The Corales Puntacana Championship 2023

Share

Tweet

Share

Share

Email

Comments

The Corales Puntacana Championship 2023

The PGA Tour moves on from Florida after a four-week run, and heads to the Dominican Republic for this event and to Texas for the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play tournament. The Corales Puntacana Championship has only been live on the PGA Tour since 2018, so it’s still a fairly new alternate event. We will see 120 players on the grounds this week, and the top 65 golfers plus ties after round 2 will move onto the weekend rounds.

There $3.8M to be won this week, the winner takes home $684K and also collects 500 FedEx Cup points. Corales Puntacana Resort is 7,666 yards in length, is a par 72, and the greens are paspalum. The average winning score at this tournament is -16.6, so don’t expect a birdie-fest this week. The record here is only -18 which is held by three golfers, Brice Garnett, Graeme McDowell, and Hudson Swafford. Place bets on accurate drivers, long hitters as this is a lengthy track, strong putters, solid around-the-green golfers, and those who are sound tee to green.

Three questions that are relevant to the Corales Puntacana Championship this week:

1. Strokes gained off the tee has proved to be a very important stat here, so which 10 players have been the best in this stat category over their last 24 rounds? Jhonattan Vegas, Tyler Duncan, Brent Grant, Sam Stevens, Stephan Jaeger, MJ Daffue, Dylan Wu, Adam Long, Emiliano Grillo, and Cameron Percy.
2. Which 10 players gained the most strokes total (minimum 6 rounds) at this event since 2018? Joel Dahmen (13 rounds), Ben Martin (12 rounds), Kramer Hickok (12 rounds), Chris Stroud (6 rounds), Cameron Percy (12 rounds), Greyson Sigg (8 rounds), Jhonattan Vegas (14 rounds), Kelly Kraft (16 rounds), Thomas Detry (16 rounds), and Charley Hoffman (8 rounds).
3. What’s my top calculated bet for the week (the goal here is to at least double the wager)? For me, it’s got to be Clark to finish top 10 this week at +115. No bet seems safe this week, so I’m going to close my eyes and invest big into Wyndham and hope for the best.

Below you will find players that I will bet, might bet, and five random bets that interest me. The odds come from DraftKings Sportsbook and are outright numbers. My betting strategy is to hedge quite a bit so my upside isn’t huge but neither is my downside, and I’m profitable or break even in roughly 70% of the weeks I’m active.

5 Players That I’m Absolutely Betting

Wyndham Clark (+900) – Clark has played weekend golf in eleven consecutive events, three of those have gone for top 10’s, and he has recorded another four top 30’s during this stretch. He had a strong week last week gaining 6.64 strokes ball striking and finished 5th as a result. He narrowly missed finishing top 20 here last year and his form coming in was absolutely dreadful. I’m betting him to win, to finish top 10, and top 20, and looking at matchup wagers also. He has to be licking his chops to earn his first career PGA Tour victory this week given he’s the favorite for the first time ever.

Cameron Percy (+5500) – Percy has done great here since he’s an accurate player and that’s certainly needed on this track. He had a T8 in 2020 and a T4 last year gaining 11.25 strokes total. He has two top 16’s over his last three starts thanks to solid ball striking and putting. I don’t think I’ll bet him to win but do like his prospects for a third straight top 10, and will likely play his top 20 +200 number also as a hedge.

Kramer Hickok (+3000) – Solid play here has grabbed my attention for Hickok this week as he has finished no worse than T21 in three career starts at this tournament and had a T10 in 2019. He has two top 30’s over his last four starts including a T14 at The Honda Classic in late February where he gained 6.32 strokes ball striking with 4.83 of those coming from his approach play. I’ll more than likely bet him to finish top 20 and may take a look at a top 10 wager also, but can’t commit to that just yet.

Ben Martin (+2800) – Martin keeps ball-striking well and it has earned him a T5 and a T13 over his last four starts. He finished T2 here last year and had a T9 in 2021, so I certainly like his prospects this week. I can see myself betting him to finish top 10 this week and top 20 at +130.

Chad Ramey (+3500) – He won here last year in his only look at this event and his form is arguably better than it was a year ago as he had a T27 at The Players Championship and he echoed that last week at the Valspar Championship with a T27, as well. I don’t like how he’s getting it done via his strong short game, but there aren’t many good ball strikers in this field and hot putters can flourish on any given week. I probably won’t bet Ramey to two-peat here, but don’t mind his top 10 and top 20 betting numbers.

5 Players That I Might Bet

Adam Long (+4500) – Here’s another player who has thrived at this event with a T5 in 2021 and a T8 in 2017. He’s coming off a T19 last week, so there’s some hope that he will do well again this week but it certainly won’t be because of his approach play as he has lost strokes in this stat category in seven straight starts. I’ll certainly look at a top-20 bet on Long this week but don’t think I’ll do much more than that.

Dylan Wu (+5000) – Wu has three top 35’s over his last five starts including a T10 at The Honda Classic four starts ago thanks to sound ball-striking and putting. He had a T56 here last year, and should be able to propel himself into top 40 status this week if his solid ball-striking continues. I would feel decent about laying down a top 20 and top 40 wager on Dylan this week.

Joel Dahmen (+2200) – Dahmen has a very nice record at Corales with a win two years ago and two other top 13’s since 2018. He had to withdraw here last year but gained 1.76 strokes total, so it’s not like he was playing terribly and decided to pull out. He hasn’t played so well lately, but did gain 4.83 strokes on approach last week and would have finished a lot better than T61 had he not lost 6.24 strokes with his short game. I feel good about betting him to finish top 20 this week, but can’t go any higher than that given he can’t seem to get his flat stick to work that well right now.

Andrew Novak (+4500) – He’s a strong putter and can pop a bit with his ball striking. He has three top 29’s over his last five starts, and I can see a top 40 wager being a half-decent play this week. 

MJ Daffue (+4500) – Daffue has some appeal this week given he has two top 21’s over his last three starts and gained 6.14 strokes ball-striking at The Honda Classic. He has also gained at least 1.96 strokes off the tee over his last three tournaments played that had shot tracker, and he popped with his putter last week to the tune of 4.58 strokes gained. I could potentially get behind a top 20 bet on MJ this week, and would feel comfortable with a top 40 wager.

5 Other Interesting Bets

Top 40 – Cody Gribble (+100) – With back-to-back T7’s in his last two starts, there is some appeal for him to finish top 40 this week given his strong ball striking and putting last week.

Winning Margin – 1 Stroke Exactly (+225) – The last four winners here have won by a single stroke, so if history repeats itself this week, we will 3.25x our wagers.

Tournament Matchup – Hickok over Wallace (+100) – Hickok has a strong record here finishing anywhere from T10 to T21 in three starts since 2019, whereas Wallace has no experience at this venue. Hickok has also finished higher than Wallace in 3 out of their last 4 events played, so I like Kramer this week to beat Matt and double our money.

Tournament Trio – Clark over Detry and Dahmen (+130) – Clark has been playing some mighty fine golf for a while now and I expect him to improve on his T22 from last year when he was a rookie here.

Tournament Matchup – Clark over Detry (-140) – I’m going hard on Clark this week as you can see as he’s playing the best golf of anyone in this mediocre field and seems hungry to capture a win on the PGA Tour – this week is as good as any to accomplish that goal.

Be sure to do lots of research and due diligence on each player before parting with your hard-earned money, and all the best in having a profitable week!