Ben Coley has five each-way selections for The Players Championship at the iconic TPC Sawgrass, including two major champions.
- Iconic Sawgrass is home of famous 17th hole
- Unofficial 'fifth major' key part of Masters build-up
- Scheffler favourite for hat-trick over injury doubt McIlroy
Golf betting tips: The Players Championship
3pts e.w. Hideki Matsuyama at 30/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
2pts e.w. Matt Fitzpatrick at 35/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
2pts e.w. Viktor Hovland at 35/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Jacob Bridgeman at 60/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Corey Conners at 80/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
If one of the measures of greatness is the ability to overcome, then it's fitting that Rory McIlroy joined Tiger Woods as a two-time winner of The Players Championship when beating JJ Spaun in a Monday play-off last year.
There were other courses at which Woods was far more comfortable and the same goes for McIlroy, who had to do things a different way. He was statistically outdriven by runner-up Spaun, but found a means of winning regardless. Coming soon after he'd won at Pebble Beach a month earlier, this was a key stepping stone towards Augusta National and a place alongside Woods in the history books.
Scottie Scheffler reached Woods' total in no time at all. Less reliant on his driver, which is nevertheless exceptional, he found comfort at TPC Sawgrass quicker than most and won back-to-back titles in 2023 and 2024, latterly despite being injured. Still, the hat-trick was never really on the cards and he'd been blown off course on his first two tries, which rather says it all about this famous, fickle, sometimes fearsome venue.
The Stadium Course deserves its iconic status, but let's be clear: this tournament does not deserve to be labelled 'the fifth major' in anything more than unofficial terms. The unofficial tag works; something has to be the best of the rest, and this tournament is the something. Arguments to formalise it as number five have been pushed forward by the PGA Tour and others recently but I hope they don't work. Nobody outside of the Tour's own headquarters needs this.
Brandel Chamblee, erudite, educated, admirable in many ways, says the field is the best in golf, but no longer is that true. He says the course is the best from a 'shot value perspective', which in effect is to elevate it above places like Augusta and the Old Course because there are more ponds. It's a pity this discourse continues to colour one of the highlights of the calendar. Such a highlight because, to borrow Tiger's lexicon, it is what it is.
And what that is is a golf course composed of risk and reward, dramatic features, heavy penalties, but opportunity too. This is neatly summed up by the iconic 17th hole, a par-three which is no more than a wedge to a wide and perfectly deep green for the yardage. It's just that if you happen to get it wrong, you'll pay a heavy price. In today's game, this is just about as good a way as any of testing elite professional golfers.
Only when the wind blows does that 17th, and Sawgrass at large, become really difficult. Otherwise, scoring chances can be created regularly by shrewd course management, pragmatism, and an ability to hit the shot under pressure. Hit it and find it will not often work, not even in the softness of March. Few courses on the PGA Tour place greater emphasis on driving the ball straight rather than long, after which the approach shot is as important here as it is anywhere. No wonder Scheffler loves it so much.
He's drifted to a very tempting price after one too many an errant approach shot last week, but it was his friend and sometimes practise partner Si Woo Kim who topped my initial shortlist, before it seems the DataGolf model forced his price in quite considerably. They make him second-favourite and I agree that his chance is strong, but he's almost as short as he's ever been to win on the PGA Tour and can be left alone.
Instead I'll stick with HIDEKI MATSUYAMA, who is absolutely made for Sawgrass and is fantastic value at the prices.
Matsuyama's record here backs up that statement, particularly since the move to March in 2019. Since then he has three top-10 finishes in five and I'd venture it would be four in six had the abandoned 2020 edition been completed, as he'd began it with a course-record 63.
This was all part of the case for siding with him last year and he was a massive disappointment, but to be honest I think that performance only underlines how good a fit he is. Matsuyama made a complete mess of his second hole, the par-five 11th, found water again at the 12th, bogeyed the 14th and the 15th following more wayward tee shots, and was well and truly beaten at five-over through six.
Watching that unfold wasn't pleasant, but despite a three-putt bogey at the 17th soon after, he was in the end just a single shot from making the cut, playing the final 27 holes of his truncated tournament in five-under. These things happen in golf and with absolutely everything that could've gone wrong having indeed gone wrong, to come within a roll of making the weekend was a mighty effort.
Since then, Matsuyama has continued to operate at a high level and ended 2025 reminding us of what he can do when capturing the Hero Golf Challenge courtesy of a dazzling final round, before a string of good performances to begin the new year, including second place in Phoenix, another course he loves.
