Chapters
Shownotes Transcript
We're driven by the search for better. But when it comes to hiring, the best way to search for a candidate isn't to search at all. Don't search, match with Indeed. Indeed is your matching and hiring platform with over 350 million global monthly visitors, according to Indeed data, and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast.
Ditch the busy work. Use Indeed for scheduling, screening, and messaging so you can connect with candidates faster. Leveraging over 140 million qualifications and preferences every day, Indeed's matching engine is constantly learning from your preferences, so the more you use Indeed, the
better it gets. Join more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide that use Indeed to hire great talent fast. And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at indeed.com slash blue wire.
Just go to Indeed.com slash BlueWire right now and support our show by saying that you heard about Indeed on this podcast. That's Indeed.com slash BlueWire. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed. ♪♪♪
This episode of Inside Golf Podcast is brought to you by Rub Peer Sports. This is a place to find all my content, community, it's a Discord. It's where we hang out and talk golf. We do premium shows where I can get the takes off that I don't think I can get away with on this podcast. The Wednesday night ball knower show with...
Wiley will join that sometimes, and it's generally always me, Kobe, and Kyle has become a massive hit. So would love for you to join and check that out, particularly on the major weeks. I think it's become one of our favorite hours of the week, but it is essentially at Run Pure Sports you get –
The place where my friends and I all talk golf and create content together. The mission has always been, we are going to create a community where the information is from people that really know golf, really know architecture, have boots on the ground. We'll get a lot of,
Good reporting from Pinehurst this week. Caddy information, really understand the market, give you the best daily fantasy information, give you the best betting information, give you complete and total access to those people at all hours of the day. We take it very seriously, particularly on major weeks.
I will be living in that discord all week answering questions. So this is a great time to sign up for the week long pass over at run pure sports. I promise you, you will get your money's worth on a major week. I'll be living in there answering questions. That's the best place to reach me. Great golf conversation in the discord. You'll wake up on major week to, you know, a couple thousand messages and you could always, you know,
Shoot me DMS as well. If you've got specific questions, a lot of ton of smart people in that discord, just a really fun sweat, a really fun hang, a really fun community. Plus all of the premium shows that we do, all of the inside information that I get from the golf course, I put that in there.
All of my articles, my in-depth written preview of Pinehurst, my final DK thoughts. I update ownership in there every single day, four times over the course of the week on Tuesday and Wednesday. Core plays, written opinion on every single player. I cannot emphasize enough to give us a shot during one of these major weeks because this is where we really show out. So, yeah.
RunPureSports.com. You can choose the golf-only option. Use that promo code Andy. That's the important part to get you 15% off. Try it for a week. Try it for a month maybe because we got an incredible stretch of golf coming up. But I always say, you know, let us prove it to you. Try it for a week and see if it's worth your time. So RunPureSports.com. Code Andy to get you that discount. Okay, coming up on this podcast –
Third major of the year. We're back with the annual U S open preview, a comprehensive guide to Pinehurst with my guy, Steve Bamford have been super, super excited to talk about this golf course. I think it's a very singular, unique U S open venue and, and,
One that we'll grow increasingly familiar with over the next couple of decades. I think that Pinehurst has got five of the next 25 U.S. Opens starting this week in 2024. I love this golf course. I've played this golf course. I was at this tournament in 2014, and I'm excited to dive in with Steve. So without further ado, let's bring on Steve to talk some Pinehurst.
All right, Steve Bamford's here. We're back. It's the third major of the year. Gosh, time flies. Feels like yesterday we were breaking down Augusta, but we're already at US Open week. Pinehurst number two. Yeah, Pinehurst number two. I was there in 2014. I was in college in North Carolina. It's been a decade since we've been back to
what many believe to be the home of American golf. What are your memories from the 2014 U S open at Pinehurst? And give me a little background on your relationship to Pinehurst excitement level for this week. It's going to be up there. What top three iconic courses in the U S. Yeah. Yeah. I'd put, I mean, you got to start Augusta and then probably pebble. And then there's probably a bit of a gap and then you probably get into the
Pinehurst, Shinnecock, Oakmont, that group. I think the fact that Pinehurst is public probably puts it ahead of like an Oakmont or Shinnecock, maybe in my opinion. Yeah. The Carolina Lowlands. I can remember the speed of the golf course. I think from memory, I think Kyma, I've got some notes from the event saying that Kyma did...
he ended up on a nice side of the draw where there was a little bit a tiny bit of moisture on the course on the friday apparently when he played in the morning so it rained on it rained on thursday night yeah there you go but with we're talking we're talking mike davis usga days where he he didn't want under under under pass scores winning the united states open did he
But I think we're in slightly different times these days in terms of winning scores. The thing I remember most, and when I've looked back into it, looking back at the videos of Kymer and that tournament in general, he was just flushing the ball off the tee. He was...
He was typically long, straight, finding positions in fairways. But his iron play was so crisp. And he said in interviews, he was just playing at the very top of his game. And he was also playing with confidence because he knew that even if he was missing greens, which is inevitable in this Donald Ross design, we'll go into the green complexes.
He was at the top of his game where even if he was missing greens, he was missing them on the right side. And he had that scrambling Texas wedge kind of putting game where he was recovering.
not making doubles. If he was making anything, it'd be a bogey and we move on. And that is this golf course. There's so many bogeys and triples out there. It's unbelievable. It's minimizing mistakes. It is proper, proper major championship golf this week. It's completely different to what we saw at Valhalla. Yes. Mine as well. Yeah. So you brought up 2014, the weather conditions, what Keimer did to that golf course and,
You know, in terms of what we're going to see this week, there are some changes to the agronomy of the golf course. Yeah. How I do believe that the golf course is going to play. With that being said, it's the it's pretty much the exact same length they have. I've noticed.
Two new teeing options that I'm not even totally convinced that they're going to use. I think the biggest shift is the, uh, the pioneers here. It was back grass too. Right. Or had they got to Bermuda at that point? No. Yeah. It was back grass. Kyma one on bent grass. Yeah. Yeah. And we've been talking about it on the golf betting system podcast all year about, uh,
you know, bent grass and the mix with Bermuda. And then it became apparent last, well, earlier this week, actually. If you watch the fried egg, fantastic video they put together on YouTube, it's mentioned on there by Corr, who did the renovation with Ben Crenshaw, Bill Corr.
He said, basically, this golf course is the same as 2014. The thing that he actually featured on, though, was there was one major difference, and that's the fact that they have planted more wiregrass around all of the fairway landing areas. Yeah, yeah. But in reality, that's pretty much all they can do, isn't it?
Yeah. No, there's no rough here. Right. That was the big one. I was going to, I was going to get to wire grass as our buzzword of the week. Yeah. Well, what was it last year? I'm trying to remember LACC. It was these gully things, wasn't it? Oh, the Barrancas. Yeah. You got it. What, what though, what bill court doesn't mention on that video is the fact that they've changed the greens. And after 2014 to ultra dwarf champion Bermuda. Yeah. Yeah.
