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 RSM Classic, according to the models, as well as their Golf odds win odds.
| Golfer | FanDuel Salary | Win% | Top- 10% | Made Cut% | FanDuel Sportsbook Win Odds |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Louis Oosthuizen | $11,700 | 5.7% | 29.2% | 74.8% | +2500 |
| Cameron Smith | $11,800 | 4.6% | 26.5% | 72.7% | +1700 |
| Scottie Scheffler | $12,000 | 4.6% | 26.8% | 73.0% | +1400 |
| Corey Conners | $11,500 | 4.3% | 26.1% | 72.4% | +2700 |
| Webb Simpson | $11,900 | 4.0% | 24.2% | 71.5% | +1400 |
| Harris English | $11,400 | 2.2% | 17.8% | 66.0% | +3000 |
| Alex Noren | $10,800 | 2.1% | 15.1% | 62.7% | +3600 |
| Russell Henley | $11,300 | 2.1% | 17.7% | 65.6% | +2700 |
| Talor Gooch | $11,000 | 2.0% | 16.0% | 63.8% | +3800 |
| Joaquin Niemann | $11,100 | 1.8% | 15.4% | 63.5% | +3100 |
| Adam Scott | $10,900 | 1.7% | 13.8% | 61.9% | +3600 |
| Brendon Todd | $10,400 | 1.6% | 13.0% | 60.0% | +6000 |
| Chris Kirk | $9,800 | 1.5% | 13.1% | 60.1% | +6500 |
| Taylor Moore | $8,700 | 1.5% | 12.6% | 60.1% | +12000 |
| Brian Harman | $9,800 | 1.5% | 12.7% | 59.8% | +6500 |
| Keegan Bradley | $10,500 | 1.5% | 12.9% | 60.6% | +6500 |
| Kevin Streelman | $9,700 | 1.5% | 12.0% | 59.1% | +9000 |
| Max Homa | $10,300 | 1.4% | 12.1% | 58.7% | +7000 |
| Seamus Power | $9,900 | 1.3% | 12.5% | 59.7% | +5500 |
| Joel Dahmen | $10,100 | 1.3% | 11.5% | 57.6% | +6500 |
| Alex Smalley | $9,100 | 1.2% | 10.6% | 56.6% | +10000 |
| Jhonattan Vegas | $10,200 | 1.1% | 10.6% | 57.3% | +7500 |
| Justin Rose | $10,600 | 1.1% | 11.2% | 57.3% | +5000 |
| Lanto Griffin | $9,200 | 1.1% | 9.0% | 54.8% | +9000 |
| Chad Ramey | $8,600 | 1.0% | 10.4% | 57.2% | +12000 |
| Mackenzie Hughes | $10,000 | 0.9% | 10.3% | 57.2% | +6500 |
| Branden Grace | $9,000 | 0.9% | 8.8% | 53.3% | +7500 |
| Charles Howell III | $9,700 | 0.9% | 10.3% | 55.4% | +7500 |
| Emiliano Grillo | $9,000 | 0.9% | 9.3% | 54.9% | +12000 |
| Chez Reavie | $8,600 | 0.8% | 8.6% | 53.4% | +12000 |
| Michael Thompson | $8,100 | 0.8% | 8.8% | 53.8% | +14000 |
| Lucas Glover | $8,500 | 0.8% | 8.9% | 53.8% | +12000 |
| Matt Jones | $8,400 | 0.8% | 8.4% | 53.5% | +14000 |
| Adam Hadwin | $8,900 | 0.8% | 8.6% | 53.6% | +14000 |
| Troy Merritt | $8,900 | 0.8% | 9.4% | 54.7% | +9000 |
| Mito Pereira | $9,900 | 0.8% | 9.2% | 54.7% | +6500 |
| Doug Ghim | $8,600 | 0.8% | 8.8% | 54.0% | +14000 |
| Stewart Cink | $8,100 | 0.8% | 7.7% | 51.9% | +14000 |
| Stephan Jaeger | $8,000 | 0.8% | 8.2% | 52.8% | +17000 |
| Patton Kizzire | $8,500 | 0.8% | 8.0% | 52.4% | +14000 |
| Cameron Davis | $8,300 | 0.7% | 7.6% | 50.8% | +14000 |
| Tom Hoge | $8,400 | 0.7% | 8.5% | 53.4% | +12000 |
| Kyle Stanley | $8,200 | 0.7% | 7.6% | 52.0% | +14000 |
