Matt Brown and Kelley Bydlon preview the fourth event of the fall swing, The Shriners Children's Open. They go through which stats they are leaning on this week and go through their best bets.
This is long Shots, Vison's premier golf betting podcasts. Here's Matt Brown, West Reynolds and Kelly Bidlin. Hello, welcome to long Shots here on the Beson podcast Network. Matt Brown, Kelly Bidlin coming to you for the Shriners Children's Open taking place down the street. For me here at TPC Summerland in Las Vegas, Kelly, this golf course is the golf course I've played second most in my life. I've played the TPC Las Vegas more than I played TPC Summerland, but really actually.
Have a well, it actually surprises me.
I'm a member at the Las Vegas. I'm not a member at the Summerland. I just have buddies that are members at the Summerland, and so I go over and play it quite often with them.
It's good to have friends with boats and with good golf.
Membership, Yes exactly. And you know, so we get a course that I'm actually very very familiar with. And you know, the more that I kind of got into golf, and the more that I started to understand the nuance of the difference between a normal golfer and these super humans that we call pro golfers, you understand why they go out and just absolutely destroy this course. And so I'm sure as you started to do your your modeling and things and whatever like, we probably are expecting some pretty good scores. Though. We should say this right off the top. Yeah, as we record this on Wednesday, you said there's been a pretty good shift in weather here in Vegas.
Yeah, I was doing my most of my handicapping Monday really check the weather. And by weather in Vegas, we're really just talking wind as a factor obviously, and we have seen this tournament get impacted by the wind before and it make it much much tougher to play. So yeah, I was kinda do it my handicap in Monday night, you know, just just some you know, we had to shuffle around some of the podcast stuff, so we haven't we have a recorded one of these this late in the week in a while. And man, just getting getting done with the numbers game this morning and catching a couple of tweets about from from the Great the Great Golf Twitter feed and the folks I have set up there. I wish I could give credit to one individual person, Matt, but I don't remember who I saw it from. So I immediately went and checked the weather and I'm like, oh, this looks like we might actually have a wave advantage Thursday with the early starts early starts on Thursday and the late starts on Friday, because wins kick up too. Now I'm using the airport wind finder, but so you're a solid what thirty you know, almost twenty thirty minutes west off the airport. But still we're looking at a sustained wins in twenty twenty five mile an hour in the afternoon on Thursday with gus up to thirty seven. I see, and then it kind of carries over into Friday morning, calms down a little bit in the afternoon on Friday. But I mean, Matt, this is We're gonna get into the course and everything. I know, but this is not a tournament. I heavily bet, and I'm kind of gretting the couple of the bets that I've made so far now that I'm looking at this wind and might need to be adding some as we talk through this.
Yeah, it does look like there will be a good amount of wind, and that is the defense of this course because there are there are severe penalty areas if you are way too waitward on your drives. Now, the thing is it's pretty generous fair ways, and certainly for these pros, like, it's nothing that they're too worried about in normal conditions. I've seen some of the guys out there playing and and they're just you know, destroying this thing. However, ball moves weirdly when there's twenty five thirty five min our wins. I see stuff out here saying there could be gusts up to forty kelly and so the penalty areas here are actual rocks that is just the balls out of bounce and you just you know, and you're you know, there's no like you know, you see these tree lined courses, like guy he's forced to punch out or he's forced like no, the ball it's dead like so you're just you're out of play and you have to go and and take a drop. So I mean, this is certain late something to monitor because you can in fact find yourself in bad positions off the tee strictly based off the of the win. Like I said, if there's no win, these guys are going to go if there was no win on this course we've seen, I mean, you know, the the ridiculously low scurse that you can shoot out here. But you know it's no joke when you're talking twenty five to thirty five.