And that is fascinating for me because, I mean, I've had a man crush on Scotty Sheffield to win. I know none of this is revolutionary. I do apologise. But there's one golf course that suits Scotty Sheffield to win, apart from Augusta National. This must be near the very top of the list. And the fact that it's got Bermuda grass greens as well, that's just playing into his wheelhouse, really is.
Well, I digress. No, we're going to we're going to get to Scotty very soon. Just one more quick note on the switch to Bermuda. And then I want to talk about how the addition of wiregrass plants is going to affect play a little bit, in my opinion.
But I think the Bermuda, they did this for a pretty specific reason, right? You know, mainly for resort guests, Bermuda in the heat. This is why you see so much Bermuda in the Southeast and in Florida. Bermuda is very good at, at withstanding heat. Right. And I think they're going to have a lot more control over how the golf course plays when you have a Bermuda base, right?
You think about 2014, you mentioned it was pretty baked out, but they did have some rain on Thursday night. So the course was a little bit softer than you would have expected on Friday in 2014, but it got really brutal over the weekend when it really started to bake out. And this year, I mean, there's a...
There's a touch of rain in the forecast, so you might get a slightly softer version in 2024 of Pinehurst. But this golf course can recover from rain really well and still present very firm.
It's built on basically sand and sandy loam, they call it, isn't it? Yeah, it's a good sandy soil. It really has got andy. And when you look at
You look at Martin Keimer, you look at, you know, you look at even Michael Campbell, you look at Payne Stewart. These guys knew how to play on kind of linksy kind of golf courses before winning this. It has got that feel to it. You know, you watch the approach shot, there's sand flying from the divots that are being created.
You can, you know, Bill Corr mentioned, and it's true, that clearly you can recover here because the greens have got openings to them all. So you can play kind of low recovery shots that would skew close to or onto the green if you're on a perfect kind of approach play. So it has got a kind of Lynx-y feel to it, even though it's in the lowlands of Carolina, landlocked completely, and it's surrounded by pine trees. I get that, but there are...
My new shy of links, he kind of feels in there for me. Well, the other thing with, um, I was thinking you brought up lengths courses and to me, not only some of this, the strongest characteristics of links golf courses is the firmness of the turf, right? And the wind, it's not going to be, it's not going to be suit. It's not an area of Carolina. They get super windy. But the other aspect is when I think of open championships, like specifically, um,
Royal Liverpool, Brian Harmon last year, there was a lot of placement and positioning and open championships off the tee tend to be a lot more accuracy driven over brute force. Whereas U S opens tend to be particularly in recent years. Like you look at golf courses like Torrey Pines and wing foot and this style of narrow fairways and thick rough, uh,
is very conducive to the power game. Like a place like winged foot, if the fairways are so narrow that nobody's hitting the fairway, uh,
you want to be as far up as close to the green as possible, hitting shorter clubs out of the rough and the most accurate players lose a little bit of their advantage. To me, that is not Pinehurst. I actually think that this is one of the rare US Open venues, rare modern US Open venues where I would actually prefer that a player is accurate than long. Obviously, there's both, right? I think a
A total driving is exactly what you want to look at this week. But fascinatingly enough, Steve, you know, Martin Keimer of the last 10, you'll like this one. And I'm sure you're keen to it as well. Martin Keimer of the last 10 U.S. Open champions. Do you know that in the lead in, Keimer was the only U.S. Open champion of the last 10 U.S.
That ranked higher heading in an accuracy than distance off the tee. And I don't think it's a coincidence that Pinehurst ended up being the spot that
that he triumphed at and the additional planting of the wire grass, what that is going to do is going to create a higher missed fairway penalty. Right? So the intrigue of, of the wire grass is essentially if you miss the fairway,
You could be in a very solid gettable lie in that sandy area, or you could be in vegetation. You could be in a plant and you could have some real trouble getting out. That's going to create a lot more variance. But the fact that there's more plants in that sandy area, I think is actually going to create a higher penalty for missing the fairway. And it's actually going to make me the other aspect too, is I don't know if you've looked at like,
This is kind of in the weeds, but some of the Google Earth on this golf course, why do these fairways get significantly more narrow the longer that you get up? A lot of them shrink around 300 yards. And so the increased...
of the vegetation and the wire grass off the fairway that is going to create a higher missed fair. I think the golf course play a little bit softer than what we saw in 2014, but in terms of difficulty, that may actually even out based on the fact that I think there's going to be a graver penalty for missing the fairway this year. I think it's everything Valhalla wasn't. I don't, I don't, you know, uh,
I remember listening to your podcast after we were discovering on site during the week that all of a sudden, the idea that it was like Oak Hill where you were losing 0.5, 0.6 of a stroke when you were missing fairways, it became absolutely obvious on the Monday. Absolutely.
at the course of Valhalla, that these guys were just taking driver with impunity and not worrying about the actual problem. There was no problem with the rough. No. Because it just wasn't of that length. Same with missing greens, Steve. The juxtaposition is going to be even stronger around the greens. Watching that PGA Championship, was there ever a moment where... No.
You almost wanted to short side yourself because just play aggressive. You just pop it right out and the greens are soft. This is the 180. So you actually look at the numbers here, Andy. Airway landing areas of 35 to 45 yards, which is wide. We know that. Yeah. But you are correct. As that ball rolls, as that ball moves, because these fairways are going to have plenty of roll on them.
If your ball isn't online, you know, if you're playing a fade, for example, it's over cunning, whatever, and you're ending up, you could be ending up in some seriously bad lies within these sandy native areas with the wire grass. And they have,
They are vocally saying, that's the main defence of this golf course. We are going to make that wire grass as thick as we can in those landing areas. And of course, if you've then got greens that have got a little bit of release in them as well, with these upturned saucer Donald Ross beautiful greens, those two defence mechanisms could cause what they will cause mayhem.
if the USGA really want to, but it's going to be a tough, tough ask. I wouldn't be surprised if there is going to be a level of positioning from off the tee with a lot of players. I think driving with impunity here is just not going to happen. It's going to be more about positioning off the tee. But I'll take you to Martin Keimer. These were his PGA Tour results.
numbers as he arrived at Pinehurst in 2014. Driving accuracy, 37th rank, 47th for the driving distance. He was 36th driving distance all drive, so top 40. 10th for off the tee on the tour. He was fourth for total driving. So if we can find players that have got a great mix of both length off the tee and accuracy, then
Those, for me, are the players that I am targeting. If you can find drivers that have got the drivers of the ball that are confident enough to drive the ball well, long, and because they know they're straight, I think they could have the ultimate advantage here. And part of the reason I think why Keimer separated, which is the same reason that allows
great players to separate sometimes at Augusta national when that golf course is playing firm. And I also think this goes hand in hand with the reason why myself and many others believe that Scotty could win this tournament in a runaway is that pioneers really accentuates mediocre shots. Um, like you think about why it was so hard to separate at Valhalla, um,
Didn't penalize mediocre shots, like really easy golf course to get up and down. Pinehurst is the inverse of that, where a great shot will be rewarded and a mediocre shot, a fractional miss could result in a really big number. There's a lot of randomness there.
at play once you get into the wiregrass. And that's why I think some similarities to Augusta, they both accentuate the degree of really good shots, I would say. Like the first hole at Pinehurst is a really good example of that. The first hole at Pinehurst, for example, that is a...
