We’ve reached the penultimate event of the PGA Tour season, the BMW Championship, this year taking place at Olympia Fields Country Club outside of Chicago for the second leg of the FedEx Cup Playoffs with the Top 30 heading to the Tour Championship next week.
Course Breakdown
Par 70, 7366 yards, two of the Par 3s are pretty short while the other two are extremely long, seven of the Par 4s are between 450-500 yards, average to narrow tree lined fairways with large bunkers in the landing areas, 91 bunkers on the course, 8-12 yards of thick rough (in 2020 it was between 5-7 inches tall) between the fairways and trees, only subtle doglegs on some holes so guys should be able to crush driver, much lower driving accuracy here at just 48% (vs. tour average 62%), much lower GIR percentage here at just 58% (vs. tour average 66%), driving distance here is much higher at an average of 299 yards (vs. tour average 284 yards), greens are tough to roll up to and a lot have large deep front side bunkers and the same very thick rough off the fairways, small elevated bluegrass greens (mainly bentgrass with some poa mixed into it) that slope heavily from back to front, hitting over the green makes the recovery shots very difficult
Tournament Notes
- The second of three events of the FedEx Cup playoffs. The Top 30 in the FedEx standings will advance to East Lake next week for the Tour Championship with starting strokes based on standings
- This event has been played at a variety of courses over the years
- This is the second time this course has hosted this event, last time when Jon Rahm won in 2020 in a playoff over Dustin Johnson
- Olympia Fields previously hosted the 2015 US Amateur Match Play (won by Bryson DeChambeau) and the 2003 US Open
- Besides 2020 when Jon Rahm won in a playoff at -4 here at Olympia Fields and last year where Patrick Cantlay won at Wilmington Country Club at -14, the winning score for the BMW Championship has been -20 or lower every year since 2015 played on a different course every year
- All of the Top 6 finishers here in 2020 finished T15 for the week in driving distance
- This event used to be the Top 70 in FedEx Cup standings, this is the first year with the smaller field
- No cut event
- In 50,000 simulations, 100% of golfers currently ranked 1-20 advanced to East Lake and 99.95% ranked 21-23 advanced, really only leaving 7 spots up for grabs to move on to the Tour Championship next week (as per simulation from datagolf)
- SG: OTT plays a bigger impact on this course and comes a lot closer than approach than most events
- Form matters in the FedEx Cup Playoffs
- The last week of the One & Done season
Key Stats
Approach, SG: OTT, Par 4 Scoring
Field
50 golfers – the top 50 in FedEx Cup standings
Defending Champion (Wilmington Country Club): Patrick Cantlay
Runner Up Last Year (Wilmington Country Club): Scott Stallings
2020 Champion here: Jon Rahm (-4 in a playoff)
One and Done: Lucas Glover
One and Done Considerations: Take the best elite player that you have left, I pretty much used them all already so I’m just rolling with the best available (and I’m already in the money, so I just need to stay put in the standings in this final, very important week)
Players
Viktor Hovland: 10300: +1800 – Already won this season at the Memorial in a loaded field and has been playing great golf, fantastic off the tee, finished 40th here in 2020 in a 70 man field, 13,13,29,19,1,16,2,43,59,7,3,10 finishes in his last twelve events, 12th in Approach, 7th in SG: OTT, 13th in Driving Distance, 17th in Fairways Gained, 19th in GIRs Gained, 20th in Par 3 Scoring, 8th in Par 4 Scoring, 1st in Par 4 Scoring: 450-500 yards, 26th in SG: ARG, 33rd in Putting, 12th in Opportunities Gained, 25th in Bogie Avoidance
Xander Schauffele: 10100: +1600 – Plays well in no cut events and has been having a lot of great finishes this season without winning, finished 25th here in 2020 in a 70 man field, 24,17,42,19,10,24,18,2,4,10,19,39,33,19,13,3 finishes this season, 7th in Approach, 30th in SG: OTT, 24th in Driving Distance, 35th in Fairways Gained, 6th in GIRs Gained, 22nd in Par 3 Scoring, 5th in Par 4 Scoring, 3rd in Par 4 Scoring: 450-500 yards, 24th in SG: ARG, 4th in Putting, 9th in Opportunities Gained, 11th in Bogie Avoidance
Tommy Fleetwood: 9700: +2500 – Has played great this season without picking up a win despite being in contention a bunch of times, including four T6 finishes in his last six events (five T10s in that span), didn’t qualify for this event in 2020 when it was hosted here, 3,10,6,MC,5,2,MC,18,5,15,33,3,27 finishes in his last 13 events, 17th in Approach, 8th in SG: OTT, 16th in Driving Distance, 10th in Fairways Gained, 7th in GIRs Gained, 14th in Par 3 Scoring, 4th in Par 4 Scoring, 33rd in Par 4 Scoring: 450-500 yards, 10th in SG: ARG, 8th in Putting, 35th in Opportunities Gained, 1st in Bogie Avoidance
Lucas Glover: 9100: +5000 – I don’t necessarily think he can win three weeks in a row but his stats are just too good to stay off of him this week, 1,1,MC,5,6,4,MC,20 finishes in his last eight events, didn’t qualify for this event in 2020 when it was hosted here, 4th in Approach, 9th in SG: OTT, 32nd in Driving Distance, 3rd in Fairways Gained, 2nd in GIRs Gained, 9th in Par 3 Scoring, 11th in Par 4 Scoring, 24th in Par 4 Scoring: 450-500 yards, 42nd in SG: ARG, 38th in Putting, 3rd in Opportunities Gained, 7th in Bogie Avoidance, going with him for one and done since he’s my highest ranked player in my model that I haven’t used yet (and only one in my top 18 for the week that I haven’t used) so I need a decent finish from him to stay in the money, his betting odds vs. his DK pricing and his stats are fantastic
Tyrrell Hatton: 9000: +2500 – Has been the best player statistically on Tour this season who hasn’t gotten a win with seven T6 finishes and only five finishes outside T20 in 16 PGA Tour events this year, 43,20,6,27,3,12,15,5,3,19,34,MC,2,4,40,6 finishes in his last 16 events, finished 16th here in 2020 in a 70 man field, last week was the first week since April he’s lost strokes to the field which were entirely around the green and putting, with him gaining T2G, 19th in Approach, 12th in SG: OTT, 17th in Driving Distance, 34th in Fairways Gained, 10th in GIRs Gained, 29th in Par 3 Scoring, 2nd in Par 4 Scoring, 4th in Par 4 Scoring: 450-500 yards, 19th in SG: ARG, 6th in Putting, 21st in Opportunities Gained, 2nd in Bogie Avoidance
Model
Approach (25%)
SG: OTT (15%)
Driving Distance (5%)
Fairways Gained (5%)
GIRs Gained (5%)
Par 3 Scoring (5%)
Par 4 Scoring (10%)
Par 4 Scoring: 450-500 yards (5%)
SG: ARG (5%)
Putting (5%)
Opportunities Gained (5%)
Bogie Avoidance (10%)
Stats based on past 36 rounds
Bets
Outrights
.7u Xander Schauffele (+1600)
.6u Viktor Hovland (+1800)
.4u Tommy Fleetwood (+2500)
.4u Tyrrell Hatton (+2500)
.2u Lucas Glover (+5000)
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