Yeah, I mean you're talking. You're talking, you know, on an average for an average tournament. Here, you're talking about some of the biggest fairways and greens that we're going to see on a PGA tour all seasons as far as with the fairways and then just size of greens. So usually fairways and greens pretty easy to hit. But yeah, like you said, yet kind of waste areas whatever you want to call it, the desert waste areas that you can go to get into if you play way off that you know, way off line off the tee, you know, and then ninety two bunkers too, which you know what, mainly around the greens, but still you might be struggling with the wind off the tee and then on your approach shot as well into the greens, those bunkers could come into play for sure.
So yeah, I eighty nine those ninety two, I bet you have. Yeah, I've seen eighty nine. If those ninety two, like, I'm pretty sure I've seen every single one of them.
He spends more time in the sand than David's a little bit. Yeah, that's so. Yeah. I think it's an interesting handicap, and I think it changes things a little bit as be and you are hopping on to record this.
So if you and I play this course it is a seventy two par uh, they play it at a seventy one at seventy two hundred and fifty five yards. So just understand that while that definitely sounds like a little bit of a meaty course, Kelly, we're also looking at a course that is at twenty five, twenty six, twenty seven hundred feet of elevation. If you guys have ever played golf out here in the desert, you know, you get a little bit extra carry, you get a little bit extra roll out, you get a little bit extra everything out here. So these guys are going to, in my opinion, drive it long, drive it good as long as the weather permit. Certainly the weather does slow down over the weekend, so I expect these scores to go much much lower over the weekend than it does over Thursday and Friday. Maybe something to keep in mind too, as some of these scores over unders get posted and things like that, Kelly, where you might want to come in and take advantage of you know, the scores on a whatever gets posted on a Saturday, Sunday's post, we gets posted on a Thursday and Friday. But as you mentioned, I mean it's tons of bunkers. There's only four water holes, so not that big of a deal. But if you do miss the fairway too badly, you will be in an area where you cannot play the ball. It's not like you know, you're you're punching out from under a tree and stuff. So think about that. But you know, historically we're looking at a course that gives it up and gives it up a ton, and I imagine if this weather doesn't hold Kelly, then we're going to get another ridiculously as to you, and I like to affectionately term them birdie fests, and I think that there will be a birdie fest on the weekend regardless. So challenging course. What are the easiest courses are gonna find on tour?
Yeah? Yeah, absolutely, I'm just trying to think, you know, there's other things coming to play here, the you know, just around the green with the bunkers, right, That's not something that I really factored into stuff. That I was modeling this week because when you do talk talk birdie fest. Okay, if it's tough around the green, that's something to note. But if you know how these guys are gonna go so low, I don't wait as much because if I have a guy that's playing around the green too much, he ain't gonna be winning anyway. So it's not really something I looked at. But now I'm kind of thinking I might have to plug some of that stuff in if we're looking at this the wind like like it might be.
I'm gonna tell you I didn't do it either. And my thinking is the kind of the same as yours, which mainly is like, look there, if they're having a deal with the ground the green, they're losing, right, Yeah, you're losing.
Yeah, you gotta be on these greens.
Yeah, So it just doesn't matter to me.
These greens are bigger than Matt's house.
Matt's rough not all that bad. I mean, you know, it's bad for recreational players, but it's not bad for I would know, for like pro golfers and stuff and and things like that. So yeah, I mean we're looking at at big old greens, you know, rough that's not all that bad, and pretty wide fairways as well, thirty six yards, so I mean they're they're they're one of the wider ones tours as well.
Yeah, I think as we're just in sorry, we're we're kind of just talking through this now because this wind's really screwing with my head and kind of some things I looked at, I do think so this is one where I would normally say distance matters here more than it usually does at other courses. Now I would say, though, you could look back at who's won recently and you've gotten a mix of shorter hitters and some bigger hitters because the width the fairways really helps that out. And it's an easy on approach course. But if we're getting strong winds, distance never hurts you. If you got a strong you know, right, more distance off the tee is only going to matter more, you know, if winds are swirling in their face whatever. So that might be something you might want to look at a little bit more. Other than that, Matt, I think like some of the most important things I think you got to look at. With how big a greens opportunities gained, you get, you gotta look at proximity to the whole on approach shots. Uh, here you can get thrown. Don't look at something like greens and regulation or something like that too much, because these greens are so big. Uh, most of these guys should be hitting them. And then and then I what I always do too, where I bring us up when we talk either really small greens or really big greens. Three putt avoidance right, three point of avoidance lag putting, those types of stats I think you need to look at and regardless of what the wins like, that's gonna be a factor. And there's something I think you should be weighing pretty heavily this week.
