Fairway Rollin' - PGA Championship Key Stats, Major Players, and Predictions With Rick Gehman and Pat Mayo

Episode Date: May 19, 2021

Time to try and make some money with House and Hubbard! It's a major week, so they enlist the help of CBS Sports contributor Rick Gehman to discuss every consideration for what could make a winner for this PGA Championship (01:49). They are then joined by Pat Mayo of the 'Pat Mayo Experience' to talk about the key stats and outcomes to keep an eye on as they make their predictions for who will take the trophy this year (36:30). Hosts: Joe House and Nathan Hubbard Guests: Rick Gehman and Pat Mayo Producer: Steve Ahlman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's basketball season and we've got you covered. The Ringer NBA show breaks down the latest and greatest around the league five days a week. Check out the Ringer NBA show on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, friends, and welcome to this major golf podcast, unlike any other. Oh, yes, my friends, it is a major week and we are all here together on Faraway Road. The Golf Podcast on the Riga Podcast Network. My Birdie Buddies, you know how we get down. It's major week.

This is one of my four favorite shows of the week because it's time to go ahead and try and make some money, my friends. We're going to try and examine all of the angles, all of the attributes, all of the considerations that go into producing a potential winner here at the PGA Championship at Kiowa Island. Joining us on today's show, it's a four ball today, my par saving pals. Two of the greats from the golf analytics community, we have our old pal Pat Mayo on to help us out, but a brand new contributor to the mission today, a guy that we have admired from afar

for a long time. Rick Gaiman is joining us. The first tee is wide open. my friends. This four ball is ready to throw a peg in the ground and get this going. All right, my friends, let me introduce you. He is the founder of Rick Rungood.com, the host of the 300 yards to the unknown podcast, co-host of the First Cut podcast on CBS Sports and a frequent contributor to CBS Sports and Golf Digest on all things, golf analytics, golf DFS, golf betting, whatever you want. Rick Gay, And welcome to Fairway Rowling, my man. I appreciate it, Joe.

Yeah, I'm stoked to be here. We've got a good one on our hands. And there's no other place I'd rather be than right here, right now talking about it. How about that? Nate Dogg. How you feeling, buddy? I'm feeling like Rick looks better than I do at this time of the morning. But we're going to be all right.

Yeah, we're going to make it through this. Now, typically, this is the show is up on Wednesday. And by this time during most of the golf season, including, of course, major season, I would have already spent a whole bunch of time with Rick, all of his content. You know, to his great credit, he gets his stuff up early in the week. By this time, typically, I know everything that he has to say about the course, what kind of attributes he's looking at, what kind of angles are out there, where there's value. I deliberately this week, my Eagle enthusiasts, you avoided it.

I didn't look at one thing because I knew we were going to have the man live and in person here. And so it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a blank slate. And the thing that makes this week in particular so fascinating is we don't really know what kind of golf course this is going to be. And we don't really know what kind of particular skills are going to translate into winning golf. So Rick, how are you looking? at this golf course and this week. Very carefully is how I'm looking at it. But I mean, I think there's a couple of good things to note.

We, it is a Pete Dye design, the ocean course down there at Kiowa. And Pete Dye is always known for a couple of very common, unique kind of standard attributes. And we have had a major championship, the PGA championship here in 2012. So there is at least some information that we can go on. Of course, we know the scorecard is scary, gentlemen. I mean, over 7,800 yards is the longest course in major championship history. You're going to have to be able to hit it far. It also means you're going to be hitting a lot of long approach shots in.

So that dispersion from, you know, 175, 200 yards out in the fairway is certainly going to allow you to miss more greens than normal. So you're going to have to be able to get up and down for par at time. So long story short, this is a course that will test all facets of your game. I think that your short game will certainly need to be. be relied on more than most weeks. And if that wind starts kicking up, those fairways are exposed off the Atlantic Ocean. I think these guys could be in trouble. So as we look at the wind this week, right now the forecast actually is pretty benign, isn't it? Thursday, it's coming out of the east, seven to 15, maybe gusting to 17, Friday out of the east, six to 12 miles an hour, gusting to 15.

Saturday it goes to the West, which I think makes those finishing holes a little bit easier than early in the week. Only 5 to 10. And Sunday, it looks like maybe 8 to 14. Relative to what we have heard about this course, that's kind of child's play from the wind perspective, right? So what does that mean for this course then? What's its defense?

That is about the best you could ask for. As I mentioned, some of these race fairways, it's 12 different fairways. that have been raised up so that you can see the ocean. It's called the ocean course for a reason. You've got to be able to see the ocean, but that exposes it to the wind. You know, even 12, 15 miles an hour, it feels like more when you're right there on the ocean.

But I will say the forecast is pretty much A plus as of right now. We know that can change in a moment. And what it probably means for handicapping this event or who might come out on top is it keeps a lot of guys in play. You know, some of these, with the wind, you have to be a lot more creative. some of the guys that are more of the mechanic over the artist, you know, a wind throws them off. Bryson DeShambot trying to calculate everything. More variables are worse for everybody.

So some of these artists guys, when the wind starts kicking up, I think they tend to find more success. So without it, probably a lot more guys in the mix. Is that a euphemism for Europeans and South Africans and Australians? Because House and I have been pretty excited about those guys. but to your point, should we be downgrading some of those players who've had to grow up and win because they're just not going to be able to bring that skill set? I don't think so because this is still a link style course. Pete, I designed this to be like the courses of Scotland and Ireland. So I think it gives you choices.

If you want to play the ball on the ground, by all means, go after it, you know, pull out the Texas wedge, take out your hybrid off the green, roll it up there and see what happens. You don't have to play that American flop shot. So I think that it just allows you to play this differently. If the wins kicked up, yeah, I'd prefer the guys who grew up in it, who thrived in it, who were born in it. But I don't think it's going to down, I don't want to downgrade them just because you can still play that style of golf on this course.

So that's interesting to me because we have heard a lot of folks try and draw like a bright line between this course and more traditional links venues because in the same way that you've mentioned, the fairways being raised. The same is true of the greens. The greens have false fronts. have runoffs. But I think to your point, even with false fronts and runoffs, that you can go ahead and still put under those conditions. It just means that you have to have a level of comfort with doing so. And that especially means, to me at least, you have to have a level of comfort

with pass palom, the type of grass there. That's this sticky, firm, stern grass that can withstand being, you know, growing alongside the ocean. You agree with that? I certainly agree with that. And there are certainly going to be a couple of holes where the greens are so elevated, maybe, you know, maybe using something on the ground is not the play. But you're going to, you can be, it's not like some of these American courses where, you know, they're just being guarded with bunkers in front. You don't have the option to even try that. The past palm greens, that's seashore past palm. They put that in right before Rory McElroy won this in 2012. And it's much more, you know, it's much nicer to the salt that's coming up

off the ocean. And the other. big thing about it is it's a bit of a bigger, wider strain of grass. It's not as small or as thin as some of the other strains of grass that we get. And what it tends to do is, yes, you mentioned it's sticky, but some of the more poor putters that we have on the PGA tour tend to put better on past palm. It doesn't really, you don't have to be as exact on it when you are putting. So you'll see guys like Emiliano Grillo, but he's had success on past pollen greens. We know that Victor Hovland. His only two wins on the PGA tour have come on these greens. So it's just kind of a different type of beast when you get out there, not only on the greens, but just off

them as well. Well, so you just referenced two guys, Emiliano Grillo and Victor Hovland. Both those guys are great long approach hitters. And earlier, you referenced how long this course is going to be. We know that it's going to be the longest course in major history. but that means 200-yard-plus approach shots. And both of those guys that you just talked about are top 25 guys in that statistical category. There are some other guys that you'd expect, Bryson is third, JT is near the top.

