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First off, congrats to me for finally getting another winner across the finish line, it had been a while. Bigger congrats to my guy Ryan Noonan for grabbing an early number on Min Woo and cashing at 50/1!

Off the Top

1. Last Licks to get the late invite to Augusta. 27 golfers in this field are already invited to the Masters, but if one of the other 117 hopefuls gets a win this week, they’ll need to start looking for lodging in Georgia.

2. While many used last week as the warm-up, there are plenty of top golfers here in San Antonio as well. Ludvig Aberg, Hideki Matsuyama, Tommy Fleetwood, Keegan Bradley, Patrick Cantlay, Maverick McNealy, Jordan Spieth, Tom Kim, Tony Finau, Sam Burns, last year’s defending champion Akshay Bhatia, and two-time winner Corey Conners are all here.

3. Unlike last week, there isn’t an archetypal golfer who does well here. Ball Striking is a must, but all sorts have gotten it done here, including some big ol’ long shots.

TPC San Antonio

TPC San Antonio features the standard par-72 assortment of ten par-4s, four par-5s, and four par-3s. Even though it lies in rugged terrain amidst the Texas Hill Country, there are seemingly no holes that stand out with their own unique identity. Including the 602-yard second hole, the first four holes add up to 1,708 yards and 0.36 shots over par making it vital that players are focused and striking the ball well from the start.

Most of the front-nine holes are quite similar with slight dog legs and bunkers guarding both sides of the green. There are five par-4s under 410 yards and the four par-5s are among the longest on Tour, averaging 588 yards. Three of the four par-5s are difficult to reach in two shots and, overall, they rank as the toughest on Tour. Competent wedge play is vital in setting up birdie chances on the par-5s.

One unique characteristic of TPC San Antonio is that the holes were designed to play downhill if players are hitting into the prevailing wind and uphill with the wind at their back. This feature prevents bombers off the tee from gaining a significant advantage.

The 347-yard 17th hole might be the most interesting hole on the course. It can stretch out to 366 yards and is potentially a driveable hole when not hitting into a southerly wind. Greenside bunkers on both sides guard the front of the hole, but it presents a risk-reward opportunity for some excitement down the stretch.

The par-5 591-yard 18th hole is one of the more underrated closing holes on Tour. Not only does it play uphill, but the creek that traverses the fairway can cause issues on erratic drives. While it has a Birdie or Better rate of 25%, it also has a bogey or worse rate of 16%.

Betting

I told myself I should have a smaller card this week since I’m going to have such a big card of props next week. But, in the end, that seems like a bad process, and I’ll kick myself if I had a winner that I left off in the name of saving a little bit of cash to bet on “Patrick Reed top LIV player” in 5 days. So, we roll out a full card in the hopes of heading to Georgia on a winning streak.

Keegan Bradley +3300
Maverick McNealy +5000
Ben Griffin +5376
Ryan Gerard +8476
Rico Hoey +9886

Make sure to check out Noonan’s thoughts as well, we align on a few of these names:

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Model

Put a bit more into it this week, but I have always loved Greens in Regulation% as a predictive stat. This is heavy on the ball striking and even has a little bit of scrambling and sand save % in it. I really think this week is many multiples harder to model than last week, so maybe check out some of the expert models on the site and see if any of those tickle your fancy. I myself will ride with Rico Hoey once again.

See the whole model at BetspertsGolf.com. I also looked at some smaller splits for a few keys stats while hunting for the perfect one-and-done selection this week:

Weather

We’ve seen winds here in West Texas before and it looks like that should be the case again, with Driday looking pretty rough, especially early on. Maybe calming down a bit for Friday afternoon, which seems backwards, but may lead to a slight bump for the AM/PM crowd. The way perceived wave advantages have gone for the past few weeks though, I’m not sure I’m going all in on something like that.

News and Notes

• Still debating WHY he said this. It’s not like the NFL where you can get fined for unreported injuries.

• One more hat tip to Michael Kim for grinding out some great golf over the past three months.

As always, bet responsibly, have fun, and make sure to put pimentos on your shopping list this weekend.

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