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Ben Coley's golf betting tips: RBC Canadian Open preview and best bets
After an 80/1 winner in his latest PGA Tour preview, golf expert Ben Coley provides five each-way selections for this week's RBC Canadian Open.
Golf betting tips: RBC Canadian Open
1pt e.w. Mackenzie Hughes at 80/1 (Paddy Power, Betfair 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Maverick McNealy at 80/1 (Coral, Ladbrokes 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10)
1pt e.w. Ben Griffin at 100/1 (General 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Carson Young at 160/1 (bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
1pt e.w. Doc Redman at 300/1 (Sky Bet, bet365 1/5 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8)
As Denny McCarthy and Adam Schenk backers will know all too well, for every winner there has to be a loser, and in tournament terms the RBC Canadian Open has fallen into the latter category over the last few years.
The final event to return to the schedule following the Covid-19 shutdown, only doing so last June, it's one whose title sponsor has lost a number of star names to LIV Golf in the interim.
To compound matters, it now finds itself playing second fiddle to the elevated Memorial Tournament in this early-summer run, which means we've just 10 of the world's top 50 taking part. Even the resurgence of Rickie Fowler and former winner Jason Day means they've eyes on the US Open instead.
Fortunately, one of those who is in the field is Rory McIlroy, and he helped serve up a real treat in a Sunday battle with Tony Finau and Justin Thomas on his way to back-to-back wins in the event, separated by three years. That means he returns for the hat-trick bid at the head a cosmopolitan market where winning USA form comes from Sam Burns alone, with Sahith Theegala and Cam Young still looking for their respective breakthroughs.
Still, if there is an event which can cope just fine without a glut of stars, it's this one. The Canadian Open is always given full-throated support by the locals wherever it goes and that will remain true on our first trip to Oakdale Golf & Country Club, a short drive from the centre of Toronto. It's a short course, too, at least by modern standards, and a somewhat rare one as a par 72 with three par-threes and three par-fives.
None will support the event with more vigour than Geoff Fienberg, content creator, golf handicapper, all-round good egg and member of Oakdale. Between selfies with his idol Tommy Fleetwood (join the club, pal), he confirmed much of what many of us will have read about the course: it's classical, tree-lined, parkland and similar to most of its 36 predecessors which have hosted this event.
Geoff, who expects scoring to be lower than last year's 19-under winning total, says the challenge comes from undulation changes and blind approach shots to heavily tiered greens. Beyond that, these PGA Tour professionals should find it extremely scoreable and there's no doubt that the scorecard itself points towards a lot of short-iron approach shots. With wedge in hand, bentgrass greens which are bigger than St George's should be easy enough to find.
History tells us that sticking to the top of the market is the way to play this still prestigious event, with McIlroy, Dustin Johnson and Jason Day on the roll of honour. The leaderboard last year saw McIlroy, Finau and Thomas followed by Sam Burns, Justin Rose and a flying Corey Conners, while in 2019 Rory had to see off Shane Lowry and Webb Simpson, with Matt Kuchar, Brandt Snedeker, Adam Hadwin and Sungjae Im next.
The problem I have is that only Tyrrell Hatton looks an ideal fit from the head of the betting and he's 11/1 and shortening. McIlroy, at no bigger than 5/1, can go ahead and win it again at that sort of price.
Lowry, my pick of the top half dozen or so, would still have a question mark next to his name as regards putting as well as overall strike-rate; he's an 18/1 shot who is generally better supported at bigger odds in stronger fields.
With such a poor middle section this leaves me with nowhere to go but to big prices and I'll start with MACKENZIE HUGHES, who has proven time and again that he can raise his game when it matters most.
He did that in a fashion when landing the Sanderson Farms Championship at the beginning of the season, a time when he had a point to prove following his Presidents Cup omission. He's done it in majors, too, contending for two of them in the summer of 2021, and he stood tall to reach the 2020 TOUR Championship with a gritty back-nine which opened up those future opportunities.
These are good qualities to have in your national Open and Hughes's record over the past four renewals reads 32-8-14-28, one bad round hurting him in 2017 and again last year, with two rock-solid efforts sandwiched in-between.
One of those came at Hamilton, his home course, just an hour from here, and he was in the mix all week before falling out of the places on Sunday. The field was stronger though and he'd gone a long time without winning, whereas this time he returns having validated his breakthrough PGA Tour victory with another down in Mississippi.
