NBA Postseason Best Bets (5/17)
Alex Christenson
The PGA Tour is back in action this week as they head to Mexico for the World Wide Technology Championship.
We have a new host course for the event, El Cardonal at Diamante. Greg Norman stole the previous host venue, El Camaleon, for LIV Golf. Lining up very well with the political state of golf right now, we have a Tiger Woods design taking the place of a Norman design. Let’s dig in to see what kind of betting value we can find on this fresh piece of property.
Course Fit
We have a new course hosting this week, but we can still hunt for course-fit stars based on the information we do have.
When we have a new course, I tend to lean more on correlated course performance with crossover course attributes being the key.
This week at Tiger’s El Cardonal, we have a coastal layout with paspalum turf, and by all accounts it should play relatively easy. So, we can plug in those split stats and find that courses like Corales GC, Grand Reserve, El Camaleon, and Vidanta Villarta should have some crossover.
My “Form Fit” stat looks at those split stats and correlated course performance while also weighing in recent form as a part of the equation. Here are the top 10 names in that stat this week (you can see the full list on the Culp projections page):
- Thomas Detry
- Akshay Bhatia
- Troy Merritt
- Vince Whaley
- Greyson Sigg
- Kevin Yu
- Cameron Champ
- Erik Van Rooyen
- Nick Hardy
- Matt Kuchar
Detry and Bhatia have crushed coastal courses relative to their usual week-to-week output. Names like Whaley and EVR have flashed some consistency lately while someone like Cam Champ has a couple of big finishes in recent events. He tends to go in spurts so has that hot streak passed or were those just the hints that another big finish is on the way?
Outright Odds
Here’s what the top of the board looks like on DraftKings Sportsbook:
It’s amazing to see Aberg leading the betting market in the same event where Cam Young and Sahith Theegala are also teeing it up. He’s certainly earned that price tag, though, thanks to a quick ascent out of college without many “down weeks” so far.
Finish Position Market
The outright markets are most common when looking at golf bets but there is plenty of value to be found in the other markets.
Vince Whaley Top-20 Finish
Best available: +300 (BetRivers, DraftKings, FanDuel)
Worst available: +250
He had a quiet season thanks to an injured wrist that sidelined him for roughly seven months. Whaley’s results didn’t pick right back up, but it is notable that he’s hitting it just as long, if not longer, than he was before injury.
The rest of his game has come along recently with four straight finishes of T-28 or better including a T-6 at the Boise Open and T-13 at the Shriners. He’s gained 25.4 strokes over the field in those four events, currently 16th in the field in three-month baseline performance.
He has seven caree top-15 finishes on the PGA Tour and three have come on coastal courses so this resort style of golf suits him pretty well. I will stick with the hot hand and play Whaley in the T20 market this week.
Keep an eye on the PGA bet tracker for more plays. Hop in the discord to get those bet alerts.
Use promo code CULP when signing up for FTNBets and FTNDaily to get a 10% discount while staying sharp in the fall. I think it’s going to be a very fun finish to 2023 with so much of the competition having their attention stolen away by NFL.
