For the final time in the 2024 season, 30 of the PGA’s best golfers will tee it up, all vying for the coveted $25 Million. The Tour Championship is certainly a unique event, as it’s the only golf tournament that handicaps players before they tee off on Thursday. For the third consecutive season, Scottie Scheffler will tee off with a score of -10, as he finished with the most FedEx points this season. Two-time major champion and the second-best golfer in the world Xander Schauffele will start 2 strokes back at -8. Hideki Matsuyama is next at -7, followed by BMW Champion Keegan Bradley at -6, and then Ludvig Aberg at -5. The remaining 25 golfers are put into groups of 5 as the scores progressively get closer to even par, where the likes of Aaron Rai and Justin Thomas will begin 10 strokes behind Scottie Scheffler.
The structure of this tournament is questioned quite a bit by the golf community, although I really do enjoy the idea. With so much money and the honor of being Tour Champion on the line, I’d much rather see the golfers that have succeeded throughout the year have an advantage. In my opinion, prior to the addition of starting strokes, the Tour Championship was much closer to the likes of The Players rather than a true season-ending tournament. The current structure allows for the PGA to confidently crown 2024’s champion, rather than just a golfer who got hot one week and won a prestigious tournament.
Many fans dislike the starting positions because it virtually eliminates half the field. This is a fair thought, as I could not imagine any golfer gaining 10 strokes on Scottie Scheffler, 8 on Xander Schauffele, 7 on Hideki, and so on. However, 2022’s TOUR Championship truly showed everyone is in contention. Rory McIlroy edged out both Sungjae Im and Scottie Scheffler to win the 2022 crown after starting the tournament at -4. While -4 isn’t starting at even par, it only took Rory 2 holes to fall back to that mark. After starting the Tour Championship with a triple bogey and bogey to follow, Rory McIlroy finished his final 70 holes 21 strokes under par to win. Sure, it would take an unbelievable week for golfers at -2 and lower to win this thing, but I can assure you, it’s doable. And if that’s still not enough to convince you, there are betting markets that take these starting strokes out of play, allowing you to bet on any of the 30 golfers all starting at the same position.
Let’s dive into East Lake, and a few golfers I expect to make a push for the Tour Championship.
The Course: East Lake Golf Club
Atlanta has been home to the Tour Championship for 20 years. East Lake has provided golf fans fascinating and thrilling finishes to many seasons, and I expect fireworks this weekend as well. At 7,350+ yards, East Lake is a fairly long course for it being a par 70. While distance will certainly help golfers this week, it is once again more important to be accurate.
East Lake has the narrowest fairways on Tour, as it is the only active course that on average has fairways less than 25 yards wide. And if golfers miss these small fairways, which they will at a very high rate, they will certainly be penalized for it. On an annual basis, only Muirfield Village holds a higher missed fairway penalty.
A few data points stick out when picking golfers to back at East Lake. Driving accuracy is obviously an important point, but Good Drive percentage is what I have my eyes on. This takes into account both driving accuracy and greens in regulation. For a drive to count as a “good drive”, it either has to land in the fairway, or the golfer must hit the green or fringe in regulation from the rough. While you certainly don’t want to be playing from the rough at East Lake, being able to still hit the green from it will be very beneficial. Approach play is important as always, with East Lake having greens that are below Tour average by a decent margin. I anticipate scoring to be a bit lower than last season’s rendition, so I will be looking at Scrambling and Bogey Avoidance as well.
With all this in mind, 3 golfers caught my eye that I believe deserve a look when placing wagers.
Best Bets: TOUR Championship
Xander Schauffele (Wire to Wire +700)
Xander Schauffele has somehow arguably had an equal season to GOAT Scottie Scheffler, and this is his final chance to make it clear who’s had a better 2024 season. Seven wins and an Olympic Gold Medal is almost impossible to beat, but 2 majors and the title of TOUR Champion would certainly do it! And given Xander’s excellent history at East Lake, there’s no doubt in my mind this will happen, and quite easily I might add.
