Volatility is the name of the game in golf, and picking winners isn't easy. With fields of 150-plus golfers sometimes being separated by how a putt or two falls each week, predicting golf can be absurdly tough.
We'll never be able to capture everything that goes into a golfer's expectations for a week, but we can try to account for that by simulating out the weekend and seeing what happens.
The Process
Over the years, I have made plenty of tweaks to my original golf model, which uses a combination of the OWGR's field strength numbers and datagolf's field strength numbers to adjust each golfer's score relative to the field (on the PGA Tour, the European Tour, and the Korn Ferry Tour).
The ultimate goal is to place a score from the Waste Management Open, the BMW International Open, and the Knoxville Open on level playing fields. This adjusted strokes metric lets me see how golfers are performing across all tours. From there, a golfer's adjusted stroke data is combined with their round-to-round variance to see how the field is likely to perform when playing out the event thousands of times.
In addition to that long-term adjusted form, I factor in course-level adjustments for course fit.
I run a second model that uses more granular strokes gained data, which allows me to adjust for course fit easily. The results are averaged out.
I let the data do the talking and don't make many tweaks -- if any. Golfers with a small sample get regressed to a low-end PGA Tour player to round out their samples. Data points are weighted more heavily toward recent performance.
Here are the most likely winners for the Hewlett Packard Enterprise Houston Open, according to the models, as well as their Golf odds win odds.
| Golfer | FanDuel Salary | Win% | Top- 10% | Made Cut% | FanDuel Sportsbook Win Odds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cameron Smith | $11,600 | 5.3% | 28.2% | 78.5% | +2300 |
| Sam Burns | $12,000 | 4.2% | 26.0% | 76.7% | +1800 |
| Scottie Scheffler | $11,800 | 3.9% | 25.2% | 76.5% | +1800 |
| Sungjae Im | $11,900 | 3.6% | 24.7% | 76.0% | +2400 |
| Tony Finau | $11,700 | 3.1% | 21.8% | 74.3% | +2500 |
| Tyrrell Hatton | $11,000 | 2.7% | 19.4% | 71.8% | +3100 |
| Talor Gooch | $11,200 | 2.4% | 18.3% | 71.1% | +3000 |
| Cameron Tringale | $9,900 | 2.2% | 17.5% | 70.4% | +4700 |
| Brooks Koepka | $11,400 | 2.1% | 17.7% | 70.6% | +3000 |
| Shane Lowry | $10,100 | 2.1% | 16.6% | 69.9% | +4600 |
| Patrick Reed | $10,900 | 2.1% | 15.5% | 68.7% | +3600 |
| Joaquin Niemann | $10,800 | 2.1% | 17.6% | 71.0% | +3000 |
| Adam Scott | $10,600 | 2.0% | 16.3% | 69.1% | +3600 |
| Aaron Wise | $10,700 | 1.9% | 16.9% | 70.0% | +3300 |
| Christiaan Bezuidenhout | $9,700 | 1.8% | 14.8% | 67.5% | +6000 |
| Marc Leishman | $10,300 | 1.8% | 13.3% | 65.2% | +4100 |
| Russell Henley | $9,800 | 1.7% | 15.0% | 68.2% | +4700 |
| Jason Kokrak | $10,200 | 1.7% | 14.1% | 66.7% | +4500 |
| Maverick McNealy | $10,400 | 1.6% | 15.6% | 68.4% | +3600 |
| Charley Hoffman | $8,900 | 1.6% | 13.1% | 65.6% | +10000 |
| Seamus Power | $9,800 | 1.5% | 14.0% | 66.8% | +6000 |
| Ian Poulter | $9,500 | 1.5% | 13.8% | 66.9% | +7500 |
| Harold Varner III | $9,600 | 1.5% | 14.3% | 67.0% | +7000 |
