The 2026 MASTERS: Outright Bets, Core Plays, Bets, Lineup Process, Value Plays, and Player Pool)

20 hours ago
11 min read

Here is a quick snapshot of the Masters this week:

Cut Line: The Masters employs a 36-hole cut, with the top 50 players and ties advancing to the weekend rounds. This keeps the field competitive yet manageable for the final two days.
Course Length: The course is currently set at 7,555 yards, a par-72 layout. It has been lengthened over the years to adapt to modern play, though its strategic design remains the priority over sheer distance.
Greens: Augusta features bentgrass greens, known for their dramatic slopes and contours. Recent updates include resurfacing of four greens (notably the 16th) following damage from Hurricane Helene in 2024, though they’ve been restored to their original shapes. The greens vary in style—some oceanic with rolls, others stepped or tilted—demanding precision and adaptability.
Green Speeds: Exact speeds aren’t officially published, but they’re famously fast, often estimated at 13 to 15 on the Stimpmeter during tournament week. The SubAir system beneath the greens helps maintain firmness and speed, adjustable daily based on conditions and desired challenge.
Location: Augusta National is located in Augusta, Georgia, USA, a city in the eastern part of the state near the South Carolina border. The private club sits on a 365-acre former nursery site.
Course Designed: The course was co-designed by Bobby Jones, the legendary amateur golfer, and Alister MacKenzie, a renowned architect, opening in 1932. Clifford Roberts, the club’s co-founder, also influenced its evolution, with later modifications by architects like Robert Trent Jones and George Cobb (for the Par-3 Course).

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.

PGA DFS: Masters 2026 First Look

SLATE CONFIDENCE RATING: GREEN

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.*

This is a weird one this week, where we are loaded with extremely good pay up plays, all in which should be able to find themselves in contention. The difference between this week and other Masters is that we lack clear-cut easy click values. We have plenty of pretty good ones, and I would argue baseline on average we have softer pricing across the board, just no golfers that are clearly underpriced relatively speaking. Expect for one golfer at that is Matt Fitzpatrick. A lot of my week will be dependent on him showing up or not.

On top of that I almost think that Scottie and Rory are easier fades this week, even if they win I could see them not finishing in the GPP winning lineup, and again that is due to the amount of golfers come into this event that look like they are poised to win. I think there will be a path to get 3 top 10 finishers in your builds by going with 3 golfers at Matt Fitzpatrick's price or higher.

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 (E2B) Key Stat 1
Strokes Gained Approach (SG AP) Key Stat 2
Total Driving (TD) Key Stat 3
Strokes Gained Around the Green (SGT2G) Key Stat 4
Ball Striking (BS) Key Stat 5

The best part about Augusta is that it is a complete course challenging golfers in all aspects of their game, the golfers that are on their game this week will be the golfers that play well. Now Augusta is unique because it will penalize great shots if those great shots are hit in a slightly wrong spot, so targeting golfers that have course history more so good course history will be another key thing to look at.

Basically everything that we typically look at for predictability matters even more this week.

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)

Last 4 years course history.

Weather:

Per PGA Tour website - tournament page - Course Stats - Weather

Not much water or wind in the forecast, which means its will be interesting to see how they treat the greens this week. With no wind the course will be easier to attack, so the best defense would be keeping the greens fast.

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.

Ludvig Aberg 28/1
Tommy Fleetwood
Xander Schauffele
Matt Fitzpatrick
Si Woo Kim

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

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.

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.

Collin Morikawa would be someone I would consider an outright bet if we see that his back is good to go during his practice rounds. I will not really be on him for DFS purposes.

Bets:

Bryson DeChambeau
Xander Schauffele
Ludvig Aberg
Matt Fitzpatrick
Cameron Young

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"

Just a callout for LIV golfers their data is mostly just DP Tour, and PGA Tour starts, typically does not include LIV golf starts. So someone like Tyrrell Hatton I view more as a Low Exposure play. Jon Rahm I would also consider more of a Mid Exposure play. I would prefer to get to Bryson first if we are targeting LIV golfers.

But getting into Scottie and Tommy Fleetwood, it is pretty easy to see why the have both safety and upside. They both have made the cut at this event in 4 straight years, and both have a long made cut streak going on the PGA Tour.

Scottie's form has been a little bit off recently, and he is overpriced this week, maybe we could consider him a play at $12,000 but at $14,000 he is simply priced out. Again this is due to the quality of other pay up options we have this week. Including Fleetwood who has finished Top 10 or better 3 out of the last 4 starts on the PGA Tour. Both are very safe options with upside and that is why the data is considering them core plays.