If we look at the odds board here for the tournament, Kelly, it's a it's an interesting you know, it's a the field is not weak per se for one of these false wing tournaments.
Yeah, this one always ends up being a little bit better, right, just because the guys that have connections out here.
Yeah, like you know, Tom Kims in the field, Taylor Pendrith, Kiddyama Davis Thompson, Shame Power, bohas Er, Keith Mitchell, Eric Cole, these are all dudes that we talk about. Steven Jaeger Tom Hogy, Ben Griffin, Adam Hadwin. These are all guys we talk about on a week to week basis, you know. So, so it's not your your upper tier guys, but it is at least the these guys that you know, you and I placed bets on basically everyone that I just named some at some point over the last year. Yes, you know so in some way, shape or form in all this, but Tom Kim is your overwhelming favorite. One is two years in a row at twelve to one, Taylor penderth at twenty two, Kidi Yama, Davis Thompson, Seamus Power, Bo Hostler, all at thirty, Keith Mitchell, Eric Cole, Tom Hogy, Stephen Jaeger, Ben Griffin, all at thirty five. Then you get into the forty to one range, in which we have a big, large grouping of guys actually in Adam Hadwin, Matt McCarry, Jonathan Vegas, JT. Post and Harry Hall another guy that went to un LV, Harry L. Harris, English at forty to one, Cam Davis forty to one as well. We don't have to go head. We don't have to tell you, guys. We've mentioned it a lot of times here Vegas is one of the places where a lot of golfers live. It is, you know, sunshine here and warm here most of the year, so these guys can go out and practice golf and play golf a ton. So there are gonna be guys in this field that we'll talk about that do live in Vegas and or played golf in Vegas, or live very close and spend a lot of time in Vegas. So there are there's some of that that you can take in your handicap as well.
Kelly, Yeah, yeah, one hundred percent. And the Tom Tom Kim's interesting. I just don't know with with how low guys can go here. I think twelve to one is really tough to consider. He was basically an immediate cross off.
He's an immediate cross off mainly too, because at the end of the day, Kelly, like, like we we always say, the courses are what separate these awesome golfers from each other. And on this course, any one of the thirty names that I just named can go twenty five under on this over four days, like any one of those guys can. Like they're absolutely that they said they possessed that skill, and so yeah, it's just not no way, shape or form. Am I ever playing a twelve to one dude in a tournament that like half the field can go super low in mm hmm.
Yeah, No, I'm right there with you, right there with you. So I made I only got three bets. This is another one when we go this big of this big of birdie fest, right, this is well, let.
Me let me get to my uh, let me get to what's in my in my model, and then we can go into it to our bets real quick. But my being but no, no, no, fine first and foremost, so just remember guys, betting on sports, betting on golf in particular can be hard, but Harry Morgan and Morgan is easy. Morgan Morgan's America's largest injury firm. They have over one hundred offices nationwide more than one thousand lawyers. Their fee is free unless they win for you out there. So for more information go to four the People dot com slash best bets again, or you can dial pound law, which is pound five to nine from your cell phone again for the people f O R thepeople dot com slash best bets or pound law pound five to nine on your cell phone. This is in fact a paid advertisement. I did a lot what you did Kelly there on your your modeling. The only thing I did is I really juiced up the strokes again on par fives to see if, like these dudes are gonna like what these dudes can do on these par fives. There's only three of them, but like all of them are gettable. Who's gonna make eagles on these things? Might be a differentiator in all of this, And like I just I juiced up the Birdier better like I mean birdier better percentage and just and just birdier better gained, like I juiced up both of those higher than I ever have maybe before in any sort of tournament. And then just the other one, just the the.
