The PGA Tour is back from Japan and off to the island of Bermuda this week for the third staging of the Bermuda Championship, an event which carries all the usual benefits for winning a PGA Tour event.
Brian Gay was the man who enjoyed the benefits last year when he took the title and he is back to defend it after a tricky route over to Bermuda. A competitive field awaits him in what is the only major tour event this week.
Recent Winners
2020 – Brian Gay
2019 – Brendon Todd
The Course
The tournament is back at the Port Royal Golf Course over in Bermuda. The track is a par 71 but it is only 6,828 yards long so it certainly isn’t a course that needs a big hitter to tame it. That has been highlighted in both years when one of the shorter but most accurate hitters won the tournament and we are looking for that sort of player here. Someone who is accurate enough but most importantly of all someone who putts well because the signs are that this is going to be a very low scoring event.
The course has wide fairways and large greens so the only defence for it is the winds with so many holes residing next to the ocean. The wind is expected to blow strongly on the opening day and it could well be pretty strong at certain times over the weekend as well therefore it is important to keep good wind players on side. We are looking for players who can flight their ball in the wind and who will hole a lot of putts.
The Field
After the two big Asian events of the last two weeks a number of the leading lights on the PGA Tour have decided to give the event a miss. There are still some household names on show here though with the biggest of them probably being the former Masters champion, Patrick Reed. Matthew Fitzpatrick was a winner on the European Tour a couple of weeks ago and he also tees it up here while Christiaan Bezuidenhout is another notable name in the field.
This is a tournament where the lesser lights get the chance to shine but with no European Tour event this week we have a number of players coming across the pond for a start. They include David Lipsky, Matthias Schwab, Danny Willett and Guido Migliozzi while some of the more seasoned PGA Tour players include Adam Hadwin, Patrick Rodgers, Russell Knox and the two former champions Brendon Todd and Brian Gay.
Market Leaders
Matthew Fitzpatrick is the leader in the betting this week. That might be based on his win at Valderrama recently but that place and this is chalk and cheese. He is 14/1 to win the tournament and while he is one of the two true class acts in the field I’m not sure I want to be on someone at that price when they haven’t won a PGA Tour event. I can’t really think of a tournament where the wind has been strong that he has contended strongly in either so I’ll ignore his class and look elsewhere.
Christiaan Bezuidenhout is next in the betting at 18/1. He is another who has a touch of class about him but who hasn’t won a PGA Tour event. In terms of profile for this place he should fit it well because he is pretty straight off the tee and in the main gets the job done with the putter but I just can’t bring myself to back someone who hasn’t won at this level before at what has to be called a skinny price at anything less than 20/1.
Patrick Reed is third in the market at 22/1. The first question regarding him is whether he is fully fit after the illness he had during the FedExCup playoffs last season. If he is then he has everything going for him here in that he is decent enough off the tee and then comes alive on the greens. That fitness issue is a huge concern though because he has barely played since then. If I knew he was definitely fit I’d take him at 22/1 but I don’t so I’ll leave it.
Mito Pereira is the only other player in the betting who is 25/1 or shorter. I like the Chilean but I was burned on him a few weeks ago when backing him on a course that should suit him perfectly so on one where I have more doubts over whether he’ll be effective I’m less inclined to get involved. I’m certain this guy is a PGA Tour winner in waiting but it might be that he has to wait at least another week before that elusive win comes.
Main Bets
Adam Hadwin is a player who should go well this week. He has proven himself to be competent in the wind, and you would expect nothing less coming from north of the border. He is extremely strong off the tee in terms of finding the fairways and probably doesn’t get enough credit on the greens. He has had a lean time of it by his standards but I suspect that was all pandemic induced. He was still able to finish eighth in the Charles Schwab Challenge in Texas last season though where the wind always blows. Since then he has been T6 at the 3M Open and last time out at the Shriners with another top 10 at the Wyndham in between. During his bad spell his iron play really suffered but that doesn’t appear to be as much of an issue anymore. Thankfully the rest of his game never suffered so he looks a leading fancy this week.
Hayden Buckley is showing signs of being a future star and it might be that he comes good this week. After missing the cut in his opening PGA Tour event of his career, he has finished 4-8 in the two events since then, finishing with a 63 at the Shriners recently. That has been done on a staple of hitting fairways. Going back to his Korn Ferry Tour days, his last five recorded events for fairways hit saw him ranked 14-5-2-13-2 so he barely misses a fairway and has been putting well enough. IN those events he has gone 40-4-9-4-2 for GIR so he is setting up a lot of chances. If he can handle the breeze here he could well fire up his PGA Tour career in style.
Outsiders
I always like backing Anirban Lahiri in these lesser PGA Tour events as regular readers will know. One of the reasons for that is he is such a good putter and in the main they get played on tracks where you don’t have to smash the lights out of the ball. Lahiri is a decent enough driver of the ball and has shown in the past that the wind offers up no issue for him. He was T11 here last year so he has shown it here too. I was on Lahiri when he finished third in the Barbasol Championship last season and although he hasn’t done a lot since then, he tends to pop up often in these second tier events. This track suits him and I’ll pay to see if he has another decent run in him.
Austin Cook is another player who hits a lot of fairways but handles himself well on the greens. Cook finished last season with a T11 in the Korn Ferry Tour Championship to get his card back and then opened the season finishing in the same position in the Fortinet Championship, an event which had the world number one Jon Rahm in it so was a much better event than this. He has ranked 2-17-5 in driving accuracy in his last three starts and although his putter deserted him at the Sanderson Farms Championship it is generally in good nick. You often see these players who hold their nerve at the Korn Ferry finals to get back on tour free up and go well for a few weeks. I’ll pay to see how well Cook goes here.
Tips
Back A.Hadwin to win Bermuda Championship (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 34.00 with William Hill (1/5 1-8)
Back H.Buckley to win Bermuda Championship (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 36.00 with William Hill (1/5 1-8)
Back A.Cook to win Bermuda Championship (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 81.00 with William Hill (1/5 1-8)
Back them here:
Back A.Lahiri to win Bermuda Championship (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 71.00 with Sky Bet (1/5 1-7)
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