The full field at the US Open will get to taste the course at Oakmont Country Club under competitive conditions on Thursday when the first round of the penultimate major of the year takes place with anticipation high about what we might witness.
We have all heard how hard Oakmont is and has the potential to be and on Thursday we will find out exactly how tough it is as the players on show look to dodge what seems to be inevitable carnage and position themselves strongly after 18 holes.
First Round Leader
As ever in a major tournament, the first market we focus on in the round preview is the first round leader. This is a popular market because if you nail the winner you get paid out in a quarter of the time of an outright bet and also often at a bigger price. Before we pick our selections we need to check the weather which doesn’t actually change too much here. It warms up a bit throughout the day but there is no wind to speak of. With no weather bias, I’ll play one player from each of the two waves.
In the morning wave, it is hard to ignore the form of Ben Griffin. His exploits in recent times where he finished T8 in the PGA Championship, won the Charles Schwab Challenge and was the closest challenger to Scottie Scheffler at The Memorial, have seen his outright odds shrink which stopped me getting involved in that market but in those events he opened with a 70, 66 and 65, each of which had him close to the pace after 18 holes. He is riding the crest of a wave and I’ll pay to see if he has a big round in him. Patrick Reed was also on my shortlist as a player to have onside this week but I just couldn’t find a market to use him in. His short game could see him leap a few players on any leaderboard so if he can drive the ball well for 18 holes, the former Masters champion could find himself in a nice spot when the final putt is holed in the opening round.
Thursday 3 Balls
As always in a major tournament, the field will go out in three balls in the opening round and in the US Open we have a morning wave and an afternoon wave. Such is the depth in the sport we have three featured groups in each wave. The headline groups in the first part of the day are the ones which contain Ludvig Aberg, Adam Scott and Hideki Matsuyama, who go off the tenth tee at 12.18 BST, the one including the defending champion Bryson DeChambeau, Xander Schauffele and the amateur star Jose Luis Ballester who begin on the first tee at 12.29 BST. The other morning group is the one which has Rory McIlroy, Shane Lowry and Justin Rose in it. They go out from the tenth tee at 12.40 BST.
The later part of the day will begin to focus around the group which features Min Woo Lee, Justin Thomas and the former champion Brooks Koepka. They start out at 18.03 BST while the US Open winning trio of Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth and Jon Rahm tee it up on the tenth at 18.14 BST while back on the first tee 11 minutes later the USPGA Championship winner and world number one Scottie Scheffler goes out alongside Viktor Hovland and two-time major champion Collin Morikawa. After looking through the groups there are four bets I like.
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Matt Fitzpatrick/Wyndham Clark/Gary Woodland
Match tees off at 12.40 BST
The first of those four bets comes in the group which features three recent US Open champions as the 2022 winner Matt Fitzpatrick goes out with the man who took the title from him in Wyndham Clark and the 2019 champion Gary Woodland.
Clark has looked bang out of form for a while and there is little future for a player who arrives here not on top of his game so he is easy to pass over while Woodland is recovering from too many injuries for my liking. That leads me to Fitzpatrick whose chances I have already talked up in the side markets preview. He is solid from tee to green, decent around the greens and certainly not weak on them and he has a competitive mentality that he won’t freeze if the going gets tough. Fitzpatrick might only need to be solid here to get the job done.
Cameron Smith/Brian Harman/Phil Mickelson
Match tees off at 13.02 BST
The second bet of the day sees three former winners of The Open out alongside each other when the LIV Golf pair of Cameron Smith and Phil Mickelson go out alongside the winner of the Texas Open from earlier in the year in Brian Harman.
I think this is another group where solid and steady could win the race here. Phil Mickelson could run up all sorts of numbers with the way he sprays it off the tee here and while he’ll catch up with the short game, he doesn’t have a huge advantage in that department on his two playing partners. Smith is another who isn’t solid with the driver but he will be relatively long to compete but this course sounds like it has to be played from the fairways and Harman very much appeals in that regard compared to the other two. His short game is certainly no weakness and as a player who has won on tour this year and who was third at The Heritage since then, he looks the one to be on here, particularly with six of his last seven opening rounds being par or better. That could easily win here.
Davis Riley/Jackson Koivun/Johnny Keefer
Match tees off at 13.24 BST
The third of my three ball bets on Thursday comes towards the end of the opening wave of the day when the former Charles Schwab Challenge winner Davis Riley goes out with the amateur Jackson Koivun and the Korn Ferry Tour player Johnny Keefer.
I find it hard to believe an amateur can go well around here if the professionals are so fearful of the place so that is Koivun is out of the equation. Keefer might be someone making his way in the game but I’m not convinced someone so inexperienced will go well around a course with the renowned toughness of Oakmont. I probably would have left this group alone had Riley not finished second in the last major. He hasn’t got oceans of major experience but he is a PGA Tour winner and has a solid game if a little unspectacular. I would have him a clear favourite in this market but in places he is an outsider. He has too much top level experience for me to ignore him against an inexperienced pair.
Marc Leishman/Aaron Rai/Nick Dunlap
Match tees off at 18.58 BST
I’ll conclude my three ball bets with one from the later wave on Thursday and it is one which has two PGA Tour players in Aaron Rai and Nick Dunlap going out alongside the LIV star Marc Leishman, who has bundles of major experience to fall back on.
Rai is very solid in terms of ball striking and pretty much everything he does is straight but he isn’t at all long and I wonder if that will go against him here. Dunlap had a wonderful time on the PGA Tour last season but his only top 10 this term came in the Sony Open in January and his two major championship first rounds this season have been 90 and 78. When you consider this is the hardest course of the three by a distance that doesn’t bode well, neither does the fact that he has missed six of his last nine cuts. That leaves us with Leishman who qualified for this at one of the regional qualifiers and in his last four starts he has won in Miami on the LIV Tour and was in the top 10 in Virginia last week. This will be his first major since the 2022 Open Championship so he’ll be keen to make his mark. He is solid off the tee and the rest of his game is in decent order and he’s the value in this group.
Tips
Back B.Griffin First Round Leader (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 67.00 with Unibet (1/5 1-7)
Back P.Reed First Round Leader (e/w) for a 0.5/10 stake at 101.00 with Unibet (1/5 1-7)
Back M.Fitzpatrick to beat W.Clark & G.Woodland for a 3/10 stake at 2.50 with Boylesports
Back D.Riley to beat J.Koivun & J.Keefer for a 3/10 stake at 2.88 with Boylesports
Back them here:
Back B.Harman to beat C.Smith & P.Mickelson for a 3/10 stake at 2.63 with Bet365
Back M.Leishman to beat A.Rai & N.Dunlap for a 3/10 stake at 2.75 with Bet365
