The Cheat Sheet provides DraftKings fantasy golf players with course info, player history and the most noteworthy trends of the week to help them with their roster selections.
Set your DraftKings fantasy golf lineups here: INTL GOLF $800K Gold Golfer Special [$200K to 1st]
The Field
The international golf field comprises 60 of the world’s top golfers. The qualifiers include the top 15 from the Official World Golf Rankings (up to four per country), but the International World Golf Rankings are used after that. The top two ranked players from any country — that does not already have at least two players inside the top 15 — are then chosen. The USA is the only country with four players in attendance while France got two spots automatically as the host.
The event will not include any cut and will begin Thursday at 3:00 AM EST. As of now, top players in the field include Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, 2020 Gold Medalist Xander Schauffele, and last week’s winner on the LIV Golf Tour Jon Rahm. In 2021 we saw several players far back in the betting odds win medals (Rory Sabattini silver; CT Pan bronze) so don’t be shocked if a few dark horses make some noise this week.
The Course
Le Golf National: Albatros Course — Paris, France
Par 71, 7,200 to 7,300 yards; Greens: Poa blend
The Albatros course at Le Golf National is a unique technical test of golf that should provide some high theatre for this year’s Olympic golf events. The Par 71 features skinny fairways and smaller greens that traverse around several bodies of water and strategically placed fairway bunkers that place high importance on accuracy and par-saving. Water comes into play on nine of the 18 holes with it featuring frequently over the final four-hole stretch. Additionally, while it’s not expected that the rough this year will be as tough as it was during the Ryder Cup in 2018 — when Europe purposely grew out the rough and skinned the fairways to take away the USA’s length advantage — you can still expect off-center tee shots to be properly punished.
The venue is challenging but isn’t overly long and all three of the par 5s will be birdie opportunities. However, even these holes will still require accurate approaches to avoid penalizing sand traps and the water that protects the green on the 560-yard par 5, 3rd hole. If players can’t dial in their approaches on these holes, they’ll likely find making birdies the rest of the way a tough endeavor, as the rest of the course only has a handful of scoring opportunities to offer, at best.
The players do get a slight reprieve on the front nine, which has two par 5s, and two par 4s that play under 400 yards in length. However, these shorter holes also have smaller, skinny greens that don’t offer wide targets and can quickly force a player into a tough up-and-down just to save par. Accuracy will again be of the utmost importance on the tee shots of these shorter par 4s, which have doglegs off the tee that will likely cause most big hitters to club down.
The four par 3s are all relatively short, but each one of them brings water into play. These will again require bold approach play and control with mid-to-short irons. Big hitters will have a slight advantage this week on the Par 3s, and the longer par 4s, given that they’ll have shorter irons in their hands when hitting into the water-protected greens. Still, this event hasn’t necessarily been a great venue for power players with names like Alex Noren, Graeme McDowell and Tommy Fleetwood dominating the leaderboard here over the past decade.
Great iron play will undoubtedly be of the utmost importance and I’d be hesitant to go overboard on anyone not performing well in that area on this course. Players gaining a lot of GIR’s (greens in regulation) and fairways (fairways gained) will also be very attractive for DFS and betting. The ability to find fairways and greens will take out big numbers and allow players a shot at hanging around the leaderboard if they can sink a few putts along the 18-hole layout. For stats, I’m focusing on some of the obvious (GIR’s gained, SG: Approach, and SG: Tee to Green) but also placing a pretty solid emphasis on around-the-green play where possible. Par 3 efficiency from 175-200 yards is also an area to consider.
For course comparisons, there is little doubt that the Albatros Course takes a lot of its design features from TPC Sawgrass and PGA National. Both are stadium-like courses in Florida that feature plenty of water and force players into attempting high-risk approaches or risk dealing with scrambling out of tough greenside bunkers or rough.
2024 outlook: We have a really small field this week so wave stacking for DFS will be tough if not impossible. Thursday does have some thunderstorms in the forecast with the Olympic website posting that there is a “40-60% chance of rain from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m” That could cause some stoppages and make Day 1 a little easier if the greens are receptive. Winds on all four days are around 8-9mph so we likely won’t get any of the chaos that higher winds would provide around this venue. If early week rain does occur (and it’s already been wet around Paris) I’d expect the Albatros course to potentially cede a few more birdies than usual and potentially allow players who have elite approach games (but potentially are lacking ATG) to prosper this week.
Top 10 Golfers (from the Official World Golf Rankings as of July 26)
TOMMY FLEETWOOD (14TH)
SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER
XANDER SCHAUFFELE
RORY MCILROY
LUDVIG ABERG
WYNDHAM CLARK
COLLIN MORIKAWA
VIKTOR HOVLAND
JON RAHM (10th)
HIDEKI MATSUYAMA (12TH)
Winners Stats
2020 Winner: Xander Schauffele (18-under-par)
2020 lead-in form (T46-T26-T7)
- Schauffele came in without a win in 2021 but with plenty of close calls, including two runner finishes from the first three months of the season
- He finished T7 at the US Open and T26 at the Open Championship just a couple of weeks before winning in Japan
- Overall, he’d been in great form ball-striking, gaining over 5.0 strokes on approach in each of his last two starts, before the Olympics
Finding Values (DraftKings Sportsbook)
Min Woo Lee +4000 and $8,400
Comparables:
Mathieu Pavon +6000 and $8,000
Comparables:
All odds provided by DraftKings Sportsbook and all odds subject to change
RECENT FORM
1. Xander Schauffele ($11,200; win-T15): Schauffele is coming off a dominant final round at the Open where he won his second major title in three months. The American is the defending gold medalist and arguably the best player in the world at the moment.
