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13-0; +3.11pts Pre-tournament plays: LAY 20pts liability Tim Petrovic 120 mc
Alex Prugh 200 mc
John Daly 250 mc
Will Mackenzie 70 8th
Greg Chalmers 230 mc
Jonathan Byrd 55 39th
Petrovic lost out in the five-man playoff last year, but had a terrible season otherwise and finished 194th in the FedEx Cup standings and 2016 looks to be even less promising - he missed the cut in his only start of 2016 (a Web.com Tour event); Prugh has yet to make it to Sunday in a PGA Tour event this season and has made the cut here only once (2011; 37th) in three attempts; Daly is another with very little Tour golf in 2016 - he missed the cut by 10 shots in the Qatar Masters, his only Tour event of 2016; Mackenzie showed some glimpses of form in the Valspar Championship when he finished 37th, but it is his only top-50 finish of 2016 (7 events); Chalmers did finish 7th in the Louisiana Open (Web.com Tour) last week, but he hasn't shown any other form this season; while Byrd has the best form of the six - 3rd last week in the Louisiana Open and 5th in a Web.com Tour event in January, but he has played in only two other events this year and finished outside the top-50 in both, so can be opposed at this lower price. Pre-rd3 plays: Scott Brown 32 5th
Michael Bradley 150 26th
Dean Burmester 85 39th
There's a congested leaderboard after rd2 so even though Brown and Burmester are only five shots off the pace, they are outside the top-20, while Bradley is four shots off the pace, but will need to overtake 14 players to win this event. Brown's history in this event suggests that he can make up ground over the weekend, but these are still very short odds for someone outside the top-20 this stage; Bradley is also a former winner of this event (2009 and 2011), but he has played in only one previous event this year (he missed the cut) and is only a few months away from joining the Champions Tour so I don't see him as being competitive enough over the weekend to challenge for this title again; while Burmester is the player in the best form with top-5 finishes in each of his last four starts, but they have all been on the Southern Africa Tour and there is a very big step-up to the PGA Tour and the pressure that he will face over the weekend if he does get close to the lead. Pre-rd4 plays: Mark Hubbard 100 15th
Alex Cejka 55 11th
Patrick Rodgers 310 21th
Derek Fathauer 60 21th
This is Hubbard's 41st event on the PGA Tour and his best finish so far is 18th, so it looks unlikely that he will significantly improve on his current 12th place position; Cejka won this event last year, but he was 5th with one round to play rather than 11th and not only has he never won from outside the top-10 after rd3, the last time that he climbed into the top-10 on Sunday from outside at the start of the day was back in 2011; Rodgers is six shots off the pace and in 19th place, so will need a career round to even contend, but that looks very unlikely given his form in 2016 - four missed cuts in six previous starts; while Fathauer is alongside Hubbard and Cejka in 12th place, but he has secured only two top-10 finishes (and no top-3 finishes) in his previous 68 PGA Tour events so can be easily opposed when the leader is also the highest-ranked player (in terms of World Rankings). |
