British Open Golf Picks
PGA Tour
Date: July 14–17, 2022
Course: St Andrews, The Old Course
Typically, We don’t put much emphasis on form because any golfer can show up in any given week and win regardless of form. However, in the last 5 years there has been a trend where the player who won The Open Championship had at least 2 top 10s in the 5 events prior to winning The Open and in Jordan Spieth and Francesco Molinari’s case they won an event. Henrik Stenson is really the only one of the past 5 winners who didn’t come directly into The Open in great form because he had 2 missed cuts in a row prior to winning. However, prior to that he was in excellent form with 2 top 10s in 3 events. This tells me that this is one of the events where form really does play a role in predicting the winner. That’s not to say we’ll completely toss out players in bad form, but will definitely be playing guys in good form more confidently this week. Another trend of note is that there seems to be a crossover with The Open Championship and the Masters at Augusta.
Now let’s talk about how the course is likely to play. The last time The Open was held here in 2015 the fairways were easy to hit, the greens were easy to hit, scoring was easy relative to typical Open conditions, and we saw a smattering of players reach double digits under par. we don’t expect it to play much different this year and it may even play a touch easier, especially if the weather doesn’t kick up. The way the course is set up would lead you to believe bombers should hold a distinct advantage but that wasn’t exactly the case when looking at the 2015 leader-board. We will place emphasis on Strokes Gained: Off the Tee but I think Strokes Gained: Approach will be the difference maker on these enormous greens. we’d also heavily factor in Strokes Gained: Tee to Green because we want the best all-around players for majors.
Speaking of huge greens, I’m definitely going to place emphasis on player’s ability to lag putt and to be able to 2-putt from 40 and 50+ feet. We are going to see plenty of 3-putts this week so we want to target guys that will be able to avoid those. Along those same lines there are still plenty of spots on this course where players can find trouble, so I’ll be factoring Bogey Avoidance as well. With a whopping 14 par 4s on the scorecard par 4 scoring is definitely going to play a major role as well. were not going to look at any proximities really because we feel like most holes players will be able to put the ball wherever they want to off the tee as long as there’s no wind. They are going to basically be leaving themselves whatever distance they feel most comfortable with and that’s why SG: Approach will be a pretty big factor. You can pick your spots all you want off the tee but if you can’t stick it within 15-20 feet on these greens your opportunities are going to be very limited.
Lastly, let’s talk briefly about the biggest factor in my opinion, the weather. Most of these links course’s biggest defence to low scoring is the weather, specifically the wind. We’ve seen how incredibly difficult these courses can play when it’s windy, but we’ve also seen how gettable they are when there’s no wind to speak of. So, if it looks like the wind is going to lay down then we definitely want to place more emphasis on Birdies or Better gained. If the wind is going to kick up, then we’ll be looking for guys that play well in windy condition and will be placing more emphasis on Bogey Avoidance.
Key Stats
SG: Approach
SG: Tee to Green
3-Putt Avoidance
Par 4 Scoring
Bogey Avoidance
SG: Around the Green – If the wind kicks up this will be important
Our Winner Pick:
Jordan Spieth @14/1
Spieth already owns a Claret Jug after his sensational finish to the 2017 Open at Royal Birkdale when he dodged a bullet at 13 after a wild drive and went birdie-eagle-birdie-birdie from 14-17 to win by three.
Other Betting Predictions: (All Picks Each Way as most firms paying 11+ places)
John Rahm @12/1
Dustin Johnson @28/1
Tommy Fleetwood @28/1
Best Golf Betting Tips and Predictions
Image Credit: skysports.com
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