Picking winners of a golf tournament is hard. Doing it consistently is downright impossible. But finding value is something all bettors must practice in order to give themselves the best chance to make hay when the day finally comes that they ping a champion.
Below, we will cover the best bets for the Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship based on current form, course fit, and -- of course -- the value of their odds over at Golf odds.
On the heels of a major championship week, the PGA Tour heads to the Dominican Republic for a slightly less significant event this week, though it's been confirmed that nabbing a winner here pays the same as one at Winged Foot as long as you pick the right guy. Our field this week features a couple more well known names but by and large is flush with fringe Korn Ferry Tour / PGA Tour players.
That dynamic creates a unique value proposition, as the top of the market is mostly untouchable at the numbers they are offered, and golfers further down the board have a much better chance here than in a full strength field but are triple-digit odds in both places. While the Tour's return from the COVID layoff has been marked by big name dominance at the top of the leaderboard, we can safely scroll down this week and diversify our betting card with some smaller stabs at big payouts.
For more info on Corales Puntacana Resort & Club, along with this week's key stats and comparable courses, check out the course primer.
At the Top
No one up here is particularly attractive, with the market led by a golfer without his PGA Tour card in Will Zalatoris (+1200). Sam Burns (+1800) was a popular pick at the Safeway Open a couple weeks back going off at 40/1 or longer and closed at T7. Neither are worthy of investment for the outright at their hefty price, but both are intriguing for a finishing position. Zalatoris is available for a Top-20 Finish (-150), which seems a tad hefty until you consider he's currently riding a 12-event streak of such finishes including a T6 at the U.S. Open. Burns is more palatable for his own Top-20 Finish (+120), posting recent finishes of T7, MC, T13, MC, T32, and T17.
Value Spots
Kristoffer Ventura (+3600) - Ventura has upside in both the ballstriking and short game departments, putting him in the driver's seat if he is able to put it all together. He's most likely to outperform the field in an event like this, where his best especially on the greens is miles ahead of many of his opponents. He finished T7 at the Safeway Open and has three top-15's in his last four Korn Ferry events. He also finished T20 at the Puerto Rico Open in February, the last time the field has seen paspalum putting surfaces.
Adam Schenk (+4800) - Currently riding a streak of six straight made cuts on the PGA Tour -- though with a top finish of just T30 in that span -- Schenk can catch fire both with his irons and occasionally with the putter, though not often long enough to sustain a full tournament. He was T14 in Puerto Rico, and with just two other top-20s in the past year, he is feast or famine. That being said, he missed out on the softer summer tournaments between the U.S. Open and the Open Championship in a normal year. Watch him catch fire and spread some of your investment onto the First Round Leader (+5000) and get a good return right out of the gate this week. Schenk was 28th on the entire Tour in Round 1 Scoring Average for the 2019-20 season.
Long Shots
Doug Ghim (+6500) - The former top-ranked amateur in the world, Ghim has failed to make a big impact on the PGA Tour, though surely a T14 at the Safeway in which he was one of the top tee-to-green players in the field will give him some confidence heading to the Dominican Republic. Earlier this year, he posted a T18 at the 3M Open and a T20 in Puerto Rico. Like Schenk, he doesn't quite measure up to the top dogs on Tour that dominated the post-layoff events. In a weaker field, he should be able to rise above the fray.
Kevin Chappell (+8000) - Chappell fired a 59 in the second round of his first event back from a long layoff last fall, and if his back and confidence are right, there's no reason to miss out on the two-time PGA Tour winner at 80/1. Chappell was devastating tee to green in his hey day, a former top-50 player in the world who has finished inside the top 15 at all four majors throughout his career. Bet on the talent, and if we can get the best version of each golfer in the field, Chappell is behind only Henrik Stenson (+2500) this week.
Deep long shots we like this week include Kyoung-Hoon Lee (+10000), Chase Seiffert (+15000), and Robert Streb (+25000).