That's less true of Bay Hill, where he has one top-10 finish in a dozen tries and invariably struggles under the pressure of having to hit a lot of drivers, the club that can sometimes cause him issues. Here, while it did get him into bother last year he still ended those two rounds with very strong numbers, testament to how well he played off the tee from midway through his first round, and it's actually been the strongest aspect of his game at Sawgrass.
We know he's capable of matching the very best with his irons – he ranked sixth in this two years ago and has been among the best in the field in more than half his tournament starts – and that he's almost always sharp around the greens, so this may come down to how well he putts.
On that there are mixed messages, but later in his career Matsuyama appears to have become more comfortable on bermuda, putting the lights out to win the Sony Open, The Sentry, the FedEx St Jude Championship, and the aforementioned Hero. That's four of his last five wins on similar greens and having gained strokes from tee-to-green in all bar one of his starts here, I'm happy gambling on a good putting week.
Matsuyama always looked a Masters champion and went on to become one. He's pretty much always looked a Players champion, too, and this could well be the year.
MATT FITZPATRICK was last Monday's big market mover only to start the tournament slowly, but I'm surprised to be able to back him at close to twice the price for an event which may be even more suitable on paper.
The former US Open champion has rediscovered his best form over the past 10 or so months, dating back to a top-10 finish in the PGA Championship. Since then, nine more have followed, including in another major, while he ended 2025 winning the DP World Tour Championship at the expense of McIlroy.
It's an overwhelmingly positive picture for a player who also stepped up and delivered for Europe in the Ryder Cup, so it could pay to forgive one lacklustre performance at the penal Bay Hill, where he admittedly struggled with his approach play in particular.
However, he'd ranked eighth, third and 11th in that department over his previous three starts and ever since the start of his career, Fitzpatrick has been good at putting a blip behind him. Indeed his win in Dubai came after his worst performance in six months in Abu Dhabi, where his long-game was poor, and his fifth place in this event two years ago followed a missed cut at Bay Hill.
He won the Dunhill Links after a backwards step at Wentworth in 2023, his first really notable major performance (second in the PGA) came after he'd let down backers massively at his beloved Harbour Town, the second of two Dubai wins followed a missed cut in the RSM Classic, and in 2017 he won at Crans after a miserable summer. This has always been his way and his first two wins came after big flops, too.
I doubt he'll dwell on a poor effort last week and he might even draw particular encouragement from the way he battled back from being three-over through eight holes to make the weekend. Regardless, he's now drifted to a value price based on one week's evidence, when the previous 10 months suggest he's capable of being a massive player here at Sawgrass.
The course certainly suits on paper. As he has alluded to himself, most players have patchy records here and his is no exception, but two top-10s in the last five years show what he can do. He was amid a big dip in form when missing the cut last year so that's easily forgiven, with the fact that he's won at Pete Dye's Harbour Town of greater significance and more evidence of the type of golf he so enjoys.
Fitzpatrick also played well at Sedgefield in the autumn, one course which always stacks up as a guide to The Players, so there's plenty to like if you can excuse him an off week. I can, especially as it at least ended a run of concerningly poor putting, and it's a pretty easy decision to side with him.
Ludvig Aberg's revised price, 20/1 from 35/1, makes that decision fairly easy too. We still don't know where his ceiling is and he's a player I love, one who lives close by to a course he ranks among his favourites, but Bay Hill is both more suitable and less competitive.
This might not be a bridge too far...
It would be quite something were JACOB BRIDGEMAN to win again so soon after fending off McIlroy to break through at Riviera, but I find myself wondering why not and make him the best of those quoted at just upwards of 50/1.
This is one of the form players on the PGA Tour with six top-20s in six events so far this year, played under a variety of conditions. He's at the absolute top of his game and just as we saw Ben Griffin win three (well, two and a half) times in 2025 and Chris Gotterup do so twice in a few weeks earlier this year, I wonder if this could be the latest fast-improving player to make hay while the sun shines.
Bridgeman certainly caught the eye last week at Bay Hill, shooting 75 in round one on his first start as a PGA Tour champion, then playing beautifully to climb to 19th. That extended an excellent record in Florida which includes second and third across the Cognizant and the Valspar last year, plus another top-20 finish in the Arnold Palmer Invitational, and as he's from South Carolina that all makes sense.
Considering that just two other players shot 75 or higher on Thursday and made the cut, and that neither of them could crack the top 40, the Genesis champ was exceptional and his blend of solid driving, quality approach play (14th for the season) and dynamite putting makes for a likeable blend at Sawgrass.
