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Get down on LineStar PGA Chat for the lowdown from experts.

The 2018 Travelers Championship Preview ⛳️

After a pretty crazy week at the U.S. Open where Brooks Koepka conquered the beast that is Shinnecock Hills, a strong field featuring nearly half of the world’s top 50 golfers travels a couple hours north to TPC River Highlands located in Cromwell, Connecticut for the Travelers Championship. This more traditional PGA track is a Par 70 Pete Dye designed course that stretches just 6,840 yards. TPC River Highlands has been inside the top 15 on Tour the past 3 years in the amount of birdies made, so we should see quite a bit of scoring with the eventual winner ending with about a -15 to -18 score.

The fairways here are forgivable but pretty narrow. Ball placement is important and the rough can absolutely penalize golfers. Taking bombers off the tee isn’t exactly necessary considering how short the course is, but guys who are accurate off the tee, sharp with their irons & wedges, and hit a lot of Greens in Regulation (GIR) will traditionally have the most success. Par 4 scoring should account for 60-65% of DFS scoring, so that stat should also be heavily weighed. Jim Furyk once shot a 58 here if that tells you what kind of golfer can have major success on this track.

Weather 🌦️

Temperatures should hang around the 60's and 70's for much of the tournament while bumping up to the mid-80's on Thursday & Sunday afternoons. The sustained winds on Thursday & Friday don’t appear like they will cause any major issues either, as they should max out at 9-10 mph but remain under that for the most part. There will be rain moving in early Thursday morning so there is a slight advantage to the Thursday AM wave, as the course will play softer for them. Nothing worth fading the Thursday PM wave over, but definitely worth considering.

Top 5 Stats to Consider 📊

1. Strokes Gained: Approach (SG: App)

2. Par 4 Average

3. Birdie or Better % (BoB%)

4. Strokes Gained: Off the Tee (SG: OTT) + Driving Accuracy

5. Greens in Regulation (GIR)

Lineup Foundation Targets

Here I will highlight three golfers who I believe can be reliable “building blocks”, especially for cash games, but all are in play for GPPs as well.

Patrick Reed ($10,000 DK, $11,600 FD)

Reed is riding into this week with great form, ranking 2nd in average finish over the last five events and 1st in DK scoring in that span. The top stats that pop off with him: he is 21st ranked SG: App, 6th in Par 4 average, and 9th in BoB%. His season-long stats don’t show him gaining a ton of strokes off the tee (67th SG: OTT) but he’s been improving that aspect of his game in recent weeks. He appears to like this course as well, finishing 5th last year and 11th the year before. With 16:1 Vegas odds, I think he is a solid buy as the 5th most expensive option on both sites -- should give you a lot of win equity.

Bryson DeChambeau ($9,500 DK, $11,400 FD)

DeChambeau comes in #1 overall in my personal model for the week and will be another top target. His DFS price has crept up to his incredible leap forward with his game this season, but I still think he makes a great buy as a ball striking machine. Bryson is 10th in SG: App, 12th in GIR, 16th in Par 4 Avg, and 5th in BoB% and also ranks 3rd overall in DraftKings scoring the past 5 events. After fighting to a T25 finish last week at Shinnecock, I believe he’ll be looking forward to tackling this shorter, more manageable course where he’ll see a lot more birdie looks.

Paul Casey ($9,600 DK, $11,200 FD)

Casey, unsurprisingly, makes another appearance as a great foundation target. With just one missed cut on the year in 11 PGA events and 3 for 3 cuts made at TPC River Highlands with a 2nd place finish in 2015, 17th place finish in 2016 and a 5th place finish last year, he should be firmly on your radar. No single aspect of Casey’s game really pops off the stat sheet in the five categories I listed above besides his 6th ranked approach game, but he just excels with well rounded performances nearly every week. 18:1 Vegas odds gives him some win equity in your lineups as well. A virtual cash lock for me.

Top Tournament Targets

Russell Knox ($8,000 DK, $9,800 FD)

Knox is another guy riding into the Travelers with nice form, with three Top 20 finishes in his past four events and he won here back in 2016. He’s a guy who is accurate off the tee (17th driving accuracy) and 6th in GIR. But he is also another golfer struggling with the flat stick (127th SG: Putting). Putting, as I mention most weeks, is extremely volatile and tough to predict. However, Knox is 15th in the field in proximity to the hole so he is giving himself chances -- just needs to capitalize with the putter.

Jason Day ($9,800 DK, $11,900 FD)

A lot of folks will be off of Day after an abysmal showing at the U.S. Open last week going +12 through the first two rounds on his way to his first missed cut of the year. However, Day has a great track record on Pete Dye designed courses and can definitely bounce back in a big way as he excels at navigating places like TPC River Highlands. He’s a GPP only play for me but I think you’ll get him at pretty low ownership in comparison to the other studs priced up at the top. His SG: OTT (7th), Par 4 average (3rd) and BoB% (4th) are enough to allow me to ignore his SG: App (116th) stats.

Bargain Bin 💲🗑️

Others to Consider

Top Golfer to Avoid

Going to skip this part this week as every top guy I can seem to make a case for. I will say I’m not too big on Bubba Watson ($8,800 DK, $10,400 FD) despite the fact that he has won here before. Just not liking the current form and I don’t believe I’ll have many, if any, shares.

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Apologies for the later than usual newsletter! But good luck this week, guys! And feel free to hit me up in the chat @N1TRO if you want a second opinion on any specific golfer approaching this week’s tournament or to just ask about PGA DFS in general! Follow me on Twitter @NitroDFS . Let's also try to stir up some more overall discussion! Always interested in hearing other people's hot takes.

Thanks for reading!