But there's also some guys who have been playing well lately who are in there but are sort of lower beneath the radar. Charlie Hoffman, West Brian, Cam Davis, some guys like that. Is that the stat that you're, looking at this week, or is there something else we really should be focused on that makes the magic when we start to think about who might really be at the top of the leaderboard? Yeah, I start to get a little bit worried about some of the proximity's numbers when you start

getting out of 175, 200. The sample size gets smaller and smaller. I'm sticking with two traditional categories that we combine into one in our world. We call it strokes gains ball striking. It is not an official PGA tour stat, but it takes two official PGA tour stats. It takes two official PGA tour stats. and combines them together. Strokes gained off the T and strokes gained approaches. How well can you get it off the T? And then once you're in position, what do you do from there? So some of the guys that you mentioned, like Charlie Hoffman,

low-key under the radar, one of the best players on the PGA tour this season. He does not have a trophy on his mantle to show for it, but he's been piling up top 20 finishes. He's been contending at times. And he is just killing it in that ball-striking category. And when you look at, you know, the ability to get up and down, save yourself for par, that's where things start to get a little hairy with Charlie Hoffman. But I think if you're hitting enough greens, you don't have to worry about getting up and down for par.

So that's what I want to hone in on. You mentioned strokes gain ball striking. We've combined off the T and approach into that category. And I've been thinking that my focus needs to be strokes gained around the green. because I feel like, you know, you mentioned that artistry component. I think there are going to be a lot of missed greens. And so your ability to scramble.

And so far, in that vein, there are only two Americans that I bet on so far. I have seven bets out there. Only two Americans. I'll let you guess. Who do you think the two Americans are that I bet on that fit this? One would have to be Patrick Reed. Yes, of course.

Of course I have Patrick on my dance card. And then I assume, I mean, an American around the green, could it be Justin Thomas? I actually did Jordan Speeith. And it's mainly because of just that artistry sort of notion. I didn't even bother looking at his strokes gained around the green this year. It's just what resonates with me when I think about his success at Birkdale and, you know, his short game saving him from so many instances and so many different venues. But let's go ahead and start talking some names.

And let's start with, I think, like the most prominent. We called it earlier this week when we were talking storylines, the Rory conundrum, because it just feels like you cannot, under any circumstances, build a card that does not have Rory on it. Is that right? Yes and no. So I am in the lucky position where I got on Rory two weeks ago because I said, if he goes out and plays well at the Wells Fargo Championship,

this number is moving. And it did. It got slashed. Of course, he goes out. He wins that golf tournament. So I'm kind of in the fortuitous position. If you're not, I think it is really hard to avoid Rory this week. And depending on how many of the big boys you want to get, we can talk about Jordan's

beef. He's certainly one who has caught my attention. But Rory with not only the victory here in 2012, what he's been doing with Pete Cowan just in the last couple of weeks to get the swing in order. We saw kind of the full version. version of Rory McElroy at Quail Hollow where he's just lightning off the T, he's getting the putter rolling,

he's got that bounce again, right? I love the stats, I love the analytics. I can't quantify the Rory Bounce and when he gets it, it is scary stuff for the rest of the field. So yes. Yeah, well, and on that note, part of the thing that he attributed his success at Quail Hollow was

the crowd. And when you say Rory Bounce, I start thinking about that energy that he's going to get, and they're having crowds out here at Kiowa, right? Oh, yeah, they're going to have crowds out there. And, you know, what he did at Kiowa to shoot a 66 on Sunday in 2012, it was a complete performance. He actually mentioned how good his short game was that week. He called it the best short game week of his career.

So it's certainly going to be valuable moving forward. But yeah, I think Rory is certainly back, and I'm going to have to have some type of exposure to him. Well, this morning, I saw a stat from Nosferatu that is the counterhouse stat, which is we keep talking about 2012, which is a long freaking time ago, by the way. But five out of the top five and ties from that leaderboard were Euros. And that is an all-time record for any U.S.-based major, which means PGA, U.S. Open, or the Masters.

Are we overthinking the European angle here? Do you have a bunch of Europeans at the top of your board? The European game is getting stronger. The way that I've treated the Europeans this week, is essentially in in terms of long shots. I like a lot of the guys who are coming over who are unknowns that books are not necessarily paying attention to and you get them in top tens and top 20s. Talk to us. Yeah, let's hear some names. Oh, we're talking about it. Yeah, let's name some names. Let's name some names, Ricky T. I mean, Garikago, Dean Burmester. You know, Burmester is an

absolute bomber off the T who's squirching Earth on the European tour right now. He won an event a couple of weeks ago that would have been, again, equal to winning a Puerto Rico Open or a Kerales Punta Kona Resort and Club Championship. I'm not talking about premier events on the PGA tour, but winning is winning. And, you know, that's how I've kind of treated the Euro guys. I still think that the big names at the top of the board, they play more routinely on the PGA tour. They play in great conditions every single week. We know their pedigree. I'm trying to get an edge with some of the longer shot euros. Well, and on that note, one name that I keep keep looking at and thinking about and I ponder, then I walk back, but I just can't, the price is so

good is John Gatlin, who plays on the, an American who plays on the European tour that has been given an exemption into this. Now, I haven't bit down hard on him yet, but I do like the orientation that he's arriving with. Do you have any thoughts on Mr. Gatlin? I do. So he is, again, so it's Ricky Fowler, John Cattlin. They got the special exemption from the PGA championship. So that's how they got into this field. But it's well deserved for Catlin. He's a guy who's not,

he's won four times in four different countries since 2019. I don't care where they are. I don't care what tour it is. The guy's a winner. My only concern about him is he's not very long off the tee. Even by European tour standards, he's one of the shorter hitters that we have. I'm worried that, you know,

he's going to be hitting a lot of approaches from beyond everybody else. He's going to be hitting first in his group often. But the pedigree is special. I mean, he is, he's a winner on the European tour. They go and they play a bunch of different places all the time, and he's hoisting trophies all around the globe. I certainly think that he is someone, and he came over last week and got his feet wet, right? Like, I like that.

Come over a week early, play the event before he missed the cut. But I think getting those reps in is certainly going to be handy. Well, since we're talking about the exemptions, and we have to then talk about the other guy who got an exemption, because he also, in spite of his struggles, is still one of the best players around the green. House, do we have any hope or prayer for our guy, Ricky Fowler? I mean, I have hope because the pressure couldn't be at a lower moment.

Like, there's no pressure whatsoever other than the pressure that he feels to hopefully write the ship at some point and, you know, show that he's making progress in the swing renovation. And we had him on the show a couple of weeks ago, and he said he was feeling pretty good. Rick, obviously the recent resume doesn't give you anything to bite down hard on and say, oh, yeah, I love Rick as a very quiet underdog here. But is there a reason for hope as it relates to your namesake, Ricky Fowler?

No. Oh, man. And let me be clear, I love Ricky Fowler, too. And we add him on the pod before the Masters. he said he fell, the November Masters, and he said he was feeling great about his game. So we're going on, you know, six, seven, eight, nine months where he's been feeling great about his game and the results aren't there. Here's the big thing about Ricky Fowler that I'm worried about.

It's the putter. Since the start of 2021, he has been horrible. He's losing about a half a stroke per round with the putter. And usually when a guy loses their best weapon, and that's what Ricky Fowler's best weapon was, purest putting stroke on the PGA tour. When guys lose their weapon, it's usually a long time to come back. That is what we've seen. We saw Gary Woodland go through that with his ball striking at the, you know, the kind of the middle part of 2020.

