The PGA Tour is back for just the second tournament since the Tour Championship when the Sanderson Farms Championship takes place with the lower reaches of the tour getting the chance to play for the potential riches on offer next season.
Mackenzie Hughes took advantage of the tournament a year ago to win the title and the Canadian will tee it up looking to retain the title and qualify for the events which he isn’t yet a part of in 2024. That is the quest of everyone in the field though.
Recent Winners
2022 – Mackenzie Hughes
2021 – Sam Burns
2020 – Sergio Garcia
2019 – Sebastian Munoz
2018 – Cameron Champ
2017 – Ryan Armour
2016 – Cody Gribble
2015 – Peter Malnati
2014 – Nick Taylor
2013 – Woody Austin
The Course
The Country Club of Jackson stages this tournament again. It has the same dimensions as last year, so it is a par 72 which measures 7,461 yards. When you look at the statistics of the recent winners there is a bit of a picture forming. They are all pretty solid drivers of the golf ball who can all hole putts or putted very well the week they won. Given scoring is likely to be very low this week we should have putting in mind when forming our bets.
That is very much one of my focuses this week. Length isn’t the overriding thing around here although there is no denying that it helps, but I do like authoritative ball strikers as those with club head speed tend to take these classic type setups to the cleaners these days. Greens in regulation is another statistic to look at as this tournament is all about making birdies so the more chances you get the better the likelihood is that you’ll make some.
The Field
There isn’t really anything for those who had big campaigns last season to play for in the fall events anymore so the field is very much devoid of the true current stars of the game but one man who will be a superstar in the not too distance future is Ludvig Aberg and he will go in search of a first PGA Tour here. That is about as good as it gets in terms of big names, although after a Ryder Cup week and better events on the horizon that isn’t a surprise.
Stephan Jaeger will join Aberg in spearheading the European challenge this week while the home pursuit will be led by the likes of Beau Hossler, Eric Cole and Keith Mitchell, the latter who should really have won a lot more than he has. The international charge will come from the likes of Emiliano Grillo, Seonghyeon Kim, Lucas Herbert, Adam Svensson and the defending champion Mackenzie Hughes while Luke List and Tom Hoge are relatively recent PGA Tour event winners in the field.
Market Leaders
Ludvig Aberg will tee it up as the 12/1 favourite to win the tournament this week. He certainly fits the criteria of giving it a good smack, finding lots of greens and potentially holing lots of putts. The fact he is on debut here would have been enough to put me off him anyway but as with the Dunhill Links Championship, I don’t want anything to do with anyone in the Ryder Cup last week because that tournament was a physical and emotional rollercoaster.
Such is the openness of this tournament we have Stephan Jaeger as the 18/1 second favourite. He is still looking for his first win at this level which is always a turn off for me at this sort of price. Jaeger does make a lot of cuts so you are at least likely to get a four day run for your money and this field certainly isn’t the strongest he would have come up against but he still feels a little on the short side to me. He stats ok in everything but not special in anything.
Eric Cole is next in the betting at 20/1. He is another who is looking for a first PGA Tour title but you sense that it is coming. He had four top 10s last season including a playoff loss at The Honda Classic where he broke through somewhat. He comes in here having finished fourth at the Fortinet a few weeks ago and if he has been able to maintain that level of performance three weeks on then he is entitled to be a danger.
The only other player in the field shorter than 30/1 is Emiliano Grillo and the Argentine is a 25/1 shot to build on his T5 here a year ago. He has certainly found his game again in that time and arrives here as the winner of the Charles Schwab Challenge, a week which took him all the way to East Lake last season. He performed well in the big events to conclude the proper part of the PGA Tour season and would be a leading runner here if he hasn’t developed too much rust in six weeks off.
Main Bets
Emiliano Grillo sets the standard in this tournament in my eyes. I always like players who have won relatively recently in these what I would call second string fields and Grillo didn’t just win but he won at a tough Colonial CC so if he can win there he can definitely win here. His tee ball game is always very good, as is his approach play so the question is whether he can maintain the levels with the putter that he had in the heart of 2023. If he can he should be a good deal above most of these and he is my main bet here.
The other main bet is Garrick Higgo who started to show signs of life towards the back end of the regular season on the PGA Tour. He completed top 20 finishes in the Scottish Open and 3M Open, which had much better fields than the one he will compete against here, and he was T21 at the John Deere Classic. The South African finished third here on debut and is one of the better drivers on the PGA Tour. If he can find some greens off the back of his length and hole some putts he’ll be tough to reel in too.
Outsiders
Peter Malnati is a former winner around here and it is never a bad thing for a golfer to go back to a place where he has previously won. It isn’t a surprise that he has won here because he is one of the better putters on the PGA Tour statistically and he arrives here having opened up the fall events with a T11 at the Fortinet Championship where a better field was assembled than this one. Malnati also has a second placed finish here so this is a course that when he is on top of his game he can certainly handle and with no real competitive advantage for anyone that course liking and form could be more important than usual. I’ll pay to see if that is the case.
Henrik Norlander doesn’t have a huge amount of form to speak of coming into the tournament but he is another who is going to like what sees on arrival if his last three spins around here are anything to go by. He has gone T4-T4-T24 in the last three years here and the field this week is so much weaker than the ones which have been here in the past. His game might not be as good but with plenty of players likely to be carrying some rust with a lack of events in the last six weeks, form might not be as important. Knowing and liking the course very much should be so I will chance my arm with him.
Tips
Back E.Grillo to win Sanderson Farms Championship (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 23.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-8)
Back G.Higgo to win Sanderson Farms Championship (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 41.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-8)
Back P.Malnati to win Sanderson Farms Championship (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 81.00 with Betfair (1/5 1-8)
Back H.Norlander to win Sanderson Farms Championship (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 176.00 with Sky Bet (1/5 1-8)
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