Ben Coley's golf betting tips: AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am preview and best bets
After places at 25/1 and 50/1 last week on the PGA Tour, golf expert Ben Coley looks for more contenders in this week's event at the iconic Pebble Beach.
Golf betting tips: AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am
3pts e.w. Andrew Putnam at 28/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Russell Knox at 80/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,)
1pt e.w. Nate Lashley at 100/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Brandon Wu at 175/1 (Sky Bet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Chesson Hadley at 250/1 (Sky Bet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
0.5pt e.w. James Hahn at 500/1 (Sky Bet 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
It's Groundhog Day on the PGA Tour as, for the third week in succession and thankfully the final time this season, the PGA Tour takes in a multi-course event on the west coast. January truly is the worst.
Bill Murray is sure to feature in the coverage for the dozens of people worldwide who want to see him play golf, and no doubt we'll get a deep dive into the fundamentals of Gareth Bale's technique during the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, a spectacle that will test the patience of many people including those daring to type 4-0-5 into their Sky remotes.
Come to think of it, I don't believe I've ever seen Bale's football analysed the way his golf swing will be as, and you can colour me cantankerous here, my chosen sport continues to bewilder. Each to their own but there might be four or five things in the entire world that interest me less than the Welshman's wrist position at the top. One of them is the spec of that new driver and its unnecessarily jaunty spelling of the word paradigm.
On which, let's shift back to something I do believe: that, despite my nihilistic refusal to play ball with Max Homa, these tournaments tend to stick to the course history form book really well. Perhaps that's because players in this field will have to take on three rather than one or two, making it hard for newcomers to learn all they need to early in the week. The pro-am element also plays its part – those who don't have to get to know someone new might, for the most part at least, be at an advantage.
Speculation is required as to the root cause, but we only need look at the Dunhill Links and the AmEx for hard evidence. Joakim Lagergren is almost always a big price on the DP World Tour yet when he turns up in Scotland he's a colossus. Tyrrell Hatton's back-to-back wins, before he became world-class, had much to do with the relationship he struck up with the handsome man off the telly, and shock winner Oli Wilson broke through at the scene of an earlier play-off defeat.
As for the AmEx, Hudson Swafford has won it twice, Andrew Landry almost has, and David Lingmerth has twice been second. Adam Hadwin has done that runner-up double and although Jon Rahm's brilliance best explains his own brace of titles, Bill Haas is another who has managed it. Si Woo Kim had gone well before beating Patrick Cantlay. As was true over the North and South courses at Torrey Pines, previous form in the event has almost been essential.
That leads me to Jordan Spieth, whose exemplary record in the event includes a win, third place in 2021 and second last year, and who has shown promise in both starts this year despite an embarrassing plummet from favourite to missed cut in the Sony Open last time out.
With Matt Fitzpatrick and Viktor Hovland both helping ever so slightly to hold up Spieth's price, it's somewhat tempting to buy into the record of home players in this event. It's been going for almost a century, and their stranglehold has only ever been broken by golfers from Australia, Fiji and Canada, so history if nothing else is against those two European Ryder Cup players and in favour of Spieth.
However, I can't get away from the fact his long-game has been shoddy at times since Christmas and while he'll have been working hard to resolve that, it does make these circumstances quite different to when he won at Harbour Town following a Masters missed cut almost a year ago.
Single-figure prices reveal much about this field, as do odds of 16/1 about Maverick McNealy, so I'll make ANDREW PUTNAM the confident headline selection as he bids for redemption following a poor finish last year.
Putnam was the 54-hole leader but, perhaps still struggling physically following a bout of Covid and no doubt suffering from contention rust, he gradually slipped down the leaderboard to finish in a share of sixth.
One year on and he's taken further steps forward, particularly when it comes to contending having done so at the ZOZO Championship, RSM Classic and Sony Open already this season, a 62-68 weekend in the latter event representing a fine start to the new year.
Putnam said he felt a little rusty in Hawaii so the eight rounds he managed across that and at the AmEx should have him fully tuned up for a return to what could be more favourable conditions, these poa annua greens certainly familiar to a player hailing from Washington.
