We took last week off because of the Zurich Classic due to the team format, which was won by Jon Rahm and Ryan Palmer, but we return this week for one of my favorite events of the season, both for betting and daily fantasy golf: The Wells Fargo Championship held at Quail Hollow Country Club in Charlotte. Quail Hollow plays as one of the most difficult courses on the PGA Tour, and we will likely see the winning score hover around -12. It's also one of the longest tracks that we see all year, measuring at just around 7,500 yards for a Par-71 layout.
The field this week isn’t the best field top to bottom, but it's stacked at the top with elite talent such as Rory McIlroy, Rickie Fowler, Justin Rose, Phil Mickelson, Tony Finau, Webb Simpson, Jason Day, Hideki Matsuyama, Paul Casey, and Sergio Garcia all playing as they prepare for the upcoming PGA Championship in two weeks.
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The sheer length of the Quail Hollow is going to force players to go to driver off the tee early and often, and while length is certainly important, I’m going to be focusing on a mix of accuracy and length this week. Even though the rough will be short, the design of many of the holes around Quail Hollow will still require players to miss on the proper side of the fairway or face an impossible angle on their approach shots. Just go back an look at guys who have success here: Rory McIlory, Rickie Fowler, Webb Simpson, James Hahn, Ryan Moore, Justin Thomas to name a few/. All have different styles off-the-tee, but they all are either super long or super accurate.
While there are only three Par 5s around Quail Hollow, they are by far the easiest scoring holes on the course. All three are reachable in two for the longer hitters, and elite scoring on the Par 5s will be a major key to success this week. There aren’t going to be many wedge approach shots into the greens at Quail Hollow, so targeting players who are solid with mid and long irons is another angle to attack this week, especially for some of the guys who aren’t as long off the tee as the elite bombers.
Year in and year out, we see Quail Hollow have one of the lowest greens-in-regulation percentages on the PGA Tour, and because of this, this is a great week to target players who excel around the green with scrambling. It’s no surprise that short-game guys such as Phil Mickelson, Jason Day and Patrick Reed have all played well at Quail Hollow despite not being elite tee-to-green players. The greens this week will be rolling fast, and this may be a good week to pay extra attention to see who is putting well on these greens in preparation for the PGA Championship at Bethpage Black.
Before we get into the Quail Hollow picks, we have to point out that plenty of strategy goes into cashing winning DFS lineups and winning betting tickets. By now you should know the best place to start is RotoQL’s DFS tools and the BetQL Mobile App. Our easy-to-use RotoQL PGA Lineup Optimizer gives you a big advantage when you're putting together DFS lineups, and our BetQL Trending Picks and Public Betting tools provide a massive edge when you're making bets, regardless of bankroll size.
I'm always ready to help, too, so check me out on Twitter (@DFSBenj) for even more NFL, NBA, MLB and PGA daily fantasy content and gambling advice.
Key Stats
Strokes Gained: Off the Tee
Par 5 Scoring
Approach 175-200 Yards
Strokes Gained: Around the Green/Scrambling
Wells Fargo Championship picks (Daily Fantasy Golf)
DFS Core Plays to Consider:
Top Tier: Rory McIlroy, Rickie Fowler, Tony Finau, Phil Mickelson
Mid-Tier: Patrick Reed, Lucas Glover, Jhonattan Vegas, Sung Kang, Trey Mullinax
Value Plays: Scott Stallings, KH Lee, Sam Burns
Wells Fargo Championship betting advice
Outright Bets to Consider
*odds via DraftKings Sportsbook
Phil Mickelson 28/1
This is a difficult week to handicap in that we have a massive favorite at the top with Rory McIlroy at 5.5/1. While laying a big piece on McIlroy is awfully tempting -- he is a two-time winner and owns the course record at Quail Hollow -- but I just can’t bring myself to back him at that number for an outright bet and would rather load up on him in DFS formats. I’ll instead be going deeper down in the odds and starting off my card with Mickelson, who has an elite track record at this event with three top-five finishes in his past four starts here. Mickelson has added distance off the tee this season, which will only help him at Quail Hollow, and he remains one of the best short-game players in the world at the ripe age of 48.
Patrick Reed 50/1
I don’t love a whole lot in the mid-range, but one player who I will be betting on this week -- whose odds don’t match up with his ability -- is Reed at 50/1. Reed is simply a better player than what he is being given at 50/1, and he is a nice fit for Quail Hollow with his short game. Reed grabbed a solo eighth-place finish here last season and was T2 when the PGA Championship was held here in 2017. I also like the idea of adding a top-10 bet for Reed at +500.
Sung Kang 100/1
I’ve been riding Kang all year long in DFS and have placed a few outrights on him in weak fields when his number tops 100/1. Kang is excellent off the tee and has improved his consistency from week to week in 2019. He grabbed a T6 at another driver-heavy course with Bermuda greens at the Arnold Palmer Invitational back in March, so he has the potential to pop at this type of layout.
Trey Mullinax 150/1
This has been an event where we’ve seen some players get their first win, and someone who is standing out to me is the talented Mullinax, who comes in at 150/1. Mullinax has been solid this season and looked great in the team event last week. He is long off the tee and has shown improvement around the greens this season.