He lost it completely. Now, his was more injury related, but I have a lot of concerns about Ricky Fowler. They start with the putter. They go to the iron and wedge game after that. And just I just don't see it coming outside of him figuring it all out for one week and putting it together, which I think is a pretty tough ask. All right. Well, then answer this. How do you feel about Bryce and DeChambo?

losing four strokes putting last week. So for Bryson, that's an outlier. That's one of his worst putting weeks in recent memory, in recent years. You would assume that wouldn't happen again. He's usually a very good putter. And putting is a very volatile stat. I'm more worried about the way Bryson's been striking the ball. His approach game has been pretty horrendous.

And that was what was carrying him. After he added all of this distance, he was finding himself in a lot of really new awkward positions where he was kind of hitting half wedges and three quarter wedges all the time. And he tried to, and he took time for him to figure that out. And he did. And when he unlocked it, it was, it was dangerous. We're seeing some significant struggles in those areas, again, that keep me concerned. And once you start talking about potentially the winds kicking up or having to be as exact as I think you're going to need to be at Kiowa, I'm worried about Bryson. I think his range of outcomes for the bigger guys is much larger than his peers.

Well, I have a guy that we haven't touched on yet, which feels kind of crazy, because this is essentially a home tournament for this guy. But this guy since January the first has no top tens. And this is from your CBS sports colleague, Kyle Porter, no top tens since Riviera, a miscut at the Masters. He has worse strokes gain numbers than Cameron Trengali, Chris Kirk, Charlie Hoffman, and Abe Answer. I know that you know who I'm talking about.

What are we going to do with DJ? Yeah. this is a little bit concerning at this point. You know, he's playing whackamol is what it looks like. And when I say that, it's one week, it's the putter, the next week. He can't find the driver the week after that. It's the wedge game. And when you're constantly playing whackam ball, you're just always behind the eight ball.

You know, normally with DJ, we kind of see his metrics start trending in the right direction. Things start coming together. He starts to foreshadow his victories or starts to foreshadow a lot of the great success that he has or that he's going to have. and we're not seeing that story being told right now. Now, the overused cliche is that nobody can flip a switch like Dustin Johnson can, and he's got a short memory and all this stuff. But I look at the metrics.

I look at the spreadsheet, and usually DJ tells us when it's coming, and he's not telling us it's coming right now. He's telling us a wedding might be coming. That might be it. He's thinking about other things, I think. One of the fun stories from this week is that Max Homo went out and got Bones. Bones is going to caddy for him coming around. Homa prior to his missed cut defending in Charlotte might have been one of those guys coming in who you thought,

all right, if it's not going to be a chalky top of the leaderboard, you know, Max is a guy who has proven that he can win against good players on really hard golf courses. Every time Bones steps in, guys elevate their play. He won with Thomas. He's been all right with Fitzpatrick. Do we think anything of the Homa Bones connection this week? I mean, Noma's sitting down there at 150 to 1. Are we taking a look at Max? It's a really good value for sure. He is a guy. When you go out and you win Riviera,

not only on that golf course, but with that field, it's impressive. I was actually more impressed with what he did the following week. He goes out at Workday, top 25s that. He wasn't even supposed to play that event,

but he got in because of the victory. Then he kind of went on this run where he pops up top 10 at the Arnold Palmer invitation. I like that miscut last week. It's hard to defend. It's hard to defend an event from two years ago, which is when he had won the Wells Fargo Championship.

He bled some strokes on and around the Greens. I'm not worried about it. Max Homa has been, his trajectory has been on a great line for the last 18 months, and there's no reason to think that's going to stop anytime soon. Have you run Rick the Pete Dye profile through your analytics machine, you know, the guys that tend to perform? I know that you have.

I have one guy in particular in my, mind, but I'm just interested in like the class of guys that you are getting as you apply some of these others. Because this is, this is indeed obviously the most Pete die. It's the most it's his most diabolical design after all. But it also is different. It's different than then like the traditional kind of, you know, Harbor Town or, you know, other kind of. Sawgrass. Yes, exactly.

Pete die places. I have been monitoring Webb Simpson's health. I've been looking and see it because he withdrew from Quail Hollow because he had a neck problem. It seems like it might be in his rear rear mirror, but that's a guy that does tend, I think, to show pretty well on Pete Dye venues. Obviously, he won at Harbortown in 2020. But how is that Pete Dye profile showing out in terms of some names? And what do you think about Webb this week? Not only did he win at Harbortown in 2020.

one at Sawgrass in 2018. He's piled up top tens at some of these courses as well. If you just look at just pure strokes gain total, essentially say who are the best players over the last six years at Pete Dye courses? Web Simpson is 10th. He is 10th. He is the actually he has the most rounds played of anybody above him. So there's nobody who's played as many rounds as he has that has been as good as he has. And I'm not as worried about the neck injury. You know, there's the small reports that we got when it first happened was just, you know, It was unexpected. He was planning on teeing it up.

That's, of course, of Quell Hollow. He has a house on. It was just kind of a weird little thing. And he said, you know what? We're about to enter a really important part of the schedule. I'm not going to risk it. So I'm not even really considering the neck as much this week. I'm looking at what he does on the golf course.

And dye design is awesome for him. And as long as he can get it off the tea. Once these guys walk off the tee box, Webb Simpson's one of the best players in the world. And do you think we should be relying heavily on your Pete Dye good performers on this course, or is it just different enough that that's a less helpful analysis?

And if so, who besides Webb is in that list? Yeah, so it is not as... I don't love it as much as if we were going to Sawgrass or something like that. This is kind of like a lynxie sawgrass, but I think there's something to look at it, maybe just to, hey, break ties between guys. I'm in between these two golfers.

Does one of them play Pete Dye courses better? And I will say, If there was going to be a time where you use the architect model, Pete Die would be the guy because of some of the features that he uses. So the other names on that top 10, Patrick Cantlay's number one, if you're willing to stomach that. I'm not. And go back to that mess.

Adam Scott, Bryson D. Shambo, Hadeki Matsuyama, Dustin Johnson. Siwu Kim, of course. He's the ultimate Pete Die. Yes, see, woo! That's right. Matt Coocher, Abraham, Answer, and Cam Davis rounding out the top of 10. Well, let's go to Hideki, because it's weird that we're this. deep into talking about a major championship or any golf tournament that doesn't matter or that

matters. And we're not talking about putting. And Hideke won the masters because the putter got hot. Do you think, is this going to be one of those tournaments where the guy with the hot putter can actually rise to the top and is going to gain, you know, five to six strokes on the field? Or do you think it just doesn't matter as much this week? And it's going to be, you know, the stats that you laid out. Somebody who hits it far and then drives in their approach shot and is making pars. Yeah, I got to tell you guys, I'm loving Hadeki this week. You know, there's like, okay. Yeah, so let me, let me lay this out for you. I was, I was really worried last week. And I'm like, you know what? He did the tour. He did the tour. He had the pomp in circumstance. I have no idea

what to expect from him when he comes back and plays for the first time. And the metrics are beautiful. I mean, he was phenomenal off the T. Approach game was Hadeki-like. He actually gained a stroke putting, which I will say, Hadecki's figured the putter out. He has gained strokes putting in five of his last eight starts. That is like unheard of when you get to Hadeki Matsuyama. And the only thing, the only thing, gentleman, that he did wrong is he lost four and a half strokes around the greens, his worst around the green performance in six years by a mile, probably not going to happen again. I'm feeling the Hadeki. I like that a lot. Boy, oh boy, I did not have him showing on my dance card, but he's going to make an appearance on some of these lineups now.

