The PGA Tour made the two-hour trip to the desert for the Shriners Open this week as the popular stop off at Las Vegas hosts the latest event in the fall with the players in the field all looking to enhance their playing privileges for next season.
Tom Kim made a successful defence of the title a year ago and he’ll be looking to complete the three-peat this week but a competitive field will be out to stop him in what is one of the better events in this part of the year.
Recent Winners
2023 – Tom Kim
2022 – Tom Kim
2021 – Sungjae Im
2020 – Martin Laird
2019 – Kevin Na
2018 – Bryson DeChambeau
2017 – Patrick Cantlay
2016 – Rod Pampling
2015 – Smylie Kaufman
2014 – Ben Martin
The Course
We are back at TPC Summerlin this week for what is always a popular tournament with those who like making birdies. The course is a par 71 and one of the easier of that par on the entire tour. It measures 7,255 yards but plays nothing like that yardage with the heat and altitude of Las Vegas. The rough is usually kept to a minimum here and the greens are enormous so it is very much a case of swing hard and make as many putts as you can.
There is no massive advantage in terms of length this week although it stands to reason with the rough down that the further you mow it off the tee the closer to the greens you’ll be. This will be a putting contest so players who hole lots of putts and who have shown some good recent form should be the ones to focus on. This isn’t really a week for the players who prefer the tougher courses.
The Field
Two of the recent Internationals team at the Presidents Cup headline the field in Las Vegas this week when the defending champion Tom Kim is joined by his teammate Taylor Pendrith for this tournament. They are not the only internationals in the field though as the likes of Cam Davis, Adam Hadwin and Ryan Fox are some of the others from overseas with a tee time in Nevada. The winner from last week in Matt McCarty is also in the field too.
He is part of an American charge which is spearheaded by the likes of Kurt Kitayama, David Thompson, Beau Hossler, Keith Mitchell and Tom Hoge among others while those from Europe who are heading up their challenge include Seamus Power, Stephan Jaeger and Matti Schmid. Other notable players sin the field this week are Harris English, Rickie Fowler, Daniel Berger and the former winner of this event in Martin Laird.
Market Leaders
Tom Kim has played this tournament twice and he has never been beaten in it so given the relative weakness of this field it is quite a surprise that he is as big as 13/1 to win the title for a third time. It can only be the history that is in that price because tournaments are only won three years in a row by the truly elite. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kim does it though and I’m very surprised he isn’t a single figure price. I’m almost priced in here but the only thing putting me off is his form hasn’t been brilliant in 2024.
Taylor Pendrith is a 25/1 second favourite on the best prices and he should be really suited to this Las Vegas layout. It isn’t a tough track and we know that he can overpower any course that he comes up against. His putting in the Presidents Cup looked in a decent order and arrives here off the back of a T3 finish. Having won on the PGA Tour now he is entitled to think he is worthy of going very well on familiar territory this week.
Davis Thompson comes next in the betting market at 28/1. The John Deere Classic champion will be teeing it up for the first time since he ended last season at the BMW Championship so he is teeing it up seven weeks after his last competitive outing which is immediately a negative for me. He did win the John Deere Classic with a -28 score so we know he can go low to win tournaments but it is hard to believe he will do that after nearly two months without a competitive spin. He isn’t for me.
Seamus Power and Kurt Kitayama are the only other players in the field who are shorter than 33/1 this week. They can both be taken at 30/1. Power arrives here in decent enough form but he is yet to crack the top 20 in this tournament. Kitayama teed it up for the first time in more than two months last week and came away from the Black Desert Championship with a T25 finish after a one over final round when he was in contention. You would imagine he’ll naturally improve here and shouldn’t be dismissed.
Main Bets
I don’t think anyone who reads my golf previews regularly will be surprised to know that the first of my main bets is Taylor Pendrith. He played pretty well in the Presidents Cup and this course should suit him perfectly, as evidenced last year when he finished third. Since then he has won on the PGA Tour and arrives here as one of the better players and in a field lacking depth in quality he has to be the starting point for the betting team. He belts it a long way, is flushing his iron shots recently and at the Presidents Cup he putted well. He shouldn’t be far away here.
I’m staying Canadian for my second bet here because Adam Hadwin not only has a brilliant record in this tournament but he is a man on a mission as he was livid to be left out of a home Presidents Cup so he will feel that he has a point to prove. He might think that anyway considering his form since June has been pretty ordinary, which is the reason why he wasn’t handed a wildcard, but I’m a huge fan a golfer who is returning a course where he has good memories. You have to hit good irons and putt well here and that is the strength of Hadwin so the Canadian feels like an obvious bet to me.
Outsiders
Adam Schenk has gone well here in the last couple of years and that isn’t necessarily a surprise either because he is an excellent iron player so when the putter warms up, which you would imagine it will do on a fairly easy resort course, then he is going to put himself in the mix. He was T12 here last year and T3 the year before that. His two efforts prior to that were both in the top 30 too so this is a place where Schenk performs well. He is a big price for someone who has his record here, particularly when it is only six months ago he was finishing T12 at The Masters. He also has a top 20 in Phoenix this season so there are so many reasons to like him at a monster price.
Ryan Moore is a former winner of this tournament and while you have to go back a dozen years for when he won it, he went to college in Las Vegas so this is obviously going to be an event in which he has fond memories and feelings when he plays it. He doesn’t have a great deal of form to go by but he’ll know the conditions and his game would have been honed in this part of the world so he’ll know how the ball flies and everything else. Moore is out first on Thursday so he’ll have a chance to post a score and I’ll pay to see if he can do that and add three more to it.
Tips
Back T.Pendrith to win Shriners Children’s Open (e/w) for a 1.5/10 stake at 23.00 with William Hill (1/5 1-8)
Back him here:
Back A.Hadwin to win Shriners Children’s Open (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 41.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-8)
Back A.Schenk to win Shriners Children’s Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 176.00 with Sky Bet (1/5 1-8)
Back R.Moore to win Shriners Children’s Open (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 176.00 with Sky Bet (1/5 1-8)
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