Three wood, short iron, right? But if you, by some chance, hit a mediocre short iron, it's one of the toughest up and downs on the entire course. And there's a lot of luck involved too with the wiregrass, as I mentioned. It's a real skill separator, right? Like you think about golf courses with thick rough, high thick rough, winged foot, tory pines, oak hill.
When you have high, thick, rough like that, that puts everyone in the same spot. Okay. You miss a fairway at winged foot by two yards. You miss a fairway at winged foot by five yards. It's the same spot. There's no variance. It's either you hit the fairway or you miss the fairway here. There's an element of luck involved, right? And when you have that
added variance of when I miss the fairway, I actually don't know what's going to happen. What is the safest bet to just identify players that don't miss the fairway? There's no room to...
separate out of the rough and show your skills on these other golf courses where it's highly homogenized miss fairway penalty, whereas Pinehurst is the opposite. And I think that's the way golf should be, right? Like that's the way that golf is in Scotland. That's the way golf is in Ireland.
The randomness is just part of golf. That's how it should be. That's more fun. That's more fun to play that way. That's more fun for a spectator. You're going to see real attempts at recovery shots, right? I think you...
Sometimes you could actually get a really good lie from some of the native area. And sometimes you could also be chipping out sideways and, and be kind of dead. And, and if you're, you know, if you're the shortest hitter on tour, you're going to be hitting to wider spots on tour at Pinehurst than you would some of the longest players on tour. So there's going to be that added element of risk. You know, I think this is a golf course where a longer player could be
club down on a lot of holds and really focus on hitting the fairway. And if you're going to take that, that aggressive approach, which we know some will, I think you're going to be playing with fire and increase the variance of what your score could be on this golf course. It feels far more like, um, you know, if you're, if you're the kind of driver that can just drive club down or,
you know, you're 90% drives and you know, you've got confidence, the fact that you can, you can hit your three 10 bullet and it's going to be fairly straight. It's not your longest, but it's going to hit fairways 85% of the time. I think drive, I genuinely believe as per Kyma, I genuinely think that the winner here will end up with, it's going to be somebody that's in the top 10 for driving accuracy.
I agree. Somebody that has found far more fairways and have just beaten the field in terms of the length of the tee and they've got more opportunities with slightly shorter clubs to get some really piercing approach playing. And if they are missing greens, they're missing them on the right side. They're playing the true major tactical game, not chasing a lot of pins, middle of the greens if necessary on a lot of the holes and just play that tactical game.
That's what I foresee anyway. I think so too. And the other thing that I would add is that if we start to see players take a lot more of a conservative strategy off the tee,
And decide not to, to play with fire as much because you're getting a U S open venue. Like I mentioned with less homogenized rough, a higher miss fairway penalty. Then what that's going to do, particularly, particularly at a golf course like Pinehurst, which is so penal on approach and around the greens, the emphasis is going to fall so much on the second shot and,
And around the greens. And that's always the case at us opens, right? Like if you think about us opens, it's usually total driving with an emphasis on distance and long iron play. And to me where Pioneer separates itself is.
Total driving with an emphasis on accuracy, long iron play, and really skill and creativity around the greens. So talk to me about those greens because there's a lot of –
There's a lot in there. There's a lot of meat on that bone I want to get to with these green complexes. But what were your thoughts breaking down some of these? You know, there's a there's a million little buzzwords we can talk about when it comes to these greens, inverted saucers, volcanoes, domes. Take me wherever when you think about the greens at Pinehurst and why they're so unique.
They've got the kind of profile of like what you'd find at Area 51 with some of the UFOs. The upturned saucers. They're 6,500 square feet on average. They are champion Bermuda grass in terms of their agronomy. Now, if you want a list of golf courses that we can run through...
that feature those kinds of greens. Sedgefield Country Club, which is a Donald Ross design. That's the Wyndham Championship. Country Club of Jackson, the Sanderson Farms. Quail Hollow since 2017. So since JT's win there at the PGA. Worthy of note though, those greens at that stage of the year in May do feature Poetrivialis Overseed. So not exactly the same.
but they are a base of champion. The Dunes Golf and Beach Club, where they played the Myrtle Beach Classic a few weeks ago. Also, TPC Southwind that we see each and every year, be that the FedEx St Jude Championship in the playoffs, the three WGCs, 19 through 21, and going way back to the FedEx St Jude Classic.
In terms of a major course that actually featured these kind of greens, Atlanta Athletic Cup 2011 PGA Championship, the big head-to-head in 2011 between Jason Duffner and Keegan Bradley, which clearly Bradley actually won.
There's another golf course here I do want to mention, and I think that this is an excellent course in terms of its location and in terms of just the way the course is built in the lowlands of Carolina. Congaree. Yes. Yeah. 2021 Palmetto. That was played the week before the US Open that year. And the 2022 CJ Cup, which Rory McIlroy won.
from, I believe, Kurt Kitayama. That was played more September into early October. I can't remember the exact date. But that golf course, it's got more water on it, I grant you, but that golf course at Congaree, which I believe is a training base. Kevin Kisner plays a lot there. He always referenced the fact that Congaree was very similar to Pioneers No. 2.
So that, to me, is a decent look and does share exactly the same champion for Mudegrass greens. But let's take that to one side. These greens, the way that Corrin Crenshaw went back to the original Ross design of, you know, this golf course doesn't need rough, it just needs rough.
green speeds that are releasing and shaved areas around these contoured, convex kind of greens, where literally the middle of the green is the peak of the green and everything is rolling away from that point. That is your Donald Ross. All of his courses feature these kind of green complexes.
It screams to me a number of things. Firstly, distance control, clearly. Distance control this week is going to be critical. On top of that, it's the creativity when you miss greens because we've had this discussion on previous major pods on various courses that haven't got thick, lush, rough around the greens. When you're giving a professional golfer three or four different shots,
in their head to play, to choose from, to get up and down, that for a professional golfer or lots of professional golfers is the worst situation ever. Completely, yeah. What shot do I play? The indecision that goes with that. And putting from off these greens, the Texas wedge is 100% in play for the US Open this year.
Interestingly enough, again, Kymer's numbers, because you think to yourself, well, was Kymer an around-the-green genius walking on the golf course here? Well, no, he wasn't. He ranked 165th around the green, 178th out of about 185th for scrambling. He had the chipping yaps heading into that US Open. He didn't chip once. Exactly.
You know, it kind of feels, you know, Victor Hovland-ish. It kind of feels like that. I know he clearly chipped in from a bunker yesterday at the memorial. But, yeah, I don't – you are going to get your Denny McCarthy sorts, your Mackenzie Hughes's, your Jordan Spieth, the Magic Beans Brigade. There will be a number of those guys that get in the mix because they just will. Cam Smith.
