This article is part of our DraftKings PGA DFS Picks series.
BUTTERFIELD BERMUDA CHAMPIONSHIP
Purse: $6.5M
Winner's Share: $1.17M
FedEx Cup Points: 500 to the Winner
Location: Southampton Parish, Bermuda
Course: Port Royal Golf Course
Yardage: 6,828
Par: 71
2021 champion: Lucas Herbert
Tournament Preview
The Bermuda Championship began in 2019 as an alternate-field event the same week as the WGC-HSBC Champions in China. It was elevated to a full-points, stand-alone event on a temporary basis the past two years after the WGC event was canceled because of the pandemic. Now, the WGC tournament has been eliminated altogether, and the Bermuda tour stop is still standing alone. Really alone. You'll get that joke once you see the field.
There is only one big name. It's 56-year-old John Daly. No, we're not kidding. Technically, there is one golfer in the top-50 in the world rankings. Seamus Power did his best to fall out of the top-50 by tournament time, but stalled his week at No. 48. There are five guys total ranked in the top-100: Power, No. 61 Adrian Meronk from Poland, who got one of the two sponsor invite set aside for a foreign player, plus No. 83 Denny McCarthy, No. 92 Lucas Glover and No. 97 Erik Van Rooyen. Last year's winner is No. 54-ranked Lucas Herbert, though he didn't even bother to come back to defend his title. How sad is that? Glover is a major winner, as is Daly, so there is that. Anyone else of note? Well, there's European Ryder Cup captain (and former world No. 1) Luke Donald, if he counts. Otherwise, there are more than 40 of the recent Korn Ferry graduating class and more than 20 (TWENTY!) from the dreaded "Beyond 150th on Prior Season's FEC Points List." That's almost half the field right there.
Oh, there are two guys named Palmer and Nicholas -- that would be Palmer Jackson and James Nicholas. Actually, there's also Nicholas Jones. These are real names, we promise. Jackson is a senior at Notre Dame in on a sponsor invite. Jones is one of three Bermudians in the field.
A year ago, the field was weak but not on life support like this. Patrick Reed and Matt Fitzpatrick were entered; Reed wound up co-runner-up to Herbert. Things got pretty bad last year when a large number of golfers withdrew and they couldn't get enough guys to fill the 132-man field, thanks in large part to Bermuda's vaccination requirements. It went off at 126, then had three more WDs after Thursday.
Okay, enough piling on. Bermuda is beautiful so there at least will be "sweeping ocean views from nearly every hole," as the tournament website says, right? Well, yes, but wait till you see the weather forecast (below).
Port Royal is a public course designed by famed architect Robert Trent Jones in 1970. It is among the shortest tracks the golfers will see all year. It was a real pushover in its debut in 2019, when Brendan Todd won at 24-under. It stiffened the past two years when Brian Gay and then Herbert both won at 15-under. But it's still very short. There are only three par-5s, two of which are under 520 yards. There are six par-4s under 400 yards. The signature hole is a long one, the 16th, which is one of the two 235-yard par-3s. As the tournament website says, there is "nothing but the Atlantic Ocean between the tee and the pin." It's actually really cool, with both the tee box and green on cliffs. The green is thin, surrounded by bunkers and on a peninsula.
Since Port Royal is not long, what are its defenses? For one, doglegs -- eight of them. When you combine those doglegs with lots of cross bunkers, driver will not be a popular club this week. There's also water on five holes. There are significant elevation changes. The TifEagle Bermudagrass greens are medium size, averaging around 6,000 square feet (because of course they use Bermudagrass greens in Bermuda). But the primary defense on an island course, as you can imagine, is wind, wind and more wind. And this year, the forecast says, well, here we go ...
The National Hurricane Center tweeted on Monday that a tropical depression was moving into the area by Tuesday bringing heavy rainfall and gusty winds. Thunderstorms are forecast all four days. It will be warm, in the upper 70s, but the wind is forecast to be whipping all tournament long.
If this week wasn't hard enough to pick golfers based on just the field alone, the weather will make this week's DFS plays complete dart throws. We will have four golfers in Tier 1, as we always do. But we have much greater confidence that the winner will come from somewhere farther down than up top.
