Free betting tips: Ben Coley's RSM Classic preview
Five tips ranging from 55/1 to 250/1 make up Ben Coley's attack on the RSM Classic, the final full-field event on the PGA Tour this year.
The usual suspects are in town for the RSM Classic, an event with an end-of-term feel which does now represent the end of term. Granted, Tiger Woods' return at the Hero World Challenge next week will generate many more headlines, but when it comes to FedEx Cup points, Masters invites and meaningful silverware, this is where the PGA Tour signs off for Christmas.
It's no secret that Sea Island, Georgia is home not only to this event, but to a dozen or more professionals who have not been able to resist its private runway, golf coaches and courses and, by all accounts, unmissable cuisine. Davis Love III is head of the so-called Sea Island Mafia and he'll doubtless host a barbecue on Saturday night as players begin to unwind at the end of another long year.
All of which is to underline the possibility that something strange occurs in terms of the result. Last year, we were treated to a five-way play-off which extended into Monday, albeit without Billy Horschel after his shocking miss from no more than 18 inches the night before. In the end a rookie by the name of Mackenzie Hughes emerged with his first PGA Tour title, but had he failed to then the champion would have represented no less of a shock.
That being said, Kevin Kisner was as obvious a winner as you could wish for in 2015 and the case for Chris Kirk wasn't much more complex two years earlier. Throw in narrow defeats for Bill Haas and Webb Simpson and it's not like this has proven to be a puzzle beyond solving, yet I can't shake the feeling that it's best to try to find a way to get the favourites beaten in an event which saw Tommy Gainey lap the field and Heath Slocum hold them at bay.
Kisner heads the market and is the one I respect most on the back of another excellent season, which culminated in a deserved Presidents Cup debut. He's a winner who is ideally suited to the courses used for this event: Sea Island GC, the host venue which plays to around 7,000 yards as a par 70, and the par-72 Plantation, introduced for one round the same year Kisner won the first of two PGA Tour titles.
Beyond Kisner, there's nothing to fear. Matt Kuchar's last win came in 2014, Simpson's in 2013, and Charles Howell III's drought stretches back to 2007. We were on board CH3 last week but he's now half the price and is absolutely not the type of player you want to be siding with at sub-33/1, however good he looked when slinging his ball into the wind on Sunday afternoon.
I'm a fan of Ollie Schniederjans, of course, and he'll do for many having come close here a year ago and continued to progress since, but I couldn't call 33/1 any kind of gift. He's chalked up at the same price as one of the toughest, most prolific competitors around in Zach Johnson and that's largely on the strength of one good week one year ago. I wouldn't be certain that courses like these will prove to be Schiederjans' optimum conditions in the fullness of time. As for Johnson, he's yet to contend here and might be one of those residents who takes their eye off the ball.
You get the picture. Last year's bookmaker-friendly result and a head of the market which is at once solid and soft forces the eye further down the list and while we'll work back up it afterwards, I want to start with 250/1 chance Kelly Kraft.
This event always lends itself to some kind of link with Sea Island, be it via residents like Johnson or Love III, or college form in an event such as the Jones Cup.
In Kraft's case, it's a degree more personal than that: he got married at Sea Island four years ago, for reasons I'm not quite sure of given that he is from Denton (like the best ever death metal band...) Perhaps the connection is to do with his wife, who LinkedIn tells me studied with Kraft at Southern Methodist University, but I suppose she may well have made her way there from Georgia. Or maybe Kraft just didn't want his wedding guests to have to travel far. Who knows?
Whatever the explanation, this looks a great venue for Kraft to put up a performance to match his second place to Jordan Spieth at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro Am back in February, a significant one given that it too is a multi-course event by the coast. Hughes, last year's winner, went on to finish 10th at Pebble and while hardly the strongest link you'll find, the same players tend to pop up on exposed courses with a sea view.
Prior to that, Kraft was most famous for upstaging red-hot favourite Patrick Cantlay in the final of the 2011 US Amateur, under windy conditions I might add, and it's tempting to speculate that seeing his old foe win the Shriners a fortnight ago will add fuel to the fire as Kraft seeks his breakthrough.
That event in Las Vegas was also Kraft's latest start and he was second at halfway, before struggling as conditions worsened. That's very much been the issue of late - good play undermined by serious mistakes, such as a nine in Korea when a top-20 finish was within reach - but it's all factored into the price.
