There have been 85 previous editions of the Masters Tournament but for DFS purposes all we care about is the 86th running.
That takes place this week at Augusta National. There have been a few minor tweaks to the course since last year but that is usually the case as they continue to modify in order to keep up with modern-day standards.
What we do know from previous Masters is that big hitters have a nice advantage here and performance in other big events is often a good pointer to future success in the majors.
Bombs Away
Augusta National stretches out past 7,500 yards and is relatively generous off the tee, other than some of the claustrophobic corridors made by the trees lining the fairways which seem to always be pointing toward the middle of the fairway.
“You can hit drivers and it’s a bigger golf course. At the same time there’s not a lot of rough. There’s thick trees but not a lot of branches.” -Bubba Watson
As a result, big hitters often thrive here. When I look at the lead-in form of recent top-5 finishes at the Masters, over 80% of them were driving it longer than TOUR average in the lead-up to the event.
Here are the leaders in driving distance over the field, in the last 12 rounds played:
Cameron Young
Rory McIlroy
Cameron Champ
Jon Rahm
Matthew Wolff
Dustin Johnson
Bryson DeChambeau
Sam Burns
Stewart Cink
Justin Thomas
Min Woo Lee
Will Zalatoris
Tyrrell Hatton
Scottie Scheffler
Gary Woodland
Rory McIlroy ($41): He’s found his game again in the last six months or so and driving it as strong as ever. He’s still missing the Masters as the final piece of his career grand slam puzzle. There are six others priced higher than McIlroy on Yahoo this week, making him a very attractive option at the top.
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Performance on the Big Stage
Year after year we see certain golfers find their A-game at the majors.
Brooks Koepka is exhibit A for this. He always seems to find a way to put his name on page one of the leaderboards when a major rolls around.
Let’s check in to see who those golfers have been in recent years.
Here are the golfers with the most adjusted strokes gained total over the last six majors:
Jon Rahm
Louis Oosthuizen
Collin Morikawa
Paul Casey
Bryson DeChambeau
Xander Schauffele
Scottie Scheffler
Tony Finau
Hideki Matsuyama
Patrick Reed
Dustin Johnson
Brooks Koepka
Will Zalatoris
Viktor Hovland
Jordan Spieth
Xander Schauffele ($41): He hasn’t won since the 2019 Sentry Tournament of Champions so many gamers are getting bored with Schauffele. I don’t think we need to lose faith just yet. He has top 20s in 12 of his 18 career majors played. More recently, he’s posted top 15s in three of his last four stroke-play events. Not too shabby for a golfer that may come in a bit under the radar due to the lack of recent wins and a relatively high price tag.
Hopefully, these stats will give you some names to dive into when it comes to researching your final selections this week over at Yahoo!