Cam Smith, he's an interesting one with the width off the tee that is available, although he is very, very wayward. But you are going to get a number of those, I think, that do get into that top 10 kind of mix, that first page of the league board. Do they ultimately win? I don't think so. But if you're looking from that from a DK perspective, I think Magic Bean's sorts and picking the right ones, that could be a decent angle to actually differentiate your teams with. But
Yes, they're just, they are the most unique green complexes I have seen on the PGA Tour or on the United States, you know, golf course roster of any. And I've been doing this for over 15 years.
We're driven by the search for better. But when it comes to hiring, the best way to search for a candidate isn't to search at all. Don't search, match with Indeed. Indeed is your matching and hiring platform with over 350 million global monthly visitors, according to Indeed data, and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast.
Ditch the busy work. Use Indeed for scheduling, screening, and messaging so you can connect with candidates faster. Leveraging over 140 million qualifications and preferences every day, Indeed's matching engine is constantly learning from your preferences, so the more you use Indeed, the
better it gets. Join more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide that use Indeed to hire great talent fast. And listeners of this show will get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at indeed.com slash blue wire.
Just go to Indeed.com slash BlueWire right now and support our show by saying that you heard about Indeed on this podcast. That's Indeed.com slash BlueWire. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed. Ryan Reynolds here from Intmobile. With the price of just about everything going up during inflation, we thought we'd bring our prices down.
So to help us, we brought in a reverse auctioneer, which is apparently a thing. Mint Mobile Unlimited Premium Wireless. I'm going to get 30, 30, I'm going to get 30, I'm going to get 20, 20, 20, I'm going to get 20, 20, I'm going to get 15, 15, 15, 15, just 15 bucks a month. Sold! Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes each detail.
I think what's so great about Pinehurst compared to what differentiates itself from a traditional PGA Tour setup, particularly the ones that you see, like what we just saw at Valhalla, what we're seeing this week at Mirafield Village, when you miss a green...
It stops in the rough. It's, it's the same hack out shot, right? Easy, no problems. Short sighting yourself. Like I mentioned earlier can, can often be better because you know, it just stops in the rough. And if the greens are softer, you can get the ball to sit really well. So it actually is conducive to more, to a more aggressive style play. It actually takes a lot of thought out of the decision-making process of whether or not to go for a pin and,
Uh, whereas at Pinehurst, like you're going to get your hand caught in the cookie jar quite often. And there's going to be this real decision matrix of Weber, whether to play aggressive or conservative. And, you know, the guy who all that, all that mental gymnastics, all that brain play is very conducive to, you know, a player like Scottish chef, or we'll just add that to the 800 reasons of why this is the perfect golf course for him. But yeah,
And that really induces real strategy too. Like when that's what Pinehurst does is the short grass around the greens, a penalty for missing. If you miss a green at Pinehurst, it's rolling, right? The ball's rolling, the ball's on the ground and who knows where it could stop sand, rain,
pine straw. Yeah. Uneven lies. Doubles and triples are very in play here. Purely just around the green. This is it. Was it the first hole again that call was highlighting where if you, if you missed on the right and that's where your brain's telling you to miss all of a sudden, if you're chipping the ball or putting it too, too fast and it rolls through the green, you're in the sand. You're back in the bunker, which is, which is what you were playing away from in the first place. The other thing that I want to mention, um,
I've heard some rumbling, Steve, from the grounds, and I'll get more insight to this as more of the folks that I know get to Piners. I don't want to say that they chimer-proofed this golf course, but I've heard that the colors around the greens are a little thicker this year in terms of
You know, so can you go back and watch? It was so conducive to putting for Kymer. And I still think I still think that you can putt. Right. But.
The narrative that you don't need to be able to chip at all because of what Keimer did, I think is a bit of a red herring. Like Keimer had this anomalous, maybe the best lag putting performance we've ever seen in a major championship. And I actually think that this golf course really still does separate skill and chipping off of short grass around the greens. Um,
I think that players that are really confident and strong around the green chipping are going to chip. Like, I think you're still going to see guys like Scotty Scheffler and Cam Smith speed guys who are really strong. Hideki guys who are really strong around the green chipping off of short grass, Justin Thomas. I S I still think those players are going to chip a lot. And I still think that skill is going to be incredibly valuable. And I think,
The weaker chippers are going to lean on the putter a little bit more. I think the players that I think the players that chip off of tight Bermuda often, I think are going to have like a very maybe some of the guys from Florida, I think are going to have a really big edge here. And.
I think a misnomer will be, I want to bust the narrative quickly that everybody is just going to putt. The optimal strategy is putting, and you actually don't need to have a great touch around the greens to succeed at Pinehurst because you can take the Kymer route. I think that was a pretty anomalous situation. And he got away with what I'm not quite sure would have been the most optimal strategy.
And it's actually going to be even a little bit more difficult to do that this year, especially if the golf course play softer than like some of those around the green 70 yard pots. If there's a little bit more grass there and a little bit more moisture in the grass, then
It's not the same concept of like, I'm just going to get this ball started with my putter. I'm not going to have to take as big of a stroke and it's just going to roll 30 yards. I, I, again, I think the Kymer lack putting everything I think is just a bit of a red herring on this golf course. I think you're going to need tremendous, tremendous skill chipping off of short grass. As we said at the top of the show, um, the,
the usga is not the same as it was when they were coming in 2014 the way the emphasis of their golf courses and the way that the courses were set up is different so i get that if there's going to be more collar
I'd be amazed if the Stimps go anywhere near what they were in 2014. So, yes. So what we're really saying is that we need a total driver that's great with their approach play and has got a short game as well. It's just the complete golfer, really, isn't it?
And yes, I'm the only thing that I would add to that mix as well. Total driving the other total driving. We talked about short game and around the green play Bermuda putting. Pioneers is pretty long too. Like I know that it's going to play firm, but.
You're going to get some role in the fairways, but I was looking at like, okay, what's going to be the average driving distance here, right? Even a firm golf course like LACC 300 yards, Congaree 300 yards, right? So you extrapolate in terms of like the average driving distance, what is going to be the proximity buckets that guys are going to be hitting a lot of their approach shots out of, right?