"The greens here are very similar to what I grew up on in the Pacific Northwest, so I feel really comfortable out here and I grew up on some greens with a lot of slope and a lot of speed, so these look good to my eye," he said last year.
"It's a place I've always felt pretty comfortable at I played here a bunch, I played a lot of pro-ams outside of the PGA Tour events here and I love really fast, slopy greens. I feel like I can visualise the balls going in really well and the putter's been working pretty good."
That wasn't the case at the AmEx, yet such has been Putnam's improvement of late that he was still comfortably able to make the cut – officially his 14th in succession, which places him behind only Rahm and Xander Schauffele in the rolling list, one place ahead of Cantlay, and underlines just how well he's playing.
At 62nd in the world, he's improved almost a hundred places from this time last year and this tournament looks an ideal place to complete his return to the top 50.
Seamus Power is already there and looked for 36 holes last year as though he'd make this the scene of his second win. Instead, that came in Bermuda, and with his iron play sharp in Abu Dhabi last time he looks to hold an obvious chance. He'd be preferred to Justin Rose at the odds, though the latter has offered plenty of promise, but I can't see a great deal of value at the front end of this market.
And that's just fine. We've got high-class fields in Phoenix and at Riviera to come, tournaments which will no doubt be dominated by the best players in the sport. This is our best chance of an upset in February and I'll happily throw some darts in that direction.
The idea that course form stacks up here clearly doesn't mean we have to focus squarely on the favourites, because the format also lends itself to strange results such as wins for Ted Potter, Vaughn Taylor, Nick Taylor and DA Points.
While he can be wild at times, the one I'm most excited about here is CHESSON HADLEY, who would fit the bill were he to go on and bag his second PGA Tour title.
Hadley's course form is really strong, three top-10 finishes including a career-best performance in the 2019 US Open, and he spoke there of having played Pebble Beach more than 50 times. No wonder he also labelled it his favourite course in the world.
He's not alone in that view but not everyone translates it to the kind of record he has, which has seen him better the field average at the host course in six of his eight starts in this event, 18th place in 2020 a more recent form line than back-to-back top-10s at the very beginning of his career.
Hadley of course went on to win in Puerto Rico to give us a very strong correlating form line. So many winners there had marked our cards here, Hadley included, and the likes of Ted Potter, Vaughn Taylor, Nick Taylor and Tom Hoge tie them together, as do several others including Putnam.
Another good pointer is River Highlands, where Spieth once edged out subsequent Pebble Beach winner Daniel Berger and where Hadley sprang into life with fifth place last summer, so the idea that this event could and should bring out the best in him has plenty of substance to it.
The issue on paper is a run of missed cuts which now stands at three, but each has been by a narrow margin and last time out he shot 73-70-65 in the AmEx, his short-game costing him at the Stadium Course and ultimately denying him a Sunday tee-time.
Hadley had previously struck the ball really well in the Sony Open so having shot a bogey-free, seven-under 65 when last we saw him, I don't think he's all that far away from the form that saw him sign off last season with two top-10 finishes in his final three starts.
Returning to Pebble Beach is a definite positive and it's worth knowing that he was in seemingly dire form before each of his top-10s in the event, as he was prior to his runner-up finish at Congaree in 2021, where he should've won.
That's Hadley in a nutshell, and if you can cope with the downside then there's plenty of upside at massive odds.
Amateur star ready to soar
BRANDON WU also has fond memories of the 2019 US Open, finishing mid-pack as an amateur on the day of his graduation, and this Californian youngster looks like he's really finding his feet as a professional.
Winner of the Korn Ferry Tour Championship in 2020, Wu had to wait to graduate to the PGA Tour and had got into some bad habits before being handed his card. Accordingly, the first few months of his career at this level were tough as he missed nine cuts in 10 and generally by a good margin.
However, he wasn't all that far off making the weekend here during a miserable spell and perhaps that's not surprising, because as well as that major performance he managed to sit eighth at halfway on his debut in this event, very early on during his professional career and before he'd won anything of note.
Also significant is that when Wu's form did turn last year, it came in Puerto Rico, where he finished third. Subsequent top-10s by the coast in Mexico and Scotland confirmed what we saw both here and when he qualified for the Open Championship in the summer of 2019, that playing by the coast often brings out the best in the Stanford graduate.
