PGA DFS Picks: The First Cut for the Sanderson Farms Championship

This is the first installment in our weekly PGA content for DraftKings, FanDuel and SuperDraft, breaking down the best PGA DFS picks and everything you need to know for the Sanderson Farms Championship.

If this is your first time reading the article, or you’ve forgotten all about PGA DFS, then I’ll give you a quick summary of what’s to come:

Tournament Intro
Course Breakdown and PGA DFS Sweatsheet
Player Preview
Statistical Preview

PGA DFS Picks: The Sanderson Farms Championship

Back stateside, the tour returns. After a week of minimal info, we luckily have all our technology back, including shot tracker and PGA Tour Live. Among other things, not having either system to sweat my lineups was annoying. Moreover, the score changes and incorrect scores being printed added a whole additional layer of tilt most weren’t expected, including myself. Sometimes those score changes went for us, but they mostly went against, like Chris Kirk going from the first-round leader to -1 and subsequently missing the cut. But we don’t have to worry about that again until the Bermuda Championship in a month or so.

The Tournament

A year before I was born, the Sanderson Farms Championship was created — or at least that’s what the PGA Tour says, but it’s been a part of the schedule since 1968. Now in its 34th year, serving host as one of the PGA Tour’s swing season events, the Sanderson Farms Championship provides an opportunity for some of the newer PGA Tour players to earn some much-needed early-season FedEx Cup Points. In 2014 the Tour moved the event to its new home, the Country Club of Jackson in Jackson, Miss. With this being a full-point FedEx cup distribution, the field is noticeably better than in years past and better than last week’s for sure. Let’s dig into the Country Club of Jackson and start to identify some of the players that may be a good fit.

The Course: Country Club of Jackson

From a seaside gem to an inland parkland design, the sites and sounds will be vastly different this week. Its original design was by Donald Ross, but the 18 holes used for the tournament were redesigned by John Fought and Mike Gogel in 2008. A par 72 measuring just shy of 7,500 yards, it isn’t long given the fact that is a par 72. Although it’s quite the opposite course from last week, the winning score won’t be much different, with the previous five winners of the event finishing at -18 or better. Twice the winning score has gotten into the -20s. Let’s see how it’s done.

Tournament Format

There are 144 golfers with a cut after 36 holes and the top 65 and ties making the cut

Course Facts & Figures

Par and Yardage

Par 72: 7,500 yards

Course Difficulty

26/49 or -.-.754 or (71.246)

Hole Dispersion

Four Par 3’s: 181, 214, 223, 168
10 Par 4’s: 411, 418, 482, 403, 421, 449, 330, 479, 416
Four Par 5’s: 571, 612, 554, 584

Grass Types & Hazards

Grass Type: Champion Bermuda
Average Green Size: 6,200 sq ft.
Water Hazards: 7
Bunkers: 56
Rough Length: 2 inches

Designer

John Fought and Matt Gogel in 2008. Donald Ross original.

Facts and Figures

Off the Tee: From Winged Foot, where the driving accuracy was less than 50%, to the Corales, where it was over 70%, now we go back to hard-to-hit fairways with the Country Club of Jackson boasting a 55.42% driving accuracy. It was one of the top six toughest on tour last year. With the rough length only being about two inches, missing the fairway isn’t that penal. I’d throw accuracy out the window this week.
Approach to the Green: Even though driving accuracy is down, greens in regulation didn’t suffer all that much. Greens were reached in regulation 67.54% of the time last year, good enough for 26th out of 44 on tour, so it was on the more accessible side.
Around the Green: The golfers missed the green about 32% of the time, and when they did, they were able to get up and down for par 60.51% of the time. That ranked it 14th easiest on tour last year.
On the Green: In terms of average versus the tour, not much changes once on the green, as it ranked 20th easiest on tour in terms of putting average.

Sweatsheet

A 600-yard par 5 is eclipsed by a drivable par 4 this week in terms of DraftKings Points scoring. The four par 5’s and one drivable par 4 total about 45% of the total scoring. But even so, the fifth hole, that long par 5, didn’t yield as many birdies as the first hole, and the second hole was only one birdie away from it. So obviously that fifth hole isn’t a passover hole, even if it’s a par 5. The best chance for a streak a golfer has is the first three holes. There may be a tiny bit of strategy for showdown slates trying to stack golfers teeing off on the 10th hole so that they have warmed up before heading to the front side.

Player Preview

Henrik Stenson was the lowest-rated OWGR in the field last week; he’s No. 4 this week. That makes the field much stronger, as the golfers after him are ranked much higher than those that competed last week in Punta Cana. Louis Oosthuizen, off yet another top five at a major, might end up coming in as the odds favorite. Sungjae Im comes back to Country Club of Jackson for the second straight year, losing to Sebastian Munoz in a playoff last year, and he likely will either the most or second-most expensive golfer on the board. If it isn’t Im or Oosthuizen, it most certainly will be Scottie Scheffler, who returns after a two-week absence due to testing positive for COVID. In all, 17 of the world’s top 100 are here to compete.

*Update Louis Oosthuizen has withdrawn from the event. He is replaced by Doug Ghim.

Previous Winners and Cutline for the Sanderson Farms Championship

2019: Sebastian Munoz (-18)
2018: Cameron Champ (-21)
2017: Ryan Armour (-19)
2016: Cody Gribble (-20)
2015: Peter Malnati (-18)

Statistical Comparison for PGA DFS Picks

Driving Accuracy vs. Driving Distance: The winners don’t really tell us to much, as Malnati and Champ find themselves on opposite ends of the driving distance spectrum. Even Armour, for that matter, doesn’t bomb it. This seems much more like a second-shot golf course.
Strokes Gained Tee to Green Analysis: Strokes gained on the approach was prevalent in all of these winners over the last five years. When driving accuracy for the field is so low, players with good iron play can really shine.
Putting; How good do they need to be here?: Gribble was the best putter out of the group, but all the other winners aren’t statistically fantastic with their putter.

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Author

Jason Rouslin

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].