2024 WM Phoenix Open Data-Driven Picks: Longshots for Corey Conners & 6 More
Via Getty Images/Action Network Design. Pictured (left to right): Akshay Bhatia, Corey Conners & Si Woo Kim.
While the Super Bowl might already be the biggest party of the year, having the 2024 WM Phoenix Open as its opening act is sure to add even more excitement.
You don't have to look any further than fans dressed in Elmo and Big Bird costumes to know that the WM Phoenix Open is unlike every other event on the sports calendar.
From a viewership perspective, that creates extra fun for those tuning in to watch. However, all winning bets count the same way, so let's try to continue our run after connecting on Wyndham Clark last week at 100-1 and see if we can find value still left on this board.
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 WM Phoenix Open Data-Driven Picks
Every Monday, I take an aggregated total from a handful of books I respect and form a median outright price. None of that suggests you wouldn't be able to find better if you shopped around, but that is a total I use to compare against a golfer's outright odds movements.
Those returns indicate where the square versus sharp money has entered the market and shows potential DFS value for those looking to round out their player pool. Let's dive into some of the shifts in the market and see how they line up with the outright bets I talked about on Links + Locks.
2024 WM Phoenix Open Biggest Market Movers
When diving into my model's projections, we got sharp versus square movement split down the middle this week.
My math identified Byeong Hun An, Erik Van Rooyen, Hideki Matsuyama and Scottie Scheffler as the notable sharp movers who saw a credible shift in their price.
The opposite occurred for Austin Eckroat, Denny McCarthy and Emiliano Grillo, three options my model thought landed as overpriced commodities and continued to stay as such throughout some of my more respected shops.
It was a much more challenging handicap for Wyndham Clark, Shane Lowry and Sahith Theegala. I tend to think that some combination of their lack of positive trajectory for upside would make the trio better-suited for other markets than outright bets. However, I don't have any massive gripes against what appears to be money that possesses some respect behind the wagers.
2024 WM Phoenix Open Outright Picks
The top of this board has a ton of strength highlighted by Scottie Scheffler, Justin Thomas and Max Homa. All three golfers carried significant projected win equity for us to consider, although books placed us in a spot of either having to choose a name up top or attempt to take them on further down the board.
My belief is that this tournament exponentially opens up for everyone if the favorites falter. I don't know if that will come to fruition because there is a perceived talent gap from that trio of favorites compared to everyone else.
Nonetheless, I decided to take my shots down the board and grab a handful of the cheaper options since I wanted to avoid ending up with too much exposure to this slate.
Corey Conners (70-1) – Best Price Available Now (65-1 at bet365)
Connecting on Wyndham Clark during back-to-back wagers at 100-1 at the 2023 U.S. Open and last week's AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am may go down as one of my most impactful moments here at Action Network, although I must say that the most profitable wager I have ever made was on Corey Conners at 250-1 to win the 2019 Valero Texas Open as a journeyman golfer who had to Monday qualify for the event.
I've always said that Conners's skill set has its limitations because of his inferior short game compared to other PGA Tour professionals. It is hard to win an event when you rank outside the top 75 of most full-field events in both Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green and Strokes Gained: Putting. However, there are specific locations on the schedule (like his two wins at the Valero Texas Open) where Conners's game fits the narrative of finding high-end success.
It is worth noting that Conners's struggles around the green have typically been one of his undoings at TPC Scottsdale, but the softer conditions should present a higher GIR rate for all players, helping to shift the Canadian into a zone where his ball-striking has the potential to place him inside the first page of the leaderboard.
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Si Woo Kim (65-1) – Best Price Available Now (65-1 at bet365)
Roberto Arguello broke this down best on this week's Links + Locks show. Kim has shown a past inclination to succeed on similar green complexes when he captured the Players Championship there in 2017, and we are never more than a hot putter away from another top-end finish.
His past course history at the venue does leave a ton to be desired, but 21 consecutive starts of gaining off the tee, mixed with the top putting tournament we have seen from him in years when he gained 5.2 shots to the field with his flat stick during the 2023 iteration of the contest is worth diving into deeper.
Akshay Bhatia (66-1) – Best Price Available Now (80-1 at bet365)
Only Si Woo Kim, Scottie Scheffler, Cameron Young, Akshay Bhatia and Davis Thompson placed in the top 15 of this field when I weighed aggression, ball-striking and weighted scoring.
Sharper markets have taken a disliking to Bhatia for some reason, but I will trust my model that loved his ball-striking acumen.
Erik Van Rooyen (125-1) – Best Price Available Now (100-1 at BetMGM)
There isn't a golfer in my sheet who is experiencing more of a boost over his past 24 rounds than Erik Van Rooyen.
Dark blue returns in all the critical ball-striking areas should enhance Van Rooyen's ceiling, and the 81-spot improvement for weighted tee-to-green return for this week's course versus his baseline elsewhere may be the key to unlocking this puzzle.
Adam Svensson (150-1) – Best Price Available Now (150+ if you shop around)
Svensson was one of 13 golfers in this field to crack the top 60 of all six statistical categories I ran this week. The lack of true upside in any area outside of weighted scoring would be the drawback, but we are not that far away from prices in similar fields that saw Svensson half of this rate at the Sony Open.
Davis Thompson (200-1) – Best Price Available Now (200-1 at PointsBet/BetRivers)
Thompson's ability to hold things together during the more challenging holes will be the ultimate decider, but when I removed all holes that weren't in the top seven for birdie or better percentage, Thompson jumped to third in my model for weighted scoring. That return placed him behind only Scottie Scheffler and Justin Thomas.
The floor is shallow, but Thompson has some of that boom-or-bust potential that Clark showed last week, even if the floor and ceiling are both much lower.
Jhonattan Vegas (350-1) – Best Price Available Now (400-1 at PointsBet)
Vegas's three missed cuts to begin the year have plagued us on multiple occasions inside of the placement market, but I remain bullish because most of those failures to make the weekend only needed one thing to go differently. It is a dart-throw for a reason, but Vegas’s game does match up ideally with the course.
Top-Two Projected Win Equity Choices In My Model
Best Values To Consider At New Price (Not In Order Of Perceived Edge)
We will try to stay hot in this section. Both Clark and Aberg showed as two of the better values on Wednesday last week.
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