PGA Betting Picks, Odds & Expert Predictions for The U.S. Open

For the third major of the season, the 2021 U.S. Open will be held at the South Course (par 71, 7,685 yards) of Torrey Pines, located in La Jolla, California. The Farmers Open takes place at Torrey Pines every season, with three of the four rounds played on the South Course. Also, this track hosted the 2008 U.S. Open, when Tiger Woods famously took home the major title. Playing through torn ligaments in his left knee and fractures in his left leg, he was able to overcome and win at only one-under. While I don’t expect this type of winning score this time around, the South Course will challenge every single golfer.

Every week I use Alex Baker’s Unofficial World Golf Rankings to help identify mispriced options in both the PGA DFS and golf betting market, and below are three of the best PGA betting picks for the U.S. Open.

Crush your PGA DFS contests with tools and data from the #1 DFS Player

PGA Betting Picks & Odds for The U.S. Open

Much like the standard rankings in golf, Awesemo has come up with the Unofficial World Golf Rankings, so we can use them in PGA DFS lineups or to find an edge on your PGA betting picks. At Awesemo, the metric is the number of strokes above or below how an average field in a PGA tournament performed. How to weight these data points is essential, as people love to talk about short form versus long form. Only PGA tournaments are considered right now, and golfers need a minimum of 20 rounds played. Players are not rewarded by more or fewer rounds in the time period.

Latest PGA DFS Content

Xander Schauffele (+2000, William Hill)

According to Awesemo’s Unofficial World Golf Rankings, Schauffele is the second best player on the planet right now, trailing only John Rahm. Schauffele missed the cut at The PGA Championship, but he quickly showed this was just a blimp on the radar. It only turned into an 11^th-place finish at The Memorial his next time out. At Muirfield Village that week, Schauffele produced 6.8 strokes tee-to-green and 5.9 strokes on approach. Both of those numbers set new highs this season for the 27-year-old.

Schauffele now heads to Torrey Pines, where he finished runner up at the Farmers back in January, to compete in his favorite major championship. In four career starts at the U.S. Open, Schauffele has never finished worse than sixth place. He has been in contention at every single U.S. Open he has appeared in and the South Course is the perfect venue for Schauffele to finally win his first major title of his career.

Schauffele has been a stud on this type of putting surface, ranking fifth in total strokes gained over his last 50 rounds at venues that feature POA. To put a cherry on top, Schauffele grew up and went to college right down the road in San Diego. Winning the U.S. Open in his hometown would be a dream come true for Schauffele, and these +2000 odds on William Hill are the best out there.

Tony Finau (+2800, PointsBet)

Finau’s ball striking has been stellar, ranking second in strokes gained tee-to-green over his last 12 rounds. However, it has been the flat stick preventing him from contending. He ranks 128^th in strokes-gained putting across his last 12 rounds. It is worth noting, though, Finau has only competed on Bermuda greens over that span. Undeniably, Finau’s putting is shaky on this green type, and we should see some vast improvement on the POA greens.

In his last two starts at tracks that are home to POA, Finau has been on the cusp of winning, carding two runner-up finishes, one of which came here at Torrey Pines for the Farmers Open just this past January. Finau has two top-10s in his past three U.S. Opens and the sky is the limit if he can catch fire with his putter this week.

Matchup: Brendan Grace over Bubba Waston (-114, BetRivers)

Grace heads to Torrey Pines riding a five made cut streak, with a fourth place finish at the Memorial coming in his last start. This event delivered a major-like field and Grace had an incredible showing as ball striker, gaining 8.5 strokes tee-to-green and 4.8 strokes on approach at Muirfield Village. These both mark new season highs for Grace and he has shown great upside at U.S. Opens in the past, with two top-fives in his last six attempts at the major.

As for Watson, the demanding conditions of the U.S. Open have notoriously given him fits throughout his career. He has only made it to the weekend six times in 14 career starts at this major. To get things going in his last start, Watson withdrew from the Memorial during the second round at +10, and his 80^th place showing at the PGA Championship was also extremely ugly. Despite going 13 strokes over par for the weekend, he made the cut and posted a season-low -5.8 strokes with his irons. Nothing about Watson’s form lends optimism heading into at Torrey Pines, and Grace is an easy choice for me in this matchup.

Get a risk free bet + 2 months FREE of Awesemo+ platinum all-access!

Thanks for reading to the end of this article! If you appreciate this free content and want to see more of it every day, you can help us out by sharing this article on social media!