There's going to be a tremendous amount of long irons on this golf course, particularly, you know, there being a lot of holes that players are going to decide to, to play more conservatively. And there's going to be, I think there's going to be 485 yard power fours that players are not going to hit driver on that players are not going to hit 330 yard drives on and, and,
you know, a, a 150 yard pitching wedge coming in. I, I mapped it out and I still think we're looking at like a 60% proximity from 175 yards plus, which is, that's really high. Like for context, LACC is 58% coming from one 75. So that's right on cue with what we'd expect from,
Even Augusta, like Torrey Pines, Augusta, Bay Hill, all those golf courses are like 50 to 55%. I mean, the only golf course I could find that's like more long iron intensive than I think what we'll see at Pinehurst is
Vedanta Vallarta in Mexico is like 64%. That's just all long irons because you have a bunch of reachable par fives and longer par threes. God, the par threes, I don't want to spend a tremendous amount of time on the architecture of each hole, but I think this golf tournament is going to be one on the par threes. I really do. I think that you have four distinctly unique players
long, distinctive par threes, particularly coming down the stretch. Like the last time we saw a real golf competition in at, at Pinehurst was the 2019 us amateur one coincidentally by, uh, by Andy Ogletree now, now on the live tour, um, like the par threes, the four par threes played as like four of the six toughest holes on the golf course. Like nine, uh,
at the 2019 us amateur played like three and a half strokes over par. And you had these two incredibly high leverage shots down the stretch on 15 and 17, where the, the tournament was really won and lost on, on those par threes. They all measure between like 190 and 215 yards. And like 15 is like,
such a penalty for not hitting a precise approach shot coming down the stretch. Like you're going to need to step up to those two par threes and nine on the backside and hit really, really proper golf shots. It's, it's going to be a test of nerve. It's, it's, it's really, really exciting stuff. I think down the stretch with some of these par three holes. Um,
In my mind, I don't – I mean, I'll ask you the question. I think Muirfield Village, and if you wanted a warm-up, in quotes, event –
with the length of Muirfield Village, the difficulty of Muirfield Village. High Miss Fairway penalty. It's like Muirfield Village is a long golf course. I know the aesthetics of the golf course are different. I know that the technique around the greens is different, but just in a vacuum, what do you need to win at Muirfield Village? Total driving with an emphasis on accuracy off the tee, short game scale because of really low greens and regulation percentage, and long iron play. Yeah.
When they used to play the WGC at Akron, Firestone, the week before the PGA, the amount of carryover you had from that into the PGA the following week was amazing. And I just cannot see in my mind players butchering the Memorial Tournament and then lo and behold, five days later, six days later, being in contention at a Pioneers No. 2 US Open.
Because if you're peaking your game for a major, as these guys will be, and that game hasn't peaked at all well at Muirfield Village, you have got to seriously find something in a very short space of time, in my mind. So I think what we're going to see from the key numbers from Muirfield Village to carry over into Pioneers number two, I think is going to be significant carryover.
Whether we see that from Lyft, which is also running this week down in Houston, not so sure. That course isn't as onerous as anywhere near as onerous as Muirfield Villages. Now, Bermuda. But yeah, I get the point. I genuinely think that the fact that Memorial is, you know, like you said, the penalty for missing fairways is very, very tough.
I think that kind of play is just the way that the courses are similar in that respect is something we really do need to keep an eye on in terms of drivers, players that are driving the ball confidently long and straight hitting lots of fairways. I don't think that's a bad skill set to carry over to pioneers next week. Well, let's start talking about the players, but well, cause the, the,
The live golf course, that's got to be Bermuda in 100 degree heat, I would imagine. Yeah. It's the old redstone, isn't it, from the Shell Houston Open days if you go way back. Right. So they at least have that gone for them. I think it used to be Miniverdi, but I can't remember. I don't know what it is now. But yes, definitely Bermuda grass. They've got a slight advantage on that basis. Scottish Shufflers 4-1, Steve.
You know, I haven't ever bet a golfer in my life of doing this. I've been doing this seriously, betting golf for almost five years now. I don't think I've ever bet a golfer at four to one. I haven't made a final decision yet on if that's the direction I'm going to go, but I would say that it is.
I guess I definitely considered it at Augusta too. I'm considering it more heavily here. This is probably the closest that I've been to seriously considering backing a golfer at this short of a price to win any professional golf tournament, particularly one with 130 plus players. So I guess let's get the Scheffler thing out of the way now. For me, it's the perfect golf course for Scotty Scheffler. Yeah. And up until this week,
And clearly, he's at the top of the leaderboard up in Ohio.
He hasn't won outside the Southeast United States. I mean, throw Texas in there. He's a Southern States golfer, isn't he? He loves this agronomy. The fact that these are Bermuda grass greens. One thing I will say, not that it makes any difference at all, because, you know, you could have said this last year about Wyndham Clark. Wyndham Clark had never won on bent grass green, so he's not going to win the US Open. You know, we know that's just, it's fallacy really. But none of Scheffler's,
yet have been on this champion mutagrass. So if you're looking for something to kind of give you a negativity towards him, I will just list them out. Berger, Keegan Bradley, Wyndham Clark, Jason Day, Harris English, Lucas Glover, Jim Herman. Yeah, you heard that right, Jim Herman. Max Homer, Mackenzie Hughes, Dustin Johnson, Sung Kang of all people, Siwoo Kim, Tom Kim, Brooks Koepka, Peter Malnati,
Rory McIlroy, JT Poston, Nick Taylor, Justin Thomas and Will Zalatouris have all won on champion Bermuda grass greens within this field. Just if you're taking a note around that. But yeah, Scotty, mate. Yeah, I would love him to disappear from the top of the leaderboard at Memorial and get maybe nine to two, something like that next week, but it's not going to happen. Does, does,
Let me ask you this question. Does anything that can happen? We're recording this on Friday morning. He hasn't even teed off in his Friday round at the Memorial. Is there anything that you could see from Scotty over the next three days at Memorial that would leave you feeling more bullish or bearish, right? Like sometimes winning the week before a major event,
People think that's not a good thing. It doesn't happen a ton where you have players win the week before a major and then win a major in their direct
Next start. Is there an optimal fitting finishing position for Sheffler this week? Do you feel less inclined to bet him if he runs away with the Memorial by six or you, you know, do you get worried if he finishes T eight? I mean, I'm just trying to think about like the range of outcomes with Scotty over the next three days at the Memorial where it feels like his ceiling is, uh,
Winning the Memorial by four or five strokes and his floor is struggling a little bit more over the weekend and maybe finishing seventh or eighth at worst. And I don't really think either outcome makes a huge difference to me in terms of my confidence in him heading in into pioneers. He's not going to win every tournament. Prime tiger didn't win every tournament. I don't, I don't really have a strong, uh,
take on what he does over the next three days at at memorial unless we see something like crazy concerning where he like loses his swing or his confidence on the greens and and even in that case he's probably finishing like i said like eighth well these are moving numbers but as of if that his first round he was uh he was ranking fourth for driving accuracy and third for greens in regulation which is the perfect mix that we're going to want next week um
The thing that kind of does, I mean, clearly the layers are onto Scotty. You're getting four to one. I mean, I remember prime Woods 08 and beyond, you know, you're getting three to one, something like that. So, you know, these are pretty much Tiger Woods prices. What you've got to ask yourself is, it's like, you know, it's Sheffield against the field, isn't it? Do you back Sheffield? Do you not back Sheffield and you back the field? Do you go without Sheffield in certain markets like that?
There's ways of playing it. Do I see Scottie Scheffler as far bigger a chance of winning than Rory McIlroy? Yes. Me too. McIlroy is currently the second favourite. Price is over in the UK up to 11-1. Interesting enough, I will say Rory has actually won three times on champion Bermuda grass. Congaree. He likes the surface and like you say, Congaree.