Halfway leader in the Wyndham Championship at the end of last season, another short course, Wu is sure to prefer this kind of challenge and again like Hadley, his recent missed cuts hide some generally encouraging performances.
In the AmEx last time he shot 68-64 over his final two rounds, before that he'd missed the cut narrowly on his Sony Open return, and he'd made seven cuts in a row before Christmas to again suggest that his game is in a good place granted favourable conditions.
He'll have them here, and with his approach work showing signs of improvement, Wu can go well.
As Sam Ryder showed last week, patience and perseverance is sometimes required if you're prepared to back golfers at big prices, and in that spirit I'll chance NATE LASHLEY again at 100/1.
Lashley was a bit of a letdown in the AmEx, never really threatening to get involved, but before that he'd done everything well for seventh place in the Sony Open and on that form he'd be a big player.
As with Hadley and Wu, he played well in the US Open here and in Lashley's case, it sparked a dream week on his next start as he dominated the Rocket Mortgage Classic to win by a wide margin.
The potential for Lashley to do something like that had been there for a long time and while he's yet to back it up, Pebble Beach looks a good place to do so based not just on his US Open effort but on fifth place in 2021 and 28th in 2022.
He's always played the host course well, beating the field average on every start in this, his correlating form comes courtesy of two top-10s in two trips to Puerto Rico, and Lashley has a very similar profile to a couple of the big-priced winners of the event.
Given that he turned 40 in December and went so well on his very next start, there's a lot I like about his profile and it's only one poor week in the desert that needs forgiving.
In an event like this, one of the handful for which Arizona-based Lashley will ever appeal, I'm very happy to do so.
Knox getting back to his best
Doug Ghim and Luke Donald made some appeal along with Greyson Sigg, who has amateur form here and played well for a couple of rounds on his debut in the event, but I'll break from the USA-all-the-way theme to include RUSSELL KNOX, who looks like he's close to producing a really big performance.
Knox's iron play has been right back to its best this season and especially so either side of Christmas, a period during which he's also shown flashes of promise with the putter.
Poa annua greens raise a concern but he has often putted well at Pebble Beach, a course which matches up really nicely with a game that relies on finding fairways and dialling in approach shots – indeed it's similar to that of the defending champion, Hoge.
Knox's comfort levels at the host venue can be seen in the fact he's ranked fourth and third for strokes-gained approach on his last two visits and was the fourth-best scorer at Pebble Beach when 15th overall in 2018.
All told he's played the event nine times, making six cuts, and bagging seventh place a couple of years ago. That saw him lie second entering the final round only to incur an unfortunate penalty on the very first hole, from which he did well to recover.
As was the case both then and last year, his form coming into the event was modest, whereas this time around he's missed one cut all season and that when shooting 70-69 at the Shriners. That, combined with the consistency he's showing with his approach work, is why I believe Knox is as close as he's been in some time to the player who reached the world's top 20.
When doing so he won at River Highlands, a course which as mentioned correlates well with this, and there seems every chance that he gives backers a real run for their money at a nice each-way price.
Alex Smalley is one to watch but experience generally pays here, so between Brendon Todd and JAMES HAHN I'll opt for the truly speculative option to round things off.
Hahn shot 72-76 at the Farmers last week and has missed both cuts this year, failing to break 70 in five rounds, so there are obvious negatives which explain massive prices.
Still, he's a Californian with course form courtesy of third place on his debut in the event, and one who has gone on to win twice at top-class courses. Difficult conditions undeniably suit and, for a pro-am event, that's what we have here at Pebble Beach.
It's also worth stating that his iron play is red-hot, ranking 12th on the PGA Tour this season, while the awful short-game issues he demonstrated before Christmas have been far less prevalent since the return.
Ultimately he's putted badly the last fortnight and there's been a two-year problem with that club, but Hahn does at least spike from time to time and as a proven winner in this grade he looks well overpriced given we've only one area of weakness.
Anything 250/1 and bigger is worth a dart and that's very much the way I'd suggest playing things before we get a little more serious in the coming weeks.
Posted at 1715 GMT on 30/01/23
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