Golf Channel’s free-to-play game is back for another year, and the 2020 season has officially resumed.
Located in the NBC Sports Predictor app, Golf Pick ‘Em gives fans a chance to win cash and prizes by predicting how some of the top PGA Tour stars will fare against each other on a weekly basis. The focus will be on choosing between a series of seven head-to-head matchups as well as selecting an overall tournament champion and winning score.
Players can compete for weekly cash prizes, with a $50,000 jackpot available each week for any players who earn a perfect score. But there will also be at least $1,000 awarded each week in cash and prizes, even if there is no player with a perfect score. So be sure to download the NBC Sports Predictor app and make your free selections each week!
The contest continues this week with the Wyndham Championship and will run through the rescheduled Masters in November. Here’s a look at some of the players to keep an eye on when making your Pick ‘Em selections as the PGA Tour wraps up the 2019-20 regular season:
1. Webb Simpson: A deserving favorite on one of his favorite courses. Simpson earned his first Tour victory here in 2011, subsequently named a child after the title sponsor, and hasn’t slowed his affinity for the layout. He’s finished T-11 or better eight times in his last 10 trips, T-3 or better each of the last three years and typically contends even in the midst of mediocre seasons. Now he turns up for a quasi home game as one of the best players on Tour with two wins already this season.
2. Brooks Koepka: Coming off some major disappointment, Koepka has a chance to re-write the narrative on a course where he has had some past success. He finished T-5 at Sedgefield back in 2015, has shot 68 or better in seven of his eight competitive rounds here and has shown over the last two weeks that the injury issues slowing him down earlier this season may be a thing of the past.
3. Patrick Reed: Reed broke through for his first Tour win at this event in 2013, beating Jordan Spieth in a memorable playoff. He has since added three straight top-25 finishes, highlighted by a final-round 63 a year ago. Reed hasn’t gotten much attention in recent weeks but his game has been solid, with three top-15 finishes since the break including a T-13 result last week. He’s up to 10th on Tour this season in strokes gained: putting and should roll in his fair share this week.
4. Paul Casey: Casey came up short in his bid to win a maiden major at age 43, but there’s reason to suspect he’ll contend again on the other side of the country. The Englishman has had a consistent run of success at Sedgefield, with three straight top-20 finishes and 12 straight rounds in the 60s dating back to 2014. His success at Harding Park somewhat came out of the blue, but his game seems ideally suited for the demands of this week’s layout.
5. Sergio Garcia: Garcia might be one of the more motivated players at this week’s regular season finale. The Spaniard will start the week at No. 134 in points, needing a solid result to crack the top 125 and extend his season to next week’s event at TPC Boston. Garcia won here back in 2012, finished fourth in 2009 and hasn’t finished worse than T-29 in four trips to Sedgefield.
6. Tommy Fleetwood: Fleetwood remains the highest-ranked player in the world without a PGA Tour victory, and a Sunday 73 to fade from contention at the PGA Championship didn’t help that drought. But the Englishman is still one of the Tour’s best ball-strikers, and the stats backed it up at the halfway point last week. A more complete effort this time, especially on and around the greens, could help him get his name etched into a trophy for the first time on this side of the Atlantic.
7. Justin Rose: Rose broke a run of three straight missed cuts last week in San Francisco, finishing ninth at the PGA. While he hasn’t played this event since 2009, he did finish T-5 that year and has had great success on similarly cozy layouts like Colonial and Harbour Town. He has been feast or famine since the break, mixing top-15s with missed cuts, but stands a great chance to contend this week in his return to Greensboro.
8. Si Woo Kim: This is where Kim broke through for the first time on Tour, cruising to a five-shot win months before his triumph at TPC Sawgrass. He added a T-5 finish and has made seven cuts in a row, highlighted by a T-13 showing last week at Harding Park.
9. Harris English: English just keeps rolling right along. While he hasn’t won in seven years, the veteran is in the midst of a resurgent season that includes a whopping 11 top-20 finishes and four such results in his last four starts. English has a similarly solid record in Greensboro, where he has never missed a cut in six appearances while finishing T-10 in 2012 and T-11 two years ago.
10. Brendon Todd: Todd has let a few Sundays slip away recently, but there is no denying his overall success that includes two wins this season and now three straight top-25 finishes. Todd has missed four of five cuts at this event but returns to Sedgefield as a different player, having held the 54-hole lead twice in his last five starts.
