DraftKings Daily Fantasy Golf Helper: Waste Management Phoenix Open

Daily fantasy golf requires a new approach for each and every event.

The course and field change week after week, making no two contests alike. That means you need to refine your approach for each PGA Tour event to try to find golfers who are primed to excel for your daily fantasy golf lineups.

Each week, we have a course primer, and our daily fantasy golf projections and lineup builder can help you get started, but these golfers stand out specifically on DraftKings for the Waste Management Phoenix Open.

Key Stats

Let's get to the picks. For details on why these stats stand out this week, check out the course primer.

Stats are from Fantasy National Golf Club and are for golfers in the field over the last 50 rounds, unless otherwise noted.

High-Priced Studs

Jon Rahm (DraftKings Price: $11,200 | FanDuel Sportsbook Win Odds: +700) - Rahm has a great feel for TPC Scottsdale, having attended college at nearby Arizona State and finished T5 as an amateur back in 2015. Starting with a T16 in 2017, he has improved in each of his trips as a pro, racking up T11, T10, and T9 in the three years hence. He is second in strokes gained: off the tee, second in strokes gained: par 5s, and third in birdies or better gained. His iron play is perfectly fine if not reflected with elite ranks in the stats (37th in our sample), but he gets it done week in and week out. Another ho-hum top 10 at the Farmers Insurance Open gives him four straight and seven of his last nine with such a finish.

Justin Thomas ($10,800 | +900) - Thomas gets the nod for our other spot at the very top end, edging out Xander Schauffele ($11,000 | +1100) and Rory McIlroy ($10,600 | +1100). You really can't go wrong here, with Schauffele finishing T17, T10, and T16 in his three trips and has some of the best recent form on Tour. McIlroy's game has slipped over the past year and he's making his first trip to Phoenix, but this course should suit him perfectly. Plenty of golfers have shown up here and played well without history, but each of the past five winners has a top-five finish on their resume before their victory. That's enough to get us on Thomas and his consecutive third-place finishes. He also rates out the best statistically of the three, ranking 1st in birdies or better gained, 2nd in approach, 13th on par 5s, 15th in proximity gained from 150-175 yards, and 19th in strokes gained: off the tee.

Daniel Berger ($9,600 | +2200) - You really can't go wrong with anyone above $9,500 this week, and if possible we are going to want to roster two high-salaried golfers this week given how classy the leaderboards tend to be at TPC Scottsdale. Berger is the lowest of that group and allows flexibility in choosing any of the other studs to roster. He also happens to pop second in our stats model this week behind only Thomas. He is 6th in birdies or better gained, 13th in both strokes gained: off the tee and strokes gained: par 5s, 14th in strokes gained: approach, and 31st in proximity gained from 150-175 yards. He's been laying the best golf of his life the past year and a half, and another top 10 at the Sony Open (T7) last time out shows us he's ready to keep rolling.

Mid-Priced Options

Harris English ($9,300 | +2800) - English missed the cut at the Farmers last week, just the third time in the last 12 months that he's missed the weekend. His finishes following the first two MC's were T17 and T10, and there's no reason to suspect any lingering issues this week. He's played well at the WMPO in the past, with a T16 last year and top 10s in 2014 and 2016. He's 5th in birdies or better gained and 10th on par 5s, and most importantly, he ranks 4th in total strokes gained in our 50 round sample. Only Schauffele, Rahm, and Thomas have been better.

Brooks Koepka ($8,800 | +5000) - We don't know if Koepka will ever get back to his dominance, but we do know that if he's $8,800 and 50/1 we'll be rostering him in DFS and betting on him on FanDuel. Koepka picked up his maiden PGA Tour victory here in 2015 but hasn't competed at TPC Scottsdale since 2017. It's been a long road back from the knee injury he suffered in South Korea 15 months ago, and with three missed cuts since his T7 at Augusta, we are buying him at his lowest price and, hopefully, rostership. Even for all his struggles of late, he still ranks 6th in proximity gained from 150-175 yards, 17th in birdies or better gained, and 24th in strokes gained: off the tee.

