The FedEx Cup Playoffs have arrive and the top 125 on the PGA TOUR will take aim at the largest cash prize in golf.
Technically, it will be 124 this week with Louis Oosthuizen passing on the opener, but the rest of the stars are at Liberty National Golf Club for the Northern Trust.
Let's break it all down.
The Course
We’ve seen Liberty National Golf Club on a few occasions, including for this event in 2019 when Patrick Reed came out with the win. It also hosted this event in 2009 and '13 along with the Presidents Cup in '17, which was won by the U.S. by a fairly comfortable margin.
Adam Scott also grabbed a win here in 2013 on the 7,387-yard, par-71 layout. It’s a course that has small bentgrass greens and will require precision with the approach game or a good scrambling game.
The Favorites
Jon Rahm opens at the top of the board, as he has most of the summer, sitting at +1100 on FanDuel. The U.S. Open champion was third here in 2019, and his form is in great shape this year. Nothing's really held him back in '21 outside of a couple positive COVID-19 tests.
Jordan Spieth, Collin Morikawa and Dustin Johnson make up the next range between +1200 and +1800. Johnson has technically won this event three times on three different courses in three different states, none of which were Liberty National. He doesn't have a top-20 finish in two tries here.
Spieth has the best results of the trio, finishing inside the top-20 on two occasions, including a sixth in 2019.
Morikawa is likely the best fit at Liberty National, though. It's not overly long and with the real emphasis on the approach game, he should thrive this week.
The +2000s group is as strong as we'll ever see featuring Brooks Koepka, Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas, Xander Schauffele and Bryson DeChambeau. McIlroy has played well here with a couple top-20s, while Thomas was 12th here in 2019. I'd expect this range to be quite popular on the betting cards since most of them are usually half the price. We just don't see them drift into this range too often.
The Mid-Tier
I'll start my card right in that next range with Patrick Cantlay at +3300 on FanDuel.
Cantlay was 12th here two years ago and should be a good fit. He's been playing solid outside of a missed cut at The Open. The ball striking has been really good for about three months now and the short game has been pretty spotty which has kept him out of contention some weeks.
But Cantlay gained just over 4.5 strokes putting here in 2019. If he can find that comfort level again, he could be near the top of the leaderboard.
We'll also try Harris English one more time at +4100 on FanDuel.
English was the class two weeks ago at TPC Southwind for the St. Jude Invitational for 63 holes, but he clearly didn't like being put on the clock while DeChambeau was on an Easter Egg hunt for his golf balls. A couple really bad swings at really bad teams ended up costing him.
Overall, the play has been really good against these strong fields this year for English, and this is another course where his all-around game should succeed.
I'll also go with Tyrrell Hatton at +6000 on FanDuel.
Hatton's putter really hasn't cooperated most of the summer, but he's been solid pretty much everywhere else through large portions of the year. He's a guy I expected more from this year after breaking through on the TOUR in 2020 and stringing together some wins in Europe.
It hasn't materialized so far, but I'll give it another go at this price.
The Longshots
Nothing here for me this week. When the playoffs roll around, I tend to steer clear of the longshots.
Hank Lebioda is the only one who really caught my eye at around 300/1. But after a hot-run a month back, he appears to have come back to reality. If he bounces back, though, he could be a decent top-20 play.
The Northern Trust Card
- Patrick Cantlay +3300 (1 unit)
- Harris English +4100 (.8 units)
- Tyrrell Hatton +6000 (.55 units)
Total Stake: 2.35 units
