Farmers Insurance Open: Free betting tips from Ben Coley
Golf expert Ben Coley has five fancies for the Farmers Insurance Open, where Tiger Woods returns to action.
Farmers Insurance Open selections
1pt e.w. Gary Woodland at 50/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6) - loves it here and primed to go well again
1pt e.w. Jhonattan Vegas at 60/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6) - in the form of his life; third here as a rookie
1pt e.w. Beau Hossler at 150/1 (1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7) - plenty of course experience and a huge talent
For details of advised bookmakers and each-way terms, visit our transparent tipping record
The mark of a quality golf course, or in this case two quality golf courses, is whether it or they open themselves up to myriad methods of attack.
Take Doral as an example of a bad golf course, where in recent years the pendulum swung too far in favour of big hitters. It's a skill, as well as a gift, to be able to clout the ball 350 yards, but I hope we never see the day that there is no room on the PGA Tour for those who go about scoring in an altogether more subtle way. When the WGC-Cadillac Championship swapped Doral for Mexico and got a new name, it also found a better home.
In contrast to Doral, Torrey Pines - both the South Course and its kinder sibling, the North - strike the right balance. The South is brutally long on paper, but the advantage that gives to big-hitters is dependent on either their powers of control or recovery. If the hare loses focus, the tortoise can overtake it. Likewise the North offers short-iron approaches to par-fives for some, but those taking a more reserved approach are allowed to do so.
We've seen in recent editions of the Farmers Insurance Open that some of the most athletic players in the sport have been crowned champion, such as Jason Day, Bubba Watson and latterly Jon Rahm, but then there has been Brandt Snedeker and Ben Crane, while KJ Choi and CT Pan have, perversely, found that their ability to keep the ball in play off tee can be more useful at the monster South than it is on many shorter layouts.
Throw in spectacular views of the Pacific Ocean and you have yourself a must-see golf tournament, without even reaching for the return to proper PGA Tour golf of Tiger Woods, who has won this title on no fewer than seven occasions.
There are only five players in the market who are shorter than Tiger, whose latest reincarnation at the Hero World Challenge was packed full of promise. Forget the scorecard, which itself was encouraging as he took the lead midway through the second round; the most pleasing aspect of Woods' return was the speed with which he swung, and the shock willingness to hit more than a timid fade.
In the end, eight players finished ahead of Woods in the Bahamas and eight were behind, and a similar mid-table finish of those who make the cut would surely be considered a success here. It's difficult to avoid getting swept away in the excitement of what could be this year - so difficult that many of Woods' peers have not managed it - but for now I see very little point in speculating as to whether he can compete, even here. My finger in the air says 25/1 is on the short side, but not unexpectedly so. I'd have rushed to chance him at 50s make no mistake.
Rahm heads the betting, of course, having collected his fourth title on Sunday, this time via a play-off. The Spaniard is ticking things off as he goes and a first successful title defence at the first attempt would surprise nobody, but having reluctantly and foolishly swerved him last week, backing him against an altogether stronger bunch and with more on his plate away from the course isn't really an option.
With Rickie Fowler having largely struggled here of late and doubts surrounding Jason Day, who has yet another new man on the bag and hasn't performed here since winning the title in 2015, I quite like the shape of the market from an each-way perspective and first on my list is Gary Woodland.
While most in this field will be relishing a crack at the North Course and hoping they can hang on once switched to the tougher South, Woodland sees the latter as a venue which suits better than perhaps any other on the circuit.
"I feel I have a huge advantage out here," he said two years ago when contending for this title and that's because he feels comfortable unleashing his preferred cut with the driver, which Woodland says is the shot you need for 54 holes of grind on the South Course.
Such is his awesome athletic power, Woodland often finds he has to hold back at certain other locations but this one allows him to take a more aggressive approach, and when that's the case he's extremely dangerous.
The 33-year-old has long been at his best on the west coast, too, having burst onto the scene with a play-off defeat in the CareerBuilder Challenge and finished second, beaten by Rory McIlroy, in the final of the WGC-Match Play at Harding Park in San Francisco.
Here, he's led at halfway (2016) and after 54 holes (2014), and on the latter occasion was still in there with a big chance to win the title before a drive which set off left and didn't this time come back to the fairway cost him a double-bogey at the 71st hole.
On both occasions, he'd made an encouraging start to the season in Hawaii and that's once again the case here, after he led the field in birdies and putted well above-average on his way to a top-10 finish in the Sony Open, where slow green speeds seem to suit.
That will again be the case on the poa annua surfaces of Torrey Pines and if this habitually poor putter can again make ground on the field on the greens, he should be a major factor in search of a third PGA Tour title, which would be long overdue.
Woodland had a big chance to win the RBC Canadian Open at Glen Abbey last year, and that event throws up some serious leaderboard ties with the Farmers Insurance Open.
Snedeker and Day have won at both courses in recent years, while two-time Glen Abbey champion Jhonattan Vegas has been third at Torrey Pines and calls it one of his favourite venues on the circuit.
Perhaps, then, Vegas can continue what's been a fine start to the year by becoming the latest player to win both events.
The Venezuelan was seventh in the Tournament of Champions, before four sub-70 rounds last week saw him share 11th in the CareerBuilder Challenge, the event in which he overcame Woodland to win his first title in 2011.
It was shortly after that when Vegas threatened to win the Farmers title which instead went to Bubba Watson but his affinity with the course in fact stretches back to junior golf, when he realised that this regular PGA Tour and major venue plays to his big, high-hitting strengths.
