stage are interesting, but the main reason I’m backing Kim this week is his excellent recent form. Getting a player in this kind of groove under $7K with under 2% projected ownership is a great GPP strategy.
Gordon Sargent $6,100
My ultra-cheap fliers with upside have been performing well lately. Not that any have taken down a tournament, but they’ve been making cuts and saving stockpiles of salary. Last week, my pick of Monday qualifier Peter Kuest helped lineups from this price point, and this week I think Sargent is poised to do the same.
Sargent is actually a little chalkier than Kim, with a projected ownership of almost 4%, but that’s because so many people are realizing his potential value and using him to cram top options into their lineup. I still love him at this salary in spite of the attention, but just make sure to find other ways to differentiate if Sargent is your cheap play.
Usually, we can just cross off the amateurs at majors like this and move on, but Sargent is an exception to that rule. He has been a standout all year and was honored as Golfweek’s 2022-23 men’s college golf Player of the Year after winning the 2022 NCAA individual title while playing at Vanderbilt. He scorched the course and the field with a 64-67 in qualifying in Georgia.
Sargent is the second-ranked amateur in the world right now and earned plenty of praise from Rory McIlroy, who called him the best prospect he’s ever seen. He got a lot of hype coming into the Masters but missed the cut, so maybe his ownership will be a little down from people who got burned by that missed cut. His distance should make him a good fit for this course, where it doesn’t look like accuracy off the tee will be quite as important due to wider fairways.
Since he’s an amateur and no amateur has finished in the top 40 of the U.S. Open in four years, he is definitely a long shot that comes with risk. However, the odds for him making the cut and finishing in the top 40 are much stronger than for any other player in this price range, showing that Vegas thinks he could be poised for a strong enough showing to be a great punt play.
If you don’t want to go quite so bold as to spend all the way down to Sargent, some other cheap plays under $7K that I like this week are Adam Schenk ($6,800), Adrian Meronk ($6,700), Adam Hadwin ($6,900) and Carson Young ($6,900).
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