The weather sounds terrible across the board, but you might want to check the forecast closer to the lock to see when it will be blowing hardest, and who will be teeing off when. If deciding between two guys, definitely go with the guy expected to play is calmer conditions.
Key Stats to Winning at Port Royal
The most important indicators every week are current form and course history. "Key Stats" follow in importance.
• Strokes Gained: Approach/Greens in Regulation
• Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green/Scrambling
• Putting Average/Strokes Gained: Putting
• Driving Accuracy: Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee
Past Champions
2021 - Lucas Herbert
2020 - Brian Gay
2019 - Brendon Todd
Champion's Profile
There is no ShotLink on the course, so we have no strokes-gained data. Herbert ranked seventh in the field in driving distance, at a mere 286 yards, though that was much more than Todd and Gay, who were 51st and 38th, respectively. Both of them ranked fourth in fairways hit, to Herbert's 53rd. Wyndham Clark, who lost to Gay in a playoff, ranked second in distance but 68th in fairways hit, so it seems as long as you are either long OR accurate, you don't have to be both to contend. But it's safe to say the tournament was and will be won from the second shot on in. Todd also was 10th in greens in regulation and tied for third in putts per round. Gay was 15th in GIR and fourth in putts per round. Herbert was only 53rd in GIR but also putted well, sixth in putts per round. Herbert really is one of the worst iron players on Tour, and the fact that the wind was blowing so hard last year surely helped him because now everyone else was inaccurate. Patrick Reed and Danny Lee, who tied for second a shot behind Herbert, also were in the top-6 in putting. The over/under on the winning score on golfodds.com last year was set at 270.5 -- only 13.5 under par, which indicated they thought the weather would depress scoring. They were right. But they overcorrected. This year, they set the over/under at 268.5 -- 15.5 under.
DRAFTKINGS VALUE PICKS
Based on Standard $50K Salary Cap
Tier 1 Values
Aaron Rai - $10,100 (Winning odds at the DraftKings Sportsbook: (+3000)
Rai is from England. The English play well in the rain, right? (Narrator: Maybe, but not thunderstorms.) ... Anyway, Rai ranked top-25 on Tour in greens in regulation last year, and he is again in the early going of 2022-23. More notably, he's putting much better so far, which helped him tie for 20th at the Shriners and for 36th at the ZOZO. Rai played Port Royal last year and, while he only tied for 62nd, he does have four rounds of familiarity now.
Mark Hubbard - $10,000 (+2500)
Hubbard is a pretty good putter -- an excellent putter in this field -- whose big trouble spot is length off the tee. That won't be a concern this week, nor was it last year, when he tied for 22nd. Of course, at this price we'd be looking for something far better than T22, but in the field Hubbard's chances of a higher finish are greatly improved. He's made every one of his cuts so far this season and tied for fifth at the Sanderson Farms.
Justin Lower - $9,900 (+3000)
In three tournaments so far this season, Lower has a tie for fourth at the Fortinet and a T20 at the Shriners. He finished 17th here last year in the blustery conditions. Lower is ranked top-30 on Tour right now in both greens in regulation and Strokes Gained: Putting.
S.H. Kim - $9,600 (+3000)
Kim is probably our favorite play in Tier 1. Not only because he's the cheapest in this section, but because he's shown a lot since arriving from the Korn Ferry Tour. The 24-year-old South Korean has played only six career PGA Tour events -- four of them this season -- and hasn't missed a cut. He tied for 13th at the Sanderson Farms and tied for fourth at the Shriners. Kim is ranked 18th on Tour in SG: Putting.
Tier 2 Values
Stephan Jaeger - $9,300 (+3500)
With the weather the way it's expected to be, even the finest of iron players will miss greens. That brings scrambling into play. Jaeger ranked 10th on Tour last season in SG: Around-the-Green and is 11th this season. He's far from great from the fairway, but no one will be very good if the wind blows as forecast. Jaeger finished last season strong with a solo fifth at the Rocket Mortgage and a T13 at the Wyndham, and he hasn't missed a cut so far this season. He tied for 20th here last year.