Let's go ahead and do some stud horse kind of conversation here. I have been disappointed with John Rom for a little while now. And the reason I've been disappointed is because we keep in, and it's just, you know, manufactured kind of expectations. It's just me and, you know, the golf community writ large, seeing all the talent in this dude. and we keep having these check-in moments at these big venues where he could come out and kick-ass and remind everybody, oh, yeah, John Rom's, you know, massive stud horse. He's still up there at like 10 to one odds to win this event. He's favored ahead of J.T., DJ, Speath, and Bryson right now. Yeah, so I can't make sense out of Rom at the moment.

He's not playing poorly, but he's also just not grabbing the gold chain, if you know what I mean. Yeah, he's got, well, you know, eight top tens in his last 12 or 13 starts, something like that. That's not, exactly. But no wins. And we kind of grade some of these guys on victories. I think that I'm probably more bullish on John Rom than most, but I don't really like the way that he's being treated in the markets. I would like to see his numbers a little bit longer. There's some guys I'd like to see above him.

If you're splitting Harris at the top, if you're doing this, maybe more than recreationally, maybe you care about a number here or a number there. But the good thing about John Rom is he is phenomenal off the tee. He never hurts himself off the T's gain strokes in that category in 28, 28 straight events. That is every event of this season and every event of last season. There's nobody who can touch anything close to that. So he always puts him – that's why he has such a high floor, and we're seeing it in his results. He just needs to tighten up the rest of it.

The putter – since switching to Callaway, the putter has been the thing that he has not been able to figure out. And until he does, it is probably unlikely that he wins because the talent and depth on the PGA tour, is so strong. So dial it out to 30,000 feet for us. When you see the back nine on Sunday, which is going to be a beast, wind or no, do you see a chalky top of the leaderboard? And if not, when you look across all the odds that you're seeing right now, where is the best value? Is it in those sort of unknown euros that are coming over? Or is there value somewhere else that people should be looking at? I believe it's in two places. The value I believe, I believe, is in the unknown, the unknown euros, the guys that can kind of pop up finish inside the top

10, maybe they're, you know, Saturday afternoon, they're kind of in contention. They finish T8, that type of thing. But also the second tier of PGA tour stud. So we all know the guys to top, you know, your big 10 names. And then the guys after that, because there's such a small margin between Colin Morikawa, Daniel Berger, Patrick Reed, Victor Hovlin, Will, like, trying to parse through those guys. So I think. think if we can get the second tier or third tier of golfers correct, I think there's value there. I think there's value in the euros. But I think that if you're playing the ocean course on Sunday of a major championship, wind or not, the cream is going to rise to the top. I think there's

going to be a couple of studs up there. Well, we haven't talked to about him other than in just sort of glancing blows. Why can't Justin Thomas win this week? I don't think that's the case. I The argument would be that the putter is erratic. That's the only thing. The thing I love about Justin Thomas is he's incredibly on brand. He is going to be one of the best players from T to Green every single week. And we don't know if he's going to lose six strokes putting and finish T-13 or if he's going to be a zero and win this golf tournament. The other concern I would have about Justin Thomas is when he misses Greens, he gives us the old like, oh boy, that's way, that's way left.

That's way right. And if you're way off here, I think that could be a little bit of a concern. I love JT. Every single week, I have a couple of concerns this time around. Can Spieth win this week? Spieth is probably going to win this week. Yeah.

So make the case. Make the case. Listen, guys, this is, I'm a numbers guy, and we got to follow the numbers here. You know, since this is not one event, this is not two events,

this is five or six months now of him being the best player on the PGA tour. He is literally, since the start of 2021, gaining over two strokes per rounds. The gap between him and the next closest, golfer is the same gap as golfer number two to number 10.

He's lapping the field. He's doing it in a way that is sustainable, his approach game. Phenomole. He is Colin Morikawa right now on his approaches. And we know Morikawa is a robot. He's the best player in the world with an iron or a wedge in his hands. And then you add in the creative, short game, speed, magic, whatever you want to call it. It is very likely Jordan Speeth wins this week.

And I will certainly be involved in that victory. Yeah, I have exposure to him. I mentioned at the outset, I went ahead. Just last night, I had a card that was all Europeans. I put two Americans, one with Patrick Reed, and the other was Jordan Speath. So I'm thrilled to hear that. And obviously, him completing his own Grand Slam is a wonderful narrative. And also, like, the golf community.

It's been such a nice reminder to have Jordan Speeth back in our lives because he's a true, like, transcendent star. He's a star not just to golf, but in the whole sporting public consciousness. So I hope you're talking truth here, Ricky. Yeah, there are probably two golfers my mom can name, Tiger Woods and Jordan Speed. Those are the guys that transcend. And we for so long have been saying, oh, golf is so good. The last couple of years, golf is so good. Can you believe this?

Golf is so good. Could you just imagine if Jordan was good again? Well, spoiler alert, Jordan is good again. He's not only good. He's great. and like this is, this is a really good spot for him, guys. So my last question to you is about momentum. Is there anything that we take from last week?

I mean, Sam Burns with a lot of 54-hole leads. Daniel Berger making a hell of a run on Sunday. Schwarzel playing four great rounds in the 60s. Is there anything to learn from last week, given that the course is pretty different and obviously conditions are different? Yeah, I mean, you can certainly look at the metrics and say, okay, you know, Will Zalotaurus was phenomenal on approach. I'm glad you mentioned Daniel Berger.

I'm such a huge fan of Daniel Berger because when you get to any major championship, and especially this week at Kiowa, I think you're going to have a complete all-around game to you're going to need it. And that's exactly what Daniel Berger has. And what I love about Burger is, you know, even in the weeks where he's won or finished inside the top five, he doesn't have to gain a ton of strokes putting. He gains like one and a half strokes or two and a half strokes. And that's enough because the rest of his game is so strong. So I'm glad you brought him up.

But in terms of last week, yeah, I mean, guys that were out there, you know, hitting it well from Tita Green, like a Sam Burns, like a Will Zalotaurus, like a Jordan Speeth. I'm trying to just look down the list here of guys that are playing this week. There is certainly those stats, the Tita Green stats, usually are sticky. They carry over from week to week much more than some of the others do. Homeboy, where can we find your stuff this week? you're among the hardest working golf media men in the in the biz. Obviously, Rick Rungood.com is churning content on the on the 24-7.

But what do you have coming up and where can we find your stuff? Yep. So Rick Rungood.com, that's all the data. That's all the sheets that I put together, all the things that I think are important. And then, you know, I'll be contributing to not only Golf Digest this week, but over at CBS Sports. I, you know, host the First Cut podcast. We're doing a lot of great stuff. We'll have some guys down at the course with some insight.

And it'll just be all things PGA championship all week long. It's a beautiful week. The weather's going to be beautiful. I wish we were all there to enjoy. I don't even know what the signature drink is. Nate, we need to look up the signature drink down there. I think they have at the ocean course. They call the bar there, the Rider Cup room.

Ricky G, you're in Vegas. What do you think the drink is down there in Chau, at Kiowa? Oh, man, your guess is as good as my. Definitely some sweet tea would have been. been, that's the answer. Don't they love their, and I don't even know. I couldn't even muster a guess on this. They've got a

gator bite. They've got a sweet tea mojito, all at the Ryder Cup bar. They got an albatross, which has got some King Charles vodka in it. There we go. Grip it and sip it is basically their margarito with some grapefruit in it. Oh, all right. Those are the drinks

that are at that bar on the specialty cocktail menu. All right, well, let's all make one of those. We'll, we'll circulate the links amongst ourselves and we'll enjoy the hell out of this week. Rick Damon, you're the man. Thanks for coming on today, my friend. All right. Thanks, fellas.

Had a blast. All right, my par saving pals, as promised, it is our old buddy, the CEO, the president, the head poobah of Canada. Well, of Canada, yes. And also of the Mayo Media Network, Pat Mayo. What's happening, home boy? Oh, I'm well. I want to give a special shout out to Justin Ray.

