The 2025 Cognizant Classic

The TOUR makes its first visit of the year to the shores of Florida for some warm weather in the Sunshine State — but we might get just a bit of wind and rain as well. The worst of the mostly mild conditions is expected to roll in on Friday morning, so keep the PM/AM wave in mind when setting your lineups.

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

Taylor Pendrith -126 ($9500) vs. Daniel Berger -104 ($9900)

This week’s matchup features a discrepancy in the $9k range where the sharp overseas oddsmakers have Taylor Pendrith as a heavy favorite in a 72-hole matchup against Daniel Berger despite a $400 discount on the Canadian in DraftKings DFS.

Both players have started the season well, but there’s a clear experience advantage at PGA National for the underdog in this matchup. Berger has played this event eight times with three finishes of T4 or better, while Pendrith’s best in three starts is a T25 back in 2022.

As a result, Berger is the more popular player in DFS according to our Nut Hut ownership projections available in the Discord. Berger is near the top of the list at just over 19%-owned while Pendrith is behind him at just under 16%.

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 Roy- Syracuse, NY

  Just one year after losing his TOUR card following the 2023 season, 34-year-old Roy earned his way back to the PGA TOUR with strong performances on the Korn Ferry Tour highlighted by a solo second at The Bahamas Great Exuma Classic and a T2 at the Albertsons Boise Open. A Long Beach State alum, he was teammates with Xander Schauffele during the 2011-12 season. The Syracuse native now lives in Lakewood Ranch, Florida where he plays out of Concession Golf Club. Among the other ‘new’ TOUR members, Roy has had one of the better starts to the 2025 season with two top-20 finishes at the AMEX and the Mexico Open.

• Cristobal Del Solar - Chile

  With a top-15 finish in the season-long KFT points list, Del Solar became the third Chilean to earn PGA TOUR membership via the Korn Ferry Tour. His 2024 season was highlighted by his first victory at The Ascendant presented by Blue. He also made history with a 13-under 57 at the 2024 Astara Golf Championship, the lowest round ever in a PGA TOUR-sanctioned event. The 31-year-old moved to the U.S. as a teenager before playing collegiate golf at Florida State University. He has yet to finish better than T66 in four TOUR starts so far in 2025.

Over/Unders for the Cognizant Classic

Jaeger and Harry Hall’s hot start last week brings our season-long record to 5 wins through just seven weeks — up nearly 10 units over that span. Now we look to stay hot with the East Coast swing off and running.

By all accounts, PGA National is a tough track, and anything under par on Thursday should be a solid start to the week. But with very mild weather conditions expected for Rd. 1, I find it hard to believe that the best players in the world won’t get theirs.

These guys are good-ole southern boys who will be thrilled to be back on Bermuda in the Southeast, and -2 (Par 71) seems gettable for this trio who pop in our models this week.

BTN Weekly Prop Play 
2025 Record: (0-7-1) [-7 units]

Made Cut Parlay: Sepp Straka + Lucas Glover (-102)

Again, just tail the Underdog plays — but we’re contractually obligated to include some here…

Really need to see one go in — so we’re keeping it simple. An MC from Sepp this week would frankly be shocking given his recent form and affinity for this course. Glover shows up #1 in DB’s model for this week with his outstanding approach play as of late, and he’s made the cut at PGA National in six of his last seven trips.

*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. 

Much like the Underdog plays, the Chalk Bomb section of the newsletter is on a heater. We’re picking losers instead of winners, and we’ve been doing well with three straight missed cuts from those golfers unlucky enough to be named the Chalk Bomb. Sam Stevens kept us going last week in Mexico, so let’s dial up another fade as the TOUR kicks off the Florida swing at the Cognizant Classic.

While the name has changed, the location of the year’s first Florida tournament hasn’t, and we return to the unfriendly confines of PGA National which routinely plays as one of the more challenging tracks on the PGA TOUR calendar.

The par-71 isn’t overly long, but plenty of water hazards and sharp doglegs create several less-than-driver holes, so this place can’t be bullied into submission. There’s ample water lurking on approach as well, and ball-striking will be key to avoid the drink at PGA National which sees some of the most penalty drops of any tournament every year.

With that in mind, the experts at Bet the Number, have singled out a few key data points to take note of when handicapping this event, and we’ll use some of them to identify our choice for this week’s Chalk Bomb.

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. That leaves us with six players to choose from, so let’s get into the data to see who doesn’t fit the mold.

This week, BTN is highlighting SG: Off the Tee and SG: Approach, followed by SG: Around the Green on Bermuda and Par 3 Scoring Average. All stats are over the last 40 rounds.

That said, here’s where this week’s Chalk Bomb ranks among the field of 144 in those stat categories:

• SG: Off the Tee — 20th

• SG: Approach — 112th

• SG: ARG on Bermuda Chipping Areas — 62nd

• Par 3 Scoring Average — 59th

Quite frankly, this approach number just isn’t anywhere near good enough to back this guy at a venue like PGA National. Combine that with less-than-ideal numbers around the green, and the data doesn’t exactly instill confidence.

While this player is a former winner at PGA National, that result came all the way back in 2020, and he’s posted two missed cuts and a T42 in his last three starts in this event.

So at $9800 on DraftKings and with an ownership of nearly 20%…

Sungjae Im! You are the Chalk Bomb!

I wonder, in the future, if instead of a product being branded “handmade”, it will instead be “AI Free”.

I feel like people who started the art of writing in hieroglyphics would be very proud of our extensive use of emojis today.

Obvious southerner here but do people still shovel snow? I mean, it seems a heat-radiating leaf blower would be much more efficient. And fun.

Alright folks! That’s all I got for the Cognizant Classic at the Beaches of Palms this week. Stay well and good luck with all your PGA DFS lineups and bets. BOME!