Matt Cooper steps in for Ben Coley to preview the RBC Heritage, with five fancies ranging from 14/1 to 200/1.
Golf betting tips: RBC Heritage
2pts win Collin Morikawa at 14/1 (General)
1pt e.w. Si-Woo Kim at 50/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Adam Hadwin at 66/1 (Unibet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)
0.5pt e.w. Matthew NeSmith at 175/1 (BetVictor 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6)
0.5pt e.w. Adam Svensson at 200/1 (Sky Bet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
One of the great abiding mysteries of the PGA Tour is the question of why there is a ‘U’ in the title of The RBC Heritage host, Harbour Town Golf Links. “It’s because of English tradition,” I was once told, to which I muttered something about that being true of all American English, but I already knew I was fighting a losing battle. A delight in arcane grammatical rabbit holes is, it transpires, of limited interest to most folk.
There is no unfathomable riddle regarding the popularity of the tournament itself, however. It acts as a sort of after-party to the Masters, providing a chilled-out vibe in contrast to the full-on nature of the first major championship of the year.
It’s far from the only difference between last week and this, of course. Augusta National is wide from the tee, undulating, and has fair-sized putting surfaces; Harbour Town is as tight as it gets with the first blow, lacks almost any kind of elevation changes, and has tiny greens.
There are folk who adore this test. For them the famous lighthouse steers them safely through the trees (rather than rocks) to the 18th green. There are others who are utterly befuddled, whose hopes regularly end up dashed by those hazards and metaphorically shipwrecked.
Among the former are Luke Donald (a staggering seven top three finishes), Jim Furyk (twice a winner and twice runner-up), and last year’s winner Stewart Cink (it was his third triumph).
Numbered in the latter group? Something always drags Dustin Johnson back but it’s not top-10s (he lacks one in six tries which is peculiar for a man of his talents), Rory McIlroy has visited twice without finding the top 40, and Tiger Woods had one look back in 1999 before deciding it wasn’t for him. Driver is something of a heedless extravagance here and the elite big-hitters are not fond of those restrictions.
Keep calm with Collin
No matter, there are plenty for whom such a trial is a welcome relief, one that provokes their best golf and, in the case of first pick, COLLIN MORIKAWA, we get a man who enjoys the business of pinpoint-accurate medium to long hitting whilst also being an elite-level performer.
His tournament debut came the week after he was somewhat rocked by defeat in the 2020 Charles Schwab Challenge, an event he really ought to have won but for a couple of missed tiddlers, one late in regulation and another in the play-off.
Nonetheless, he went sub-70 three times in finishing T64th. A year later he was second behind Cink after 54 holes, but five blows back. Drawn into pushing for the win on Sunday, he slipped back into a tie for seventh.
However, he did rank third for SG Approach, second for Tee to Green and first for Greens in Regulation. That bodes well, as does the fact that his normally excellent long game sparked back into better form last week at Augusta National (eighth for Approach, third Tee to Green, 12th GIR).
It’s also a positive that so much of his best approach work on tour has come at Colonial and Waialae: similar tests to this week in calling for precise blows to doglegs or tight spots from the tee, before taking aim at small greens.
What of those around him at the top of the market? Justin Thomas is playing lots of good golf without winning, Cameron Smith’s deflation post-water-splash on Sunday has to be a concern, and Johnson we’ve dealt with.
Shane Lowry has plenty in his favour yet the price is tight after the physical, mental and emotional toll of last week. Matthew Fitzpatrick loves the course and enjoyed vacations there as a boy, yet is also a little short. Patrick Cantlay tempts with two thirds and a seventh from four visits. The worry is that he’s cut an oddly grumpy figure this year, looking rather like a Regency-period gentleman in reluctant attendance at a ball. Morikawa it is, then.
Si can Woo at the RBC
For the second pick I lean on a long-standing link between Sedgefield, home of the Wyndham Championship, and Harbour Town. Carl Pettersson, Webb Simpson, Davis Love III and Brandt Snedeker have all completed the double, while Justin Leonard, Luke Donald, CT Pan, Branden Grace and even Ollie Schniederjans are among those who have gone mighty close to doing so. Kevin Kisner also has top-three finishes at both, but I narrowly favour SI-WOO KIM.
The Korean has a really quite wonderful record at Sedgefield, winning in 2016, finishing fifth in 2019, holding the 54-hole lead in 2020 (he ended the week third), and being one of the unlucky five bested by Kisner in last summer’s play-off.
If that’s one good connection with this week, another is his fondness for Pete Dye tracks (which Harbour Town is): he’s a past winner at TPC Sawgrass (and has never missed a cut there if you overlook a forced withdrawal this year) and he also claimed The American Express last year when it played three circuits at Dye’s Stadium Course.
That recent withdrawal aside, Kim has played four rounds in 14 of his last 15 strokeplay starts and while there is only one top-10 in that tally that’s solid enough for me when placed alongside the final piece in the puzzle: he finished T14th on his course debut, was second after a play-off in 2018, and was T33rd last year, a decent effort after he had spent all week at Augusta in the top 12. This time he arrives having had a less draining experience in the Masters (T39th).
Follow corresponding course form
For my next two selections I was pleased to see that I’m aligned with Ben’s way of thinking from last year. ADAM HADWIN is in a really nice trot of form at the moment, landing three top-10s at TPC Sawgrass, Innisbrook and San Antonio. Shortly before that he was also in the top 10 all week at TPC Scottsdale before slipping backwards on Sunday.
As a past winner at Innisbrook – a decent enough pointer for this week – my interest was piqued, especially as the price was bigger than I expected with that form. The explanation? An ordinary course record (four cuts made in six tries, but no top 20). On digging deeper, though, his stats are far from disastrous. He ranked first for SG Tee to Green in 2017, first for Ball Striking in 2019 and second in that category in 2020.
Next up is MATTHEW NESMITH who made my short-list thanks to his third placed finish at Innisbrook last month, when leading at halfway, topping the SG Approach stats and ranking third for SG Tee to Green.
It was undoubtedly something of a bolt from the blue, but it was only two starts ago. Moreover, Ben’s preview from last year included the nugget that NeSmith is a member at Harbour Town and won the Junior Heritage too.
“I’ve been around this golf course with a lead,” he said. “I’ve won here. You start to get comfortable, and you just kind of keep doing what you've always done.” He proposed on the course, too. If his caddie can just mutter a few random “Rahms”, “Torreys” and “Oh yesses” into conversation this week, hopefully NeSmith’s subconscious can do the rest.
ADAM SVENSSON completes the plan and in many ways is my favourite pick of all, which is not to say that I think he should be 40/1 this week, but I do think anything over 125/1 is marvellous - we can get 200/1 with Sky Bet.
The Canadian’s best golf this season? Seventh in the Sony Open at Waialae (when top 10 all week) and ninth in the Honda Classic at PGA National.
Both of those are decent guides for this week and he hit plenty of greens as well as ranking first for SG Tee to Green in the latter where he also said: “I just love playing in the wind. I’m able to control the golf ball, hit it low and create shots where, if there's no wind, it's more of just hitting the shot.”
That’s a handy quality to possess for his debut on a course known for being buffeted by the wind. It also got me wondering about his second tier wins. The first came at The Abaco Club in the Bahamas, a blustery track, by the sea, among trees, on a spit of land.
The second came on the Deer Creek Course at The Landings Club in Georgia – another windy spot, on the oceanfront, fringed by trees, on an island not unlike this week’s location Hilton Head. This might all be too neat, but at the price it’s not going to cost us a lot finding out.
Posted at 1830 GMT on 11/04/22
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