So if Rory could vacuum his, oh, I'm playing a major kind of brain away, I'd be far more sweet on Rory, to be fair. The issue I'm going to have at the US Open this year, that when I'm looking at core numbers, I'm looking at players that I think will challenge Scotty,
They are the obvious sorts. They are the Rorys. They are the Zanders. They are potentially the victors. I know that driving distance at US Opens is a thing. I know that longer hitters dominate US Opens. They've dominated them recently. The one they didn't dominate at was Fitzpatrick winning two years ago at Brookline, but Brookline was a shorter golf course.
far shorter, more about accuracy. And to be fair to Matt, he's driving in the build-up to winning the US Open. He was all through that year building speed, working in the gym, and it kind of come very quickly towards the US Open victory where he was actually driving the ball really strongly. The one guy that does just jump out at me, another one to add to the list of short prices, is Colin Morikawa. Yeah.
If you want, let me get this straight. You want a golf course where you're hitting lots of fairways. You've got to have pinpoint accuracy on your approach play from 175 yards an ounce. You've got to be great on par threes. And in reality, you're going to need a short game as well because you are going to miss upwards of 18, 20, 22 greens for those guys that are hitting the most greens.
Morikawa ticks all of those boxes. The only box doesn't tick is just outright power off the tee, which we both think is less important. The other golf course that Morikawa won at that I think has some resemblances to, to Pinehurst in terms of the fact that it's pretty sloping and undulating greens, Bermuda, a lot of chipping off of short grass and a high missed fairway penalty is
at this golf course, not really in the sense of wire grass, but in the sense of water is remember concession, um, where they played the 2021 and that leaderboard. Yep. That leaderboard fascinating because it, it can, it can lead us into the guy that I actually think is the most likely to beat Scheffler in this tournament. More cobble would be
If I'm making a power pull, Morikawa would be three for me. So I'm right there with you. But that concession leaderboard, Morikawa, Hovland, Scheffler was up there in the mix as well. But T2 was Brooks Koepka, who I just...
He's 24 to one now. And I think you're, you're getting Brooks at a relative low point, comparatively speaking to the buzz that he had entering the hall of this year and the masters as well. And you look about, you look at some of these golf courses with Sandy soil. You look at these firm golf courses where it's a lot about long iron play and chipping off of,
short grass and and and like i said the sandy soil first of all i finished fourth at pinehurst in 2014 kind of his coming out party right like this is the first time that we said okay brooks might be a real guy finishes fourth at pinehurst in 2014 you know he's got a great resume at augusta i think that the chipping off of short grass at augusta while the greens are different different agronomy
There's a lot of similarities there in terms of the skill set of like chipping off of short grass and long iron play at, at Augusta second at the concession. As I mentioned, a lot of short grass Bermuda there. He's a Florida guy that chips off of this Bermuda and Jupiter all the time. Finish second at Kiowa, right? Which I know is past Paul. But you think about a golf course where again, a lot of chipping off of short grass to heavily undulated greens, uh,
Kind of big, you know, I know it's a little soft. There was sand and sand dunes, wasn't it? Exactly. Right. And then visually, I do see that, you know, I see very, very aesthetically similar. And then you think about, it's also 17th at LACC. And then he, you know, the two us opens to the us open C one shit, a cock and Aaron Hills. Right. And I, and while I think neither of those, none of those golf courses are, are perfect golf.
But I always said to myself, this is heading into the year. Like as soon as Valhalla got to 21 under par, so, okay, no Brooks has got no, no chance that he's not winning a us open at 21 under par. No, this is such a thinking man's golf course where playing smart, conservative pacing yourself over the course of a tournament is
is going to be so important. And again, not getting your hand stuck in the cookie jar, playing to the fat part of greens, making smart, sound decisions off the tee on approach. That all screams Brooks Koepka to me, Steve. You just need to see some core basic strengths, don't you, at Houston? You want to see him hitting the ball confidently off the tee
You want to see him hitting lots of greens. You want to see him in kind of semi-contention. A couple of days where he's shooting the top five best score in the field, just warming up nicely. And as we know with Brooks, his record of winning majors, it tends to be when he's played the week before, correct? Yes.
Yeah. Yeah. He's one. I get that. And he is, he's got, you know, me, I, you know, me Brooks at majors. I was on him at the PGA. I was disappointed when I found out how easy the course is going to be that easy. Yeah. I think it was top fives. He, at least all of his PGA wins. He had a top five, uh,
Just to answer your earlier question, he's I want to see something definitely. And yeah, let me use in this week. There's there's generally a strong indicator. All of his PGA wins. I know I'd have to go back and look at Shinnecock and Aaron Hills, but all of his PGA wins. He had a top five in the start heading into the week that he won.
Yeah, I think it was the second US Open win where he... I think it was 33rd or something the week before. But apart from that, they all tend to be top fives, definitely top 10. So yeah, there's something in that. I tell you... Yeah.
I'll tell you a player I think will struggle around Pinehurst. It's Justin Thomas. Oh, I thought you were going Bryson here. Well, I think Bryson would as well. You guys will remember I was all over Bryson as you were for the PGA. I don't think it's the Bryson golf course either.
I agree. I agree. Just lashing the ball off the tee as far as you can, I don't think it's going to work at all. I mean, that is disrespectful to Bryson. Also, has he ever won on...
It's his only Bermuda win API, and that's not even champion Bermuda. I think you want Bryson on thick, rough Parklands back grass. I'll go back to Koepka. Koepka was, of course, a champion Bermuda grass winner at TPC Southwind. So I get that. Yeah, I'm with you on DeChambeau. I think JT, I think you put JT on a course where he's got to drive the ball a long way.
and he just cannot drive the ball straight enough. Wyndham Clark's in the same boat for me on that.
This is the trouble. This is the trouble I'm having. There's no one in those traditional kind of mid-price, 25 and up, that I actually really fancy, which in a way is quite good because the way that we're seeing the winning, you know, winners on the PGA Tour this year have all been either sub 20 to 1 or above 50 to 1. So I'm not seeing players in that bracket that I'm interested in. I'll tell you what I would like an opinion on. And as soon as I saw him...
hitting a mega long bomb on the first hole yesterday for birdie it piqued my interest straight away ludwig oberg what are you what are your thoughts on him and pioneers number two and well he's never played a usga setup before uh this will be his first us open uh can't think of the last time uh
Guy won a U S open and his, in his first U S open start. Um, but counter counterpoint, you know, the guy finished runner up at the masters in his first start, a golf course that is amongst the most nuance that you'll ever see that, uh,
rewards course history more than any other track on tour and and pinehurst at least levels the playing field a bit because there's not a lot of players with a ton of experience on this track i think he's got the right profile the reason why i don't think i'll be on ludwig is you look at what
One of the biggest reasons his only hiccup at Augusta was he lost two strokes around the green at Augusta. Like that was really what undid him at the Masters. He actually putted great and he obviously drove the ball great and hit his long irons really well. But I don't know if I'm totally there with with Ludwig short game for him to win it at Pinehurst.
Wyndham Clark won the U.S. Open last year. He clearly had played the U.S. Opens. Miscut, miscut first. So, yes. Zero top 70 finishes, I think, in a major. So, it can be done. And Ludwig is, I think, long-term, obviously, a better player than Ludwig. But clearly, yeah, Ludwig also is a 66-1, as Wyndham Clark was and above. But, yes, I get that. Right, right, right. And so, I think...
