Sony Open 2023 HP

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If golf research were sexual...you'd be rounding 2nd base after this.

Here are a few key things to know that may not have been covered on the podcast enough. Keep these in mind when narrowing down your bets and/or player pool.

While we are still in Hawaii, it's hard to imagine a starker contrast of a golf course than Waialae Country Club in comparison to what we witnessed at Kapalua. That said, we've seen a definite correlation between success at the Sony and players who simply teed it up for the Sentry. The tournament reps are of course important, but I think it's also a familiarity and comfort with all aspects of routine, warm up, time zone, tradewinds, etc that help create a comfort level for those making the short journey to Honolulu.

My course notes year over year emphasize wedge play and short game over anything else. If you analyze the list of previous recent champions, Cam Smith, Kevin Na, Justin Thomas, and even Hideki, they also possess great hands around the greens and are able to consistently stick short wedges into the greens which are above PGA Tour average in size. Here is the Data Golf radar plot on course fit for Waialae:

While the yardage on the scorecard appears to present a short chip and putt, the architecture and routing of Waialae requires you to often club down off the tee which increases the average approach shot distance. The majority of the holes feature prolific doglegs where cutting the corner is well gaurded by trees and bunkers to discourage players from taking it over the talk. The risk is often not worth the reward. Looking at Driving Accuracy specifically on courses with shorter total yardage where you see an uptick in clubbing down OTT is beneficial this week.At only 10 ft above sea level, there is almost zero elevation change throughout the course as even the Bermuda Grass greens play flat and easy. They are statistically the easiest greens on Tour in terms of make percentage from 5-10 ft.

Again, I'm putting slightly less emphasis this week on scores and stats from the Fall swing. By this time, every player has had some time off to rest and reset their swing. In turn, I'm increasing the weight on performance last week and Course History. Waialae has a proven track record of being a sticky Course History spot in terms of predictability. DataGolf has it ranked 2nd of all courses on the PGA Tour behind only Augusta National.

The wind has definitely played a factor here in the past, particularly in 2020 when it got wild on the weekend before Justin Thomas won in a 3-man playoff. We'll take a much closer look and will relay any potential advantages we see in the Chalk Bomb email.

Top 8 in SG VS Expectation (min 16 rounds) at the Sony Open: Mitchell, Connors, Blair, Stuard, Kizzire, Kelly, Kirk, Walker

Bottom 8 in SG VS Expectation (min 8 rounds) at the Sony Open: Tway, Streb, Hubbard, Lee, Matsuyama, Scott, Garnett, Herman.

DataGolf's optimal DK lineup is Sungjae Im $10,300, Brian Harman $9,700, Matt Kuchar $7,900, JT Poston $7,700, Brendan Todd $7,400, and Robby Shelton $7,000.

2 DFS Sleepers for the Sony Open

DB's taken an early look at ownership projections around the DFS space, and he's attempting to sell you on 2 names with upside and high ownership leverage in GPP tournaments on DraftKings and FanDuel.2 Names in 12 Minutes. Click below & see if DB sells ya!

1. Proximity to hole from 100-150 yards last 36 rounds: 1. Knox  2. Henley  3. Hoge  4. Matsuyama  5. Stuard  6.  Kim  7. Taylor  8. Hubbard  9. Choi  10. Griffin2. Strokes gained Putting leaders on bermuda grass last 36 rounds: 1. B. Taylor  2. Merritt  3. Todd  4. Kraft  5. Long  6. Hall  7. Werenski  8. McNealy  9. Hughes  10. Montgomery3. Suggested Course Experience Positive Adjustments to Players Skill-set per Data Golf:  1. Sabbatini  2. Kelly  3. Walker  4. Piercy  5. Kirk  6. Harman  7. English  8. Henley  9. Knox  10. Thompson4. With easy scoring conditions and birdie-fests, your top 10 in SG: Total in the last 50 rounds are: 1. Im  2. T. Kim  3. Hoge  4. Spaun  5. McNealy  6. Conners  7. Spieth  8. Hubbard  9. English  10. Henley5. Top 10 in SG: ARG on Bermuda Grass greens last 36 rounds: 1. Kuchar  2. Si Woo  3. Bez  4. Hughes  5. Kirk  6. An  7. Sabbatini  8. Baddeley  9. Henley  10. Jaeger6. Top 10 in SG: OTT on courses sub 7200 yards in the last 36 rounds: 1. Im  2. Conners  3. C. Davis  4. Mitchell  5. Matsuyama  6. Hickock  7. Henley  8. Bradley  9. Kirk  10. Grillo7. Top 10 Players in True Strokes Gained at Waialae over last 20 rounds via Datagolf: 1. Kizzire  2. Simpson  3. Kirk  4. Henley  5. Stuard  6. Kuchar  7. Kelly  8. Cink  9. Johnson  10. Woodland8. Top 10 in Projected Fantasy Points Total Scoring: 1.Im  2. Harman  3. T. Kim  4. Henley  5. Conners  6. Spieth  7. Bradley  8. Hoge  9. Matsuyama  10. KH Lee9. Top 10 in Opportunities Gained on courses less than 7200 yards last 36 rounds: 1. Conners  2. Henley  3. Grillo  4. Svensson  5. Matsuyama  6. Bradley  7. Horschel  8. Smotherman  9. Palmer  10. Armour10. Top 10 in DFS Value (Fantasy Points projected per Salary via Datagolf: 1. Im  2. Harman  3. Poston  4. Kuchar  5. Todd  6. Jaeger  7. Putnam  8. Kirk  9. Hughes 10. KH Lee

While we ended 2022 with 5 straight cash PrizePicks cards...we lost our 1st one in 2023, but we made up for it significantly in the Nut Hut for the rest of the Sentry. We straight up ROBBED PrizePicks last week in the Nut Hut, including a 15x hit! Hope you kept tailing.On to this week though...I'm going with the trusty 2 banger here. Sungjae's coming in hot from Kapalua and going low. 5 birdies or better shouldn't be an issue given the 2 par 5's are basically gimmies and Waialae averages over 4.5 birdies in benign conditions, and Sungjae ain't average.I'm rolling with the former Sony champ, course horse, old timer that knows his way around Waialae over my buddy Smothdaddy in the BoB matchup. I don't love a lot of the matchups on the board, but this one seems to make the most sense. Tail at your own risk!