Typically an excellent putter, which historically has been a good starting point here, Kraft is capable of adding to a win on the Web.com Tour at this sort of level and there's enough to like to take a chance at 250/1 after he finished 21st here a year ago.
Another candidate who interests me at a big price is Tyler Duncan, who can be backed at just a shade shorter than Kraft.
Although probably not among the genuine standouts of the new batch of Web.com players, Duncan has already bagged a top-five finish at the Safeway Open and therefore has less pressure on his shoulders than others jostling for position in the reshuffle.
Two missed cuts followed that effort in California, but Duncan battled through to the weekend in Mexico and may well have found that something clicked, given that he hit a remarkable 35 greens from 36 over the final two rounds.
That was enough to rank first in greens in regulation, as well as driving accuracy, and the last time he managed that was one week before the Safeway Open, when he was just outside the top 10 in the Web.com Tour Championship.
Fairways-and-greens types like Duncan have done well in this event, which offers little for the power hitters, and he's in great spirits right now having got married not long ago, delaying the honeymoon until after this event. Perhaps celebrations will begin early.
Beau Hossler, by contrast, is probably the pick of the graduates and has already gained some valuable experience in the mix at the Shriners, where he played in the final group.
A Sunday 73 cost Hossler a shot at the title, just as it had when 10th a week earlier, but with more good signs in Mexico last week it's clear that this rapid riser is adjusting to life on the PGA Tour just fine, as his amateur career hinted he would.
"No matter what level you're at, it's kind of a new challenge every time you get into that position," he said in Vegas.
"I enjoy that challenge. I enjoy putting myself in positions where I'll be nervous and testing myself there. If you're not successful that first time, that experience is always going to help you moving forward."
Winner of the Jones Cup in runaway fashion here last February, where he defied extremely difficult conditions to confirm his status as one of the most talented and tenacious amateurs in the world, Hossler is sure to have pencilled in this return to Sea Island some time ago and looks a big enough price to chance.
Martin Piller is interesting, as a multiple winner on the Web.com Tour who looked in good shape last week and seems suited by this sort of challenge, while CT Pan's effort here last year catches the eye along with his standout second place in the Farmers Insurance Open by the California coast.
Braden Thornberry is a youngster with huge potential who succeeded Hossler in winning the prestigious Jones Cup, albeit not here, while there's a straightforward case to be made for Meen-Whee Kim and a slightly more speculative one for Cameron Tringale.
Hudson Swafford is a local resident who is sure to have been buoyed by Patton Kizzire's win, while Kizzire himself got married here two years ago and it wouldn't be a total surprise were he to go in again. He managed two wins and a sixth in a four-week spell on the Web.com Tour and his OHL Classic success was no flash-in-the-pan.
However, I'll sign off with the two who I think look most likely to give their running which, given that they're both available at upwards of 50/1, seems like solid justification alone.
First is Scott Brown, who I thought might be scandalously short here on the back of two top-six finishes in his last three starts, but that isn't the case at 50/1 generally and 55s in places.
Born in Georgia, this is near enough a home game for Brown and three top-20 finishes in four visits to Sea Island show just how comfortable he is here.
That's because Brown is a short hitter who reserves much of his best golf for a small cluster of courses, all of which present a level playing field when it comes to his battle with those who outhit him by 30 yards off the tee.
As well as a best of fourth here in 2013, Brown has placed at the RBC Heritage, John Deere Classic, Wyndham and OHL Classic and he repeats at his favourite venues, too - we saw as much on Sunday in Mexico, where he added sixth to a fifth-placed finish two years ago.
Brown's sole win at this level came at the expense of Jordan Spieth in the Puerto Rico Open, again an event played by the coast, and with all aspects of the game appearing to be in good shape he's well worth a bet at the odds.
Finally, there's plenty in Kevin Streelman's favour as he seeks a third PGA Tour title.
Even by his own high standards, Streelman's ball-striking in this embryonic stage of the '2018' season has been outstanding and the only frustration is he's managed three top-20 finishes without finishing in the frame.
Last week in Mexico he made a remarkable one bogey across the first three rounds and it may just be a case of getting the putter going for one or two rounds at the weekend to get right in the thick of it.
Streelman was sixth here in 2011, one of just three visits, and if his long game remains in the shape it has been in since September, he seems sure to feature at some stage.
Recommended bets: RSM Classic
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Posted at 2150 GMT on 13/11/17.