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The holiday weekend filled with outspoken loved ones and colorful extended family is finally over as we head to The Bahamas for the Hero World Challenge. 20 players will take the flight south for warmer weather, 72-holes of play, and a date with the one and only Tiger Woods.
Playing host at Albany Golf Club for the sixth time and for the first time in two years, Woods is familiar with the world’s best playing in his event. As the last time the Hero World Challenge took place, the then U.S. Presidents Cup playing-captain had most of his team – Dustin Johnson was shockingly the lone American to not – make the trip to the Ernie Els design before flying to Australia together.
It proved to be a fruitful decision as Woods and Justin Thomas (+900) finished inside the top-five by week’s end before leading the U.S. Team to a hard-fought Presidents Cup victory at Royal Melbourne Golf Club. However, it was not all sunshine and rainbows as Patrick Reed (+3500) had a Hero World Challenge to remember, having incurred an infamous penalty in the third round and finishing two-strokes behind the eventual winner, Henrik Stenson (+6600).
This mistake would follow Reed to Australia as spectators needled the newly donned “Mr. Sandman” at every turn. Playing into it at first by shoveling his way around the Alister Mackenzie design, it eventually boiled over into an altercation between his caddie Kessler Karain and a fan after Reed and Webb Simpson (+1800) lost their four-ball match to C.T. Pan and Hideki Matsuyama.
Unfortunately, none of this was caught on camera – a true rarity in this day and age – yet another recent pillow fight between Bryson DeChambeau (+1000) and Brooks Koepka (+2500) was. That is the direction in which I will be leading the card as I believe there are two ways to attack this limited field.
The first would be to single out a player at the top and you can’t do much better than the tournament-favorite at PointsBet Sportsbook, Rory McIlroy (+700), given his recent run of form. Single bullet. One and done. Short and sweet. That unfortunately has never been my style as I look to get off the schneid of the past two months – a fact my relatives very much made me aware of.
With +2500 still available on the four-time major winner, I simply could not look past this era’s big game hunter. While Collin Morikawa (+800) is certainly giving him a run for his money, I reckon the title still resides with Koepka for the time being and this week may very well pique his interest.
Making his fourth Hero World Challenge appearance, Koepka has failed to find his footing on this par-72 outside of his debut in 2016 when he finished in a tie for seventh. However, with five par-5s and two potentially drivable par-4s, the American’s firepower off-the-tee – one of two areas where he has found some form this fall – should set him up for success.
As in 12 previous rounds at Albany GC, the 31-year-old has shot par-or-better in 11 of them without taking advantage of those seven holes. If he is just able to convert his birdie opportunities at a more efficient clip, he should play his way into the winning range of 20-under. His putter has been cooperative in his last few outings and believe it or not, Koepka has done some of his best work when the competition is whittled down.
While Xander Schauffele (+1400) may garner the most notoriety for winning such events, Koepka is close behind. Between his major championship logic of needing to beat only 30 other players and his victories at the 2018 CJ CUP and 2019 WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational, Koepka has captured six of his eight career victories on the PGA Tour when competition is limited in a sense.
There will be plenty of new this week as well for Koepka as he recently signed a deal with Srixon and will have his brother, Chase Koepka, on the bag in lieu of Ricky Elliott. Motivation to play well in front of his little brother, Woods, and some of the best players in the world with new clubs in hand is plenty to get his juices flowing and squashes any concerns in that department.
Simpson was another U.S. Open Champion heavily considered in addition to Koepka, but instead it was the Albany resident himself, Justin Rose (+2900), who was selected. Having made three starts this past swing season, the Englishman steadily improved each time he stuck a peg in the ground.
It started about as poorly as possible when he opened with a 3-over 75 at The Summit Club, but Rose battled back, posting rounds of 65-69-68 to finish in a tie for 57th at THE CJ CUP. In his next start at El Camaleon Golf Course, the 41-year-old carded four rounds of under-par golf en route to a top-40 result at the World Wide Technology Championship.
Finally, it all came together for him at the RSM Classic where he extended his streak of rounds at par-or-better and eventually finished in a tie for 12th. Gaining on the field in each Strokes Gained category, Rose posted +4.8 SG: Tee-to-Green, possibly signaling a return to his late summer form when he collected a top-10 finish at the Wyndham Championship and finished a tie for sixth at the BMW PGA Championship.
There may be no better spot for Rose to put a bow on this stretch of play as he is clearly comfortable around Albany GC. Playing it during his off weeks has proven to be helpful in recent editions of the Hero World Challenge having captured finishes of T-5, solo third, and T-5 and I fancy Rose’s ability to play himself into a similar position once again.
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If heading down the path of course history, a player with plenty of history, as already discussed is Patrick Reed (+3500). We will forgo the urge to spend 180 hours dissecting that fateful day in 2019 as an expert forensic videographer has graciously already done so. While Reed would have loved this act to have been ignored, something I cannot seem to ignore is how well he has played at Albany GC, specifically on the par-4s.
Leading the field in par-4 scoring in 2019, the nine-time winner on the PGA Tour finished in a tie for third in said category in 2016, 2017, and 2018. In his runner-up effort in 2015, Reed finished in solo sixth in par 4-scoring. So why am I pointing this out? Simply put, here in the United States those have been the holes on which the Texan has tripped up recently.
Playing the par-4s in an under-par fashion at the DP World Tour Championship, perhaps Reed is on the way back to his former self. Finally gaining strokes on approach, the 31-year-old was left out to dry by his play on and around-the-greens of the Earth Course at the Jumeirah Golf Estates.
With his accuracy off-the-tee ticking up in his last four starts now, Reed’s chances may depend on his short-game oddly enough. It seems like I’ve been beating this drum for the past month now, but his chipping and putting has to come back around eventually and history suggests Albany GC is the perfect place for it do so.
Outright Selections (Odds Via PointsBet):
Brooks Koepka (+2500)
Justin Rose (+2900)
Patrick Reed (+3500)
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