Cadillac Championship 2026: Outright Bets, Core Plays, Bets, Lineup Process, Value Plays, and Player Pool)
- 7 days ago
- 7 min read
This week is a fun week due to the fact that we have a course that we haven't seen in a while we do not know exactly what to look at key stat wise. So to determine the Key Stats we have to find which courses are Comp Courses. The Comp Courses are the courses for these tournament: Cognizant Classic, The Players Championship, and Valspar Championship. They share a lot of the course characteristics of the course that we have this week.
Breaking down my step-by-step process to give you the top picks, plays and bets for this weeks tournament.
*Please note I always publish the rough draft version of this write-up, and then come back and edit it / correct it later that day. If there are grammatical errors that is why.
SLATE CONFIDENCE RATING: Yellow
Slate confidence rating is a way of looking at the slate in terms of predictability. Red will be a week in which I am reducing my units bet. Typically this will mean entering the same amount of lineups but in a contest where the entry $ amount is less. A Yellow week is a standard week. Green is a week that appears to be very easy to predict, these are weeks in which we typically have a full field event that is loaded. (Majors) thus it should be very easy to make a good profitable lineup. **Note for betting my strategy does not change per week.
I really like the values that we are getting this week, but there's almost too many good options as values. The flip side we have Scottie who is a clear-cut spend up if possible After that I like Cameron Young, fitting both of them is possible, but it is also a little difficult.
KEY STATS:
*Based off of which key stats led to golfers winning but also making the cut in previous years at the course tournament. I look for which one or two Strokes Gained stats matter the most. Look to see whether this is a wedge fest or a long iron event. (175-125 stats don't really matter in terms of predicting who will play well in a given week) Find out which scoring stat matters the most (BOB, B2B, or BA). Find if this is a course in which accuracy or distance matters the most.
Birdie To Bogey Ratio (2B) Key Stat 1
Strokes Gained Approach (SG AP) Key Stat 2
Total Driving (TD) Key Stat 3
Strokes Gained Differential (SG DIF) Key Stat 4
Ball Striking (BS) Key Stat 5
These key stats are designed to be more general, but also focused in on the comp courses.
Course History:
Going forward Course History for an event with go by H1, H2, H3, and H4. For most weeks that will simply be 2023, 2022, 2021, and 2020 course history. (Last 4 years is course history is when the data is the most significant)
This years:
Cognizant Classic
Players Championship
Valspar Championship
Weather:
Per PGA Tour website - tournament page - Course Stats - Weather
Wind could end up playing a factor especially on Saturday, I think it is best to take a look at the wind for round 2 specifically to see if there is a weather advantage.
BETTING PICKS:
First Round Leader
I will be targeting AM Tee Times that rank out top 5% for FRL betting using the NineToFive betting sheet until further notice (basically if weather tells us not to). Note you can always bet on golfers to finish Top 5 or Top, just make there they are paying out a tie.
Andrew Putnam 110/1
Ryo Hisatsune 50/1
Brian Harman 80/1
Cameron Young 20/1
Scottie Scheffler 10/1
Jacob Bridgeman 35/1
Round 1 - 3-Ball Bets
Available by clicking on either the Ownership Leverage, or Props page on NineToFive, then click on the 3 person Icon. I will typically only bet on golfers that have a 40% likelihood to win or type their group. Those will be highlighted in the PGA Tour Betting Sheet - Click on 3 Ball Bets
No 3-Ball Bets this week.
Matchup Tournament Bets:
Best matchup bet for the week.
More will be highlighted in the PGA Tour Betting Sheet - Betting Page Dropdown - Matchup Bets You can also find the best matchup bets per round here as well.
No Matchup Bets this week.
More Bets found: Ninetofive Betting Sheet
Outright Bets:
2023 Recap = 12 Outright Winners = 144 Units of Profit (Wyndham Clark winning at +100/1 Odds at Pebble carried)
Picture 1 = Golfers that are the statistical best Outright Bets. This is determined by looking at which data points were the most predictable in regards to players that won the past two seasons. These golfers meet at least 80% or more of the statistical thresholds used to determine winners.
Bets:
Scottie Scheffler 3/1
Cameron Young 12/1
Collin Morikawa 19/1
Jacob Bridgeman 40/1
Sam Burns 30/1
Data Tag: Core Plays
Golfers that are the most likely to make the cut, and meet or out produce their price tag. To be a Core Play golfers need to be coming in "Checking All the Boxes"
This is exactly how I view this week, I think we should be getting to 1 or two of these golfers in all of our builds, they are both clearly the top choices in the field, and both at the top of their game lately.
