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Tides’ Takes – PGA Tournament Matchup Picks, Props & Outrights: Rocket Mortgage Classic

Timothy Buell Tue 7/26 8:47am PT
Our PGA betting experts are backing Nick Hardy at the 2022 Rocket Mortgage Classic.
Image Credit: Imagn

ScoresAndOdds analyst Timothy Buell gives free expert advice and betting picks for the 2022 3M Open!

Welcome to my new weekly PGA column! I will be focusing primarily on tournament (or H2H) matchups, but if I think the odds are right, I will throw in an occasional outright wager.

Make sure to use our tools at ScoresAndOdds to find the best lines at your favorite legal sportsbook.

Congratulations to all of the Tony Finau backers last week. He certainly deserved that win with a gutsy Sunday performance. We could have had a profitable week, if Doug Ghim didn’t double bogey his very last hole of the tournament to cost us our top-10 ticket. 

Golf can be a tough sport to wager, but we always know there will be another tournament coming right up. That leads us to this week’s Rocket Mortgage Classic, at the Detroit Golf Club, in Detroit, Michigan. 

Rocket Mortgage Classic – Course Breakdown

The course is a par 72 and plays 7,370 yards. There is only one water hazard on the course, but 87 sand traps. The greens average a size of 5,150 square feet and are a mix of bentgrass and poa. The dominant grass is poa, so I will be leaning more towards poa splits when ranking golfers.

The rough in years past is not very penal.  This course favors distance over accuracy. There really isn’t much trouble you can get in off the tee and I expect the field to be able to go quite low.  The winning score should be around -20 this year and the cut line has been anywhere between -2 and -4 in the three years that this tournament has been on the tour.

When looking at stats from the previous years at this course, the one thing that really sticks out to me is that you really need a hot putter to contend. Strokes-gained putting is the most important metric for golfers that have finished in the top-10.  

Free PGA Betting Picks For This Week

Max Homa

If you go back 50 rounds, Homa ranks fourth in the field in total strokes gained. He is extremely consistent in all elements of the game and he goes underrated by most for his ball striking and approach game, where he ranks seventh in field in both metrics.

Most people are going to go to Will Zalatoris and Cameron Young in this range on the betting board and I think that is a mistake.  Neither of them have the skills with the putter to go low enough to win this tournament in my opinion. Homa ranks 13th in the field in strokes-gained putting, while Willy Z ranks 93rd and Young 43rd. 

Homa’s weakness is his around-the-green game, but I don’t think that will play much of a factor this week, with the course being so flat and easy to hit greens. I think he will go very low this week and has the putting skills to hit a ceiling performance and win an outright bet for us. 

Cam Davis

Cam Davis is the defending champion of this event after he out-dueled Troy Merritt and Joaquin Niemann in a playoff last season. 

Davis comes into this tournament in great form. In his last three tournaments, Davis has two top-10 finishes and a 16th last week at the 3M. 

His profile is exactly the type of golfer we want at this course. Davis makes a ton of birdies and plays easier courses better when compared to the field. His ball striking stats are off the charts in his last eight starts – gaining over 30 strokes on the field! 

His good recent form and his history on this track makes me willing to back him. I thought the number would be a little longer on him, which makes me feel Vegas oddsmakers are seeing the same thing in the numbers.  

Head to Head Matchup Picks

Luke List vs. Joel Dahmen

I considered taking List in the outright market, but I felt like his putter would let him down in what will be a putting contest this week. 

The other parts of his game are absolutely the class of the field. He ranks first in tee to green, second in ball striking, fourth in off the tee and third in approach. The guy is an absolute wizard with his irons. 

If List can just putt neutral, when compared to the field in strokes gained, he should have an absolute monster week. Dahmen doesn’t have one particular strong skillset that would lead me to believe he will have a strong week here. Dahmen is also a terrible putter without any of the same ball-striking numbers as List. 

Official Betting Card