| Luke List | $9,300 | 0.7% | 9.5% | 55.3% | +7500 |
| Matt Kuchar | $9,600 | 0.7% | 8.1% | 52.8% | +7500 |
| Brendan Steele | $8,700 | 0.7% | 8.0% | 52.3% | +12000 |
| Matthias Schwab | $9,000 | 0.7% | 8.0% | 53.1% | +12000 |
| Robert Streb | $9,400 | 0.7% | 7.4% | 50.7% | +7500 |
| Sebastian Munoz | $8,900 | 0.7% | 7.1% | 50.6% | +12000 |
| Aaron Rai | $9,100 | 0.7% | 8.0% | 52.8% | +10000 |
| Jason Day | $9,400 | 0.7% | 7.7% | 52.0% | +9000 |
| Hank Lebioda | $7,900 | 0.6% | 6.7% | 50.6% | +10000 |
| Patrick Rodgers | $9,500 | 0.6% | 7.0% | 50.8% | +7500 |
| Brian Stuard | $8,300 | 0.6% | 7.1% | 50.5% | +12000 |
| Denny McCarthy | $8,600 | 0.6% | 7.4% | 51.4% | +9000 |
| Russell Knox | $8,100 | 0.6% | 7.3% | 51.0% | +14000 |
| Harry Higgs | $8,200 | 0.6% | 7.1% | 50.4% | +14000 |
| Danny Lee | $9,600 | 0.6% | 6.7% | 50.0% | +6500 |
| Matt Wallace | $9,500 | 0.6% | 6.2% | 48.7% | +7500 |
| Henrik Norlander | $8,800 | 0.6% | 6.5% | 48.4% | +9000 |
| Adam Long | $9,300 | 0.5% | 7.1% | 50.3% | +9000 |
| Keith Mitchell | $8,500 | 0.5% | 6.5% | 49.2% | +9000 |
| Adam Svensson | $7,000 | 0.5% | 6.0% | 47.5% | +34000 |
| Andrew Putnam | $7,800 | 0.5% | 6.7% | 50.3% | +17000 |
| Zach Johnson | $8,400 | 0.5% | 5.9% | 48.4% | +14000 |
| Brice Garnett | $7,800 | 0.5% | 5.8% | 48.2% | +17000 |
| Kevin Kisner | $10,700 | 0.5% | 7.3% | 49.7% | +3000 |
| Kramer Hickok | $7,800 | 0.5% | 6.3% | 48.2% | +12000 |
| Brandt Snedeker | $7,500 | 0.5% | 5.3% | 46.2% | +23000 |
| Vincent Whaley | $7,900 | 0.5% | 6.6% | 49.4% | +17000 |
There's a ton of value on Louis Oosthuizen (+2500), according to my model, which would view Louis at closer to +1600 if setting the odds. I've already made sure to bet him in case the odds shortened from here.
With a lot of positive expected value on Oosthuizen, the model views a few others at the top as overvalued. That doesn't apply to Corey Conners (+2700), whose simulated win odds imply +2200 territory.
From there, though, we have to skip down a good bit to find positive or even value. We get it with Brendon Todd (+6000), Chris Kirk (+6500), Brian Harman (+6500), Keegan Bradley (+6500), and Max Homa (+7000).
I've already bet Todd, as well. He should benefit from an accuracy-friendly course that features bermuda greens.
I also went with Homa despite not being the most ideal course fit; he's just too good to gloss over at that number.
Taylor Moore (+12000) has great adjusted data and stands out as a long shot option, though I'm more inclined just to stick with a top-10 or top-20 on a golfer with odds quite that long, personally. The same can be said for Kevin Streelman (+9000) and Alex Smalley (+10000). However, I might break that rule for Moore and bet him outright anyway.