PGA DFS Picks
World Golf Championships – Workday Championship
Discover intel from this article to accentuate your fantasy golf picks for the World Golf Championships – Workday Championship, and check out our PGA Lineup Optimizer to make more educated player selections for your DFS lineups. Best of luck this week!
Recap from last week: Max Homa and Tony Finau shot up the leaderboard on Sunday last week at the Genesis Invitational and ended up in a playoff against each other. Homa won on the second playoff hole to defeat Finau, but it was Tony’s third straight T2, so don’t feel too bad for him. Congrats to Homa for winning, whenever a player wins in his hometown I’m especially happy for him – and he did just that in Los Angeles.
Preview for the World Golf Championships – Workday Championship: The PGA Tour migrates east from Los Angeles, California, to Bradenton, Florida for the WGC – Workday Championship. If this tournament sounds new to you it’s because it has a new name and title sponsor – it was previously the WGC – Mexico Championship from 2017 to 2020, before that it was the WGC – Cadillac Championship from 2011 to 2016 – it has taken on other branded names as well and dates back to 1999. The past five winners of this event include Patrick Reed in 2020, Dustin Johnson in 2019, Phil Mickelson in 2018, Dustin Johnson in 2017, and Adam Scott in 2016. This year features a different course than we are used to since the PGA Tour decided to cancel playing in Mexico for the fifth straight year due to the pandemic. This week starts a four-week Florida-swing – next up is the Arnold Palmer Invitational, followed by THE PLAYERS Championship, and The Honda Classic wraps up play in Florida until the Valspar Championship rolls around in late-April.
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Tournament purse: The prize money for this year’s event is set at $10.5M, the winner receives a staggering $1.82M and earns himself 550 FedEx Cup points.
Course and key stats: We are on a track that the PGA Tour has never seen before – The Concession Golf Club is 7,474 yards in length, is a par 72 , and the greens consist of Bermuda grass. The course was designed by Jack Nicklaus and opened in 2006 – Bryson DeChambeau should have good vibes here as he won the 2015 NCAA Championship on this track. The winning score over the past ten years at this tournament ranges from -4 to -21 but that was at two different courses, so it’s hard to say what score will be needed to win this week. Some of the key player stats to research this week are strokes gained: approach, sand saves gained, opportunities gained, and strokes gained: around the green.
The field: The field is limited to just 72 players this week, and like all WGC events, there will be no cut line to worry about after round 2, so provided your players don’t withdraw, your lineups will all get a full 432 holes worth of fantasy points. Many of the world’s top players will be competing this week, kind of like last week’s Genesis Invitational field but with less depth players – although there are a few European Tour names that are largely unknown to us here in North America. Tiger Woods has won this event a ridiculous seven times, Dustin Johnson has been victorious three times, and Patrick Reed has reigned supreme twice – the latter two players are in the field this week. On a scale ranging from A to D, I rank the field strength to be an A+.
Lineup construction strategy this week: With no cut line to deal with this week and many of the biggest names in golf playing, you can do any configuration you want for your lineups. I’ll be heavily focused on stars and scrubs since the elite players typically win WGC tournaments, so you will want at least two or three players in each lineup that have a legit shot at winning come Sunday.
All the best to win some contests this week – here are my 15 DFS golf picks which feature my top 3 players from each tier on DraftKings (DK) in no particular order, plus I include player salaries for DK and FanDuel. I consistently provide recent and seasonal finishes for each of my picks, their performance at this event over the last 5 years (note: because this course is a new one for PGA Tour competition, I won’t provide past results this week because event results are irrelevant), and add in some helpful pieces of information, also.
The $10K+ Range
Jon Rahm (Salary: DraftKings – $11.1K, FanDuel – $11.9K) – Rahm shot a 66 in the final round last week to tie for 5th place, so he comes into this week with momentum on his side. Outside of a T13, his worst finish over his last six starts is a T7 – he’s just as consistent as DJ but without the wins. I expect Rahm to have another top 5 finish this week and I recommend using him in a few of your finest lineups.
Patrick Cantlay (Salary: DraftKings – $10.0K, FanDuel – $11.5K) – Cantlay has finished no worse than T17 over his last six starts, he won the ZOZO Championship last October, and has two top 3 finishes over his last three starts. It was challenging to choose between Cantlay and Schauffele for this spot, but I gave the nod to Cantlay who has more win equity than his Cali-counterpart.
The $9K Range
Viktor Hovland (Salary: DraftKings – $9.4K, FanDuel – $10.8K) – Hovland is such an impressive young talent who is beaming with confidence and is super-talented – a deadly combination. He won five starts ago in Mexico at the Mayakoba Golf Classic, and has three straight top 6 finishes between the PGA Tour and European Tour. He doesn’t make many mistakes and should continue popping up on leaderboards going forward.
Daniel Berger (Salary: DraftKings – $9.3K, FanDuel – $10.6K) – Berger took last week off to reward himself for winning the week prior at Pebble Beach where he was victorious thanks to his four (yes, four!) eagles. He has three top 10’s in his last three starts, is a Florida-native, and I think everything aligns well for him to have another top 10 finish this week.