He's off on paternity leave, thus opening up a spot for me to come on during a major week. This is great. Yeah, we had two of our favorite analytics guys. We had Rick Gaiman on just for a little while ago. We got all his best thoughts on what we're going to do here. And now we're going to see how you do because, you know, Rick is legit. I mean, he brings the hot, hot heat. You guys did a show together that you taped, I think last night.

Is it up yet? Yeah, it's out as of this recording right now. We basically just started at the top of the pricing and talked about the first 70 players, then plus sleepers, all time, Cody, you want to hear about anyone in the field. You get recognized opinions. And it's weird when you have to talk about every single player because it's impossible to have an opinion on every single player when it comes down to it. So some guys are just like, we got to Sergio. It was like, I don't want to play Sergio. It's like, good enough.

Well, we're not going to make you talk about every single player. but I do want to get you started on this theme that we're hearing from everybody this week, which is that putting is not anything that we need to look at because it's going to be about length off the tee and it's going to be about approach shots. Do you agree that if you're looking at putting stats this week, you're chasing up the wrong tree? I think most times when you look at putting stats, you're chasing up the wrong tree. Although I did find a few different things when I was scouring fantasy national.com is that when you look at the PGA championship by and large and try to find out who the past winners are, at least have been the past five years,

it's basically who's hot putting, who's hot on approaches. And those guys just tend to carry it through. Like everyone's talking about the past pallum putting greens and how it really normalizes the entire field. But I went and looked at like slow and average greens. I went and sorted that because that's what you would expect with this type of green. Whether it plays out that way, I have no idea. idea because I talked to a caddy on the course. He said it's firm and fast right now. But it's always different when it comes down to the actual bay of. And you would just think with these putting surfaces, they tend to be a little bit slower because the wind from the ocean

can come and knock them out. They need to keep them a bit slower because it's difficult enough as it is. But when I went and looked at slow and average speed greens, the best putters, like the guys in your head who you think are the best putters, putt even better on these surfaces. So I don't know if that narrative's true or not. Yeah, Rom just a little while ago gave a quote that it's playing really fast, but that this is a pure ball strikers course. So with that said, start us at the top. Who's winning this week, Pat Mayo?

Cameron Smith is going to win this week. He is going to hoist the Wanamaker trophy, which I think is, when you go back and look at 2012 and see Rory hold on to it, I think it's like a half Rory, or at least the size that Rory used to be about 10 years ago. It is a gigantic thing. And I mean, we're in the south. Dude's got a mullet. I mean, that's a nice narrative to go off.

Anyways, coming off a win, I'll be at a team win. But if you just look, basically since Riviera on, he has been awesome. And I buy into the, yes, you need the length. But I think this can play one or two ways. Like, if the wind does pick up, and right now, it looks kind of, let's say, I don't want to say, me dead. Yeah. But when I checked last night, it looked like it was going to be the windiest thing in the world.

I just moved back to the Atlantic coast. I can tell you from playing, you know, 25 years of golf on the Atlantic coast that can't really predict the wind out here. It just kind of pops up in any which direction and you don't really see it coming. So I'm still going to bank on the fact that it's going to be windy. Because if it's not windy, we're going to have Aaron Hills on our hands. I don't care how long this course is. If the wind doesn't pick up, it's going to play incredibly easy.

Not like minus 25 easy, but it'll be like minus 14, something like that. Like guys will breach double digits if the wind doesn't pick up. The wind picks up. And we're probably looking at like a minus five, minus six, trying to look back at what happen in 2012 and try to recreate what Rory did. There's like five guys on the planet that if they hit their 99th percentile outcome and they have their best week, they're going to dominate. It doesn't matter what course it's at. That's why they're the best players in the world. You just can't really bank on that happening. I look at the rest of that leaderboard from 2012.

I know the course has been length and there's been a few things change, but it's basically just a bunch of short-hitting, accurate grinding euros after Rory. So what does that really tell us? I'm going on the assumption that it's going to play a bit difficult. You need to be a shot maker. And I think that Cameron Smith is essentially like a discount Spieth right now. They do all the same things well. Yeah. I mean, there are certain things he does better than Spieth.

He grows his hair better. He does. I mean, poor Spieth, man. When the guy takes off his hat, it's like the first time I saw Matt Coutcher without his hat on. I was like, oh, God, this guy's like 57 years old. Turns out he's not. Speeth with a hat, he's like 24. Speeth without the hat, he might as well be Stuart.

sink. But Smith's driving gets him into so much trouble, but it can be good. It's just super erratic. Like we saw him leading a concession. Then he dunked like three in the water on one half. You beat me to it. I was just going to bring up a concession. I don't know what it says about me when you and I get on the same wavelength, because on the Monday show, I talked about Cam Mullet. And really, it's just like the idea of seeing him on Sunday on the back nine walking around with that glorious mullet out, bursting out from his hat, out from under his hat.

Now we have, and you touched on this a bit, been talking for a couple weeks now, around an orientation that we have a kind of natural attraction to Euros and Aussies because of what we are imagining, Keowa, the ocean course, might present because of these windy conditions,

because of its situation adjacent to the ocean, Do you think that that's being overplayed at all? Because my card is full of all season euros right now. I think the way that you need to approach it, obviously, you know, if I was better at picking golf winners, I probably wouldn't be on their show. I'd be in Vegas making 11 betting guys at 80 to 1 or 200 to 1 like H. Lee every single week. But the way that I look at it with my picks this week, I want guys that can compete in both scenarios.

So if the worst happens, my guys are still good. And when I call them like a discount speed, like you can put speed in any sort of lie possible, any sort of situation, and somehow miraculously he's going to find his way out of it. And Cam Smith kind of has that juice, too. Like, he's behind a tree in the pine straw at Augustine. All of a sudden, he's wrapping it around, you know, complete dog hook left and somehow it lands three feet next to the hole. Like, the guy's a magician around the greens. But in ideal circumstances where it takes length and it takes great long irons and good putting in order to win this championship,

I think he can compete with that too. Like he was fourth at the Genesis, gained off the tea that week as well. When you just look at his results, fourth, 11th, 17th, 10th at the Masters, ninth of the Heritage, one the Zurich. Like, the guy rips up Pete Dye courses anyway. People forget the Zurich, although a team event is a Pete Dye course. Ninth at the Heritage, Pete Dye course. Then you have 17th at the players, also a Pete Dye course.

And, well, those are a thousand yards shorter than what we're dealing with this week. They do have some unique properties to them that I do think that share a lot of similarities. Like, you're going to see a lot of the Texas Wedge this week. Guys who are historically bad around the greens can kind of figure it out a little bit because it gives them a few more routes. Like Stuart Sink, terrible around the greens. But what do you do at Heritage? He's pulling up the putter from 17 feet off the green. You can do that at this major championship.

There are very few. Like we saw Kimer do it at Pinehurst when he ended up winning. That's another guy who's awful around the greens. And where is he won in America? Pinehurst, where you can put from off the greens, TPC sawgrass, where you can put from off the green. So I just think that guys that are the most creative this week, as long as they, have outs that if there's no wind, that they can still compete anyway. And I think that Candace Smith is one of those guys, then I like him in both scenarios where it's either really

tough or potentially even easy. I think that he can compete. I'm seeing him at 45 to 1. I jumped on it. So that's where I'm starting. Do you see this when you sort of pan out and look at it being a chalky leaderboard down the stretch? Or do you think there are going to be some guys that right now you can get good value on? And let me focus you on that. that. Where do you see value on this board right now? I think of the unknown euros and sort of the older type American players and not necessarily the guys that you would think of. So this is what the fourth Pete die major that there's been. So whistling straights twice and obviously this course in 2012. You know who played really well at all three of those major

championships? Bubba Watson. And Bubba, if you go and look at his, this is funny when you look at stats because looking at whole to whole stats is sometimes like focusing in on the micro can be really good sometimes rather than just like, oh, man, that's a really terrible number. That's why I brought up Cam Smith's driving at concession. He actually drove the ball really well that week outside of one hole, and it cost him like five shots in terms of strokes gained. And that's why he shows up with a giant negative three. Bubbo was the same way at Wells Fargo.