The players before we get down to some of the longer shots, if I'm not going Scotty here, I think.
The most sound bats are Brooks and Morikawa. And both you can find at 20, 21 to one and, and 24 to one. I think I'm probably more interested in Morikawa because I trust that he's going to be able to hit fairways more so than maybe anyone else at the top of the board outside of Sheffler. And his short game has been tremendously improved this year. Like he chipped, he chipped the ball really well at the master's.
this year. And that has been a weak point for him in the past, but his around the green play this season has improved greatly. I just want to touch on two guys that we haven't mentioned as much, uh, before we dive into some longer shots, like in a hypothetical two ball between Hovland and Xander. Um,
Where would you go? Because I don't think I don't think either of us are betting either. But I think I think a lot of people will bet Hovland because I think a lot of people will say, OK, he can take the Kymer route and just put everything and.
I'm not so sure on that. I think the reason I would be off Hovland this week is because I don't think the fact that he chipped well at Valhalla and potentially at Mirafield Village as well, too. We'll see how he does over the next three days is a harbinger that his short game is completely fixed and he's going to be able to accurately navigate the greensign complexes at Pinehurst this year. The look, yeah.
Like you said, it depends a lot on the USGA setup. If they're preventing a lot of the weaker chippers from putting off some of the surfaces when they're scrambling, I'm not sure about Hovland. Ultimately, you look at his numbers, I think he could do a Martin Keimer, but... Pretty good leg putter, in fairness. Oh, he's a fantastic leg putter. Yeah.
It was interesting with Kymer as well that here's a number that the kind of approach putt performance, I've been desperately going through the PGA Tour record numbers, see some kind of relevance. An approach putt performance measured on all holes where putting distance was determined with a laser, the average distance of the hole after the first putt. Now, Martin Kymer arriving at Pioneer's number two was in the top 11 on tour.
Just to go through some notes, Tony Finau is number one, which I find amazing. I mean, this is effective for some kind of lag putz stat, isn't it? Jason Day, Stefan Jaegers, Siwoo Kim, JT Poston, Jordan Spieth. Then you've got Christiane Buzaydenhut, Keegan Bradley, Sam Burns, Austin Ekro, Tommy Fleetwood, Lucas Glover, Tom Kim.
Hovland is quite high in that stat, as is Scottie Scheffler, amazingly enough. Scottie Scheffler's in the top 13 with Xander. Ludwig's quite prominent in there as well. There could be something in that as well. I always think good lag putting at a really tough set-up in a major is a good number to look at. Oh, you put Xander or Hovland, that's a tricky one.
The thing that worries me about Victor is, and it doesn't seem to be getting any better after round one at Memorial is, Prime Victor is a guy that would hit the ball long and straight and accurate. And he's still missing too many fairways for Prime Victor Hovland. And he has said that in interviews that,
He's getting towards, he's playing the old, you know, he's playing the shot shape that he likes now. The fade is controllable. He's making huge progress. But he says, I'm still not hitting the driver straight enough for my liking. And you can see that in the numbers. I'd want to see that improve. So I'd probably take Zan, to be fair.
Yeah, threw one round at Memorial. He's 42nd. He was a neutral driver of the ball at Memorial. He actually putted really well. I think I'd still take Victor. You're not winning. So when's the last time we've seen back-to-back majors? Well, agreed. And I might have to read my words, but we'll see on Monday when I pull my tips together. But 12 of the last 15 US Open winners...
were first-time major winners. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah. The other thing about Xander is he's such a complete player. Outside of Scheffler, he is the most complete player in golf right now in terms of his skill set. He's still a better putter than Scheffler. He's great. He's not Scheffler around the greens, but he's awesome around the greens. If you're nitpicking one player
thing with Xander that can get him into trouble. He can get a little squirrely off the tee from an accuracy standpoint. And that's why I think I would, it's close. I don't think I'm going to be on either, but I think I would still, I think I would still maybe give the edge to Victor there. Okay. There's like,
There's a few guys that I want to mention farther down the board. So we can kind of go back and forth on these guys as we wrap up. There's I have two guys right now at 55 to one that I really, really like that. I could see myself going in this direction if I do not.
end up on um if i do not end up on chef or and then one or two guys that i just want to briefly mention at at super super deep odds that i think have the the skill set here but i'm i'm fascinated at these 55 to 1 look so i'm wondering if they they're kind of corresponding with mines but yeah okay so do you want me to go first yeah you go first okay so here's the thing with some of these guys it's like
I could make a phenomenal case for why some of these players are going to succeed here. But at the end of the day, do I really think that they could beat Scottie Scheffler coming down the stretch? Probably not. Let's start with Tommy Fleetwood. Tommy Fleetwood at 55-1. Let's look at some of his performances on –
you know, Sandy soil firm. What were Tommy Fleetwood's best us open performances? Aaron Hills, Shinnecock Hills, LACC. Tommy Fleetwood has the trifecta of these firmer us opens with more wide open, non thick, rough chipping off of short grass. Oh, by the way, he finished third at the masters this year. Oh,
Long iron play on July and green complexes chipping off of short grass. Top five Aaron Hills, top five masters, top five Shinnecock. He also finished fourth at Congaree. Steve, I know you'll like that as well. That's right. Talk about a player that keeps the ball in play off the tee. And I trust around the greens.
Give me Tommy Fleetwood. I think he's going to be highly, highly relevant at this US Open. And when I say relevant, that could mean he's T30 heading into Sunday and we look up at the final leaderboard and he's T4. If you said to me over a pint, give me, take away the Open, give me a point.
one, two, three of where Tommy Fleetwood in American majors has the biggest chance. I would personally go US Open one, Masters two, although I think ultimately he hasn't got the length of the Masters and
and PGA Championship 3. So I get where you're coming from. And this kind of US Open too, like this kind of Aaron Hill's Shinnecock Pinehurst US Open. Yes, where true 100% driving distance isn't the biggest factor. Longish and straightish with a fantastic game of being able to manage a golf course. And we know with Tommy, an amazing short game.
So, yeah, I get that. And he's very good on firmer surfaces. I keep numbers clearly around for our predictor model. And when you look at Tommy, if Tommy's faced with a soft golf course where it becomes target golf, Tommy goes backwards. If you look at Tommy's performances on firmer surfaces, which, of course, Sandy has surfaced,
that's where he comes to the full so i get that 100 us open tick in the box tommy fleet would you uh i have one more guy in this range i want to mention do you want to go first we'll go back and forth anyone by the way i would love to see did you say 55 to 1 yeah and over in the uk i'm getting nowhere near that it's 40 to 1 because we know with tommy his each way value is just amazing
Yeah, he's 55-20. We're seeing 40s at best in the UK. I'll tell you a player I do like at these kind of price appointments. I doubt if you're that interested in him. He's a little bit longer. We have mentioned his name a couple of times on the pod. Keegan Bradley. Yeah. Fourth at Pynast in 2014. Yeah. Exactly. And that guy is playing some amazing golf. I'll tell you what happened with Keegan. We saw it in Netflix when he –
When he didn't get that pick from Zach for the Ryder Cup, that really hurt Keegan Bradley. And he is 100% determined, I think, to get into that top six, those automatic spots where he can't be done over to get into the President's Cup. So he's playing some very good golf this season under the surface.