"I think it's a course that suits my game really well," he said. "Going back to junior golf, I had success here playing the Junior World and almost won here four years ago, so it's just a place that I feel comfortable and it suits my game really well."
Vegas made just four bogeys last week in a really solid display in which he again putted nicely, and now that he's fit and healthy firmly believes that he can graduate to the real elite in world golf.
I wouldn't put it past him, either, given how tough a competitor he is and there's no doubt he's good enough to win an event like this one. At prices in the region of 60/1, one of the form players in the field looks well worth an each-way bet.
Phil Mickelson was fairly pleased with his golf last week and I was tempted to give him another chance at twice the price, while Luke Donald hit it better than he scored when I put him up in Hawaii and the 40-year-old remains one to keep a very close eye on as he works hard to establish himself as a Ryder Cup contender once more.
But rather than hope that Donald's ball-striking remains solid, I'd rather take the less speculative view that Kevin Streelman will soon be rewarded for the consistency of his long game.
Streelman, who will turn 40 himself later this year, has been inside the top-30 for ball-striking on all six starts this season, ranking inside the top three on three occasions including last week, and providing he remains patient I expect he'll soon bag the big cheque his play deserves.
He's a very different golfer to Vegas and Woodland, but no less a fan of a venue which he says has suited him since his rookie season a decade ago, when he sat second at halfway but struggled over the weekend as Tiger romped to the easiest of his seven titles.
Clearly, playing with Woods on Saturday was too much for Streelman to handle at the time but after a fallow period he's remembered what it takes to play these courses in recent years, finishing a gallant third in 2016 and sitting sixth at halfway last year before a poor weekend again proved costly.
Never before has he arrived in such control of his golf ball, so I'm hopeful he can be the latest player to demonstrate that power is not the only route to this championship. His previous two PGA Tour titles came on classical, demanding courses and under these conditions he's worth a bet at 100/1.
Some may scoff at the idea that form in the Junior World Golf Championships carries any weight here, but I would strongly disagree. This annual event, played at Torrey Pines, offers the best young golfers from around the world the opportunity to get a taste for one of the most iconic venues on the PGA Tour and there are several who've returned to put their experience to use as professionals.
The best example in recent years is Day, who won the Junior Worlds here, but perhaps the one who underlines the value of the experience best is his compatriot Andrew Buckle. He won the Juniors' 15-17 title in both 1999 and 2000 and, despite never really looking like a player capable of winning at the highest level, finished fourth on what was his only start at Torrey Pines as a professional.
There are others, too. Vegas was sixth as a junior, third as a professional; Tiger won both; Martin Flores has gone close in both, as has Pat Perez; various other players have said that coming here as an amateur gave them a direct advantage as a professional.
As such, I'm keen to explore some options and one of the most appealing is Grayson Murray, who has three Torrey Pines titles to his name as a junior and is in very solid form at present. Last year's winner of the low-key Barbasol Championship is building on the promise he showed as a junior and looks certain to win a more prestigious title at some stage, possibly starting here.
However, the two I'm most interested in are Aaron Wise and Beau Hossler, both of whom played nicely last week when selected at big prices, and narrow preference is for the latter.
Hossler is arguably the most promising rookie in world golf having performed wonders on the college circuit and he has the advantage of being from California, although in pursuit of further improvement he's since relocated to Texas and plays out of the course which will host the Byron Nelson come the spring.
Still, he knows Torrey Pines particularly well, having won the Junior Worlds and gone close on several other occasions, and coupled with the fact that he's already put his name at the top of a couple of leaderboards this season that makes him worth sticking with for another week.
Hossler is a dynamite putter who is particularly at home on poa annua greens and he has some positive experience of this event, having opened with a round of 67 and closed strongly to sneak inside the top 50 when playing on an invite this time last year.
Wise is almost as appealing, but he's less reliable with the putter and given that he made some mistakes from tee-to-green last week, when he finished just behind Hossler, that's just about enough to put me off. Still, he too made the cut on an invite here a year ago and he hits it miles, so don't be shocked if he features.
A number of others earned a place on the shortlist, such as the super-consistent Corey Conners, the wild but still capable Rory Sabbatini and last week's nearly-man Andrew Landry, who said after losing to Rahm that Torrey Pines is 'obviously' a place that suits his game and could contend for the third event in four.
However, with some wind in the forecast this looks a good opportunity for Ollie Schniederjans to build on an encouraging return to action in the Sony Open and he's much preferred.
Like Hossler, Schniederjans was one of the very best amateurs in the world - so good that he bagged a top-15 finish in The Open - and it took him very little time to win on the Web.com Tour soon after turning professional.
Since then, he's enjoyed a fine rookie season at the top table, going down all guns blazing to Henrik Stenson at the Wyndham Championship, and one of his best efforts during the early part of the campaign was ninth here at Torrey Pines.
It's little surprise that Schniederjans has played some of his best golf on distinctly classical courses, because his game is a portmanteau of old and new; he hits it long, but as we saw on the final hole of the Wyndham, his preferred ball-flight is a bullet which barely gets off the ground.
This sort of creativity helped him play so well at the Old Course back in 2015 and it works well at Torrey Pines, particularly when the wind blows, so having been pleased with his putting in the Sony my hope is we're treated to the full repertoire from a player with an extraordinarily bright future.
Schniederjans and Hossler will both take encouragement from Rahm's victory here last year, which felt like the moment the wall came down. No longer are rookies and players in their early twenties to consider any event beyond their reach.
A close friend of standout 2017 performer Justin Thomas, expect Schniederjans to start to make his own headlines in the near future. Perhaps that will start at Torrey Pines.
Posted at 1155 GMT on 23/01/18.