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Tour Championship
East Lake Golf Club
The format:
Three Premium Priced picks ($8,000+)
Four Mid-tier Priced picks ($6,000- $8,000)
One Bargain Basement picks ($6,000-)
Pricey Picks ($8,000+):
Rickie Fowler ($8,700)
Justin Thomas ($9,000)
Paul Casey ($8,000)
Rickie is the cheapest among the Dustin Fowler, Jason Day, Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas tandem and yet he finished better than last week at BMW Championship. I mentioned in my article earlier this week that I think Justin wins the FedEx Cup this year passing Jordan in this tournament. He finished 6th at this tournament last year. I maintain that Paul is one of the best golfers over the last 2 months despite a 33rd place finish last week.
Mid-Tier Pick ($6,000-$8,000):
Jason Dufner ($6,600)
Brooks Koepka ($7,600)
Sergio Garcia ($7,500)
Patrick Reed ($6,900)
Dufner has a strong track record with finishes here. I think he could bring in a top 10 points ranking on a few days. Brooks has a strong shot off the tee (7th in distance) and he won’t be punished much for deviating from the fairway (155th in accuracy). He’s 5th on the tour in Average birdies. Sergio has a good track record here. Sergio finished 9th at the Tour Championship 3 years ago the last time he was here. He finished 12th last week at the BMW Championship and he’s 15th on the tour in average number of Eagles to go with 10th in average score. He is my boom or bust pick as I think he either gets you 110 points or 65 points. Patrick Reeds last four tournaments have gone up and down and I’m anticipating some eagles from him this weekend.
Bargain Picks ($6,000-):
Xander Schauffele ($5,700)
Xander is 16th on the tour in driving distance and is 24thin strokes gained off the tee. He has top 20 finishes in 7 of his last 11 tournaments. This is probably the best of the low picks considering there are only 30 golfers here. Given his strong season I’m eager to see what he can do next year to build off this campaign.
Average Stats
(I can't go based on scores, each tournament is different contingent on how many birdies occur so I will go on finishing position which is mostly close to how well they did.)
Pricey Picks: 38th (27th percentile)
Mid-Tier Picks: 43rd (30th percentile)
Bargain Picks: 58th (40th percentile)