Hopscin Birdie or better. I think both they're they're correlated. I'm with you, they're jacked up way I for me this week.
And then uh, I just did good drives, like because I don't care how far you hit it really here because like most of these dudes again in the increased elevation, Like you got to think about this, Kelly, if the guys like if if he's even in the lower tier of the driving distance on the on tour, he's still to eighty five, you know whatever. So if you're getting the extra ten yards per drive here, he's three hundred now, so it's just like, yeah, and each one there is no different you know. So I'm just seeing who can like keep it kind of relatively in the fair way.
Yeah, and unless yeah, I mean, like we said before, unless the wind is crazy, each one of the like you just said, these par fives are reachable into by the entire field. So yeah, it's I waited distance a little bit more, but yeah, it's we've we've obviously Tom Kim's win here in the last two years.
So yeah, I don't play from the teas that these guys play from, and I can get to but I mean I can get to these par fives, you know, like in from the you know whatever, like the second time, get there too, look at you, And so these dudes are are are definitely getting there and too.
Absolutely no offense to your golf game at all. But that is a great that is a great thing for listeners to know. If you can get there in two them twenty yards back at the tea boxes or whatever, they're gonna be no problem.
Yeah, they're getting there in two for sure, all right, so what at the what the model spit out for you?
Yeah, I'm gonna go right back. I'm gonna start with a little bit longer shot. Here a guy that I've bet twice i think during this full swing, and he was a fat well both of us did two weeks ago right a fat withdrawal on a on a Thursday JJ spawn. But he played last week, looked fine, finished T twenty five in Utah. Was talking a little bit about it with Wes. Wes not with us this week. He's went writing a lot for the college basketball betting guy that we got going on at Visa dot Com coming out later this week, so we gave him a week off. We had a little bit shuffled schedules around, so Wes, I know, was on him as well, though I kind of, you know, I just was talking with Wes. I was like, do you have any concern whatsoever because he's still kind of he's still rating out as one of the best guys for me, and Wes said he watched him a little bit last week. No concerns really there. He finished T twenty five, So okay, you know that last twenty four rounds number one on approach, fourth on opportunities gained fourth on Birdy fourth and Birdie, you're better in this field. So I went back to JJ spaond at forty five to one. Next up for me, Eric Cole. I did play him thirty five to one. You know, Matt, we've seen kind of a roller coaster season for him here this year, and that we know the one downside of his game that really holds him back sometimes that accuracy off the tee. Now we've talked though wider fairways that shouldn't come into play as much. Maybe the wid kicks his ass, but he is a guy that goes off earlier on Thursday, so I'm feeling a bit better about that. Spawn does go out later in the afternoon, which it does concern me a little bit, but Cole was t three here last year, so it does. It does have some equality equality finish at this event. I also pulled up his numbers from Sanderson farms Man. He was gained ten point seven strokes tee to green on the field and ten strokes on approach alone. I thought was just incredible numbers to see what he did there. So yeah, on Eric Cole thirty five to one, and then the last guy I bet is cam Davis. Who I bet him? I think I said I probably, I would guess I bet I would bet that. I said the same thing on this pod last year, Matt that I bet him then and would say his game seems to just like it should fit this course very well. Finished the seventy year last year, He's kind of had a longer layoff though, so you don't know exactly what you're getting from him. I'm gonna say though right now in this spot, I've already bet him I'd probably scratch him off my list though now that what I'm looking at with the wind, and he is one of the later afternoon guys on Thursday, so I think I would scratch him off and look at some others. I circled some other guys that rated out pretty highly for me that do te off early tomorrow. I'm gonna let you go through yours first, then maybe we can talk through some of the some of those guys if they're not on your list already.
