The Open Championship 2026: Outright Bets, Core Plays, Bets, Lineup Process, Value Plays, and Player Pool)
- 8 minutes ago
- 12 min read
We enter the final major of the season with the Open Championship. The pricing was the first thing that stood out for this event in DFS and partially for outright bets. There are 4 top dogs this week. They are Scottie, Rory, Tommy Fleetwood, and Matt Fitzpatrick. It is not that hard to fit two of these golfers into builds, and for outright you could just bet on those 4 and be done.
Now I firmly expect everyone to be on Matt Fitzpatrick, and Tommy Fleetwood, so the question is what to do with that chalk. We will talk about that and much more throughout the write-up. Let's jump into it.
*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/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.
Due to the soft pricing I mostly love this week, but this also leaves of with too many lineup paths that we can be choosing from for PGA DFS, Studs and Duds will work, Fair and Balanced will work, and just going value based will work. To me there really isn't a correct path. This makes it more difficult to make a main build but I do love to attack this event for GPPs. Target AM only, target PM only, due studs and duds, do fair and balanced, due England only, you can make a lot of fun lineup paths work that also make a lot of sense. Now I am not saying you need to do any of the builds below but it is crazy that we can get Scottie and Rory into builds together and have a way better than normal chance of getting 6/6 across the cut line.
You can also run out a fairly easy studs and duds build that I would also consider to be more of a fair and balanced build. it is crazy that this lineup combo is event possible.
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.
Bogey Avoidance (BA) Key Stat 1
Total Driving (TD) Key Stat 2
Strokes Gained Around Green (SGARG) Key Stat 3
Strokes Gained Approach (SG AP) Key Stat 4
Good Drive % (GD%) Key Stat 5
The Key Stats that I am looking at this week are typical key stats that we consider for majors but also links style courses, we do not know for sure which stats will end up being predictive like we do for most weeks as we have not seen this course on the DP Tour or PGA Tour during a record stat event. Still we know want to expect for the British Open and it is a course where you basically need to play it smart. A lot of longer hitters will be clubbing down this week which could get them a slight advantage if they are playing smart. (Rory, and Matt Fitzpatrick).
Course History:
Going forward Course History for an event with go by H1, H2, H3, and H4. For most weeks that will simply be 2025, 2024, 2023, and 2022 course history. (Last 4 years is course history is when the data is the most significant)
We do not have course history to go off of even the 2017 major here saw a good redesign on a lot of the holes. So we turn to Comp Course History. The interesting thing about this course is that I found it tough to find a course that mimics what we are expecting. I think the Scottish Open (H2) course from last week ends up being the best. Then I was looking at more course that will penalize a golfer for not being accurate so I was looking at The Players Championship (H1) and RSM Classic (H4).
Then just to get a full view how golfers have played in the majors this year H4 is the rank of the average finish for golfers through the first 4 majors this year.
Weather:
Per PGA Tour website - tournament page - Course Stats - Weather
Weather is projected to play a factor this week, but thankfully it looks playable, we are factoring in the weather as "Bad" this week already as well. Right now it does seem like there will be a pretty big benefit for golfers that have the AM tee time. So for showdown slates and best ball drafts we should be targeting AM golfers (only). This is also true for the First Round Leader bets as well.
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.
I do think Scottie could maybe struggle a little bit with his group being Hatton, and Bryson. Two of the bigger hot heads on the tour. So I won't be getting to him as a FRL bet. But after that it is very loaded in regards to whom we can get to here. Bold are my 4 favorite bets, but I will also be chasing some longer odds as well.
Tommy Fleetwood 30/1
Viktor Hovland 45/1
Nick Taylor 150/1
Si Woo Kim 55/1
Jordan 75/1
Robert MacIntyre 45/1
Min Woo Lee 60/1
Russell Henley 55/1
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
Patrick Cantlay +114 over Berger, and Nico
JT +142 over Jason Day, and Alex Noren
Margo Penge +128 over Harrington, Hollick
Tom Kim +100 over Horschel, Howell
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.
Tom Kim over Aaron Rai -118
More Bets found: Ninetofive Betting Sheet
Outright Bets:
2024 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.
I really like the idea of getting to Rory, Fitzpatrick, and Fleetwood for the other three golfers it would not be surprising to see them win that being said I donot want to chase it.
Bets:
Tommy Fleetwood 18/1
Matt Fitzpatrick 18/1
Wyndham Clark 41/1
Viktor Hovland 33/1
Rory 9/1
Sam Burns 50/1
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"
100% I would agree that all three of these golfers are our Core Plays for the week. All 3 check all the boxes, all three rank out top 11 or better in all the key metrics that we look at for safety and upside. My goal with a lot of my lineups and builds is to get to 2 of these golfers in all of my builds.
Fitzpatrick is checking all of the boxes my only concern for him is getting too chalky, right now though he is projected to be the 4th highest owned golfer behind Scottie, Rory, and Hovland. So that makes it interesting maybe the soft pricing is allowing the public to view Scottie, and Rory as more of priorities than they should. Fleetwood ranks out 6th as well. I think those two will end up being the highest owned but again if the soft pricing is going to lead to the ownership being a little spread-out I am all for that.
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