That's Birdie All Day Long
The Core4
Tyler Duncan
Yep. It is that time of year when your roster a guy like Tyler Duncan. This isn’t the Masters. We aren’t even looking at the challenging field we saw at TPC Craig Ranch. No sir. This is the John Deere Classic, and with a field this weak, we are going off the rails here when opportunity presents itself. For the casual fan, Tyler Duncan is a young 32 and has a win on the PGA Tour at the RSM Classic. Just because inquiring minds always ask…yes…he’s always been lousy at majors with the exception of the US Open. I digress. Duncan is exploding in my model. Furthermore, looking at the weighted PGA stats that I am considering, he ranks 6th in the field for this tournament. Now the recent form is suspect. Yet, he is coming off a 46th place finish at the Travelers. The point being, is that Duncan is coming in at only $7300 on DraftKings, ranks in the top-10 in my approach model, and ranks in the top-50 in my scoring model. We aren’t asking for a win for Tyler Duncan, but the top-10 potential is there and he has as good a shot as anyone in this pricing tier.
Overall Stat Model: 6th
Confi”dance” Model: 7th
Aggregate Model: 7th
Power Rankings: 11th
Mav McNealy
Exceptional talent as well as a golfer that fits our mold of first time winner potential. If you haven’t read this anywhere, four of the last six winners here at John Deere Classic have been first timers. Now, McNealy isn’t going unoticed. His current ownership projection at FanShare is between16-20%. Yet, even in single entries, it is unlikely that it is going to deviate to far above that projection. I do believe that McNealy’s ownership would be higher if he ranked in the upper half of fairway hit % in 2022. Yet, the biggest faults in his game are when he has to scrmble and his around the green game. Long story short, if you’re scrambling around Deere Run, your probably not going to make the cut anyway. Mav can score with the best of them, and is the third highest ranked player on the OWGR…that’s not saying much for this field, but it is something that I wanted to note. I’m itching for Mav to finally fulfill some of that Stanford potential really break through this weekend. Now, there has been speculation of some recent personal issues with Mav. He’s missed two cuts straight cuts, but a golfer of his calliber doesn’t falter for long.
Overall Stat Model: 24th
Confi”dance” Model: 14th
Aggregate Model: 14th
Power Rankings: 5th
Adam Svensson
I’m not afraid to eat chalk when I believe it is in a good spot. Yet, we are going to see a lot of Svensson paired up with either Hadwin or Webb. Now…if you scroll down…you’ll know what I am doing with those two. Svensson has not won on Tour. So he meets the criteria for being a first time winner. Do I think that is going to happen? No. Yet, I do believe he can be an elite play for DraftKings thanks to his scoring ability as well his dominance in approach. Similar to the aforementioned McNealy, he struggles when he has to scramble and around the green. We’ve already established that if players this weekend are fully invested into either category we are likely to see a missed cut. For me, the most impressive stat that Svensson has is that he ranks 4th in the field in rounds in the 60’s. We know that this coruse is going to play easy, and we can see potential for this elite ball striker to tear up the course and rise up on the leaderboard.
Overall Stat Model: 1st
Confi”dance” Model: 2nd
Aggregate Model: 1st
Power Rankings: 3rd
scott stallings
I like Stallings. Plus, we should all be inspired for his desire to better himself not just as a golfer, but for his overall health. If you remember, and I’m sure most don’t, Stallkings was very overweight. His goal was to live better, eat better, and the potential for better golf has been on display since his personal changes have taken flight. Stallings ranks 18th in the field in approach, 18th in birdie average, and 12th in scoring. On top of that, he has two top-10 finishes in the last four tournaments he’s played in…yes I know he also has two missed cuts. I am looking for he upside here. His tournament history says there is a lot of it, and I am going to conintue to roster scorers for the weekend.
Overall Stat Model: 18th
Confi”dance” Model: 22nd
Aggregate Model: 22nd
Power Rankings: 28th
The 19th Hole
Top Advice
Don't Suck
Additional Top Plays
Sam Ryder
Martin Laird
Doug Ghim
John Huh
Sahith Theegala
Ryan Moore
Wild Cards
Scott Brown
Patton Kizzire
Vaughn Taylor
Nick Taylor
Lucas Glover
Cam Percy
The Putters
***These guys don't appear as strong plays in your overall stat models, but have the goods on the dance floor to thrive in this tournament if they can put it together for 4 rounds. They are high risk plays, but as we've seen in just about every tournament, all you need is a hot putter. These are plays that I may or may not be considering, but use this for your information and process.
Patrick Rodgers
Seung-Yul Noh
Taylor Pendrith
Michael Thompson
Roger Sloan
Vince Whaley
Adam Schenk
Hank Lebioda
Anirban Lahiri
David Lipsky
Michael Gligic
Watch Me Deliver
***These players hit greens like no other, but they just aren't pushing your models to the limit. Put it together for 4 rounds and pepper those greens, and you could reap the benefits. These are high risk plays, but nothing pays like low owned top-10 finishers who are smashing birdies over four rounds. These are plays I may or may not roster.
Kevin Streelman
Hank Lebioda
Zach Johnson
John Merrick
Chesson Hadley
Brian Stuard
Ben Martin
Adam Long
Top 10 Overall Power Rankings (Stat Driven)
1. Webb Simpson
2. Scott Stallings
3. Adam Svensson
4. Lucas Glover
5. Maverick McNealy
6. Christiaan Bezuidenhout
7. Cameron Davis
8. Martin Laird
9. Mark Hubbard
10. CT Pan
7K Power Rankings
1. Adam Svensson
2. Martin Laird
3. Chez Reavie
4. Emilliano Grillo
5. Mark Hubbard
6. Doug Ghim
7. Nick Taylor
8. Tyler Duncan
9. Kevin Streelman
10. Ryan Moore
Highest Cut% with 8%+ Ownership
Chris Gotterup - 43.16%
Nate Lashley - 41.92%
CT Pan - 38.50%
John Huh - 37.91%
Chez Reavie - 37.28%
Can't Do It
-I said this on the show, and I am going to full fade Hadwin and Webb. Either could easily win or lead the field in DK scoring, but the leverage if they fail is pretty massive in every contest. Especially in single entries. Could it backfire? Of course. I'm willing to take the risk.
Grab a brew...don't cost nothin...Core4 coming soon.
