The 2025 Arnold Palmer Invitational

The Florida Swing rolls on as we head to Orlando where the wind will play a factor. The opening and closing rounds appear to be the toughest with expected gusts of up to 30 MPH, while the middle rounds should see much milder conditions.

For final analysis on weather advantages and tee times, make sure you tune into the Nut Hut live chat starting around 9pm ET for the latest and final thoughts on the weather this week...GET IN THERE

Tommy Fleetwood -122 ($9100) vs. Patrick Cantlay +101 ($9500)

With a loaded field, we’ve got a pair of big names in the $9k range that DraftKings DFS and the sharp overseas oddsmakers disagree on. According to the books, Tommy Fleetwood is a heavy favorite in a 72-hole matchup vs Patrick Cantlay despite a $400 discount on the Englishman in DFS.

This could be down to Tommy’s experience edge at Bay Hill as he’s played this event each of the last eight years with three top-10s to show for it. Meanwhile, it may come as a surprise to learn that this will only be Cantlay’s third start at the API following a T36 last year and a T4 in 2023.

According to our Nut Hut ownership projections available in the Discord, both of these players are among the most popular DFS plays this week at around 14-16% owned.

Welcome to the Show
Get to know the 2025 PGA Tour Rookies

Thanks to recent eligibility changes from the PGA Tour, 45 newly-minted Tour Cards were handed out ahead of the 2025 season. Each week, we’ll spotlight a few up-and-comers whose names will be important to know as the year progresses.

• Kevin Velo- Danville, CA

  Kevin Velo earned his first PGA TOUR card via a 15th place finish in the season-long KFT points list thanks largely to a victory at the 2024 Astara Golf Championship. 2024 was a major bounceback season for the 27-year-old after finishing No. 116 as a KFT rookie in 2023. Prior to earning his way onto the KFT through the 2023 PGA TOUR Q-School, Velo finished No. 4 on the 2021-22 PGA TOUR Latinoamérica Order of Merit to earn conditional status. A native of Danville, CA, Velo played collegiately at San Jose State, the only program that offered him a scholarship. He made his PGA TOUR debut at the Sony Open in January, but he has yet to make a cut through five events on TOUR.

• Braden Thornberry - Germantown, TN

  The former amateur standout earned his first TOUR card in dramatic fashion, firing a 6-under 66 in the final round of the 2024 KFT Championship to win the event and climb from 51st to 16th in the season-long points list. After three prior Korn Ferry Tour seasons, his breakthrough came following previous Points List finishes of No. 101 (2019), No. 57 (2020-21), and No. 109 (2022). A former World No. 1 Amateur, Thornberry starred at Ole Miss where he won the Mark H. McCormack Medal, the Fred Haskins Award and the 2017 NCAA individual title. He also set a school record with 11 wins. Thornberry made his PGA TOUR debut as an amateur with a T4 at the 2017 FedEx St. Jude Championship, but he's missed the cut in each of his four PGA TOUR starts in 2025.

Over/Unders for the Arnold Palmer Invitational

Before we get to how bad the prop plays have been, the Underdog record deserves a shoutout: 6/7 on the parlays since the Sony Open… On 10$ units, that’s up 11u

With the jinx now fully in effect for this week, here’s what we’ve got for the API:

Upping the units slightly to take advantage of the 30% odds boost on UD at the moment and playing the weather game in round one. As of now, the PM wave is expected to get the calmest winds of the day, while the morning and midday windows could see gusts as high as 30 mph.

Even par will be an excellent score early on Thursday, and I don’t think Billy’s game is in a place to survive the brutal conditions. Xander on the other hand should get the better weather, and while he is coming off an injury, he has the power and precision needed to finish the day in red figures.

BTN Weekly Prop Play 
2025 Record: (0-8-1) [-8 units]

2 Ball Rd. 1 Parlay (+146)

It’s honestly comical at this point with Glover missing the cut on the number to tank our parlay last week.

So I’m stealing from our fearless leader DB and copying this two-leg parlay in round one. So if it loses, take it up with him…

*DISCLAIMER: The Chalk Bomb is CHALK for a reason! This is a ballsy call. We're simply giving you 1 player projected to be highly owned that we think could warrant a fade in order to gain leverage in DFS GPP Tournaments. Sack up & fade OR Ignore the play. 

Everything in this newsletter is on a heater save the prop plays…

Last week at the Cognizant, Sungjae Im’s MC made four-consecutive Chalk Bombs who have failed to see the weekend.

So we’re looking to keep it going at the fourth ‘signature’ event of the season, the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Everyone loves Arnie’s tournament, and Bay Hill has long been one of the highlights of the PGA TOUR season.

This track has always been lengthy and features some of the most water hazards on TOUR, but extra attention has been paid to the length of the rough this week. It’s long, and with some wacky wind speeds thrown in the mix, this could be the toughest test these pros have faced so far in 2025.

The experts at Bet the Number are expecting the same, and they’ve identified a few key data points to use as we try to find our fade this week.

As always, the Chalk Bomb is limited to players projected at over 15% ownership in DFS according to our proprietary projections available in the Tour Junkies Discord. With an elevated purse attracting a loaded field, we have nine big names to choose from — so let’s jump into the data.

This week, BTN is highlighting SG: Off the Tee and SG: APP from 175-225, followed by SG: Around the Green on Bermuda and Bogey Avoidance. All stats are over the last 30 rounds.

That said, here’s where this week’s Chalk Bomb ranks among the field of 72 in those stat categories:

• SG: Off the Tee — 42nd

• SG: APP from 175-225 — 44th

• SG: ARG on Bermuda Chipping Areas — 59th

• Bogey Avoidance — 57th

These numbers are honestly surprising given the results this player has achieved as of late. But if we’re keeping it real, this guy absolutely has the game to win this week. When looking for a big name to fade in a stacked field like this, the margins are fine.

With wacky weather expected, we will see a LOT of variance, and it just wouldn’t shock me if a bad gust or two prevents this player from having the week he’s hoping for. That, and I’m just a tad bit more comfortable fading him than the likes of Scheffler, Rory, Morikawa and Xander.

I tried fading this guy at the Sentry, and he punished me with a T5 — so here’s hoping for better at Bay Hill.

So at $9900 on DraftKings and with an ownership of nearly 18%…

Ludvig Aberg! You are the Chalk Bomb!

If you are alone when you crack open a peanut shell and eat the peanut inside, you are the only person in the world to have ever seen that peanut.

In Jeopardy, if you forgot to formulate your answer as a question, you could just say “Innit?” at the end.

It feels like a massive design flaw that cooking sprays don’t particularly work as well spraying downward.

There are way too many societal problems simply caused by people not being able to follow simple directions.

Alright folks! That’s all I got for the Arnold Palmer Invitational this week. Stay well and good luck with all your PGA DFS lineups and bets. BOME!