BlogWho will win at Bay Hill on Sunday

Who should win on Sunday

Just a story on how tough it is to win on some of these fantasy golf sites.  It is a lot of fun, but very competitive.  Take in point this week, I am in one Draft King game were my six picks are Adam Scott, Keegan Bradley, Jason Kokrak, Sean O’Hair, Zach Johnson and Vijay Singh.  At around 2:30 was going to the store, but before I left checked the leaderboard and was shocked that I was in the top-15 in a 1915 player game.  The combination of Johnson, O’Hair and Kokrak were doing great, at about that time Kokrak was in first place.  I checked about an hour later and was still holding his own and when I got home caught the tail end of Henrik Stenson making birdie at 18.

Didn’t think much of it until I logged into Draft Kings and saw because of the great finish of Stenson and so many folks having put Henrik in their top-6, I dropped from the top-15 to 218.  Boy it’s really tough.

That’s when I realized how tough Stenson really is.  We have seen his good play the last couple of years, he won the FedEx Cup in 2013 and has four PGA Tour wins including the Players Championship in 2009.  On the European Tour, he won the Race to Dubai in 2013 and was runner-up last year.  So there is a reason for him being third in the world rankings and if he wins on Sunday (or finishes in the top-three) will replace Bubba Watson in second and be knocking on the door of getting into the top spot.

Stenson has played great this week and after 14 holes on Saturday he was having a good round with 12 pars and two birdies.  But he made the round really great when he played his last four holes birdie-eagle-par-birdie en route to a bogey-free, 6-under 66. Today’s score was one stroke shy of his lowest for the year. Following a 9-over 81 in round three of the WGC-HSBC Champions, he rebounded in the final round with a 7-under 65.

The key to his week is with the putter.  In rounds one and three, Stenson needed 30 putts to complete each round, but took just 23 shots with the putter in round two. With a cumulative average of 3.47, Stenson ranks second in Strokes Gained Putting.

As we have seen the last couple of weeks in which the third round leader couldn’t keep up in the final round, I have a feeling that’s not going to happen on Sunday.  Look at this chart of Stenson when he has had the lead or co-led or been within five of the lead going into the final round.  We include his stats for both the European and PGA Tour and as you can see, the last five times he has led he won four times.  Stenson is a great front runner and I can’t see anything bothering him on Sunday.  I also sense that there isn’t that much fire-power close to Stenson to put the needed pressure on him.  Sorry but the Morgan Hoffmann’s, Jason Kokrak’s, Matt Jones and Ben Martin’s of the world just don’t do it for me.  But the laws of average says that one of those guys will play well on Sunday.

So what has Stenson done right this week?  He has hit a lot of fairways, 34 of 42 which ranks T5th.  He also has hit a lot of greens, 42 of 54 which ranks T7th.  That with the fact that he is making lot’s of putts, he is fourth making 279 feet of putts and as we said ranks second in strokes gained putting makes him unbeatable.

Any chance that Stenson could not put it together on Sunday?  Of course there is always a chance, but go back to that chart that shows his performance when close or with the final round lead, in his last ten times he has shot in the 60s seven times.

So who will put the heat on him on Sunday?  I can see guys like Rory McIlroy and Adam Scott, who are pretty much out of things having great rounds on Sunday.  I just can’t see anyone close to him doing it, but for my greedy purposes (remember my six Draft Kings picks) I hope that Jason Kokrak, Sean O’Hair and Keegan Bradley go low.  Again this isn’t a great science, last year we never would of thought that Matt Every would of done it on Sunday in winning the Palmer, but he did.  So don’t be surprised if someone finds that Sunday magic.

Any more ammunition on why Stenson will win?  He’s got this great track record at Bay Hill going into Sunday.  Over his last 15 Bay Hill rounds, he is 34 under and has broken par 12 of those 15 rounds.

How bad has it been on the PGA Tour leading going into the final round?  Hard to believe that the last eight events going back to the Humana hasn’t had a third round leader/co-leader win.  Bill Haas was the last and that was back in January.  Speaking of another record, this is the 19th event of 2015 on the PGA Tour and Stenson would be the 19th different winner.  That would be the longest streak going back to 1994.

Is scoring really low this year?  The weather has been perfect, along with a course that doesn’t have the bite of past years with slow greens, we could see a score in the 20 unders for the first time since Payne Stewart did it in 1987.  But at the same time as I give the championship to Stenson, he needs to shoot 69 or 70 to make sure that he does the deed.

Below is a list of the top-22 players on the leader board going to 8 under which is eight shots back of Henrik Stenson.