PGA DFS: Against the Grain Picks for the Sony Open

Whether it’s your first time reading or you’re a seasoned vet, this article covers GPP PGA DFS picks for fantasy golf. It also breaks the field down into four price categories for FanDuel, DraftKings and Yahoo PGA DFS. 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. Now, these picks are meant only for game theory plays and may not ultimately be in my player pool.

Don’t forget to check out the PGA DFS Strategy Show with Timothy Frank and Ben Rasa. Come back tonight at 8:30 p.m. EST for our Live before lock show where I drag Ben in for another hour of chatting about all the current week’s hot topics and plays!

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Last Week Recap

It was not a good week for an average based system, as all ownerships were inflated because of the short field. The Awesemo ownership did much better than mine did, hitting 84%, whereas I was darn near close to failing at 65%.

PGA DFS Player focus this week:

A full field of over 140 players with a cut after two days gives us plenty of options to go against the grain. That is much different than last week where we had only two guys below 10% for the entire tournament. I am looking forward to identifying some against-the-grain plays this week

Top-10 Projected Golfers:

Commentary

We have the standard five golfers above $10,000 this week for DraftKings, and a pretty good five at that. Sure, the average OWGR might not be sexy but these five players are certainly performing at a very high level. Justin Thomas off of his win last week should get mild ownership but the $12,000 price tag will keep it mild. Though the last time he won the Tournament of Champions, he followed that up with a 59 at the Sony Open and a win. Webb Simpson is $900 cheaper than Thomas but should get right around the same ownership, around 20%. The next three golfers on the list are a bit harder to predict, as Patrick Reed came in last week as one of the highest-owned golfers at over 30%. I don’t think that happens this week as he should come in around 15%.

Hideki Matsuyama and budding superstar Collin Morikawa are the last two in the price section, and both of them should get around 15% as well. Ownership is pretty evenly spread amongst the top five golfers on the board.

Top PGA DFS ATG Plays

Going double or triple any of these golfers will hit the top-end allocation for a core play, at least what I normally play. We can make a case for all five, so I’d say pick your favorite and try to get two or three times leverage on the field. I know that’s a bit open ended but when ownership projections are this evenly spread, it comes down to the amount of leverage you want rather than the player.

$8,000-$10,000

Commentary

There is a plethora of golfers in this section with tons of talent and ones that are rising up the PGA Tour ranks quite quickly. Joaquin Niemann band Sungjae Im, Presidents Cup teammates, will likely get the most attention of the group, somewhere close to 20%. I know that the number above isn’t that close to 20% but I ran these middle of the day Tuesday and will recheck after Awesemo and the gang post theirs today. Charles Howell, who I mentioned hasn’t missed a cut here in the last six years, along with Corey Conners and Andrew Putnam, should all be owned close to 15% this week. Kevin Kisner and J.T. Poston, both of whom played well last week, will crack the 10% mark and trend to 15%.

The next batch of golfers, including defending champion of the event Matt Kuchar, along with Abraham Ancer, Brian Harman and Chez Reavie, should all get close to 10% this week, maybe a bit under. That leaves us with a handful of guys that should be owned under 10% in most contest this week and they include Alex Noren, Brandt Snedeker, Brendon Todd and Marc Leishman. That leaves us just one golfer left who we haven’t mentioned, Cameron Smith, who could be the only golfer under 5% from this price range.

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Top PGA DFS ATG Plays

Smith is definitely enticing, I won’t lie. I also like Snedeker, especially if the winds are supposed to be high. Leishman is interesting but I think he trends higher in the higher dollar and single entries than the stated percentage there.

$7,000s

PGA DFS Commentary:

A pair of Tournament of Champions contestants lead the way in terms of ownership allocation in this section. Both Lanto Griffin and Sebastian Munoz are trendy to be very popular picks this week. They should come in around 20%. Ryan Palmer could also join them around the 15-20% number. One of the most interesting cases of the week will be what gamers do with Dylan Fritelli, who was a big let down last week after being highly owned. A couple of more golfers will approach the 10% number, including Vaughn Taylor, Brian Gay, Rory Sabbatini and Emiliano Gillo. Some other notable names that will get close to 10% include:

  • Russell Knox
  • Russell Henley
  • Joel Dahmen
  • Carlos Oritz
  • Kyle Stanley
  • Brian Stuard

That still leaves us with plenty of options to go against the grain including:

  • Matt Jones
  • Shugo Imahira
  • Ryan Armour
  • Pat Perez

Top PGA DFS ATG Plays

Shugo Imahira is one of the more interesting plays this week and I will be curious to see what the sharks do with him. Matt Jones, who just won over in Australia, may go unnoticed and seems like he’s in good form. I’ll be giving him some shares.

$6,000s

10 golfers are shaded in gray in the above list as ones I suspect will be heavily targeted. I can see a case where all 10 get close to 10% with Xinjun Zhang, Adam Long and Doc Redman all getting over 10%. Sung Kang, who had a very good week of the tee last week, should come in around 10%, along with Mark Hubbard, Nate Lashley and Keith Mitchell. There are over 80 other names to choose from in this price section leaving us plenty of against the grain options including:

  • Harry Higgs
  • Brice Garnett
  • Graeme McDowell 

Until next time

Cheers,

Jason

Author
Jason established his roots in the littlest state that could...Rhode Island. But after 29 years of bitter cold, and only being able to play golf 4 months a year, upended those roots and moved to Florida. Now four years later, Jason is a husband to Sarah and father of two boys, James & Myles. A dog and more specifically Lab lover (Bella), he dedicates his time to serve as the lead of PGA content at Awesemo.com. In the time he is not diving into the PGA stats and covering this week's current tournament, you can find him researching and trading stocks, on the golf course, at Disney World, on a hike, or somewhere in between. Want to chat? Have a question about Golf/Stocks or anything else? Hop on twitter and give him a message @dfsgolfer23. You can also contact Jason by emailing [email protected].

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