the Memorial Tournament Fantasy Preview

Last week I told you that each of the previous six Crowne Plaza Invitational winners finished the season as Top 60 putters, so putting would be key. Then Boo Weekley came along and smashed that stat into tiny pieces. Boo came into last week as the 6th worst putter on the PGA Tour in 2013. There is no way Boo finishes in the Top 60 in Strokes Gained Putting this year, or even the Top 100 for that matter. He is a bad putter, but he managed to be slightly better than usual around the greens last week and that is what led him to victory.

This week we have the Tiger Woods Memorial Tournament. Tiger has won this event five times so it’s easy to see why he is the odds on favorite to take it home again. If you are a number guy like myself then take a look at Par 4 Scoring Average this week. 7 of the last 8 winners at this event have finished the season in the Top 30 for Par 4 Scoring Average. There are 25 golfers in the field this week that are currently in the Top 30 for Par 4 Scoring Average. This is our #1 key stat this week but there are four more important stats as well: Par 5 Scoring Average, Birdie or Better Percentage, Strokes Gained Putting and Bogey Avoidance. Those are in order of importance, and notice that Par 3 Scoring Average is not as important, so don’t even bother looking at that stat. Let’s use this stat knowledge to help pick our Fantasy Yahoo! lineups this week:

Group A

Tiger Woods: Tiger is 1st place in four of the five “key stats”. He’s won here 5 times, and is putting out of this world this year. Go ahead and pick him.

Chris Kirk: Christopher let me down a little bit last week, but he’s still primed for a big win before the season is over. He is currently ranked 4th in our #1 stat this week, Par 4 Scoring Average. He finished 25th here last year after missing the cut the year prior. He may have figured the course out, and he is in top form this year. Don’t be afraid of Captain Kirk this week.

Group B

Justin Rose: Rose has a 1st place, 2nd place and 8th place finish at this event over the course of the last five years. He also has two missed cuts sandwiched in between. If you believe in patterns, you probably think Rose will miss the cut again this year. Don’t let your mind fool you. If he can get his putter working for once then look out.

Graham DeLaet: My second favorite Canadian David Hearn let me down last week by shooting 8-over on Friday after a great 6-under Thursday Round. I’m going to let Hearn sit in the corner and think about what he’s done. In the meantime, I am going to pick my favorite Canadian golfer, Graham DeLaet. He doesn’t have course experience at Muirfield but he’s playing as well as anyone right now. Okay, not anyone, but seven Top 25s in 15 events is pretty darn good for a relatively unknown Canadian.

Jimmy Walker: This week Walker provides us a classic example of Stats vs. Course History. Walker is Top 10 in all three of the most important stats this week, but he hasn’t finished higher than 62nd here in three attempts. Course History is fun to look at but can only take you so far. Sometimes you have to go with your gut, and take the hot golfer.

Group C

Charl Schwartzel: Finally a course that Charl has played before! Don’t let last week bring you down. Charl is still scorching hot, and has finished Top 25 at Muirfield each of the last two years.

Rickie Fowler: Fowler finished runner-up on his first go-round at this event back in 2010. He has regressed since then, but he’s playing well again which means he should see a lot of Sunday Orange this weekend.

Keepers

Sleepers

Top 15 for the 2013 Memorial Tournament

1. Tiger Woods
2. Matt Kuchar
3. Justin Rose
4. Rory McIlroy
5. Charl Schwartzel
6. Luke Donald
7. Lee Westwood
8. Brendon De Jonge
9. Rickie Fowler
10. Bubba Watson
11. Brandt Snedeker
12. Billy Horschel
13. Chris Kirk
14. Jordan Spieth
15. Jim Furyk

WEEKLY CONTESTS:

Fantasy Feud has now opened PGA Contests! They will be running weekly Freerolls and an even bigger Freerolls for the Majors, Enter Now.

Golf Radar: Golf Radar is a great new fantasy sports website. They provide a unique fantasy golf experience, that is unlike any other fantasy golf site you’ve seen. You must use your allotted coins to pick up to 10 golfers. Pick a lower cost golfer and the bonuses for Top 10 or Win are multiplied! Give it a chance this week; join the featured matches on the home page and also hop in the Future of Fantasy Private Match for a chance to win a Amazon Gift Card. Join Private Match Now

FanThrowdown: FanThrowdown has been in my rotation of Daily Fantasy website since they started. They have a great user interface, a generous rakeback program, and will often have overlay in their contests. Overlay = Free money. Free money is good. They are now offering PGA Contests are FanThrowdown. Entries range from $1 to $109, plus they have a weekly freeroll. It’s definitely worth a look, try it out.

Fantasy Golf Tour: This website offers a unique fantasy golf experience, and huge cash payouts. The way these contests work is you pick 16 golfers per week. Golfers will be broken down into four tiers based on skill-level and/or world golf rank. You must pick four golfers from each group, and then manage your golfers round-by-round. I recommend trying out their free contests before leaping into the $25 cash entry contest. You can earn vouchers while playing the freerolls which can be redeemed for golf equipment and other cool prizes.