He's actually driving the ball pretty long and pretty straight. I think he's been first for strokes going off the tee his last two appearances. One of those, the PGA Championship, of course. Yeah, I just think he's that kind of guy that can do it, I think.
I do like Bradley. Yeah. Playing great at the Memorial as well. The, the other guy that I'll throw out here. And then I have one or two guys that I want to give mention pretty far down the board as maybe more of a top 20 or draft Kings play. I think about the skillset that I'm looking for at Pinehurst.
And you want to know who has one of the most underrated short games in golf is Hideki. If we're talking about long iron play and short game, and now I know he's had more success on bet than Bermuda. He's done some winning on Bermuda. Sony Open comes to mind.
I know he finished like third at TPC Southwind over the last couple of years. I think he lost that year that it ended up being answer. He was right there in the mix, lost in a playoff or finished, I think, third or fourth that year. But you look at Hideki's performance actually on some of these sandy soil, firmer, chipping off short grass. First of all, he's won the Masters.
He finished second at Aaron Hills. He finished 18th at chambers, 16th at Shinnecock, 23rd at Kiwa, 32nd at LACC, 15th at the concession, 14th at Pinehurst, 2014. I think a deck is going to play really, really well this week. I really do. I don't know if he's going to, don't know if he's going to win, but I think a deck is a really sharp play this week. That is going to, I'm going to play a factor in this tournament.
If this golf course still had, excuse me, if this course still had bent grass greens, I'd be far higher on Hedekken. Yeah, yeah. Apart from when he gained like nine strokes on the greens at the Sony Open one year. Yeah, yeah. He's only Bermuda grass green victory. Yeah. But yes, the game shape, I get that. I do get that. Again, what do you think to Tom Kim?
I noticed a sneaky T11 at Congaree in 2022 and his approach play right now, and we know that he's laser straight off the tee, his approach play is starting to come around. I know he hasn't got the ultimate power to win, but I think Tom Kim, 66-1 I'm seeing each way, I think that's a decent punt as a mid-price player.
Eighth at LACC, also second at Royal Birkdale, which firm golf course where you have to avoid landmines off the tee. Absolutely. I think this is one of the least distance biased. 16th at the Masters, like you mentioned, 11th at Congaree. I think this is one of the least distance biased opens that you're going to see in quite some time. Can I give you a sneaky one that I like? Go on then.
Go ahead. Before we go, can I, can I give you a player that has, uh, has finished top 10 in three of his last four us opens and also has a top 15 at Congaree. Yeah. I'm scanning the odds boards and no one's jumping out of me. Go Harris English. Oh, wow. Yeah. Southeastern guy. Good at the masters this year.
I can remember him being at the very top of that leaderboard at the, uh, the first, uh, Congaree tournament they played the week before. And I think he finished seventh in the end or something. Yeah. Really struggled. Really struggled. Yeah. Yeah. Really struggled on Sunday. Yeah. English is interesting. He's got a very, very underrated us open record. I know that really underrated us open record, the final guy. And then we'll get out of here. Uh,
In terms of like the skill set of accuracy off the tee, long iron play, an elite short game. This guy has one of the statistically most underrated short games in the game. Russell Henley? Yeah. Yeah.
Not a Henley fan. He's on my post-it note of doom. I never bat Ross. I could say, I could say, well, don't forget. Of course. Great Carolina golf calls record as well. Oh yeah. Sedgefield Donald Ross. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. As Tom Kim won at Sedgefield. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I get that. This is it. This is what we're saying here. Ultimately. Yeah. Great. If he won, but yeah,
The kind of guys that fill those top 10 places, if you're backing players 10 places each way over here in the UK, it's those kind of players. Your Bradleys, your Henleys, your Tom Kims. They could be on that first page of the leaderboard come Sunday evening over here. So yeah, I get that. Yeah, I do get that. All right, sir. So...
Non-Sheffler winner, Sheffler winner, how close are you to just biting the bullet with Sheffler at 4-1? I've been saying that he's going to win this for the last three months, so I think I'm going to have to put some of my stake on Scotty Sheffler. It just has to be done. It just...
Who I, of the very few players I can fit under that, it's who I go with. Is it your Hovlands? Is it your Morikawas? And who I choose at those deeper prices, would it be a Keegan or a Tom or a Russell Henley or whoever that's going to be? But yes, I think I'm going to have to have a cut into Scheffler, I'm afraid. Who's your most likely non-Scheffler winner, Colin? Yeah, I think so.
I do think so. Yeah. I think if I was betting the non-Shefflor market, I think my card would be either Colin or Brooks. It's really tight between those two. I might be a touch higher on Brooks than Colin personally. If I see anything from Brooks this week in Houston, I will not need a second invitation. Yeah. You well know that. And then like I said, if I was betting the non-Shefflor market, my card would probably look something like
Brooks, Fleetwood, Hideki, Russell Henley, Harris English. I think one of those guys is going to finish like T3.
Um, yeah. So, all right, Steve, this is a blast. We'll talk. Gosh, Trune is going to come up right around the corner. So any closing thoughts, what you guys got going on at a golf betting system this week for, for all the standard majors week, my, uh, my tips, my betting preview will be out on Monday. You can follow me at Bamford golf on X. Well,
We'll have masses of statistics. I predict a model, uh, the golf bank system podcast. Come and give that a listen. That will be out on Tuesday. Awesome. Steve. Thanks so much. This is a blast. We'll see you soon. We'll talk some, uh, we'll talk some true and soon. Very gosh, coming up like three, four weeks and, um, yeah, enjoy the golf. Enjoy the golf this week, buddy. All right. Thanks Steve.
All right, that's it for the podcast. Special thanks to Steve. Special thanks to Rumpier Sports. Special thanks to The Rabbit Hole. And we will be back on this podcast feed on Tuesday morning, breaking down the entire slate for the U.S. Open with my good friend, Kobe DuBose, one of my favorite episodes of the year. U.S. Open week. I can't wait for this one. I'm super fired up. So until then, best of luck with your bets this weekend. Enjoy the golf.
the memorial and we will see you next time cheers
Drinking and driving is a decision that could change your whole world. Things will never be the same if you ever get a DUI. Because legal fees and time in court are just the beginning. Getting into a crash is another way that your world can be turned upside down. Your vehicle may not be the only thing that gets damaged in that crash. You can face a life altering injury or
or even death. But you're not the only one that can face those consequences. Your decision to drink and drive can permanently impact not just your world, but someone else's world as well. Whether you injure them or leave their loved ones grieving. The next time you're out drinking, call a ride share, a taxi, a sober friend,
or a designated sober driver. The only decision that will change your world for the better is the decision to call for a sober ride. Drive sober or get pulled over. Paid for by NHTSA.