6 picks that our gambling expert likes

Welcome to our weekly PGA Tour gambling tips column, featuring picks from GOLF.com expert prognosticator Brady Kannon. A seasoned golf bettor and commentator, Kannon is a regular guest on SportsGrid, a syndicated audio network dedicated to sports and sports betting. You can follow him on Twitter at @LasVegasGolferand you can read his picks below for the Tour Championship, which begins Thursday in Atlanta, Ga. Along with Kannon’s recommended games, you’ll also see data from Chirp Golf, a mobile app featuring Free-To-play and Daily Fantasy golf contests where you can win money and prizes with every round and tournament.

If winning the FedEx Cup is any indication of who the PGA Tour’s season champion is, then this tournament should be a two-man field featuring the two best players in the world: Scottie Scheffler AND Xander Schauffele. Keegan Bradley is hard to swallow somehow capturing them and winning this week, when he has one win on the season and before last week, he hadn’t finished in the top 20 in three months.

Yes, the system is flawed and I believe everyone is well aware of that. The hard part is the fix and I’m not here to see how to do that because I don’t have an answer either. I love the first two weeks of the FedEx Cup playoffs. The drama, the jockeying for position, trying to sneak into the top 50 and eventually, the top 30. I thought last week’s golf course, at altitude, provided some great, new twists. And East Lake is gorgeous — now a newly renovated, par-71 beast — but the drama has been absorbed by what’s supposed to be the grand final. The Tour Championship is anticlimactic to say the least. Of the 30 players in the field, I believe only the top-10 in kickoffs have a chance.

Speaking of kickoffs, they are awarded based on where one sits in the FedEx Cup point standings coming into this week. Scheffler is no. 1 and begins the tournament at 10-under on Thursday. Schauffele is second and starts with 8-way. Matsuyama is third and starts at 7 under. This pattern continues across the board. The last five players in the field, numbers 26-30, start their week at even par, 10 shots off the lead, essentially playing just for pride and to grab as much money as possible. This tournament can be a lot of fun for only a handful of players at the top. He loses a lot of luster after that and I don’t feel he’s very open to betting.

Andrew Green was brought in to bring some of the original Donald Ross features to play at East Lake Golf Club. He has reshaped the greens, bunkers and fairways. He has added and repositioned bunkers. He has changed some of the tee areas around the greens – and changed the turf on both fairways and greens to different types of Zoysia grass and Bermuda grass, respectively. Over 100 yards were added to the golf course and it will now play as a 71, measuring just under 7,500 yards.

Many of the approach shots at East Lake will come from 200 yards or more. Each of the four par-3 holes are longer than 200 yards. Most par-4 11s fall very close to the 400-450 yard window. The fight is the key. Driving accuracy is probably more important than driving distance. Rough Bermuda grass should be avoided both around the greens and off the fairways. Avoiding bogeys, I believe, is more important than making birdies and of course, approaching the game and hitting the green in regulation will go a long way towards that silverware and the $25 million that comes with it.

I believe the list of related courses is somewhat extensive this week. TPC Potomac and TPC River Highlands mean a lot to me. The Sedgefield is another Ross design that I believe has crossover. Royal Troon, home of the last Open Championship, has similarities. Muirfield Village (Memorial) is another, with its emphasis on second shots, driving accuracy and scrambling. TPC Southwind certainly has some differences, but it has the same combination of Zoysia grass fairways and Bermuda grass greens. And finally, Innisbrook, the Copperhead Course where they play the Valspar Championship.

Having said all that, I’m right back where I started. I believe this is simply a two-man race.

Brady’s Best Bets in East Lake

Before we get too deep here, there are markets out there where you can bet on who will have the lowest score over 72 holes (like a traditional golf tournament), meaning no tee shots. Outside of the Big Two, I love it Aaron Ray there is a shot in this market of about 50-1. Hideki Matsuyama makes sense around 18-1, but you have to wonder about his health after that retreating from the BMW Championship last week. Former FedEx Cup champions, Viktor Hovland (15-1), and Billy Horschel (35-1) are excellent choices, I believe. And finally, for a long bomb, Christiaan Bezuidenhout would be my pick for a flyer around 70-1.

However, I am playing with the strike market and have been saying I believe for a month Xander Schauffele (+225) is the best bet to win the FedEx Cup. He has been the best horse for this course for several years. He won here in 2017 and has finished runner-up three times. He was the lowest scorer again through 72 holes in 2020 and 2023. In seven trips to East Lake, he has never finished worse than seventh.

He has won at TPC River Highlands and Royal Troon. He has three top-15 finishes at the Memorial and tied for eighth earlier this season. Schauffele is almost dead-even with Scheffler in the stats this week. They’re pretty much 1-2 or 2-1 any way you look at it. But he has been the best player on this golf course and he has twice the price.

I believe Scheffler will be voted PGA Tour Player of the Year and he definitely deserves it, but I’m betting that Schauffele will add another notch to his belt at East Lake this week.

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