Xander’s course history at East Lake is often overlooked when discussing the most consistent on Tour, but you could make the case it’s the best in the business. He’s played here 7 years in a row, and has not finished worse than T7. He won it outright his first time here in 2017 when there were no starting strokes. Since the starting strokes have been introduced in 2019, his finishes with them are 2nd – T2 – T5 – 4th – 2nd. Without the strokes, his finishes are somehow even better, with a 2nd – 1st – 3rd – 6th – 1st. In other words, in his 7 times playing East Lake, Xander Schauffele has won 3 times! It simply does not get any better than this. I don’t have to explain how great his current form is and has been for years now. He has long been one of the best in the game, and he’ll look to solidify the top spot this week!
Xander currently sits at +240 to win The TOUR Championship, but I think we can get even better juice. Considering he’s only 2 shots back of Scheffler and his lackluster East Lake history, I prefer to bet Xander in the Wire to Wire market. This means he’ll have to win and have at least a share of the lead after every round. Given his start at -8, history, form, and propensity to win this event even without starting strokes, I think +700 is a must-play. As long as he gets out hot on Thursday, Xander Schauffele will not look back and win by a landslide!
Keegan Bradley (+3500)
At the time of writing this, DraftKings has not offered a Without Strokes market. There will be one, but there’s no way of knowing what the odds will be. Thus, we are forced to get creative and play some guys that we might not have. But maybe that’s a good thing!
Keegan Bradley shocked the golf world with his victory at The BMW Championship. Starting as the last golfer to qualify, he needed a great result to make East Lake. His win skyrocketed him all the way to 4th in the FedEx Rankings, which means he’ll start The TOUR Championship at -6. If he maintains that spot, Bradley will go home with $7 Million. Considering where he stood in the rankings a few weeks ago, I’m sure this was a pipe dream for Keegan. But here he is with a realistic chance at $25 Million. 2023 was the only season Bradley has qualified for The TOUR Championship since the starting strokes were introduced. He got out hot with a 63 on Thursday and settled for a T9 finish. The 4 times he played here prior to that, we saw a consistent, solid finish every time.
This play is certainly more about the +3500 odds more than anything. I’m hoping Keegan follows Viktor Hovland’s 2023 route in winning The BMW Championship and following it up with a TOUR Championship win. Xander and Scottie are going to be very difficult to run down, but if he can have another solid Thursday like in 2023, his odds will be closer to +400. Get these great odds while you can!
Taylor Pendrith (Top 5 +3000)
Taylor Pendrith has quietly put together one of the better finishes on Tour this season. In his last 14 events, his only missed cut was at Valhalla and only saw one other finish outside T33. 6 of those 14 events ended with a T11 or better, including his win at The CJ Cup Byron Nelson. His fantastic finish to the season is all thanks to his newly found ball-striking form.
Prior to these 14 events, it had looked like Taylor Pendrith might play himself out of a Tour card. He missed 5 out of 6 cuts and was consistently losing 5+ strokes ball-striking. His approach play has been slowly improving, and he now enters The TOUR Championship having gained strokes in 7 consecutive events. He’s long with the driver and fairly accurate, which will help tremendously at East Lake. His bread and butter has always been the ability to putt the ball. He’s gained strokes putting in 20 of his 23 events this season. Most times around, he’s gaining 5+ strokes on the green. His putting coupled with the recent blossoming of his ball-striking sets him up for success in his final 2024 event.
Pendrith will start at -1, making it all but impossible to win the $25 Million. However, that’s not what we’re betting. If Ludvig Aberg drops a stroke, Pendrith is only 3 strokes out of 5th place. With 72 holes to make this gap vanish, I think the +3000 odds for a Top 5 finish is way too good to pass up. Look for Taylor Pendrith’s fantastic form to continue and grab himself a $6 Million payday… and if you bet on him, you’ll have a payday too!