Just a just a reminder and everybody out there that it's been listening to content from me and Kelly for over a year. This is the one year anniversary of the torn calf as on the fielding a punt out there. So, yes, this is Kelly. He's doing good now, doesn't walk with a limp. Everything is good to go. Just want everyone to know that the calf is actually back in back in shape.
That is. It's really scary that we're always going to have an anniversary date on that Matt. Matt and I were ready to go to the course right after, right after doing this, and I had to I don't know, what do you do? Back went to Matt's couch. He gave me a massage, gun worked it out. That didn't really work well, and then I sat on the couch for like four days icing this monster in calf's terrible.
It was, uh, it was, it was. It was brutal. But again, does not walk with the limp, is healthy, everything's good to go out there. So one of the things you're going to hear a lot about. I mean, like I said, there's a lot of Vegas residents in this uh in this tournament, and that said Kelly, this has nothing to do with him being a Vegas resident and everything to do with the fact that he ended up number two in my mom all this week. And it's Shamus power like this is I mean, it doesn't hurt that it's his home course, I suppose.
And you know I suppose yes.
I mean people say all the time like, well, how often are they really playing these courses anyway, because it's like, you know, they're on tour and there whatever, And that's a fair argument. It is, like I'll put this way, he's out there enough to where I personally have seen him a few different times, so it's like, you know, I imagine he knows the course very very very very very well. But honestly, that didn't really factor into this, Kelly. For me, it was just he is number two overall in my model. He rated pretty highly in just about every single thing that I put in. Oh one thing I should say that I did sprinkle a little bogie avoidance if we're talking about berdie Fest. You don't want dudes making bogies, and like, he's actually number one in this field in bogie avoidance in the model for me, So seamous power is in the account, but he was not number one in the model. He knows number one in the model, Kelly, Alex Smalley, Okay, Alex smally my number one guy in the model. So he does get a bet for me too, because guess what, he's got pretty long odds and so long odds connected to a guy that's number one overall in the model for me, then I have to put that dude in the account. If you go in he is really good on par five's already told you. I juice that up a little bit where I want guys who can go out and do that. He's really good on easy courses as well, which I put into the model as well, So Alex Smally's shamous power and then the only other one that I put in, and this was strictly a this is strictly a why is this guy any good? Why am I? Why do I continue to have this guy pop in the model and stuff? And Kelly, I think I think Wes has played Matty Schmid a couple of times. I think he has. But but Matty Schmid is sitting in is sitting in the fifth position in my model, but attacked with like really long odds to his to his name, And so I just went down the model played the model with the price that was attached to all of them. If anyone's wondering that, you know who else was around up there? So Alex Smalley, Shamous Power, Johnny Vegas was third overall, Henry Norlander yeah, fourth overall, Matty Schmid was fifth, Patrick Fishburne sixth, Paton Kazaire was seventh, JJ Spahn eighth, Joe Highsmith was nine, and then Ben Coles was ten. So that was the top ten for me over in the model. So any of those guys, if you wandered to throw them in your betting card, they all had pretty decent odds actually attached to them. And then all certainly if you're like making DFS lineups and stuff like that, maybe some guys you want to get in your rotation.
Yeah, yeah, I like it. I might. Yeah, Seamous, Seamus and Smally I'm gonna have to look out look at more because they definitely rated out pretty high for me as well, and you get both of them with earlier tea times on Thursday. Smally's actually uh second group off on this on the tenth tee on Thursday, so that is kind of attractive to me. The other ones that I just kind of circled of guys that rated out pretty highly for me that do tee off early on Thursday, I think me and you have flirted with bets with this guy a couple of times. I don't know if we're ready to run back, but he did rate out pretty highly for me. Chan Kim right back up there again. Uh, he goes early. Hoffman. I don't think I'm gonna be back on my boy hoff this week, but he does go. He did rate out pretty high again for me this week, and he goes off early. Fishburne you mentioned, I haven't been able to bring myself to bet this guy yet, but he is a guy that did rate out pretty highly for me. Go and it starts early. Taylor Pendrith another one, Johnny Vegas you mentioned as well, teas off early as well, And all those guys had rate out pretty highly for me, So I might be following along. I think definitely on shame, and then I might add one or two more of these early guys, at least first round leaders. I think I'm gonna probably heavily attack first round leader those early uh some of those early guys.
