“Between Bets” is an article series revealing our staff’s best wagers across the NFL, NASCAR and PGA Tour. This week’s bets feature our favorite wagers for the Tour Championship odds.
*Given the structure of this tournament, please take note of whether the suggested bet includes the FedEx Cup Standings advantage starting strokes. The “without the strokes” odds are wagers for the best four-day score, excluding the bonus strokes.
(Odds courtesy of DraftKings Sportsbook)
Tour Championship Betting Picks (Outrights)
- Rory McIlroy (+350 With the Strokes)
- Max Homa (+2800 With the Strokes)
- Russell Henley (+3500 Without the Strokes)
- Tom Kim (+4000 Without the Strokes)
Rory McIlroy (+350 With the Strokes)
Your defending champion is going back-to-back if you ask me! Rory McIlroy is arguably the best golfer in the game. Bias aside, he truly is. He is the best driver in this field and his approach game gets better at a slightly longer range, which this course will demand. East Lake is one of the longer courses these golfers will see season to season. I will take the short odds on the longest and most accurate long driver on tour.
The Achilles heel for McIlroy this year has been his putter, but even that has come around during the playoff stretch. He is rating out 11th in the field in strokes gained putting and seventh for three-putt avoidance. McIlroy is not the best putter in this field, but he does know his way around here and is well-versed on these greens. He should be able to gain this week, as he did last year en route to a Tour Championship victory. He overcame a larger deficit last year and clawed his way back to win. Big payday for McIlroy come Sunday!
Max Homa (+2800 With the Strokes)
If there is anyone outside of single-digit odds who has a shot at winning the Tour Championship despite the starting deficit, it’s Max Homa. Homa is peaking at the right time. He has a sixth and a fifth place thus far during the playoffs and has been gaining strokes left and right to the field since the beginning of July. He started the season scorching hot but faltered a bit mid-season. However, we are now seeing the return to form, and it’s dangerous for the golfers at the top of this board. He is accurate and long off the tee and has a solid approach game from distance. His putter is also in the top 10 on Tour. There really aren’t a lot of holes to poke in Homa’s game. He can go very low, which he will need to do here to take home the win.
Russell Henley (+3500 Without the Strokes)
Russell Henley is playing excellent golf stretching all the way back to the Masters in April. He has been lurking around the top 10 and top 20 all season. The playoffs hit, and here he is with a sixth-place finish at the FedEx St. Jude Championship and an eighth-place finish at the BMW Championship. He is arguably the most accurate player in the field off the tee, hitting fairways at a 72% clip for the season.
Henley’s approach game from the key proximities is also in the top 15 in this field. It’s not his best range, but very serviceable within this field. The putter is steadfast, so there are no concerns there. He’s just been playing solid, consistent golf, and I think the streak continues here. We may see him having the low score at the Tour Championship without the FedEx bonus.
Tom Kim (+4000 Without the Strokes)
Similar to Henley, Tom Kim is an incredibly accurate player. The difference between him and Henley is that Tom Kim is excellent from the long iron approach range that he will be playing from. He is No.1 in this field from the 200+ range and is also No.1 in the par-3 scoring ranges that we’ll see this week. Similar to McIlroy, Kim’s issue tends to be his putter. That has not been the case as of late, fresh off of gaining 3.7 strokes on the greens last week at the BMW Championship. East Lake will pose a more complicated putting challenge, but Kim is so accurate from the ranges he needs to be that I don’t see him having to make hundreds of feet of putts. Just make the ones he can and avoid three-putting, and he has an excellent shot at the Tour Championship.
Other Outrights to Consider this Week:
- Viktor Hovland (+500 With the Strokes)
- Xander Schauffele (+2800 With the strokes)
- Rickie Fowler (+2500 Without the Strokes)
- Collin Morikowa (+2800 Without the Strokes)
- Matthew Fitzpatrick (+3500 Without the Strokes)
- Wyndham Clark (+4000 Without the Strokes)
- Si Woo Kim (+6500 Without the Strokes)
Thanks for reading my best bets for the Tour Championship, and be sure to catch us live every Tuesday night at 8:30 p.m. EST on the 19th Hole Live! Get your bets in, and let’s win some money!