2. Shane Lowry ($9,800; T6-T9): Lowry led for much of the Open two weeks ago but fell off in the final two rounds. Still, he’s striking the ball extremely well and certainly well suited for a tougher, technical test like Le National.
3. Jon Rahm ($10,700; win-T7): Rahm posted his first major championship top 10 of the season at the Open (T7) and won his first LIV Golf TOUR event in London. He’s trending extremely well for the Olympics and will likely be a serious contender for the gold.
4. Corey Conners ($8,900; T25-T10): Conners has been consistent all season. He’s made the cut in all four majors and has been gaining multiple strokes on approach almost every week.
5. Alex Noren ($9,000; T13-T10): Noren is coming off a solid two-week stretch where he finished T10 and T13 at the Scottish Open and Open Championship. He’s a former winner at Le National who certainly profiles as a dark horse for a medal.
DRAFTKINGS DFS STRATEGY
Cash Games: Rahm’s surge is hard to ignore
Jon Rahm ($10,700) was an easy fade at the first three majors this season but he showed up at the Open and played more to the level we’re used to seeing. His short game and putting specifically looked much sharper at Troon and he was able to parlay that into a win on LIV last week. Overall, he should like this tougher test that Le National will provide. Underneath Rahm, Corey Conners ($8,900) is another name who should relish this target style of course, and provide a safe floor for fantasy this week. Other names to consider for this format include Sepp Straka ($8,500) and Abraham Ancer ($7,600).
Tournaments: Pavon and Perez could surprise
Playing in your home country in the Olympics is a huge honor and this year we also have two French players who have had particularly good seasons. Matthieu Pavon ($8,000) already picked up a shock win at Torrey Pines in January and is coming off a T5 from the US Open just a couple of starts ago. He’s an accurate iron player who can get hot with his putter, so even though his record at Le National doesn’t stick out, I do think he sets up well for this week’s course. Victor Perez has also had a solid season landing top-five finishes in Canada and Puerto Rico. He’s got a better record than Pavon at this course and landed a T10 just two starts ago, where he gained over 2.0 strokes on approach and over 6.0 strokes putting. Other names to consider for large field GPPs include Jason Day ($8,600), Nicolai Hojgaard ($7,700), CT Pan ($6,500), and Shubhankar Sharma ($6,500).
MY PICK: Collin Morikawa ($10,200)
Despite playing some very elite golf, Morikawa has had to endure being overshadowed for most of 2024. He watched Scottie Scheffler dominate the early portions of the schedule and then watched in vain from the sideline as both Xander Schauffele and Bryson DeChambeau joined him in the multiple major championship club, in June and July. Still, even without a win on the season, Morikawa does seem like a player who can potentially flip the script this week on a venue where his elite approach game should be able to flourish.
The American comes in ranked top 5 in strokes gained on Approach, GIR’s gained, Fairways Gained and strokes gained putting. He may have gone majorless in 2024 but Morikawa has also shown extremely well when the layouts have been tough this year. He’s placed in the top 16 at all four majors, was 2nd at Muirfield Village (a course with a low-key decent amount of water) and was 4th at the very technical Colonial. Like 2020 Gold medalist Xander Schauffele, he’s also a player who has won abroad, landing a win in Japan last fall (Zozo) and in Dubai in 2021 for the DP World Championship.
Despite his gaudy stats, Morikawa is only the sixth-most expensive player for DFS this week, making this a good level to load up. For betting, his +1100 outright number is also relatively similar to the prices we were getting on him in larger fields, where he was going head-to-head with more elite competitors and a higher quality field.
MY SLEEPER: Nick Taylor ($6,700)
Taylor is the exact kind of sleeper I like to potentially sneak into medal contention this week. The Canadian hasn’t posted a ton of good results of late but he’s showcased some great iron play that does suggest a turnaround is close. He gained 3.1 strokes on approach at the Travelers, 2.8 on approach at the Scottish Open, and then 3.71 strokes on approach in Round 1 of the Open Championship, an event where he missed the cut thanks to a poor effort on the greens.
Taylor’s never been the most consistent player, or putter, but he’s also shown the ability to spike hard on the greens when he’s dialed in. He gained 4.5 strokes putting at the PLAYERS in March and had a fantastic week on the greens at TPC Scottsdale in February, where he gained 8.9 strokes putting and notched his fourth career win.
One area we won’t have to worry about Taylor is around the greens as he comes in ranked 4th in SG: ATG over the last 24 rounds in this field. The Canadian has posted plenty of solid results at other technical venues that compare well at Le Golf National (win TPC Scottsdale, win Pebble Beach) and should find the tougher conditions and smaller greens to his liking. He’s the kind of veteran player we have seen triumph before at this venue and at just $6,700, makes for a great upside play in big GPPs this week.
For betting, I also think the +1800 available on DraftKings Sportsbook for a top 5 is more than worth taking a stab with. Taylor is a player who has shown multiple times over the last couple of years that he’s not afraid of big moments and, if he can flip his putting stats, this is the exact kind of course you’d expect to see him compete on.
Set your DraftKings fantasy golf lineups here: INTL GOLF $800K Gold Golfer [$200K to 1st]
The Crown Is Yours: Sign up for DraftKings and experience the ultimate host for games and betting experiences!
For sports betting, head over to DraftKings Sportsbook or download the DraftKings Sportsbook app.
I am a promoter at DraftKings and am also an avid fan and user (my username is wavegoodbye) and may sometimes play on my personal account in the games that I offer advice on. Although I have expressed my personal view on the games and strategies above, they do not necessarily reflect the view(s) of DraftKings and do not constitute a representation that any particular strategy will guarantee success. All customers should use their own skills and judgment in building lineups. I may also deploy different players and strategies than what I recommend above. I am not an employee of DraftKings and do not have access to any non-public information.
