2022 World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba Expert Picks: 6 Best Bets for Collin Morikawa, Tom Hoge, Brendon Todd & More

The PGA TOUR heads to El Camaleón Golf Club in Playa del Carmen, Mexico for the 2022 World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba. This is one of the marquee events of the Fall Swing as a handful of elite players will be in the field this week, including two-time defending champion Viktor Hovland, world No. 2 Scottie Scheffler, elite iron striker Collin Morikawa, former FedEx Cup champion Billy Horschel and two-time winner on TOUR last season Tony Finau.

Our GolfBet staff has found six best bets for the tournament this week, including four outright picks, one matchup bet and one place bet. Check out our analysts' picks and analysis below.

Collin Morikawa +1800 (bet365)

Jason Sobel: It’s been a weird year for Morikawa, whose game has alternated from solid to very solid, with few peaks and valleys in between. He’s posted five top-five finishes during this calendar year but rarely been in serious contention coming down the stretch on a Sunday afternoon.

If that’s his baseline performance level, though, then we should still be optimistic that a higher peak is coming soon. I like him for a few reasons this week.

The first is that his elite iron play should fit this course, as he ranked third in strokes gained on approach shots last season and is already 10th after two so-so results in this one.

The second is that he’s never played here before. I get it, that alone is often viewed as a demerit in the category of experience, but I’m reading into his rationale.

Deciding to play here for the first time likely means Morikawa wants one last chance to step on the gas pedal and end his year on a high note. He’s one of the players on whom I’ve been waiting for a win, and he knows this is his last chance to claim one. Recent history suggests we shouldn’t look too far past the shorter numbers.

Which leads to the final reason: In six events so far during the fall portion of the PGA TOUR schedule, winners have owned average pre-tourney odds of 33/1 (according to the numbers at golfodds.com), with only Mackenzie Hughes, who was 100/1 at the Sanderson Farms, bigger than a 30/1 price.

While this feels like the right time of year to play some longshots, that hasn’t been the case. If there was a little more separation between their prices, I might’ve gone with Emiliano Grillo or Tom Hoge here, but they remain options 1B and 1C to Morikawa’s 1A this week.

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Brendon Todd +5000 (SI Sportsbook)

Chris Murphy: This is the time of year when Brendon Todd tends to shine, and it seems to be coming together that way for him once again. He has put together top-10 finishes in two of his last four appearances, including in the strong field at THE CJ CUP where he finished T7.

While the result was nice, the number that sticks out to me coming into this second-shot golf course was the seven shots he gained on approach at Congaree Golf Club. He seemed to really find something with his game during the week, and that has been the case in each of his top-10 results this season.

If he can keep that momentum going with his irons into Mayakoba, a tournament where he finished 11th in 2021, we can certainly rely on him being sharp on the greens. He's one of the best putters in the world, ranking third in SG: Putting last season, and that combination of approach and short game is exactly what we want this week.
SI Sportsbook

Brandon Wu +12500 (PointsBet)

Matt Vincenzi: Thus far throughout his career, Brandon Wu has been sensational on courses with paspalum grass.

Last year, Wu had some of his best starts at the Corales Puntacana Championship and the Puerto Rico Open, both of which have paspalum greens. The 25-year-old Wu finished 28th at Corales and third in Puerto Rico. The Stanford product also finished seventh in Puerto Rico in 2021.

For this reason, I bet Wu at the Mexico Open at Vidanta last year for a top-10 finish and as an outright. He finished second in the event despite being 150-1 pre-tournament.

I believe in Wu's talent long term. He won the 2020 Korn Ferry Tour Championship in a year where there were a lot of good players competing. He's had an encouraging start to his PGA TOUR career, and I think he will build off of that success this week in Mexico.

Aaron Rai -110 Over Robby Shelton (DraftKings)

Spencer Aguiar: While the recent metrics look promising for Robby Shelton, I believe this is one of those spots where recency bias is placing the American into a value range above his long-term expectation.

Shelton has been solid over the past few events, making every cut to begin the 2023 season and providing three top-25 finishes during that span of time.

However, it is essential to remember that not all courses are created the same when it comes to the non-elite members on TOUR, and Shelton's form could take a turn for the worse when faced with what El Camaleón asks from the competitors this week.

Sure, the around-the-green game is top-notch, ranking eighth in this field over my two-year running model, but how does that hurt his potential when his greatest strength gets mitigated at the course? In my opinion, it is a noteworthy amount, and he starts running into trouble when we go to other avenues of my model trying to find sustainable success.

Shelton ranks 120th for total driving geared toward finding fairways, and the problem continues from there, placing 34 spots below expectation in weighted proximity when I ran my data for the track.

Misses here off the tee will be much more penal than we have seen the past few weeks during his onslaught of quality finishes, and we are talking about a golfer who hit under 60% of fairways last week. If that trend continues, water is ready at all turns to eat scores alive.

Tom Hoge +3000 (DraftKings)

Derek Farnsworth: Tom Hoge has a little bit of everything that we like to see when betting on golfers. He’s in good form, he is a great fit for the course, and he has a top-end finish at this event in the past.

He has rattled off five straight top-15 finishes. During that stretch, he has gained 18 strokes on approach and 13 strokes putting. El Camaleón is a course that rewards strong iron play and good putters.

You don’t need distance to contend on this short course, and that’s evident by the fact that Brendon Todd and Matt Kuchar have won here.

With the greens being easy to hit and with scoring being so low, you don’t need to be elite around the greens. That’s evident by the fact that Viktor Hovland has won here in back-to-back years.

Hoge finished third here in 2020 and has the game to contend this week.

J.J. Spaun Top 20 +260 (DraftKings)

Landon Silinsky: J.J. Spaun is slightly underpriced for his talent and for the way he's been playing this Fall. His last start at THE CJ CUP was all over the place, with two rounds in the 60s and then a final-round 76, but prior to that he finished T25 at the ZOZO and T15 at the Shriners.

He's also got strong history at El Camaleón, having made all six of his cuts with four top 30s, including a T3 in 2018. We have seen him pop big time before, especially this past season where he picked up his first career PGA TOUR victory at the Valero.

He’s been finding a ton of fairways of late as well, sitting 12th in driving accuracy over his past 24 rounds in this field, which will be quite important at this course. He’s incredibly likely to make the weekend, and I like getting almost 3/1 that he finishes top 20 in this spot.