PGA DFS Picks: Against the Grain for the PGA Championship l Milly Maker

Whether it’s your first time reading or you’re a seasoned vet, this article covers GPP PGA Championship picks for PGA DFS. It also breaks the field down into four price categories for FanDuel, DraftKings and Yahoo. The article is meant to be a guiding tool in creating variance in your lineups, which in turn, hopefully, can create an edge against the field.

Winning a GPP of any size is a difficult task, especially ones with 40,000-plus entries. Each of my big wins has come by going against the grain with some players and pairing them with the right chalk.

Millionaire Maker Review From Last Week

This was one of the best lineups for a no-cut event I’ve seen in quit some time, with all of his picks ending up in the top 12 and no winner. His total ownership was less than 50% and didn’t use all of his salary.

Picks Review

Top-end pick: DeChambeau didn’t really hurt you, but didn’t help you either.
Value: Spieth and Horschel were both OK values.
Mid-level pick: Thompson wasn’t good.
Low-level pick: Todd Reavie and a few others were good.

Projected Highest-Owned Golfers for The PGA Championship

For the full list, click here.

Player Focus This Week

This week features 156 players with the top 70 and ties making the cut.

$10,000 and Above

Six Golfers
Total ownership of around 95%

Commentary

We have six golfers and close to 100% total ownership between the studs this week, with Justin Thomas, Brooks Kopeka and Xander Schauffele trending even higher. In fact, Schauffele has gotten a ton of talk and could end up the highest-owned here at over 20%. Rory McIlroy will be one of the most interesting cases this week, as gamers haven’t bailed on him yet even though his play has been less than stellar since the return of golf. Maybe that ends this week, and you get him lower-owned. Bryson DeChambeau’s and Jon Rahm’s prices will give them a bit more ownership than they had last week, coming in above 15%

Top Against-the-Grain Plays

I feel it’ll be tough to get a good chunk of leverage on the top-end guys this week with five out of the six of them seemingly in good form. McIlroy is the only one who hasn’t shown it. If that ends up getting him close to 10%, I think 30% of McIlroy shouldn’t kill lineups.

$8,000-$9,999

13 Golfers
Total ownership of 190%

Commentary

There are only 13 golfers in this price section, the lowest amount we’ve seen in quite some time. No golfer will get under 10% here, and I doubt highly that Tiger Woods will be the lowest-owned out of the bunch. I could be wrong, but that’s how it seems to be projected out right now. Dustin Johnson had a nice bounce back last week, and now it seems gamers are ready to head back into him, especially at the $9,000 price tag. Tyrrell Hatton will get a bunch of followers again as well this week after getting a big price dump versus his price from last week.

Hideki Matsuyama’s price is also dictating his ownership again this week, as he could creep towards 20% owned as gamers look for the consistent tee-to-green play to carry him. Patrick Cantlay’s price and ownership have both come down into an absolute sweet spot for me. I love the spot for him this week. He hasn’t missed a cut in a major over his last five starts. Webb Simpson rounds out the golfers I expect to be well over 15%.

Rickie Fowler leads a bunch of golfers that should be owned between 12-15%, including:

Collin Morikawa
Patrick Reed
Matthew Fitzpatrick
Daniel Berger
Jason Day
Viktor Hovland
Tiger Woods

Top Against-the-Grain Plays

With none of these golfers getting below 10%, there isn’t any true against-the-grain play. By the same token, I don’t think there are any extremely chalky golfers either outside of Dustin Johnson. This makes for a pick-you-favorite-and-go-overweight situation; mine is Cantlay right now.

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$7,000s

39 Golfers
Total ownership of 260%

Commentary

This is the strongest $7,000 section I’ve seen in any tournament; the options will be vast. We have 39 golfers totaling almost 260% ownership, led by Gary Woodland and Tommy Fleetwood. Tony Finau and Abraham Ancer won’t be far behind as the four golfers who for sure will be over 15% owned this week. Then, we move into the Jordan Spieths, Adam Scotts and Justin Roses of the world, all whom have questions about there game right now but are expected to be over 10% owned. A handful of others in this section will get close to 10% this week, including Louis Oosthuizen, Billy Horschel and Scottie Scheffler. Plenty still, however, will get above 5% but not quite 10%, including:

Marc Leishman
Phil Mickelson
Sergio Garcia
Paul Casey
Harris English
Sungjae Im
Matt Kuchar
Matthew Wolff
Brendon Todd
Bubba Watson
Henrik Stenson

That leaves plenty of golfers still here that will be under 5% owned this week including:

Cameron Champ
Byeong Hun An
Adam Hadwin
Corey Conners
Max Homa
Ian Poulter
Erik van Rooyen
Richy Werenski
Kevin Streelman
Kevin Na
Matt Wallace
Christiaan Bezuidenhout
Kevin Kisner
Danny Willett

Top Against-the-Grain Plays

If you are picking at least one from this last bulleted list, I think you should be providing enough variance in your lineup, but adding two will never hurt. If I had to pick a few from it, it would be van Rooyen and Bezuidenhout.

$6,000s

33 Golfers
Total ownership of 130%

Commentary

Almost 100 golfers still await us in this section, but there is not much ownership at all. No golfer is projected to be over 5%, with Ryan Palmer coming in at the top. A couple of other golfers that are expected get close to 5% are Matthias Schwab (especially on FanDuel where he’s min priced), Joel Dahmen, Lucas Glover and Brandt Snedeker. Others like Cameron Tringale, Doc Redman, Nick Taylor, Dylan Frittelli, Brendan Steele, J.T. Poston and Emiliano Grillo will all get a couple of % owned this week. Bottom line, if there’s someone you love down here, outside of Schwab on FanDuel, there shouldn’t be any chalky golfers.

For a little bit more talk on this subject, check out my “Against the Grain” Podcast on your favorite podcast provider!