2021 Houston Open picks, field grade, odds, best bets, golf predictions at Memorial Park

Subsequent week’s RSM Basic is the final PGA Tour occasion of the calendar 12 months (!), however this week’s Hewlett Packard Enterprise Houston Open might be the extra intriguing of the ultimate two tournaments on the slate this fall. Its discipline — crammed with names resembling Brooks Koepka, Tony Finau, Scottie Scheffler and Sam Burns — is robust, and Memorial Park Golf Course can take a look at wills if it is taking part in quick and agency. If a couple of of the 21 top-50 gamers on this discipline get within the combine on the weekend and situations get slightly bit wild, this occasion may present an awesome begin to a pleasant closing kick for the Tour this fall.

Let’s take a better take a look at this week’s contest with odds supplied by way of Caesars Sportsbook.

Occasion info

Occasion: Hewlett Packard Enterprise Houston Open | Dates: Nov. 11-14
Location: Memorial Park Golf Course — Houston, Texas
Par: 70 | Purse: $7.5 million

Three issues to know

1. Brooks bounce? It isn’t been an exciting begin to the brand new season for Koepka, who helped course architect, Tom Doak, design this course. It is clear he likes his personal work, although, because the four-time main champ completed within the prime 10 right here final 12 months per week earlier than the 2020 Masters after taking pictures 65-65 on the weekend. He would not convey a lot momentum on this time round — no prime 25s in three begins this season — and his iron play has not been excellent over his final 20 rounds (seventy fifth of all of the golfers on this discipline). Nonetheless, tough checks appear to convey out one of the best in him, maybe much more so when he is the one which creates them.

“Tom clearly I feel did an awesome job with this place,” Koepka stated final 12 months. “From the second we form of sat down … to form of focus on some issues and what I assumed can be good in a golf course, and he had his concepts and I had mine and mixed them and that is what you get. I feel it is a very powerful golf course. You already know, with the tough being the way in which it’s, you have to put the ball within the fairway after which it is a second-shot golf course. You actually need to putt a superb strike on the ball, with the ability to spin it, be good together with your lengthy irons, there’s fairly a couple of lengthy holes. However on the similar time it makes it fairly enjoyable in the event you do miss the inexperienced as a result of you’ve so many choices.”

2. Wolff run: One of many extra thrilling gamers on the planet, Matthew Wolff, is on a pleasant heater to begin the brand new season. It is nice to see, too, after the bumpy 2021 he endured. He completed T17 on the Sanderson Farms Championship earlier than notching top-five finishes at each the Shriners Hospitals for Kids Open and final week’s World Vast Know-how Championship. Final week was particularly spectacular as a result of Wolff needed to shelve driver extra typically than he would have preferred due to the way in which the course was constructed. He can let it eat a bit extra at Memorial Park, and if it is rolling, he can let a suddenly-scorching strategy recreation take over as he goals for the second win of his profession.

3. Powerful scene: Memorial Park could not have performed terribly powerful final time round, however it did create some separation on the prime of the leaderboard, which is the signal of a superb take a look at for one of the best on the planet. Carlos Ortiz completed two forward of Hideki Matsuyama and Dustin Johnson however 4 forward of Talor Gooch and six forward of all however 5 gamers. Its protection is its greens (mostly on approach shots), however it’s solely a protection if they’re — as famous above — taking part in quick and agency or if the wind is whipping. We should always be capable to inform most of that early on, but when they’re something like final 12 months, it’s going to be a superb week for one of the best ball-strikers as final 12 months’s prime 10 included Burns, Matsuyama, Johnson in addition to Talor Gooch, Koepka and Tyrrell Hatton.

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Grading the sphere

Finau is the highest-ranked participant within the discipline, and he is joined by different top-25 gamers together with Sungjae Im, Patrick Reed, Cam Smith, Tyrrell Hatton, Scheffler, Burns and Koepka. Exterior the highest 25 however within the discipline are Joaquin Niemann, Max Homa, Adam Scott, Shane Lowry, Jason Day and Wolff. For a mid-November occasion that’s on simply its second run at a brand new (kind of new) course, that is a reasonably robust exhibiting. Grade: B-

2021 Houston Open picks

Who will win the Houston Open, and which lengthy pictures will stun {the golfing} world? Visit SportsLine now to see the projected leaderboard and best bets, all from the mannequin that is nailed seven golf majors and is up virtually $10,000 for the reason that restart.