As for recent form, that is why he's the price he is. Hughes has missed the cut in four of his five starts since a good 29th at Augusta and in two of the four he wasn't especially close to making it, his long-game ragged and his putting atypically poor for one who still ranks well inside the top 50 on the circuit.
However, two starts ago he wasn't that far away in the PGA Championship and last week he shot 72-68 to miss by one, a notable step forward and one that could just tee him up for the week ahead.
The fact that his iron play was excellent throughout that second round (fourth in the field) is heartening, especially as he's been driving the ball pretty well for the most part this past month, and I can take my chances with the putter.
Maverick wager has merit
There's plenty of excitement about Ludvig Aberg as he makes his professional debut, no doubt somewhat influenced by the performance of Rose Zhang last week. Aberg opened up 150/1 in places but is now closer to the 50/1 mark and as the top-ranked amateur in the world before turning pro, he's a player many within the game believe is going to take on a Rahm-like trajectory.
Still, it took Rahm months rather than days and while Collin Morikawa needed only weeks, as did Matt Wolff, Morikawa played in this event as a massive outsider, finishing 14th. I'd put him up at 400/1 after he opened at 750s and my view is that bookmakers are far more defensive, indeed too defensive, when it comes to these potential stars. My suggestion would be to try Sam Bennett or Michael Thorbjornsen instead if you're that way inclined.
Aberg missed out on qualifying for the US Open on Monday whereas compatriot Vincent Norrman made it, and he'd also be preferred. It seems a bit silly to me that Norrman, also an amateur stud before he made the switch, is a fair chunk bigger than Aberg having been playing well on the PGA Tour for a couple of months. My only worry there would be that his awesome driving is neutered by this course so he's narrowly overlooked.
It's that characteristic which leads me to a risky wager on MAVERICK MCNEALY, seemingly out of sorts since returning from injury and drifting away from the world's top 50 as a result.
McNealy's issues stem from the tee where he's lost strokes in all bar one start so far in 2023, but there are two reasons for cautious optimism as far as this week goes: he may not need to reach for driver very often, but if he does then might his last round of golf represent the turning of the tide?
In shooting a final-round 68 under tough conditions at Colonial, McNealy only climbed 16 places to mid-leaderboard obscurity, but he was the single best player in the field off the tee. Long and far less wild, he built a platform for hitting more greens than all bar one rival that day.
One round of golf isn't much to hang hopes on, but it gives us something with regards a specific area of concern, which in turn allows us to look closer at the biggest positives: his performances under these conditions, namely course, location, and time of year.
Last summer, McNealy went 32-75-MC-MC through May and June, then went on a run of eighth in Illinois, 16th in Scotland, ninth in California. In 2021, form figures of MC-MC-MC preceded 20th at Colonial, then a run of six top-30 finishes which carried him through to the penultimate event of the Playoffs. In 2020, he went 32-58-MC upon returning to action, then 8-MC-7 from Detroit onwards.
So far then, in each of his three seasons on the PGA Tour, McNealy has found something during these summer months. Often, it's coincided with a move away from bermuda greens and onto bentgrass and while he putts both well, these conditions in the north, both in terms of grass but also aesthetics and climate, are certainly more familiar to a player who grew up in California than those found in Florida, Texas, Louisiana and the Carolinas.
There's also a style-of-course element to the argument and it probably relates back to the driver, too. Second at Silverado and Pebble Beach, fourth at Harbour Town, fifth again at Pebble, seventh in the Sony, the Barracuda and at Riviera, eighth in Detroit, 10th in Mexico, McNealy's best performances on the PGA Tour have virtually all come on classical, tree-lined courses, or shorter ones like Pebble Beach where driver isn't often vital.
Given that he's the Tour leader in putting, a club that will need to be called upon if scoring gets below 20-under as I believe it might, perhaps the timing of his massive driving improvement last time out in Texas, albeit over one round, will prove ideal.
At 80/1, we're not having to pay a high price to find out and this big talent is hard to resist.
Lee Hodges is playing well and so might Aaron Rai if he finds something with the putter, but next on my list is another eye-catcher from last week, BEN GRIFFIN.
Like Hughes, he appears to be out of form on the face of it – four missed cuts in five since the Zurich Classic, a far cry from a run of the 15 cuts he'd made in 17 starts prior to that.
