DraftKings picks Arnold Palmer

by Sal Johnson

Founder, Chief Data Officer, GOLFstats

E-mail me at:
sal@golfstats.com

DraftKings Picks for the week

Our new GOLFstats fantasy game of the week on DraftKings
Want to thank all 99 of you that participated in our third GOLFstats.Com fantasy game on DrafKings. It sold out in just over 15 hours and many of you didn’t get it, sorry for that. We have increased the game to 200 for this week which is a hard challenge so hopefully everyone of you reading this will participate. The cost of the game is $5. It will pay off the top-20 players, the winner will get $135, 2nd $108 and those between 16th and 20th will get $18 Here is the invite and a link to get into the game, again we have to get 200 people for this to go off so play our game and tell your friends.

Screen Shot 2017-03-14 at 4.34.55 PM                                                                        Hit this link to join our Palmer game

(Update – All 200 spots in the DraftKings game sold, the last one came at 10:10 tonight.  Very happy with the interest, want to thank all GOLFstats members that have made this a succes.  Next week DraftKings won’t have a game for the Match Play, but will for Puerto Rico, so we will trim it down to 150 since there won’t be much interest for that game.  It’s looking more like we will be able to have a GOLFstats/DraftKings league that will start at the Masters.  If you folks have any thoughts or ideas for out DraftKings league please send them to me at Sal@golfstats.com)

 

As for last week congratulations to ajmacpheee909 for winning with the picks of Adam Hadwin (1st), Wesley Bryan (T-7th), Ryan Moore (T-18th), Graham Delaet (T-22nd), Charles Howell III (T-49th) and Gary Woodland (T-58th). He was 7 points better than inopac and goes to show the power of having six guys make the cut.
Here are the results of our game:

