2024 Players Championship: Odds, Field, Best Bets

2024 PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP: ODDS, FIELD, BEST BETS –  It is a terrifying week to be a golf bettor, as it appears that Scottie Scheffler finally got his putter squared away. He’s the defending champion this week, coming off a win at the API last week. At +550, it’s pretty difficult to recommend a bet here in what is typically the strongest field of the year for a golf tournament. Could he keep putting well and win the next four tournaments in a row? Absolutely.

TPC Sawgrass has played host to this tournament for a very long time, thus we have a pretty good idea of the skills needs to take down golf’s “fifth major.” Pete Dye-designed courses tend to have the same types of guys pop up again and again on them. The hallmarks of his designs are placement over distance off the tee and difficult approach shots.

With water coming into play on 17 holes, accuracy is more important than distance. Factor in small putting surfaces with shaved runoff areas and you have a tough but fair test. This course can yield a 63 or a 75 from good players. If the ballstriking is clicking, players can go low here. If the driver starts to get a little crooked or the wind picks up though, look out.

With the small greens, short game takes on a bit of added importance as most players will be forced to scramble a bit more than usual.

Here are my picks for this week!

Favorites

Sam Burns (+4000)

This is about as low as I’m willing to go on the oddsboard this week. Scottie’s potential dominance has me spooked enough that I’m not really interested in getting overly invested in lower-odds guys.

One always has to look towards Bermuda Burns when the Tour moves to Florida. His continued excellence on Bermuda putting surfaces should serve him well. He rolled it really well at Bay Hill, but I think that TPC Sawgrass will be more his speed overall.

He notched four consecutive top-10s this season before a bad round on Sunday dropped him to T-30 at the API. I think the overall form is still excellent and we’re getting a discount on his odds because he wasn’t stalking the leaderboard during Scottie’s romp on Sunday.

He’s been playing really well, and if not for that one poor round, he’d be coming in off five consecutive top-10s, likely with much lower odds. I’ll take a trip to ValueTown with Sam Burns.

Midtier

Russell Henley (+4500)

This is pretty close in odds to Sam Burns, but everything else I like in this tournament is a pretty deep longshot, so Henley is who I like around this range.

Henley gets the nod here because he fits the mold of guys who excel here. He’s coming in with top-20  showings in his previous two trips here. He’s an excellent iron player who can really get going when the short iron and wedges are in a groove.

Longer courses are always going to be tricky for him, but he’s accurate and reliable. It would be a big step up in his career to take down a field like this, however. I don’t hate taking him at +190 for a top-20 finish if you’re a little bit more risk averse.

He gained strokes in every major category en route to a T4 finish at the API last week. Let’s see if he can keep that momentum going this week.

Longshot

Doug Ghim (+10000)

This is a tough one to make a case for and it has more to do with vibes than anything else. In my heart of hearts, I think that Doug Ghim will play his best golf on courses like this.

Historically, the early part of the season is always a disaster, and he actually enters this week with somewhat better form than previous years. He has four consecutive top-20 finishes coming into this week after starting the season with back-to-back missed cuts.

The iron play has been ridiculously good during his current stretch of golf and this is a course where that skill will be at a premium. I go back to his T6 here in 2022 as evidence of enough course history to have success again. Usually it’s a string of missed cuts early in the season for Ghim as he heads to TPC Sawgrass, before he turns in a decent performance at this course. This year we’re actually getting him in pretty good form.

I’ll bite on an elite talent who is due for his first professional win after a stellar amateur career.