Matthew Wolff ($8,700 | +5000) - After a series of poor starts, Wolff was on his way to another missed cut at the Farmers before withdrawing with an apparent hand injury. The form and injury, along with an awkward price point, will suppress his popularity on DraftKings and make him a great leverage play this week. It was only last summer that we saw Dustin Johnson fire a couple 80s and withdraw with a back injury before going on a tear. So while there's more than a little risk associated with Wolff, there's plenty of upside in rostering him this week at a course where he made his PGA debut in 2019 while still a college student-athlete. He ranks 6th in approach, 12th in proximity gained from 150-175 yards, 15th off the tee, 15th in birdies or better gained, and 27th on par 5s.

Si Woo Kim ($8,100 | +6000) - All it takes is one missed cut after the dazzling ballstriking display at the American Express for Kim to get a big discount in his betting odds, and he rounds out the middle tier at a perfectly playable $8,100. Much will be made of Kim's record here, and there's no denying he's been downright bad -- three missed cuts, a T62, and a T67 the past five years -- but Si Woo is in some of the best prolonged form of his career and is another rostership leverage opportunity for those multi-entering tournaments on DraftKings. Lineup construction this week will drive most DFS players to play two high-salaried guys and fill out their team in the $7k range, and building a balanced lineup with Kim should be a differentiator. He's 13th in birdies or better gained, 21st in strokes gained: approach, 24th in proximity gained from 150-175 yards, 26th on par 5s, and 32nd in strokes gained: off the tee.

Low-Priced Options

Corey Conners ($7,900 | +8000) - Conners fits the bill here -- ballstriking, ballstriking, ballstriking. He is 6th in strokes gained: off the tee and 17th in approach, and his T37 at Torrey Pines was his first finish outside the top 25 since the CJ CUP. The putter is inconsistent, but Conners is actually positive with the short stick over his past five measured events, not including T10 and T17 at the Masters and the Mayakoba Golf Classic, which don't track strokes gained data.

Sam Burns ($7,700 | +8000) - Burns bounced back from a missed cut at the American Express with a solid showing at the Farmers, finishing T18 despite losing strokes on his approaches. He's capable of contending based mostly off his driver and putter, as he ranks 5th in strokes gained: off the tee, 7th in strokes gained: par 5s, and 11th in birdies or better gained.

Henrik Norlander ($7,500 | +10000) - Norlander's spike finish was telegraphed by his excellent approach play recently, and after another strong display, he ranks fifth in that department this week. He's also 29th off the tee, and, surprisingly, 22nd on total strokes gained.

Brendan Steele ($7,400 | +9000) - As mentioned leading up to the Sony Open, Steele tends to repeat good results at courses he likes, and before missed cuts the past two years TPC Scottsdale was definitely a Steele course. He has four top-six finishes, most recently a T3 in 2018. He ranks 4th in proximity gained from 150-175 yards and 23rd in strokes gained: approach.

Erik Van Rooyen ($7,000 | +20000) - Another missed cut at the Farmers sent EVR's number plummeting, and we'll buy in now at the bottom of the market. We've seen him play his best in strong fields, and he ranks 16th in both birdies or better gained and strokes gained: par 5s, 27th off the tee, and 28th on approach.

Bargain Basement

James Hahn ($6,800 | +15000) - Hahn reeled off three straight top 10s in the swing season, and has solid history at TPC Scottsdale with four top 25s in his eight trips. He's a streaky player who can pile up birdies when his game is clicking, and he won't be intimidated by big names at the top of the leaderboard.

Kyle Stanley ($6,700 | +15000) - Stanley is coming on a bit, as he ranks 60th in strokes gained: approach over his last 50 rounds but 16th if we narrow the sample to just his last 24 rounds. He's especially proficient in our key proximity range, as he's second in the field from 150-175 yards.

Mike Rodden is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Mike Rodden also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username mike_rodden. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in his articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.