However, dig deeper and you'll see that he's been very close to making the weekend on every occasion throughout this latest run, including last week when he ranked behind only Hughes for strokes-gained approach among those who didn't quite make the cut.
Positivity in defeat.
— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) October 30, 2022
An emotional @BenGriffinGolf is optimistic after his best career finish on TOUR. pic.twitter.com/qJjUGBaVhB
Griffin's iron play has improved every week for a month now, a run of five events, so any kind of upturn on and around the greens combined with a return to a shorter course which places less pressure on his driving might be enough to see him find that jolt of improvement we need to get him back into the mix.
Course-wise, Oakdale looks like it could be a really nice fit. Griffin stormed home with a 12-under weekend for fourth place in the Wyndham and has followed it by contending several times, including to a point at Colonial and Harbour Town more recently, two broadly similar layouts to this one.
Still well inside the top 40 on the PGA Tour in birdie average and typically a player who thrives with his irons and putting, I wonder if he might just not have had his conditions of late. Monday's decent US Open qualifying effort suggests he's ticking over nicely and the fact he won in Ontario on the Canadian Tour is another small source of encouragement.
Certainly, Griffin was going off shorter prices in better fields earlier in the year and this recent upturn with his approaches marks him down as one to keep close in the coming weeks. Hopefully he can justify that view by getting back into the mix for what would be the eighth time in this impressive rookie season.
Young finding his stride
In terms of outsiders with more tangible recent form, past champion Chez Reavie's putting continues to impress and he might make it pay before a return to type at some stage, but I prefer the improving CARSON YOUNG.
Three top-25 tee-to-green displays among his last five starts have helped produce four top-25 finishes overall, his only failure coming when missing the cut on the number in the high-class Wells Fargo Championship.
Since that setback he's been 14th in the Nelson and 21st in the Charles Schwab, finding time to dominate a US Open qualifier in the middle, and in doing so avoiding 'golf's longest day' which had several members of this field in action on Monday.
Carson Young just made NINE 3’s in a row at final qualifying for the US Open in Dallas.
— Monday Q Info (@acaseofthegolf1) May 22, 2023
He is blitzing the field and leads by 6. pic.twitter.com/F5xVPPHLsZ
Young's approach play has been right among the best of this bunch since April and he's improved from 153rd to 74th in the putting stats in his five individual starts since the Texas Open, that club well and truly coming alive.
Accurate with the driver as well, he looks the sort of tidy golfer who might enjoy this layout and he's been in excellent scoring form lately. He's also shown something in every department, ranking third off the tee in Mexico, 12th around the green in the Nelson, eighth in putting at Colonial last time, and gaining strokes with his approaches.
If he can pull everything together around the sort of classical course that might sing to a player from South Carolina, improving from the fringes of the top 10 to something inside the top five or six seems perfectly possible at a big price.
Sticking with the theme, I'll take DOC REDMAN to add to an eye-catching profile around classical golf courses.
Second in the Rocket Mortgage Classic in Detroit was his first notable PGA Tour performance as a professional, coming just weeks after another runner-up finish here in Canada, and he's since played well in events like the Wyndham, the Travelers, the Fortinet Championship, the Valspar and the Wells Fargo, each of them on a traditional, tree-lined layout as is Riviera, where he won the US Amateur in 2017.
The reason for prices as big as 300/1 is that he's been largely poor this season, but again we've seen him pop up with better efforts under the right conditions in the Sony (31st) and the Valspar (16th), before an eye-catching 30th at the Nelson last time where he left the field in strokes-gained approach.
Having hit his ball similarly well only to miss the cut at the Heritage, and gained a stroke per round with his long-game in the pairs event in Louisiana, there have been a few signs this spring that he is about to find form again, which makes him really interesting around courses like this one to my mind.
Monday saw him only narrowly miss out on US Open qualifying – he'll be an alternate next week – and that competitive golf might be no bad thing where he's concerned having been absent since the Nelson a month ago, since which time his school practise partner Grayson Murray has won on the Korn Ferry Tour.
Whether that serves as inspiration or not, Redman's long-game is absolutely good enough to compete at the top of the leaderboard in Canada. Whether his short-game holds up we'll have to see as his chipping is a real worry, but he's putted well enough, often enough this season to be worth chancing in this trappy event.
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Posted at 1200 BST on 06/06/23
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