| Kevin Streelman | $9,300 | 1.4% | 12.3% | 64.8% | +7500 |
| Max Homa | $10,000 | 1.4% | 12.2% | 64.5% | +4700 |
| Taylor Moore | $8,400 | 1.3% | 12.4% | 65.1% | +12000 |
| Carlos Ortiz | $10,500 | 1.3% | 12.5% | 64.6% | +3400 |
| Brian Harman | $8,900 | 1.2% | 12.1% | 65.1% | +10000 |
| Jhonattan Vegas | $8,800 | 1.1% | 11.7% | 63.0% | +10000 |
| Lanto Griffin | $9,900 | 1.1% | 10.3% | 61.9% | +4500 |
| Emiliano Grillo | $9,100 | 1.0% | 10.0% | 61.4% | +10000 |
| Chad Ramey | $9,200 | 1.0% | 10.8% | 62.7% | +9000 |
| Erik van Rooyen | $9,400 | 1.0% | 10.2% | 60.8% | +8000 |
| Branden Grace | $9,500 | 0.9% | 10.2% | 61.1% | +9000 |
| Gary Woodland | $9,000 | 0.9% | 9.8% | 61.1% | +9000 |
| Stewart Cink | $8,000 | 0.9% | 8.5% | 58.3% | +15000 |
| Ryan Palmer | $8,700 | 0.8% | 9.4% | 60.5% | +12000 |
| Cameron Davis | $8,800 | 0.8% | 7.7% | 57.3% | +10000 |
| Mackenzie Hughes | $9,600 | 0.8% | 9.7% | 61.7% | +6000 |
| Joel Dahmen | $9,000 | 0.8% | 8.9% | 58.7% | +9000 |
| Pat Perez | $8,300 | 0.8% | 7.9% | 58.4% | +15000 |
| C.T. Pan | $9,100 | 0.8% | 8.4% | 58.7% | +9000 |
| Jason Day | $9,400 | 0.8% | 9.2% | 59.3% | +7500 |
| Guillermo Mito Pereira | $9,700 | 0.8% | 9.2% | 60.4% | +8000 |
| Luke List | $8,400 | 0.7% | 9.2% | 60.1% | +15000 |
| Matthew Wolff | $11,300 | 0.7% | 9.5% | 60.3% | +2900 |
| Stephan Jaeger | $8,300 | 0.7% | 7.7% | 57.7% | +15000 |
| Tom Hoge | $8,200 | 0.7% | 7.8% | 57.8% | +15000 |
| Sebastian Munoz | $9,200 | 0.7% | 7.8% | 57.6% | +9000 |
| Russell Knox | $9,000 | 0.6% | 7.4% | 56.6% | +9000 |
| Lee Westwood | $8,900 | 0.6% | 6.8% | 56.0% | +10000 |
| Chez Reavie | $8,500 | 0.6% | 8.1% | 58.3% | +12000 |
| Harry Higgs | $8,400 | 0.6% | 7.1% | 56.0% | +15000 |
| Henrik Norlander | $8,500 | 0.6% | 6.7% | 55.4% | +12000 |
| Kyle Stanley | $8,000 | 0.5% | 7.2% | 56.7% | +17000 |
| James Hahn | $7,900 | 0.5% | 6.4% | 54.8% | +17000 |
| Martin Laird | $8,500 | 0.5% | 8.3% | 58.6% | +12000 |
| Aaron Rai | $8,600 | 0.5% | 7.2% | 56.4% | +12000 |
| Brian Stuard | $8,200 | 0.5% | 6.2% | 54.7% | +15000 |
| Matthias Schwab | $8,800 | 0.5% | 8.0% | 58.4% | +10000 |
| Hank Lebioda | $7,300 | 0.5% | 6.0% | 53.6% | +23000 |
| Danny Willett | $8,700 | 0.5% | 6.1% | 54.1% | +12000 |
| Zach Johnson | $7,200 | 0.5% | 5.7% | 53.2% | +29000 |
The model is pretty big on Cameron Smith (+2300) this week, which makes sense given last year's emphasis on strokes gained: around the green at Memorial Park. I've bet him already.
The model sees Sam Burns (+1800) and Scottie Scheffler (+1800) as overvalued despite sitting top-three in win odds.
It isn't actually until Shane Lowry (+4600) that we see another even value opportunity. Cameron Tringale (+4700) also fits there, as does Christiaan Bezuidenhout (+6000), Seamus Power (+6000), Harold Varner (+7000), Ian Poulter (+7500), and Kevin Streelman (+7500).
Longshot value belongs to Charley Hoffman (+10000), Brian Harman (+10000), Jhonattan Vegas (+10000), and Emiliano Grillo (+10000).
I'm in on Smith, Lowry, Tringale, Bezuidenhout, and Hoffman. I'm also considering going against the model's recommendations with Tony Finau (+2500) and Tyrrell Hatton (+3100).