Some of the best golfers in the world will make their way to San Diego, California and the Torrey Pines Golf Course as the PGA Tour schedule continues with the Farmers Insurance Open this week. Originally known as the San Diego Open, this will be the 64th edition of the event and we can certainly look to the recent results here to figure out the best way to attack the field from a betting perspective.
Event Details
Event: 2016 Farmers Insurance Open
Category: PGA
Date: January 28th-31st
Location: Torrey Pines Golf Course, San Diego, California
The beginning of the calendar year can be a little slow some years but that certainly hasn’t been the case in 2016 with a pair of solid events already in the Sony Open and CareerBuilder Challenge. Early season form will be important when weighing our options for this week, especially considering how difficult this event is to evaluate from a statistics perspective.
Last Five Winners
2015 – Jason Day -9 (Play-off)
2014 – Scott Stallings -9
2013 – Tiger Woods -14
2012 – Brandt Snedeker -16 (Play-off)
2011 – Bubba Watson -16
What To Know About The Course
Both courses were opened in 1957 but the South Course is the longer of the two at 7,698 yards with a stroke average of 73.52 compared to a 70.23 average for the North Course. The South Course is technically the longest played on the PGA Tour rotation and golfing enthusiasts will remember back to the 2008 US Open when an injured Tiger Woods went on to win in a play-off over Rocco Mediate. Meanwhile, the North Course is almost 700 yards shorter and the greens are both smaller and slower but it remains a challenging course nonetheless.
The Field
Jason Day won this tournament a year ago in a playoff in big part because he hit the ball further than anyone else last year. The top six players on last year’s final leaderboard all ranked inside the top-10 in Driving Distance but there have been outliers including both Brandt Snedeker and Ben Crane, who won this event despite placing outside of the top-45 in Driving Distance. Meanwhile, Driving Accuracy will not be nearly as important this week when you consider that since 2005, 42 players have finished in the top three at the Farmers Insurance Open and only one of them finished the year in the top-50 in that department. Expect some big hitters this weekend with Driving Distance and Strokes Gained Putting the two most important factors.
A Good Matchup To Bet
Brandt Snedeker over Rickie Fowler
Fowler certainly looked good again when he won in Abu Dhabi last week and the fact that he has registered a couple of top-10 finishes here in the past will make him appealing heading in to this week but he has a habit of struggling the week after registering a victory and that could be the case again this week in San Diego. Meanwhile, Snedeker is looked very good in his runner-up finish to Jordan Spieth at the Sony Open and he has had some success at Torrey Pines in the past so look for him to put together a strong performance and produce a better score than Fowler this week.
Top Five Prediction
Jason Day +130
The defending champion can really turn it up in this spot. Considering what he did here a year ago, it wouldn’t be a surprise to anybody if this were the event where he really set the tone for the 2016 calendar year. Day is the returning champ but remember that he also placed in second here two years ago. We would have liked to see a few more appearances from him to gauge what his momentum is like but he hasn’t played since the Hyundai Tournament of Champions. The good news is that he finished in 10th in that tournament. He should be an excellent bet to finish in the top-five as he looks to make it back-to-back victories at the Farmers Insurance Open.
Top 10 Odds To Win Farmers Insurance Open
Jason Day +650
Rickie Fowler +1015
Dustin Johnson +1550
Justin Rose +1850
Brandt Snedeker +1550
Patrick Reed +2250
Jimmy Walker +2550
Hideki Matsuyama +2550
Phil Mickelson +1850