Yeah, absolutely it is. And again, just as a reminder, this is one of those tournaments, Kelly, I would I've I've told you know, friends out here of mine who like are gonna go watch the tournament, and so they want to like have some actions over that. I'm like, don't be afraid to bet a long shot in this tournament. All these dudes are very very very good at golf. This is an easy course. They're going to score. It's just who scores the most, you know. And so it's like if you want to have a ticket on a dude that you just like and you just like to watch him play, like, it's fine, like this is this is These guys are all. These guys are all this. This tournament at one point had a cut line that set the record. Kelly, the cut line at this tournament was seven under one. Yeah, it was seven under was cut line one time at this tournament. So just something to consider as well. Of course, Wes has this article up over at vson dot com, so be sure and taken that information. If you have not yet become a VS and Pro subscriber, be sure and do that. We got specials running all over the place. Just type in any word and I think it'll probably just give you. Like we have all the words. Bet is one of them, money is another one, like any of that whatever, Like just to type it in, they'll get you you'll get a you'll get a deal on becoming a Vson Pro subscriber, Kelly, I'll I don't want to speak for you. If anything changes for me, I'll certainly put something on the Twitter machine. But I think I'm probably gonna stick with those three dudes, and like you said, maybe scope out the weather situation once it's actually happening, and then maybe make some live place because you know, they leave these numbers up even when dudes haven't even teed off yet, you know, And so like maybe the weather's not near as bad, right, Yeah, if it's not.
Near absolutely, it's changed a lot in forty eight hours, so there's yeah, it's.
Not here as bad that maybe we come in on some of these afternoon dudes and they had him ben teed off yet, you know, and like all that, so there's there's options there.
Yeah, And this is I think it's a great p s A about the win for for betters out there, and if you're handicapping golf yourself, I know this isn't gonna be super helpful, But like Matt's talking about, like yes, because of how much it's changed and how big it looked like a big look it looks like, at least right now, of an impact it could make. I'm gonna be waiting until a little later tonight, probably to check some stuff. I'll put whatever I add, i'll put up at vson dot com. But those names, at least that I mentioned early, I think any of those, at least for tomorrow morning, is a first round leader. Look are a good.
Look Kelly, Any partying any any parting words here or we're just gonna let people roll.
No, just uh you know, remember it's the false swing. We got a lot of birdie fests. Don't be firing too much money off. I think, like Matt said, you want to you want to mess around with some bets, great, but dial back the units.
Lose all your don't lose all your damn NFL money. That's right, Yeah, that's right. Like we know you made money this past week, Like, so don't don't lose all your damn NFL money.
If I went five to zero in circa, then you made everybody out there listening. But it had to make.
Somebody exactly like don't, don't, don't lose all your damn money. So that's our that's our party. But we're d.
Favorite favorites perfect or whatever last week.
Yeah, let's just let's just listen. Just that's all we're doing. Just don't don't lose all your damn money with it out there. Uh smally, power and Schmid for me, Kelly, real quick, I'm gonna have power.
I'm gonna okay, So I'm gonna say power, spawn and coal for me right now. Forget. I did bet Cam Davis, but don't don't bet him. Don't bet Cam. He's obviously gonna win. Now, he's obviously gonna win. I came out with this, I bet him. I came on the podcast, but to tell people not to bet him. Now he's gonna win.
Absolutely love it. Poor Kelly Bilin. I am Matt Brown. Good luck on all your Shriner's bets.