By: Field Level Media
PGA Odds: 3M Open Odds Are Wide Open in Minnesota
The top three players in the world golf rankings are taking the week off, creating plenty of betting opportunity for this week’s 3M Open in Blaine, Minn.
No. 4 Dustin Johnson is the top-ranked player in the field. After winning the Travelers Championship, he took two events off and returned with a pair of 80s to miss the cut at the Memorial Tournament. Johnson has as many missed cuts in his past six starts as top-10s (two), so he’s hardly a strong favorite at +1100 by several sportsbooks.
Johnson is one of several players competing at TPC Twin Cities for the first time, looking to build toward next month’s PGA Championship at Harding Park in San Francisco.
“The course is in immaculate condition, so I think it’s going to be a good week,” Johnson said after getting in a pair of nine-hole practice rounds since arriving on Sunday. “If you play well, you can shoot some good scores here.”
Overnight leader Tony Finau blew up on Sunday to finished eighth at Muirfield Village, but was hardly alone in struggling to tame extremely difficult conditions. He’s +1200 at BetRivers along with Brooks Koepka, while PointsBet is offering both at +1300.
Koepka continues to post inconsistent results as he deals with lingering issues with the knee he had surgically repaired last fall. Following an encouraging seventh-place finish at the RBC Heritage, he has posted a MC and a T62 in his past two starts.
He also finished 65th in the inaugural 3M Open last year, failing to break 70 twice on a course that rookie Matthew Wolff torched to a tune of 21-under par. Koepka has title defenses upcoming at the WGC – FedEx Invitational and the PGA Championship, so he’s looking to quickly regain some form.
“I’ve played so bad lately,” he said. “Just trying to find things. Every week I feel like the results aren’t there, but it’s getting better and better.”
3M Open Odds: Are a Couple of Boys From Across the Pond Worth Betting on PGA Odds
They’re followed by a pair of Englishmen who present interesting wild-card factors.
No. 12 Tommy Fleetwood is the third-highest ranked player in the field. He also hasn’t competed since March, choosing to stay home when the PGA Tour returned to competition over the past six weeks rather than deal with quarantine requirements on both sides of the Atlantic.
He has made the trek to the United States to fine-tune his game ahead of the PGA. Fleetwood has a win, a pair of runnerups and a solo third in his seven worldwide starts. He also hasn’t hit a shot in competition in more than four months.
Fleetwood is +1500 at PointsBet and +1600 at BetRivers, which has the same odds on countryman Paul Casey. Casey, who now lives in Scottsdale, Ariz., is +2000 at PointsBet.
Entering the week at No. 27, Casey is coming off a missed cut at the Memorial and finished T32 at the Travelers in his only two events since the Tour resume.
In addition to eight of the top 10 players, several of the hottest players on Tour are taking this week off. That includes the likes of rising stars Collin Morikawa, Viktor Hovland and Sungjae Im.
It also presents a golden opportunity to sift through the field for value plays.
Koepka called TPC Twin Cities “a bit of a bomber’s golf course” last year. Some length has been added and the rough is expected to be longer, but questions remain about how exposed the course is to the Tour’s longer hitters.
Wolff is currently sixth on Tour in driving distance. He one by a shot last year over this year’s driving phenomenon known as Bryson DeChambeau, who is not in this week’s field.
If you’re curious, Ryan Brehm is No. 3 in driving distance. The Korn Ferry Tour player has one top-30 result in 14 starts on the PGA Tour this season and can be had for +40000 at PointsBet and +50000 at BetRivers.
Will the 3M Open Odds Look Similar to Last Year When Some Bombers Were on the Board?
Last year’s 3M Open featured several bombers on the first page of the leaderboard, including Wyndham Clark (T5, currently 28th in driving distance) and Sam Burns (T7, 10th in driving distance). Clark is +8000 and +9000 at the two books while Burns is +3300 and +400 as he comes off a T30 and T17 in his past two starts.
It’s understandable why the likes of Johnson and Koepka are looking at TPC Twin Cities to bomb away and have some fun while building their games towards the upcoming majors and FedEx Cup playoffs.
But Johnson also tried to dispel the notion that several top players skip this event because TPC Twin Cities “is too easy.”
“It’s my first time around it, so it looks normal to me,” he said. “I don’t feel like the course is too easy. I mean, if you play well, that’s any golf course, you can shoot a good number.
“But you’re going to have to – you’ve got to drive it well. There’s a lot of water and there’s a lot of trouble off the tees. If you can drive it well, then I feel like you can shoot some good scores.”
Henrik Norlander is one of several “non-bombers” to keep an eye on.
The Swede is coming off a T6 at the Memorial, and he has made the cut in his past four events after missing the weekend in his first outing after the tour’s restart. The KFT graduate is +5000 at both books as he seeks his first Tour victory.
Mexico’s Carlos Ortiz is another longshot play at +5500 at BetRivers and +6000 at PointsBet. He finished T5 here last year.
Ortiz hasn’t finished higher than a T33 at the RBC Heritage in four events since the restart. However, he has shown the ability to compete on Sundays on the PGA Tour with three top-fours, including a T2 at the Mayakoba Golf Classic, during the Fall Swing.
–Field Level Media