Bubbo was playing great at the Wells Fargo championship until the 71st and 72nd hole when it took him 12 shots to ended up closing it in. He put three balls in the water. And then all of a sudden, you look at a stroke-s gained approach. It's minus three and a half. and you're like, oh, he had a terrible iron week. Now, he had a great iron week outside of two holes. And when you look at everything wrapped around it,

whether it be the valspar or even the team event at the Zurich, like he has been striping it. And the biggest thing is he's hitting more fairways than the field off the tee. And that is scary when you have the distance of Bubba Watson. All of a sudden, the putter is turned. He's gained strokes putting in three consecutive events after basically losing in 17 in a row that I don't know if he can win. I mean, I know he can win.

He's won a major championship. Five of his 12 wins have come up Pete Dye courses in his career. I just think that he's someone that we're not really talking about because everyone just kind of over Bubba at this point. But I think there are a few locations left for Bubba, and it's going to be super hyper-specific that he can really compete, he can really contend. And if he does gauge the speeds of these greens okay,

and he can put from off the green, then all of a sudden I think it's a different scenario for him, and he can be very much in the mix. So implied in your breakdown of these first two, guys that we've kind of gone on in-depth, Camp Smith and Bubba. You've touched on some of the attributes that you like. We did some strokes gained dialogue with Rick Damon. What particular categories in terms of stroke gained are you like, you know, because this is such a unique situation with this golf course, the combination of length, the potential links, the elevated

greens with the runoffs and stuff. What are you focusing in on in terms of the strokes gain categories? I think that strokes gained approach, by and large, is always the best stat to look at. Strokes gained off the T is always the most consistent, so it's the most reliable. The way I always try to describe it is in any given round, Bionn Hunt A can outputt Brennan Todd. Just happens. In no scenario, is Brendan Todd ever outdriving Dustin Johnson? It's just not going to happen.

So that's why we always rely on strokes gained off the T is the most predictive and most consistent of all these metrics. It's not to say that Dustin can't have a bad week off the fee. It happens. We've seen it happen sometime a few times at least so far in 2021. But long iron approach, so the proximity basically from 200 plus, plus around the green. I think that around the green is going to be incredibly important this week. Guys just aren't going to hit 95% of greens and regulation. I mean, it's a peak-dye course.

It gets tricky whenever you start getting around Greenside. I actually did the write-up in my article this week about scrambling percentage and how I think it's more of a storytelling staff. than any sort of predictive metric because it has no context related to it. You can be scrambling from one inch off the green or 200 yards away from the hole. It's all the same as scrambling percentage really rates it out. So, strokes gained around the green for me is going to be really huge. But it's funny because I like to dive into the metrics.

And I think it can give us a good lead on what we want. But I really think that watching these players and knowing their styles of game, if you do think that the wind is going to get up and get a bit difficult. And that's why I like Cameron Smith. He's someone who's a very creative player. Jordan Speeth is a very creative player. Bubba Watson, hell, he's a very creative player when it comes to the shots that he sees that no one else does. And maybe that's what you need this week.

And then you almost have the other side of the coin, like someone like Shane Lowry. Shane Lowry has won at really long courses in his career. And if just the weather gets shitty, he's the type of guy that you want. The irons have been firing. Like, statistically, this is the best he's ever looked, which is kind of terrifying to think because it's Shane Lowry. He's like really good one week and not so good the next week. But a short game's great. The putter can get hot.

He has enough distance. And if it's like a minus seven PGA championship, the guy can get himself around in this course in the most grinder way possible. Like how we think of Graham McDowell in the Ryder Cup or Ian Polter. That's essentially what the new school Shane Lowry is. I mean, he already won a major championship. He's not afraid of the bright lights. I think the Nova Scotia weather and the fact that spring is probably not quite upon you

is impacting the way you think about this. This is South Carolina. This weather's going to be perfect this week. You don't think there's going to be any wind. I think it's going to be benign. I really do. The forecast just looks meh. There's going to be less win this week than there was last, for sure.

But the thing I got to ask you then, because you get into these metrics and when you tell me shots gained approach is the one, I believe you. And then I go, why are there eight or nine guys who are more heavily favored than? the best ball striker in the game who is also the defending champion at this event and also fumbled the trophy like no one we've ever seen before fumbling that giant trophy? Why is Colin Marikawa

not being talked about? I would say it's because there is this overriding narrative that you need to be super long off the tee. And I mean, Morikawa gains a bunch of strokes off the tee, but he's not particularly long. But he used his driver. It was that tea shot on

on the closing 16 last year that won him the damn tournament. It is, but you're not going to find any drivable par fours at this one. Mori Cow is basically the best short par four player on the planet. People are just terrified of his putter. The chipping and the putting, the same reasons that people, I mean, people are all in on Hovlin this week, but it's the same concerns. I'm one of them. My hands up for Hovlin.

Everyone is all in on Victor Hovlin this week, with good reason. Like, the guy's playing absolutely fantastic. And the chipping is really bizarre with him where, you know, either chips it in or chips it over the green. Like, that's what we saw at the Masters. It was really bizarre. Smiling all the way through it. Yeah. And no matter what the conditions are, you know he's going to score.

Wind or not, he's going to make himself some birdies. It's just you have to prepare for the bogies that come along with it. It's really inopportune times, kind of like we saw at Torrey Pines earlier this year, is the same hole on Saturday and Sunday. He just had this hook over the green on an approach. You're like, what are you doing, Victor? Like, this is your bread and butter. What is happening to you?

And then when forced to scramble, not all. always the best case scenario. But if, Nate, if you think it's going to play benign, then Bryson's going to win. Oh, wow. Whoa. Wow. I was just going to ask, I mean, what makes you feel that way? He was not a good putter last week, Pat. I mean, that was a bad, bad week for him. Talk to us about Bryson. Lots of people are off him. I love that you're zagging instead of zgging. Go, my man. Yeah, he lost 4.1 strokes, he gained 7 the week before that, like it's Bryson. Out of all of the top and players in the world,

I guess we'll throw Spieth into that too. Bryson's actually a better putter than Spieth right now over the long term. Like, it's kind of insane how good he is on the Greens. He plays really well at Pete Dye courses. He plays really well at hard courses. But the biggest thing that I look at with Bryson is the wind

potential of this course, if it does pick up, and that's what we saw in the second round in 2012, that when it does pick up, the average score is going to be like 78, 79. Bryson doesn't do well in adaptive conditions. He needs to reset himself. But if you can go in and tell Bryson, hey, there's going to be between 8 and 12 mile per hour wins this week. He will have this entire course scouted. And if you can always say, hey, when you get to the 17th hole,

it's always going to be downwind from your back. When you get to the seventh hole, it's going to be a crosswind from, you know, east to west at 10 miles per hour. And then you can figure it out from there. If he knows that going in, he will calibrate himself perfectly. The problem is, this is what Phil talked about a lot. Locker room adjustments. He can't make them. It's the on-course adjustments. If stuff starts getting wild out there, then I don't like Bryson whatsoever because he is so set on his game plan,

he is so prepared that it's just like when you take a piece of sand and chuck it into a computer, it just fucks up the microchip so much that he doesn't know what to do. He might be able to prepare himself for the next round. That's why I say in ideal conditions, without a lot of variables to plan for, Bryson's going to dominate. But if we do get some sort of random spikes

throughout the course of the round, like, oh, it was nine miles per hour, Now it's 26 for no reason coming from her direction you didn't see it. Like it just throws him off so much. At least that's my take on Bryson. I could be completely wrong about that. But I do think in ideal conditions, it's going to be Bryson. And it's going to be probably one of the big boys out there.

