Rocket Mortgage Classic at Detroit Golf Club
Last week was our second consecutive disappointing result with both players we backed missing on our finishing position tips. Brendan Steele missed the cut and Troy Merritt posted a T49 for a -2.0 unit tally. On the season, Bettors Brew is +31.20 units, but the recent results have us highly motivated to grind out a profit this week.
The Tour goes to the Motor City and the Detroit Golf Club for the annual birdie fest called the Rocket Mortgage Classic. Here is the course thumbnail:
Par 72, 7,370 yards
Four par 3s, 10 par 4s, four par 5s
Parkland Course with rather wide fairway landings areas
Greens are bentgrass/poa, 5,150 square feet on average and running 12 on stimp
Rough is 4 inches, so very penal for missing the wide fairways
Winning score has ranged from -18 to -25 since 2019
The player profile for this course really boils down to elite wedge play (Approach from 100 to 150 yards) and putting. To post a good finish, players must make birdies in bunches so SG Putting will be a stat to keep an eye on. So who made the card this week?
Scott Stallings Top 30 +180 (FanDuel)
Stallings is really solid in SG Approach (66th) and SG Putting (43rd) which are stats that play well here. When digging a little deeper into the Approach data, Stallings is very good from proximity from 100 to 125 yards, ranking 35th on Tour with an average proximity to the hole of just over 18 feet. Last year, he finished T25 at this venue and T39 in 2020. His current form is excellent with back to back Top 8 finishes (T8 at the Travelers and T4 at the John Deere).
Mark Hubbard Top 30 +175 (FanDuel)
Hubbard has been playing very solid golf lately with seven straight made cuts including back to back finishes inside the Top 5. He fits the player profile for this week with SG Approach that ranks 27th and SG Putting at 35th. Going a further with the approach data, Hubbard is 30th on approach from 100 to 125 yards and 12th on approach from 125 to 150 yards. The wide landing areas off the tee should help him overcome his glaring deficiency which is SG off the tee, where he ranks 148th on Tour.
Matthias Schwab Top 30 +330 (FanDuel)
One of the talented players on Tour under age 30, the 27 year old Schwab has been solid, but not spectacular lately. He has made 9 of his last 12 cuts and enters the week in a precarious position on the Fed Ex Cup, ranking 119th. He needs a solid week to avoid going to the Wyndham Championship in Greensboro with his 2023 PGA Tour status on the line. He fits the key stats this week ranking 89th in SG Approach and 42nd in SG Putting. In approaches from 125 to 150 yards, Schwab ranks 6th. He should be laser focused this week given his position in the Fed Ex standings.