He was 11th at halfway last year, too, picking up valuable experience close to the lead, and has some correlating form having shown promise on both starts at the Wyndham. Ultimately, he's a player who is riding the crest of a wave and at the right side of 50/1, there's no reason his run of quality performances should come to an end at a course which sets up nicely for him.
Next, COREY CONNERS found something with his approach play last week and that should leave him primed for one of his favourite events.
Conners had been struggling with that aspect of his game, which isn't usual for a player who has long depended on it, but he was much better at Bay Hill, ranking third for greens hit and ninth in strokes-gained approach. Accurate off the tee at fourth in fairways so far this season, it was the second shot that had been making life difficult.
We know of course that the putter does that too and it remains the missing piece of the puzzle, the reason in fact that he ultimately didn't threaten the top of the leaderboard. However there are some positives to be taken from the fact that he putted well here in 2021, 2022 and 2024 having arrived in pretty dire straits with his weakest club, and then again last year.
Perhaps there's something about these greens he likes and he's certainly shown bermuda flashes elsewhere, putting well at the Sony Open on multiple occasions plus elsewhere in Florida. He has an excellent record overall in the state where he first landed on the radar back in 2018, with 11 top-30s in his last 14 appearances, five of them top-10s.
Here at Sawgrass he's been sixth, seventh, 13th and 26th from six appearances, the putter the only reason he didn't fare just as well when down the field on debut, and his 2023 flop came at a time when he was not in good form and hadn't been for a while. That's somewhat true now, hence big prices, but his long-game seemed to click in the API and that's a hint worth taking.
At massive prices, Tom Hoge has been third in two of the last three renewals and continues to hit his irons well. He can compete here off the tee, which isn't always the case, and 14th place at Pebble Beach a few weeks ago was encouraging enough. It was a similar performance there which somewhat telegraphed last year's third place behind McIlroy and odds of around 200/1 are worth a glance.
Max Greyserman missed the cut here on debut and on paper isn't the best of fits, but he has got some correlating form from the Wyndham and the AmEx and there's something about his profile I'm drawn to. He looks to be edging towards to a big performance, but I'll be hoping it arrives later in spring at courses he's able to attack.
Local resident Aaron Rai can plot his way around this place and finish somewhere close to the top 10 while I'd expect Shane Lowry to bounce back from an understandable blip which followed his nightmare finish to the Cognizant. He was perhaps most tempting of those who didn't make my final list, but on closer inspection he's tended to stick around for a good finish here rather than actually threaten to win.
So to finish off it's back to VIKTOR HOVLAND after he showed plenty of promise at Bay Hill last week.
In the end, Hovland's driver was too much of a handicap but we saw a continuation of the high-class approach play which has been so good for so long, while the putter also improved for a switch to bermuda greens, on which he holed everything to land the Valspar last year.
That came soon after a coaching switch so another of those isn't something I want to dwell on. In fact, it might be that fresh eyes do the trick once more, even if my own view is that this constant tinkering may damage his long-term prospects, and he said at Bay Hill he very much felt ready to win.
The quality of his approach play can fire him into contention here if he's just a fraction better off the tee and that seems likely, at a course where accuracy trumps power and where he's driven it well for the most part. Hovland remains accurate with driver even if he's lost a bit of the pop which once made that club just as big a weapon as his irons and he's a solid 29th so far this season for fairways hit.
And I suppose the bottom line is quite simple: this is a world-class player dangled at nice prices because the feeling is that he's not quite putting everything together. There's always mileage to be found in identifying such examples, as demonstrated so painfully by Collin Morikawa at Pebble Beach, and to a lesser degree by Aberg at Bay Hill last week.
Hovland was runner-up here in 2023, ninth a year earlier, and has produced exceptional approach play figures while also largely driving it well. More of the same putting from last week and he can contend, which is when he becomes very dangerous. We saw that at the Valspar this time last year and on the right golf course, backing him at upwards of 30/1 will always make some degree of appeal.
Here, I find him one of the most compelling options in a tricky event to solve, one where McIlroy's injury made me think long and hard as to whether the time is now to pull the trigger on Scheffler. Anyone that way inclined will find no words of discouragement, but I'll stubbornly stick to bigger prices, headed by a player in Matsuyama who has done us three big favours in the last three seasons. Help us out again, Hideki.
Posted at 21:00 GMT on 09/03/26
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