Russell Knox $9,200 (+3000)
Knox is one of the few guys to have played this tournament all three years and he's never been worse than 16th (also 11th and 12th). In a week that will bring incredible variance, that's enough of a constant for us to call on Knox, who already has two top-25s this season.
Adam Schenk - $8,700 (+4500)
Schenk is coming off a T16 at the ZOZO and before that a T12 at the Shriners. His iron play has been the key to his success -- he's ranked 26th on Tour in SG: Approach. Schenk is playing far better than he did at the end of last season. He tied for 26th here two years ago in his lone Bermuda start.
Brandon Wu - $8,400 (+4500)
Wu has shown the capability to have high finishes in fields much strong than this one -- third when Jon Rahm won the Mexico Open, sixth when Xander Schauffele the Scottish Open and eighth at the Wyndham. He ranked 19th on Tour last season in greens in regulation. Wu tied for 34th here last year.
Tier 3 Values
Sam Ryder - $7,700 (+7000)
Ryder has had very average stats over his five full seasons on the PGA Tour and, thus, very average results. He keeps his card every year, ranking somewhere between the 100th and 125th on the points list. Most guys in this field would be thrilled with that. Ryder has interesting strokes-gained stats so far this season: ranked outside the top-150 in both Off-the-Tee and Around-the-Green, yet inside the top-30 in both Approach and Putting. He's coming off a T28 at the Shriners and T36 at the ZOZO.
Ben Taylor - $7,400 (+7000)
The 30-year-old Englishman just made the jump via the Korn Ferry Tour Tour, where he had two runners-up last season and five top-10s. He opened this season with a top-25 at the Fortinet, then made the cut at the Sanderson Farms. Taylor has actually played Bermuda twice, in the first two years of the tournament, and made both cuts. He's ranked top-50 on the PGA Tour in greens in regulation and top-75 in SG: Tee-to-Green. Not bad.
Kevin Yu - $7,300 (+8000)
The 24-year-old Korn Ferry grad from Chinese Taipei has made a nice entry onto the PGA Tour. Yu was 19th at the Sanderson Farms and then 37th at the Shriners. He hits the ball far off the tee and pretty accurate, ranking 13th in driving distance and 89th in fairways hit. That goes a long way toward being 27th on Tour in greens in regulation. Yu had two runners-up and one third-place showing on the KF Tour last season.
Luke Donald - $7,000 (+13000)
The 44-year-old European Ryder Cup captain really is at a disadvantage on longer tracks. He has a fighting chance on shorter courses, such as Port Royal. And by fighting chance we mean making the cut. For someone averaging only 286 yards off the tee last season, Donald managed to rank 68th in greens in regulation. He has played Bermuda the past two years and made both cuts, finishing in the 40s each year.
Long-Shot Values
Robert Streb - $6,800 (+13000)
Streb hasn't made a cut in three starts this season. But he did make almost half of his 30 cuts last season, including in the FedEx Championship, the first playoff event. He's a decent scrambler and putter and, like with many guys this week, the shorter course and weak field will give him a boost. He's played Bermuda twice and made both cuts before skipping it last year.
Jonathan Byrd - $6,800 (+15000)
Byrd is 44 now, doesn't play a whole lot anymore, at least in part because he doesn't have full status. This will be his 2022-23 debut. He made the cut in only half of his 20 starts last year, but he surely has a better chance in weaker fields on shorter tracks. That explains why DraftKings has him at $6,800 and not hundreds of dollars less. Byrd has played Bermuda all three years, making the past two cuts, including a tie for 20th last year, when he ranked 13th on Tour in SG: Around-the-Green.
Tano Goya - $6,500 (+20000)
Goya is 34 years old and this will be just his ninth PGA Tour event, fourth this year, after making the jump from the Korn Ferry Tour. He's made two of three cuts. Nothing inside the top-50, but he did have three rounds in the 60s at the Shriners. Let's try to get to Saturday and see what happens.
Sung Kang - $6,200 (+30000)
Kang used to be a borderline top-50 golfer. Now he's ranked in the 600s. But he did make 12 cuts last season, albeit in 30 starts, and he had a decent run in the fall season. He's a pretty good putter and ranked middle of the pack in greens in regulation last season. On paper, that sounds like enough to reach the weekend.