Data Tag: High Exposure
Players that have one knock: whether that be course history, recent form, stat fit, safety, upside or price. (*This is based off of the the NineToFive Data Tag, which accurately marks a slight flaw in a great play thus why they would only be high exposure plays)
This is where I might disagree a little bit different from the data here. I do agree that Henley and Fleetwood are very two of the most likely golfers in the field to be the next best to have a top 10 finish, but at the same time I do worry that they do not have as good of a floor as some of the other golfers at different prices.
Data Tag: Mid Exposure
Players that are still good plays but have more than one flaw to them as a play this week. This could be due to recent form, stat fit, course history, injury uncertainly or just due to the fact that their are better plays around their price tag.
I really like Sam Burns and Jacob Bridgeman this week. Sam Burns game has bee trending in the correct direction, and he ranks out as the 6th best specialist. I like getting to him more than Fleetwood and Henley.
Bridgeman is my favorite mid tier golfer this week, he has done well at the comp courses finishing 5th and 14th. He is a top 10 stat fit in the field this week as well, with really no worries in his game stat fit wise. The worries come from his recent form where he has finished 33rd, and 41st. He also ranks out as a bad Specialist. But that is why we are getting him at this price tag.
I see Hideki, Rose, and Akshay as more of shoulder shrug plays, golfers I am happy to close my lineups out with but not golfers I am going out of my way to target.
Data Tag: Low Exposure
Risk/Reward Plays, Plays to get a made cut, Shoulder Shrug Plays, or Fomo Plays
I will not be covering every golfer in this section but highlighting some.
The only concern with Collin Morikawa is whether his back is healthy or not. Since his WD at the Players Championship he has finished 4th, and 7th. If he is fully good to go I would argue he is the 2nd best player in the field. The back flaring up is what is keeping me from fully trusting him.
Si Woo Kim is a golfer that in basically any event can go off and finish top 10, the being said the exact opposite is also true. he is a great stat fit, and has multiple top 10 finishes recently. I like chasing his upside.
Ryo Hisatsune, and Sudarshan Yellamaraju I like as flyers at this price, but at the same time I would almost rather get to some of the sub sub 7K options as I think they will have as much safety, and those plays will allow us to fit several of the studs of this slate into our builds, that being said these two golfers to me have more upside, and that is why they are priced higher.
Some of the values that I like are:
Corey Conners: Top 15 finishes at the comp courses, and should be able to give us another top 10 finish.
Matt McCarty: Chasing his recent starts finishing 19th, 12th, and 24th
Brian Harman: One of the most mispriced golfers in the field, 7 straight made cuts on the PGA Tour, and an 1th place finish at one of the comp courses.
Andrew Novak: 3 top 20 finishes over his last 4 starts
Bud Cauley: 5 straight made cuts, with his recent finish being a top 10 finish.
Andrew Putnam: I think the length of this course will hinder the upside for Putnam but I think he will finish better than where he is priced.
Austin Smotherman: Chasing the comp course history where he has finished 2nd, and 13th.
Chandler Blanchet: Local Ties, only golfer in the field that is an extremely local golfer, he also has a 2nd place finish just 4 starts ago, has also finished 33rd, and 18th. He is one of the golfers that I have gotten on more and more as the week has progressed.
Player Pool
Player Pool is rank in order of how I am prioritizing a golfer as a play this week. (This is based off of 20 entry max lineups. For 150 entry lineups I will open up the player pool slightly more but this will be determined by the lineup optimizer)
CASH AND GPP PLAYS:
(Finalized on Tuesday Member Write-up)
Cash Play: Highest Likelihood to make the cut.
GPP Play: Reduced Likelihood to make the cut, but if they do they have a high likelihood to exceed their salary.
Cash
Core + High Exposure Plays + Bridgeman, Harman, Conners
GPP
Henley, Rose, Hisatsune, Yellamaraju
Sample Lineup
*This is a sample lineup for you to use as a reference tool. This is typically the first look lineup that I get onto for the week. Most of the time my main lineup will be adjusted throughout the week as I do a deeper dive.
Optimal GPP Lineups (Based on Highest Upside):
From the NineToFiveSports.Com PGA DFS Lineup Builder
Projected Ownership / Ownership Leverage
Projected ownership for that weeks golf tournament, Tag to call out if they are over-valued or under-valued. What position they are being valued at given their ownership at their price.
The Ownership leverage tool has been very spot on this year especially in regards to Scottie, so that does worry me a decent amount. The golfers that are over-valued this week is a little shocking Gotterup extremely high valued, Min Woo Lee, and Kitayama, it seems people are just blindly chasing distance and hoping for the best. Anyone of those golfers could find water off the tee so I do think it makes sense to be under on their ownerships.
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