2010 Masters fantasy golf preview

AimPoint PGA Tour Picks

Fantasy Golf Picks

I’m giving myself points for picking winners.  Hopefully my picks can help you win your fantasy golf league this season.  My goal is to get to 111 points for the season, or the equivlant of picking a Top 3 finisher or better each week, based on the point scale below:

Winner = 10 points

2nd Place = 5 points

3rd Place = 3 points

Top 10 = 1 point

2010 Fantasy Golf Picks Total:  25 Points

2010 Fantasy Golf Picks Weekly Average:  1.92 Points

Think you can pick better?  Leave a comment with your 3 picks for the 2010 Masters.  If you Beat The Expert in any week you will win a FREE 2010 Rotoff Golf Draft Kit (a $9.99 value) with one possible Grand Prize winner at the end of the FedEx Cup season.  See here for official BTE rules.

It was a tough week all around with everyone getting shutout except our fearless leader.  McClung gets the only points of the week on Lee Westwood’s Top 10 finish and increases his overall lead on the rest of the BTE field.

Beat the Expert Leaderboard

Last Week:

It never helps when your best pick for the week withdraws before his tee time on Thursday, as was the case with Paul Casey.  That’s the second time this year that has happened.  Ouch.  Kevin Streelman’s 75-74 were good enough for his 3rd missed cut of the season.  My only hope on the weekend was Lucas Glover who after a 68 in R2 was T14 heading into Saturday.   But he did his best Streelman impersonation with a 75-74 to finish T55.  This marks three straight weeks without a single point.  Some expert I am.

This week:

The wait is over.  The best golf week of the year is upon us and all is well.  Now that the Tiger Woods press conference is behind us we can start focusing on what really matters………..the golf (I’ll save you from my Tiger MKULTRA rants for now).  And what great golf we shall see.  Lost in Tiger’s return is just how healthy the PGA Tour is these days.  A resurgent Ernie Els, young guns Anthony Kim and Camilo Villegas each getting their 3rd career wins this season, and Jim Furyk with his first win since 2007, all make for some great drama for the year’s first major.

But when looking for a winner this week, keep this in mind.  In the FedEx Cup era (since 2007) the Masters champions has come from out of nowhere.  Zach Johnson (2007), Trevor Immelman (2008) and Angel Cabrera (2009) all were longshots to win.  Looking at their stats for those years we’ll do some fantasy profiling and see if we can’t come up with a profile of where to look this year.

7.3 Events .33 Top 10s 2.67 C/W/D 54.54 Average Finish

More on the above stats a little later when I go into my sleeper picks.  When looking at my top picks for the week I’m going with recent play and a little bit of feeling.  You will notice that the World #1 is not amongst my picks.  Tiger is the wild card this week.  Always the favorite by Vegas standards, it’s certainly not out of the question that he can win.  But until I see a few rounds from him in 2010 I just can’t pick him here.  He knows Augusta well so I do expect him to make the cut, but how he finishes is still a big mystery.  I’ll stick with what feels right and good old fashioned research.

 1. Jim Furyk

Jimmy finished T10 at Augusta last season, his fourth career Top 10 at the Masters.  As mentioned above, Furyk has already gotten that “hasn’t won since 2007″ monkey off his back.  He has also finished no worse then T37 this year without a single missed cut.  He’s no stranger to majors, winning the U.S. Open in 2003.  Currently 9th in Driving Accuracy, hitting fairways and greens will be huge this week.  Expect Mr. Furyk to contend all week long.

2.  Charl Schwartzel

Who?  Charl Schwartzel.  The South African is playing his first Masters which might make you look the other way.  But before you do, look at his recent play.  Four starts on the PGA Tour, three Top 10s which include a 2nd and 3rd place finsih (that’s 3 bonus points for you kids scoring at home).  And that 2nd place finish was at the WGC-CA Championship which always has major like fields.  The dude can play golf.  Now will he be able to do that his first go around at Augusta?  I hope so.

3.  Chad Campbell

Now it’s time to analyze The Numbers.  Chad Campbell is the closest match to our Masters Champion profile.  In 2010 he has 8 Events, 1 Top 10, 3 C/W/D and an AF of 53.4.  Throw in that Chadness finished T2 here last season and you can see why I’m wiping the drool off my chin.  In six career starts at Augusta he either finishes in the Top 20 (T2, T3, T17) or misses the cut.  Now I just need to pray that my three year variable is enough data to predict the future. 

Sleepers:   Ricky Barnes, Justin Leonard

My two sleepers also closely match the Fantasy Profile numbers as discussed.  There are a few other golfers that fit the profile that can be found on the 2010 Masters Field Report.  Is it a fool proof predictor model?  No.  Is it better then using a Magic 8 ball?  Yes.

I’m offering the 2010 Masters Field Report for FREE to help you in your own research.  Good luck to everyone this week and let me be the first to wish you an early “Happy Masters Sunday!”

Get your FREE copy of the 2010 Masters Field Report below:

http://rotoff.shlinklincolnsports.com/download-masters-field-report.php