Like for me, in the betting odds, this is the decision that I've been trying to make all week. Because Cam Smith starts my card at 45 to 1, which means I have room for one of the big guys if I really wanted. I've taken a few flyers down the list, whether it be I like Will Zelotaurus this week. I like Shane Lowry. I like Bubba, like I mentioned. I love Si Wu. Come on now. It's my guy.

See, who, Kim. And we're at a Pete Dye course. Let's give me a break. Matt Wallace, I love this week. But in terms of realistically winning, if it's going to be ideal conditions,

I'm just waiting for Dustin to hit 20 to 1. I don't know if he's hurt or if he's not hurt, but if you give me Dustin Johnson at 20 to 1 and seeing him hanging at 18 right now. I'm just waiting for that 20. I'm not going to miss that number. And if you give me Dustin Johnson, if you give me Dustin Johnson at the same number as Hovlin,

I'm taking Dustin Johnson a hundred times out of 100. You and I are on the same page. page, but why wait? 18 is still a pretty goddamn good number. I mean, I think that's what. This feels like when we let J.T. drop down anyone, the players. Well, there were some 18 for, for DJ at the Masters because in between, you know, he went into the Tour Championship and the November Masters, you know, there was a hiccup and his number moved up a little bit. And there was an opportunity to cash on DJ at the Masters. So the idea with DJ is it's just a pure value play.

You're just looking for a number with him. There isn't anything in terms of going into the metrics that make you feel good about DJ over the last four or five months, right? No, actually there is. There's actually a ton to like about Dustin Johnson. If you just look at the path that he's on right now. So he starts out the season at the tournament of champions, first time that he's played since the Masters.

and his approaches were fantastic. He lost strokes driving at the tournament of champions at Capulua. Didn't really seem like he wanted to be there, tell you the truth. When Dustin Johnson, a guy that we've seen drive power fours and almost make hole in ones on that course, isn't driving the ball particularly well, that's concerning. The genesis, the irons were fantastic, the chipping was fantastic, the driving was bad. At concession, lost three strokes with his driver. That is what's been keeping him down so much.

And then we get to the players. He's gaining. He even gained off the T at the Masters despite missing the cut. Then we get to Heritage. 5.1 strokes gained off the T. At the Valspar, four strokes gained off the T. So the driving no longer a concern. Now, at the players, the Masters, and the Heritage, the irons were the big issue where he lost

four strokes at the players. He lost over two at the Heritage. He lost over three at the Masters. He gets back to Valspar. All of a sudden, he's gaining two again. I just need to see something positive there. Now, for a few of these, like when he came 13th at the Heritage, he putted the lights out. He putted the lights out at the players, too, not only generated a T-48 finish.

He lost strokes around the green. His minus 3.1 strokes gained around the green, strokes lost around the green at the Velaspar championship is the most since, I'm still scrolling here, since the 2017 Thor Championship. I'd call that an outlier because Dustin is fairly good from around the greens, and the putting was about neutral. So the ball striking is back for Dustin Johnson.

It just got masked at the Valspar because the chipping and putting were so bad. That's not something I would regularly concern myself with with Dustin Johnson, and that if he's okay and the knee is actually fine and he just didn't want to play the Byron Nelson because who could blame him after watching how that turned out, then I think he's going to be perfectly fine. I do think that he's actually trending upwards right now, just the results don't show it.

We've talked a lot about 2012 coming into this major. Rightly or wrongly, that's a long-ass time ago, but it's fun because Rory was in peak Rory form and he certainly seems to be on the uptrend here. I want to give you a chance to talk about Rory, But before you do that, I want to get your opinion on one other guy who was on the leaderboard at the end of that tournament who is also trending upwards, whether we like him or not. It's Keegan Bradley. And what I want to know-

Why wouldn't we like him? Why do you say it that way? It is. You don't like his Jordans? What I want to know is do we put any stock in his performance from 2012 and his performance of late as we're trying. trying to fill out the bottom of our DFS lineup, is Kegan a guy that we should be looking at? Are there guys like Kagan who you sort of see some value in at his level? Or should we just say 2012 has basically no bearing on this tournament whatsoever?

There were more Euros finishing in the top of that leaderboard than any other U.S.-based major. Throw it out. Everyone likes Kegan Bradley this week. And there's no reason not to like him. The scary part about him is he has gained strokes putting in five of six events. That's scary. He has gained strokes around the green in six consecutive events. So he's either figured something out or he has a giant horseshoe up his ass right now because this is not what he is good at.

We went through a stretch where Keegan was losing seven strokes, four strokes, five strokes, and two rounds at most of these events. Now, this wouldn't be the first time. We've seen an incredibly bad putter, someone who was really good with the belly putter, all of a sudden figure it out. I think people forget that about three years ago, Webb Simpson was the worst putter on the PGA tour. Then he became the best putter on the PGA tour almost overnight. He figured it out. So maybe something has happened with Keegan because the ball striking has never gone away. Like he does, I think the best step that I've seen this week. And this was taken with 2012 in mind is that the green regulation percentage at the ocean course was around 68% from the fairway.

If you missed the fairway, it was around 38%. and then you were left to scramble. And what's the one thing we really like about Kegan Bradley? What's the biggest skill that he has? He hits it long and he hits it straight. And much, I mean, it's almost like more, he hits it longer than Morikawa. He doesn't hit quite as straight as Morikawa. But they're in the same ballpark when it terms of that kind of ball striking.

So he's a bit more of the advanced version of what we're going to see from Abraham Answer or even Cory Conners or hell. Paul Casey is even someone else. Not quite at that same accuracy level, but much better than the guys at the very, very top. Charlie Hoffman is another one who kind of fits this similar profile. It's just if Keegan is churning out these great results and he's gaining two strokes putting, maybe that's a new school Keegan Bradley. It's just if you play Keegan Bradley and DFS, you have to realize that he's going to be one of the five most popular plays

and you're competing against 200,000 other entries that he could, in two rounds, he can lose 10 strokes putting. He's just one of those guys that can move that. Now, I'm not saying that's going to happen, but if it does happen, don't sit there with your mouth open like you're watching springtime for Hitler and the producers. Well, I don't know how to segue from that, but I do want to talk about Rory. Nate, Nate just teased it.

You know, it's the 2012 thing. It's narrative, narrative, narrative, narrative, narrative, narrative. Rory's back. He's buoyed by the crowds. We saw him at Quail Hollow. He said after Quail Hollow. I love having the people. He's got the bounce back in his step.

The price is terrible. And I imagine the whole world is also. on Rory, and yet it feels like I'm going to look at myself in the mirror on Sunday and feel like a dumbass for not having Rory exposure somewhere. Yeah, I have none, and it's nothing against Rory.

He's the favorite for a reason. He has the most likely chance of winning this tournament. But I just look, when it comes to something like Daily Fantasy, you really have to weigh the cost benefits of it. And the big thing that I, when people talk about fading the popular players, you don't just fade a popular player because

they're popular. There's probably a reason that they're so incredibly popular because they're good plays this week. And at the top, between the top six guys, like, if you look at a head-to-head, for example, this is probably the best way to explain it. If Rory is going to be just theoretically 25% owned in a 200,000-person field, if he wins, that means you're going to have to have him on your team. Sure, but if he's 25% owned, a quarter of the field also has Rory McElroy, and then you need your other five guys to still beat 25% of the field.