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So how did last week go?
Lot’s of good news with a pinch of bad news. First I didn’t have a good week in our GOLFstats game finishing way down in 62nd place again mostly because I had two guys miss the cut. I was shocked at Luke Donald missing the cut but it makes sense since he hasn’t played well the last couple of years at the Valspar. As for Scott Brown missing the cut he was terrible and it proves my point to be careful choosing a person that is playing a course for the first time. Brown was terrible, shooting a pair of 76s to finish way down the list of players. I have a funny feeling that we don’t see Scott Brown at the Valspar for the next couple of years. As for my other DraftKings games didn’t come close so of the seven games that I played at a cost of $57, it was a total bust.
But it’s wasn’t a total bust for the week. Played 5 games on the European Tour for a total of $80 and won $336 with the picks Shiv Chawrasia winning, Anirban Lahiri (T-5th), Prom Meesawat (T-13th), Peter Uihlein (T-17th), Adison Da Silva (21st) and Gregory Havret finishing (T-34th). Unfortunately Meesawat shot 74 on the last day, Uihlein shot 76 and Havret shot 79. With all of the rain on Thursday and Friday, some of the leaders didn’t complete their 3rd round till Sunday morning and Havret must of had a bad evening because the six holes he finished in the third round he was 5 over, so including the final round 79 he was 12 over par and went from starting out Sunday morning in third place dropping down to 34th. This probably cost me a lot of money, at least $500 if he could of been even par instead of T-34th. But we can’t harp on the negative, I showed a profit for the week of of close to $200.
Picks for the Palmer
First of all we only have one game, the European Tour is off for the next four weeks and returns the week after the Masters. As of next week, there is no game from the WGC-Dell since it’s a match play event so we will be forced to do the Puerto Rico Open. Oh well.
As for the Arnold Palmer Invitational, it’s a really hard event to pick. Scoring depends on the weather and it looks to be good this year. The rough is tough so you have to take a straight player. Here are the top dollar guys, first Rory McIlroy at $12,000, Jason Day at $10,600, Henrik Stenson at $11,500, Hideki Matsuyama at $10,300, Rickie Fowler at $9,900 and Justin Rose at $9,500. Think McIlroy will have a good week, but he tends to be a Jekyll and Hyde on this course, so I will pass on him. Really like Stenson at $11,500 so that is my first pick. As for Matsuyama, Fowler and Rose I like Rose but not Matsuyama or Fowler. Rose is put on the back burner for the time being to make sure I have a solid foundation under Stenson. In looking at those under $7,000 nobody really sticks out. Yes Charles Howell III at $6,900 seems to be a safe pick, but he has struggled in this event and I think the only reason he has played it 16 times is because he lives in the Orlando area. If you want a cheap pick to make the cut Howell is your guy, but I am looking for the gem. Hate to say it but there are a bunch of dogs under $7,000 so we need to structure our 5 picks in the $7,000 to $8,500 range. I see Wesley Bryan is at $7,100, he has some positives and some negatives. First the negative, he hasn’t played in this event, but he is on a hot streak with finishes of T-7th, T-4th and T-4th in the last four weeks. So I will take a chance on him again. I see that Matthew Fitzpatrick is at $7,500, he brings lot’s of value as he has won twice in Europe in the last 8 months, he was T-5th in Dubai and two weeks ago was T–16th in Mexico, he has played twice missing the cut the first time he played at Bay Hill and T-27th last year so he is good for me. Going up the list I see Zach Johnson at $8,500, he hasn’t had that great of a year, but has made five cuts in six starts but his Bay Hill record is too good to pass on. In 2009 he was T-3rd and the last two years was T-9th in 2015 and 5th last year so I take him. Now before picking Johnson I still was trying to find a way to bring in Rose, but the under $7,000 market is so weak I can’t find any combination and still take Stenson who I think has a 50-50 chance of winning this week. My next pick is Francesco Molinari at $8,600 and again I am not 100% confident in this pick. His year has had mixed results, yes he was T-6th at the WGC-HSBC and T-4th at the Shriners, but both of those events were 4 months ago. He missed the cut at Genesis, T-14th at Honda and T-20th in Mexico but the key for picking Molinari is playing well at Bay Hill. In his last 12 rounds he is 28 under par finishing T-5th in 2014, T-17th in 2015 and T-9th last year. So again I am looking for that really high finish that Stenson can give me and then solid, top-25 performances from my other five players. So I have picked five players and left with just $6,800 so I have to go bottom-feeding. As I told you those under $7,000 is not pretty, but I find Ian Poulter at $6,800. He has been consistent at Bay Hill, making 7 of 11 cuts, but has made the cut in his last six starts including at 3rd in 2012. He is coming back from a foot injury which put him out of action last summer and is fighting hard to regain his top-50 world ranking status. For years he lived off of this, being able to play in all the majors and WGC events, that along is worth at minimum a half a million dollars and now that he has slipped back to 204th in the World Rankings life has been tough on him. He is scrambling to keep his PGA Tour card, he needs to win about $200,000 in his next five starts to retain it, so he knows how serious things our. So I take him thinking that he will at least make the cut and who knows maybe find some of that magic he us to have. So here are my picks:
Henrik Stenson at $11,500
Francesco Molinari at $8,600
Zach Johnson at $8,500
Matthew Fitzpatrick at $7,500
Wesley Bryan at $7,100
Ian Poulter at $6,800

Now I started formating this on Monday and made the picks on Tuesday morning. I have never been completely happy and every couple of hours look to see if there is a way of snatching Justin Rose or some other magical combination, so that’s one of the reason this is a bit late. So it’s Wednesday morning and have to make this stick, so a word of warning if you don’t feel great with the picks, just don’t bet so much. Of course I could pick other teams but I have always felt that my placing multiple teams you are just betting against yourself.

One final word to join our DraftKings game, it’s 10 am and we are just filling up the 100th spot. We have another 100 openings so we need for more people to join or the game won’t happen.
Here is the link to our DraftKings game, thanks for playing.

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