The Greatest Week Ever Played
U.S. Open | Stats, Trends & Things You Don't Need To Know
The Country Club
Par 70 - 7,254 Yards
Fun Fact: Since 2012, the USGA has annually surpassed the 9,000 mark in entries for open qualifying, with a record 10,127 entries accepted for the 2014 U.S. Open at Pinehurst Resort & Country Club. In 2022, the USGA accepted 9,265 entries, the sixth-highest total in U.S. Open history.
The Total Driving Machine
Past U.S. Open set-ups have really benefitted a specific type of golfer — one who is generally long and straight off-the-tee. When you look at the recent winners (Koepka 2x, DJ, Woodland, Bryson, Rahm) it’s hard to argue. I’m of the belief that this set-up at The Country Club won’t be as prototypical but here are the best Total Drivers in the Field:
Jon Rahm
Viktor Hovland
Xander Schauffele
Cameron Young
Collin Morikawa
The USGA Stamp of Approval
Say what you will about the USGA, but they rarely deviate from narrow fairways and thick rough. This course won’t be as long as Erin Hills (by a mile) and will offer some other tests but expect this to “feel” like a U.S. Open. Even though we go to a different course every year, the set-ups generally remain, so here are the best U.S. Open golfers dating back to 2016.
Rahm Has Quietly Figured It Out
It’s easy to get stuck in a weekly grind, focusing only on the tournament that lies days ahead. When you start zooming out, you can try to identify golfers through their ebbs and flows. Jon Rahm is flowing right now…
When Rahm switched to Callaway at the start of the year his advanced metrics took a dive, specifically in the short-game categories. For his first (7) events of the year, he lost strokes around-the-green in (6) of them — for a total of 6.85 strokes relinquished to the field. The putter wasn’t much better, losing 1.6 strokes in total over the same span. To help with perspective, there were some high profile losses during that run:
Lost 3.04 in short-game at WM Phoenix Open, finished (4) shots out of the playoff.
Lost 4.82 in short-game at The Genesis Invitational, finished (5) shots out of the Top 7.
Lost 5.24 in short-game at the Arnold Palmer, finished (7) shots off the lead.
In fact, if you really want to play the WHAT IF game … If Jon Rahm plays to his short-game average instead of losing all those strokes, he wins two of those events and finishes third in the other. I know we’re stuck down a rabbit-hole here but the point stands that the short-game was Rahm’s demise for most of 2022. HOWEVER!!!
Rahm has now gained strokes in the category for three of his last four and totaled +7.98 strokes in his last 16 rounds. Rahm fixed the one thing that stopped him from winning … scary!
Tiny Greeeeeens!
Over the last few years, the greens at The Country Club have actually been expanded to 4,388 sq. feet on average, making them the second smallest greens in Major Championship history (Pebble Beach). Here are the best players on small greens (5,000 sq. feet or smaller):
The Last Time…
… a winner won in his first attempt: Francis Ouimet, 1913. The notable debutants include Seamus Power, Min Woo Lee and Adam Schenk.
… a winner successfully defended his title: Brooks Koepka, 2018. Outside of Koepka who finished 1st and 2nd in his title defense attempts, no defending Champion has finished inside the Top 10 since Tiger Woods (T6) in 2008.
… Corey Conners lost strokes off-the-tee: 2021 Genesis Invitational. That was 477 days or 35 events ago.
Summoning The Golf Gods
Shane Lowry doesn’t have a win this year and when the skies opened up on him at PGA National, he tried to summon the Golf Gods into giving his a Masters victory. That didn’t happen but Shane has been incredible and making his investors plenty of money despite not having a win. If you’ve been buying stock in $SLOW, you’re going to the moon.
That’s Stock Market DFS, by the way. Sign up with code RICK and earn a $100 deposit bonus. Plus, they are running a ton of great promos this week.
One & Done Ownership
Here are the most popular golfers for OAD purposes, according to the Sitewide data at OfficeFootballPools.com:
Justin Thomas 15.3%
Rory McIlroy 11.8%
Scottie Scheffler 10.5%
Xander Schauffele 9.7%
Sam Burns & Cam Smith 7.4%
Shop It If You Can!
As more states and more operators start getting involved in golf betting, we are seeing a ton of discrepancies in lines. Some are being competitive and some are just not very sharp. Here are just a few examples that I found via Juice Reel.
Birdie or Better Barrage!
There seems to be a significant edge in the “Birdie or Better Matchups” being offered by PrizePicks. They are setting every line to 0.0 (!!) which means you’re just picking which golfer will make more birdies or better. I ran the numbers for every matchup available to show how often a golfer makes 3+, 4+, 5+ and 6+ birdies in a round. I highlighted the notable ones but here’s the data:
For full clarification, if you want to pick Scottie Scheffler over Justin Rose, you would take Scheffler over 0.0. If you wanted Rose, you would take Scheffler under 0.0.
Secure them here: bit.ly/3oxONZw
Come Say Hello!
I’ll be at The Country Club Thursday through Sunday covering it for CBS Sports. If you see me, please introduce yourself!
Good Luck
Rick