Tony Finau (Salary: DraftKings – $9.8K, FanDuel – $11.2K) – Finau has been on an absolute tear over his last four starts as he has a T4 and three consecutive runner-up or co-runner-up finishes. 60% of his finishes this season have been top 10’s and five of them have come in his last six starts. He seems extremely hungry to win, and that could come this week if he keeps playing how he is right now. He also had a field-leading -7 in the final round last week, and even though he lost to Homa in the playoff, he should be refocused for this week and driven to hoist the trophy on Sunday evening.
The $8K Range
Max Homa (Salary: DraftKings – $8.6K, FanDuel – $9.1K) – Homa told us via social media prior to last week’s start that his game was getting close to contending after finishing T7 in Pebble Beach, and boy was he ever right as he beat Tony Finau in two playoff holes last week to win the Genesis Invitational in his hometown. He has five top 21’s in his last six starts and his game is in great shape at the moment. I can understand if backing a player who’s coming off the win just days ago makes you nervous, but at his pricing, I think he’s a solid play this week.
Joaquin Niemann (Salary: DraftKings – $8.1, FanDuel – $9.8K) – Niemann had two straight T2’s prior to falling apart last week on the weekend and finishing T43. He has been great for most of the season and I think he will rebound well this week.
Will Zalatoris (Salary: DraftKings – $8.0K, FanDuel – $8.8K) – Zalatoris keeps playing well, week in and week out. His T6 at the U.S. Open last year really set the stage for him to show he’s a young stud worth watching, and he hasn’t disappointed as he has six top 17’s in his last nine starts since that rock-solid finish in his first major. He finished T15 last week and his best round came on Sunday when he shot a -4 – had he not shot a +4 on Saturday, he would have easily been inside the top 10. Will-Z is a sneaky, high-value play this week, and comes in at a great price on both DK and FD.
The $7K Range
Ryan Palmer (Salary: DraftKings – $7.2K, FanDuel – $8.6K) – Palmer has three top 4’s in his last five starts, and has been putting up birdies like nobody’s business – he even had three eagles earlier this year at the Tournament of Champions. I really like his DFS pricing for this week and he’s my favorite $7K play on DK by far.
Marc Leishman (Salary: DraftKings – $7.4K, FanDuel – $8.5K) – I don’t think I’ll put Leishman in many of my lineups this week but he has been decent as of late with four straight top 32’s, including his T4 three starts ago at the Sony Open. He did well to make 16 birdies last week, but his downfall was having 15 bogeys – a season-high for him. If he minimizes the damage this week, then he should have a top 20 result.
Carlos Ortiz (Salary: DraftKings – $7.3K, FanDuel – $8.0K) – Ortiz was playing quite well before last week’s opening round when he shot a 75 – he tried to recover in round 2 and did with a two under, but it was too little too late and he missed his first cut since early October. He won the Houston Open last November, has three top 8’s in his last seven starts, and before last week, his worst finish was a T37 in his previous seven starts.
The $6K Range
Kevin Na (Salary: DraftKings – $6.8K, FanDuel – $8.0K) – Na won four starts ago at the Sony Open – it’s actually the only top 10 finish of his season but he also has eight top 45’s in ten starts. Every player will play 72 holes this week unless they withdraw, and Na has been known to pull out of events from time to time, so just be aware of that fact.
Abraham Ancer (Salary: DraftKings – $6.8K, FanDuel – $8.1K) – Ancer had trouble getting out of Texas last week due to the state’s complete meltdown and didn’t arrive in LA until Wednesday. With no practice rounds, he unsurprisingly missed the cut and will look to get back on track this week with adequate preparation beforehand. He had a T5 two PGA Tour starts ago, has four top 17’s in his last six starts in North America, and I think he will right the ship this week in Florida. He’s my favorite player in the $6K range on DK, and I’ll be leaning on him as one of my core scrubs this week.
Brendon Todd (Salary: DraftKings – $6.4K, FanDuel – $7.5K) – Before last week’s missed cut, Todd had three top 22’s in his previous four starts – his best one being T8 in Mexico at the Mayakoba Golf Classic. If you are looking for a player with a near basement price, then I would suggest looking at Todd who should fare a tad better than the average player this week.
Recapping my 15 pick’s finishes from last week’s Genesis Invitational
The $10K+ Range
- Dustin Johnson – T8
- Jon Rahm – T5
- Justin Thomas – Cut
The $9K Range
- Patrick Cantlay – T15
- Tony Finau – 2nd
- Adam Scott – T38
The $8K Range
- Bubba Watson – Cut
- Viktor Hovland – T5
- Joaquin Niemann – T43
The $7K Range
- Cameron Davis – T43
- Sergio Garcia – Cut
- Carlos Ortiz – Cut
The $6K Range
- Michael Thompson – Cut
- Matthew NeSmith – T20
- Richy Werenski – T57
