After a month-long break, golf is back with a fresh new twist on things.
The PGA Tour heads to The Cliffs at Walnut Cove in Asheville, N.C., for the first time since 1942, where the inaugural Biltmore Championship takes place a week before the President's Cup. Walnut Cove is a Par 71 course spanning over 7200 yards.
Let's dive into our staff's Biltmore Championship picks and PGA Tour best bets for this week. Make sure to download the Action Network app for more picks and analysis!
Biltmore Championship Picks
First Round Leader Pick: Ben James (+4300 at DraftKings)
By: Tony Sartori
With this being the inaugural edition of a tournament contested on a course that has never hosted a competitive event featuring players of this caliber, there is little course data to work with. That said, there are multiple reasons to believe that the short game will be the differentiator this week.
First, this is mountain golf, which means that players who typically struggle with distance will be able to keep pace with the heavier hitters. Second, The Cliffs at Walnut Cove features five par 3s and generous fairways on the par 4s and 5s.
Subsequently, two big areas to look at this week are strokes gained: approach and strokes gained: putting. This profile benefits Ben James, who made a lot of noise in his debut PGA Tour season.
James made the cut in seven of his eight events, posting a pair of top-five finishes over that stretch. His putting improved week by week, which led to those two finishes occurring over his final four tournaments.
James gained true strokes putting in each of those four events. Meanwhile, his iron play is already at a high level.
Entering this week, James ranks in the 82nd percentile in strokes gained: approach.
Ben Kohles Top 10 +600 (FanDuel) / Top 20 +270 (FanDuel)
By: Derek Farnsworth
Ben Kohles has been on an absolute tear over the last six months. He's posted top-30 finishes in 11 of his last 12 events and even picked up a win during that stretch.
We are getting terrific odds on a golfer who might have better incoming form than anyone in the field. We don't know exactly how this course is going to play, but Kohles is 2nd in this field in both Good Drive Percentage and Strokes Gained: Approach.
Hitting fairways and greens is a great skill for any golf course.
Matchup Pick: Blades Brown Over Marco Penge (+117)
By: Spencer Aguiar
I might end up being very wrong when it comes to how this course is going to play, but the flat nature of returns we have gotten from books isn't taking into account some of the neutralizing that Walnut Cove appears to do for Marco Penge on paper.
Look, I get that we are talking about a golfer who experienced health scares throughout the season and finally seems to be healthy. I understand those results have come in successfully to end the PGA Tour season and to end it over in Europe, but Penge's game is predicated on off-the-tee acumen, which this week's venue removes by taking the driver out of his hands.
If the course delivers more driving decisions and impact than I project, this could look very bad, but this is one of those weeks where pricing is about as far off my numbers as I have seen. I will take my shots and chances.
Outright Winner Pick: Davis Thompson (+2600)
By: Jake Zach
Davis Thompson's irons are as sharp as anyone's in the field, and he ranks 1st in SG: Approach over his last 24 rounds. I loved the way he closed out 2026, with a T8 at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, a T7 at the 3M Open, and a T14 at the Wyndham.
I keep coming back to his 2024 John Deere Classic win, the first of his career. That track demanded the same kind of scoring we'll see this week. This week is a great spot for DT to get his second career win on Tour.