That's a really tough path. It's not like your odds have gotten a little bit better, but it's the only. it's still extremely unlikely that you're going to come through and win a million dollars in that circumstance. And that's really what I'm talking about here. You want to play like a 50-50 or a cash game or anything like that, then it's a bit different. But if Rory's 25%, he's the most expensive guy, and even on the betting board, he's 10 to 1 in a lot of spots. And let's say Dustin is 20 to 1. Does that mean that Rory is a minus 200 favorite over Dustin Johnson and a head-to-head? No, he's not. So what are the odds telling us?

So, Pat, you are a master at handicapping. And I need you to handicap. four very, very important things for me. And they are the four specialty cocktails in the Kiowa Island Golf Resort Rider Cup bar. So I'm going to take you through them and I need you to rank them in order. We've got a Gator Bite, which is St. George Green Chili vodka, Quintra, jalapeno, jalap, and fresh citrus juices. We've got Pete's Punch, which is definitely in reference to Mr. Dye, which is Bacardi ate rum, cream of coconut, passion fruit puree, pineapple juice, and nutmeg. We've got a sweet tea mojito, which is what it sounds like, sweet tea vodka, lemon, mint, club soda. And we've got to grip it and sip it, which is silver tequila, apparel, grapefruit, lime, club soda.

Take me through it. Well, the gator, the vodka off the top is the clear number one for me. It's spicy. The Gator bite. Yeah. With the jalapino, that sounds absolutely excellent. I'm going to go to the back end here. What was the tequila one called?

To grip it and sip it. Yeah. Just the name itself. Plus the tequila, that just sounds directly in my wheelhouse. I don't do well with rum in general. I'm not a real pleasant person to be around once I start getting the rum into myself. But that's still going to come in third place because sweet tea is god awful. I cannot drink that.

It's not in your DNA, buddy. We understand that. I just, that dance, it's just a hard pass for me. House, where are you going on that? I want you to go. I know where I'm at. I know where, you know. I mean, it's the Gator Bite for me. Okay. I just got to go to this.

St. George green chili vodka seems to be something they're very excited about. And when you add in the jalapeno syrup, that's what it is for me. I love that drink. That's a one B drink for me. My only concern with it, the only reason that it's 1B is because I don't feel like I could sit and drink six of them because what I would be worried about is like the next day. You don't want to walk out, go out and walk around the ocean course. Well, maybe. Maybe doing.

Listen, I withheld one thing, which is that they've got an ocean course Bloody Mary, which is that chili vodka, but it has a house made bloody merry mix with it. So that's one way to avoid the jalapeno syrup. Oh, you just start the day with the bloody. That goes without saying, I'm on. This is amazing. Pat Mayo and I must be separated at birth. We really are on the group. world the same way. Well, because tequila

and apparel, uh, plus, you know, the club soda for a little bit of, you're maybe talking me into it. I mean, that's a, that's a, that's a, and especially because like, it puts you in the, in, in, in mind of it's getting warmer. Like, this is the beauty of this tournament occurring in May. I really, kudos to the PGA of America for putting this where it is. And by the way, the, the embarrassment of riches,

we have seven major championships in 12 months, boys. I mean, we argue about whether or not the tour, there could be five championships. This is a, it's magnificent. I just, let's keep going. Is there any way to keep this rolling along? Well, not without a global pandemic, but yeah. No, I don't want that. That doesn't have to be the price.

I got to pushback against that, too. It's taken away from the Byron Nelson's of the world and the colonials of the world. Wah. Yeah, but those are events I actually hit winners at, not majors. Oh, my God. Got it. Yes, yes, yes. You weren't on KH. That was all Feinberg.

Feinberg had KH. You didn't have nothing. Your boy had him. Feinberg had him, but I had a guest on my show last week. Pat Mayo experience, some people don't know. And we got into a debate

about KH Lee versus Wyndham Clark. And I was big team Wyndham Clark. He was giving me the hard sell on KHL. He had done all this research on the course. He was like, this is essentially just Phoenix. KH Lee came second in Phoenix. It's going to be a birdie fest.

Burdy Fess are, you know, it's going to mitigate all the top guys at the field because it makes the bad players just kind of normalized because these holes are just so easy. It's hard for the best player's skill to take over. He's like, 200 to 1, KHA. I was like, you are insane. Give me Wyndham Clark a hundred times out of 100. Here I am poor, and he's rich. So Wyndham Clark is last guy in this week.

Maybe that's a sign that you're just one week off and we need to put a little spread on him this week. Nate makes a great point. Nate makes a great point, Mayo. I had a top 20 on him, too. and he had like the worst Sunday of anyone on the course. Fortunately, my guy Pat and Keziar made a run. So that was fine for me. I'm looking at the weather right now.

And you're right. And it looks pretty benign until Sunday. And then it gets messy. Well, you know, fingers crossed. We want a messy Sunday. And let's all enjoy our drink of choice from the Rider Cup room down there at the ocean course. We'll replicate it. I'm going to try and pull some of this stuff together here at the home bar.

Grip it and sip it. Pat Mayo, always a pleasure. Thank you so much for joining us. You know you have a standing invitation anytime you want to come on. And don't worry, it will be spring there in at least, no more than 60 days. No more than 60 days will spring arrive in Canada.

I'm not good at Celsius to Fahrenheit conversion, but I believe it's like 68 here today. Oh, that's a great day. Okay, well, good. It's very nice. I might go play golf this afternoon. Who knows? I did want to run, I wanted to run one,

by it before I got out here. Go ahead. Tell me, just based on, like, the eclectic names that we saw last time at this course, I was trying to find a leaderboard that could resemble one this week. And this is the leaderboard that I found. We'll go from, you know, this is the top 10. We'll start at 10 and go all the way to the winner. Speeth, Couture, Beano, Tiger, Eddie Pepperel, Kevin Chappell,

Zander, Rose, Rory, Kisner, Molinarie. Doesn't that sound like a leaderboard that could, that type of, like, you have a bit of a different mix, all great short game players. And it doesn't matter like you have Rory in there who's a big distance driver, Coocher who's a short hitter. Maui, who's just really good tea to green and made all of his 10 foot pots at Carnusti about three years ago. It just reminds me of that's what this leaderboard is going to look like.

I love it. I love it. That's a good one. Well, we'll put that alongside the. Just don't bet on tiger. Giant better bottle of tequila that I'm going to have for this tournament. All right, fellas. good times. Thanks, Pat Mayo.

Thank you guys. All right, my birdie buddies, there you have it. A lot of things to chew on. A lot of value out there. Shared by our golf analytic homies, Rick Damon and Pat Mayo. Don't forget the Fandul, Roland Doe competition is still out there. You can get a lineup in. It's a single entry.

And we're keeping a season long leaderboard. Each one of the four majors is worth five. thousand bucks. There's $50,000 guaranteed at the end of this four tournament situation. And look, it's not too late. If you didn't get in on the Masters or if you were bad at the Masters, still three majors out there to go grab some glory. Get on to fandule.com. Look for the fairway Roland Doe contest. Get an entry in. It's only five bucks. And then go make yourself a wonderful grip it and rip it and just enjoy the tournament. We will be back on Sunday night with a Nate Dog and I and keep your eyes open to our socials.

Me, Kevin Clark and the Nate Dog, Nathan Hubbard, we'll be looking for some opportunities to jump into the locker room and maybe give some live action recap as the whole thing goes down. My par saving pals, that's it. Good luck with the R-O-Y out there. And let's go hit him straight.