The PGA Championship kicks into action on Thursday and aside from the thrill of watching Rory McIlroy aim for his second consecutive major, there'll also be quite a bit of interest in boosting the weekly wage packet.
As is regularly stated, golf can be a rather fickle mistress when it comes to waking up on Monday morning with a profit but, as many others will tell you, the rewards can be so much greater when you know where to look. So where is the value and what are the stats that will lead you to finding it?
Well, the only place to start is that Rory McIlroy will more than likely win and you can get him at current best odds of 5/1. That is the caveat from which everything else on this page is written. The Holywood man is on fire and everyone knows it. He's going in with an aura of superiority that hasn't been seen since Tiger was at his best and that can really affect the rest of the field. Having said that, the only real question is what could stop McIlroy from taking his fourth major back to Co. Down.
The pgatour.com asked some of its experts to pick a winner as part of their fantasy golf competition and this tells a story in itself.
However, if we're looking for reasons why McIlroy won't win, we'll take a look at the stats. In other words, we'll look for stats that could convince us to not bet on such a short priced favourite. First up is the fact that, other than Tiger Woods, no player ranked no.1 in the world has won a major since Fred Couples' win at the Masters in 1992. Other than that there's not a whole lot going against McIlroy.
Paddy Power have been very helpful in trying to aid punters in winning lots of money by creating this fine looking venn diagram. Which, to be fair, actually does have some helpful information.
The most striking stat here is that it's pretty likely that this week's winner will have won before this season. Last year, Jason Dufner came out of left field to claim the title but the fact that every other winner in the past 15 years, apart from Shaun Micheel in 2003, had another win under their belt says form is a pretty important indicator.
Having said that, you're really looking for McIlroy not to bring his A game and for one of the challengers to step up. That's what Sergio Garcia and Rickie Fowler have to hope can happen. Those two were McIlroy's closest challengers at Royal Liverpool and were both near the top at Firestone last week and while Matt Kuchar and Adam Scott are sure to hold steady, those two could easily be the most likely contenders.
One more likely challenger could be Martin Kaymer. The German won the competition in 2010 and has recently returned to form this season with wins at the U.S. Open and The TPC at Sawgras. His form has dipped in the past couple of tournaments but at best odds of 50/1, he is possibly the best value each way bet.
One of the most tipped outside bets has been Patrick Reed after his top 5 finish last week, but we're going to steer clear of the 24 year old purely because he has been so incredibly inconsistent this season. Since he came out earlier in the year with a statement claiming he was already a top 5 player Reed's results have not exactly matched his bravado.
Patrick Reed leads at Firestone. Results since declaring himself a "top-five player": T-52, MC, T-48, MC, MC, MC, T-35, MC, T-11, T-26, MC.
— Jason Sobel (@JasonSobelGC) July 31, 2014
That's not to say that Reed doesn't have the talent to have a decent run at Valhalla but in all likelihood he is being widely tipped because of a good run at Firestone and the fact that the PGA has a reputation for throwing up the odd rookie, what's Yang Yong-eun up to these days?
Instead we're going to plump for Brandon Todd at 125/1. As Mark Sandritter at SBNation has said, he "didn't fare all that well at the Open or last week, but he's still had about as good a summer as anyone not named Rory McIlroy". Todd won the Byron Nelson Championship in May and has added a few more top 10 finishes since that. With his 6ft 3' frame more than capable of getting the ball around the lengthy Valhalla course he's well placed to mount another top 10 challenge.
Alongside Todd, we'll give a shout to Shane Lowry who's odds of between 150/1 and 125/1 really belie the kind of consistent play that the Offaly man has shown.
The Best Bets: (none of that advised points stuff for us, just in descending order of likelihood)
To win:
Rory McIlroy - 5/1
Sergio Garcia - 18/1
Rickie Fowler - 22/1
Each way: (six places, 1/4 odds)
Martin Kaymer - 40/1
Brandon Todd - 125/1
Shane Lowry - 150/1
Best odds according to oddschecker.com on 6/8/14