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)

It is funny how fantasy golf works sometimes, Henley missed the cut last week due to a late bogey, and now I really do not want to be on him, but that missed cut is also why we are getting him at a cheaper price tag as well. What are the chances that Henley didn't have his A game last week, and was just looking ahead too much to the Masters. Tough to really say, but I do feel like a High Exposure tag is a little bit too high for him. Still I think it will be a good ideal to get exposure to him this week.

Now for Aberg, Xander, and Fitzpatrick, these 3 golfers as well as Fleetwood will be the golfers that I will be on the most, in a lot of cases I will be getting to 3 of them in most of my builds. They are just clearly the best choices for this week given their prices.

Aberg has been trending towards a win both at this event, and recently on the PGA Tour. He has two top 10 finishes at this tournament over his first 2 starts which is underheard of at this event. Now we get him this week where he is playing the best golf that he has heading into this event (from a stat fit perspective).

That being said I could say the exact same thing as Xander this week. He has finished top 10 at this event for 3 straight years, and has finished top 10 in 3 out of his past 4 events. It never really felt like he was going to win those events, but we really haven't seen Xander's A game this season or here at the Masters, if he slightly improves, he should win the event this week. This price is shockingly low. The Xander discount is FULLY back!

Matt Fitzpatrick is one of those plays where it could end up being too good to be true. That is really the only reason not too love him this week. Sure the course history upside could be a little better, he has finished 40th, 22nd, 10th, and 14th recently here, still pretty darn good. He ranks out top 10 or better in all the key metrics that we look at for predictability. Simply put he is the one golfer that is simply too cheap.

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 would probably put Bryson and Conners into this mix as well, but I really agree with this across the board.

What I see out of this is that Si Woo Kim, and Min Woo Lee are some of the best sub 8K plays that we this week, that is reflected in the model rank, and how vegas sees them this week. Both of them rank out as top 10 stat fits, and are both top 12 or better in recent form. I will likely get a lot of these two in my builds as well as Georgia golfer Harris English.

English has finished 12th, 22nd, and 43rd at this event the last 3 years. Besides his missed cut at the Player Championship he is looking like a very strong option for us this week especially at this price tag. He is one of my favorite values.

Lastly McNealy is at a very comfortable price, Cameron Young has the upside to win, when his game has been on here he has finished top 10. Hideki feels like one of the safest plays that we can be on especially when you consider his price.

Rory I do feel is a bit over priced, and Hojgaard I view more as a Low Exposure play, although I love chasing his upside. The issue that I have with Hojgaard is more that I like Bridgeman, and Knapp about the same.

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.

This is why I really like this week, because for the most part I agree with the data tags, but more importantly I agree with the players that it is getting to. Maybe toss in a couple of sub 7K value like Carlos Ortiz, and Zach Johnson, and that is the player pool. It really does seem like that simple of a week. Sure we could toss in potential top 10 finishes from Jordan, or Straka but that is far less appealing than a lot of the golfers that we are already on.

Again I view Bryson more as a High Exposure Play, he has won twice recently on LIV, and simply put it feels like this could truly be his year to win the Masters.

Patrick Reed has been playing on the DP Tour and playing well, he also has extremely good course history, and although he is a bit overpriced I do like him this week for DFS.

Now it is worth calling out that for One and Done contests that one of these two golfers should be your selection. Bryson has the best chance of any LIV golfer to win this week, but we might be better off using him at the US Open, same goes for Rahm, where we could be better off playing him at another major. So for me I like Reed, this is the best chance we will get to use him and not many people will be on him. The issue is that this would only at best be a top 5 finish not a win.

From there I like getting to Bhatia, Conners and Scott as more safe plays this week, and Bridgeman (Georgie ties), and Knapp as more upside plays.

I see Cantlay and Lowry as shoulder shrug plays.

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 Plays + Conners, English, Scott, McNealy, Woo Lee, Si Woo, Hideki

GPP

Young, Morikawa, Knapp, Hojgaard, Reed, Bridgeman

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.

The first build is capturing both safety and upside, but chasing a little bit more upside.

The second build is the opposite where it is chasing a little bit more safety. I really like both builds.

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.

I did the write-up a little bit earlier this week than normal, so i expect the ownerships to change more but as of Tuesday morning, a lot of the ownership is very spread-out, and if Xander, and Fitz come in at their ownerships I would love that. Again ownerships will update more as the week progresses though.

That is all for this week, good luck everyone!