2024 The PLAYERS Championship Data-Driven Pick: Best Bet for Sunday
(Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images). Pictured: Mackenzie Hughes.
It was a nice 2-0 day for us in the head-to-head sector after Ludvig Åberg (+100) eclipsed Collin Morikawa and Christiaan Bezuidenhout (-120) got past Sepp Straka.
Depending on how Sunday goes for our wagers, we are probably looking at somewhere between a small winning week and a large one, but here is where everything stands entering the final day.
We will see if we can get Brian Harman (70/1) into the winner's circle for back-to-back wins. My model has been pushing Xander Schauffele as the name to beat since Thursday night, but here is a round-four matchup for you to consider Sunday.
If you haven't already, you can find me on Twitter (@TeeOffSports). There, I provide a link to my pre-tournament model, a powerful and interactive data spreadsheet that allows user input to create custom golf rankings. That sheet is released every Monday, so be sure to check it out and construct your own numbers from my database of information.
2024 The PLAYERS Championship
Mackenzie Hughes -110 over Sami Valimaki (BetMGM)
Nobody will ever question that I love my fade-worthy candidates on a head-to-head board. Nevertheless, this is even a little more shoot-from-the-hip than usual.
I recommended a different wager this week after saying, "Don't be surprised if we win this battle in missed-cut versus missed-cut fashion." We did get that bet across the finish line after both options landed outside the top 90 and inevitably missed the weekend, but I do want to stress that if I am saying that we are attacking this solely because of one player's floor, it means that all caution has been thrown out the window when it comes to safety on the other end.
What separates me from most is that I don't care how bad both players are on my model since I am running my own projections to recalculate these prices. I am always going to unquestioningly trust my math when implosion flags start looming in a manner that isn't capable of ignoring. Still, this matchup possesses two names outside the top 50 in head-to-head projection for Sunday out of 73 players, including both landing outside the top 90 out of 144 from a pre-tournament outlook.
These wagers do have the propensity to get ugly when things go wrong because the amount of help on the other end can be questionable if our opponent prospers. However, a few metrics made me believe my model needed to be better on Mackenzie Hughes, especially after my math drifted the proper price out into the -126 range for round four on this particular battle.
Hughes has been a significant climber for me this week after overachieving his baseline ball striking but sinking down the names on the leaderboard with his putter. My model believed that despite the bullish returns with the driver, his 4.24-shot decline with the flat stick provided this 2.21-stroke underachieving mark on the leaderboard. It shouldn't hurt matters that Hughes' expected spot on the leaderboard should be 26th versus 44th. Regardless, my model shows Sami Valimaki as a ticking time bomb heading into the final day.
Valimaki ranked 123rd overall for me pre-event, highlighted by his ranking of 139th in weighted scrambling, 141st for around the green data and 59th with his putter. I will say that his putting retrieval looks realistic enough after landing 23rd after three rounds, but I am more caught up with the 3.27 shots he has gained around the green and how it places him seventh in this field.
This looks like a spot where markets have been slow to react because two bottom-tier options in their model landed equally on the board, but something must be said about one of those names being projected 9.06 shots better on the leaderboard.
I am going to close my eyes and trust that difference when only three players posted totals all three days where they overachieved their projected ball-striking by more than 10 spots on the leaderboard. Valimaki is naturally one of those targets. J.T. Poston and J.J. Spaun would be the other two.
You don't need a large wager here, but I found it interesting that Spaun and Valimaki drew Hughes as an opponent when you shop around. That could show the books disliking all three names very easily. But I believe Hughes was placed into these matchups because it was easy enough for automated reasons when they could grab pre-tournament totals and use them for this battle. If my model is correct in that area, we have a lazy market that was too slow to move.
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