The PGA TOUR finishes out back-to-back Signature Events to conclude the West Coast swing with a return to The Riviera Country Club for The Genesis Invitational. Unlike last week at Pebble Beach, the event does have a light cut this week, from the limited field of 72 to the top 50 and ties, along with anyone within 10 strokes of the lead. If you’re planning to tee it up for any of this week’s GPP contests on DraftKings, check out these top three fantasy golf picks for The Genesis Invitational. This week, I’m backing Patrick Cantlay ($9,300), Akshay Bhatia ($7,500) and Sami Valimaki ($6,200) as my three top GPP options, who I think come in with lower ownership but have a strong chance to step up and exceed salary-based expectations as strong pivot plays.
Let’s be sure to define what we’re searching for in this post to be sure we’re all hunting the same flagstick. A fantasy golf pivot play is a golfer with low expected ownership in tournament formats but very high upside. Typically, these selections come with major risk factors compared to more popular options that are available around the same DFS salary.
Even though these plays are NOT the safest options in their price range, they have enough potential upside to be worth the extra sweat since they come with lower ownership. These are “grip it and rip it,” boom-or-bust style options that could go off or could flame out. Getting players at low ownership is critical to finding success in GPP tournament-style events with many entries, in which making yours stand out is critical. Be sure to check out my companion post to this one that highlights my picks for cash lineups if you’re looking for safer options that raise the overall floor of your lineup.
Getting players at low ownership is critical to finding success in GPP tournament-style events with many entries, where making yours stand out is critical. Be sure to check out my companion post to this one that highlights my picks for cash lineups if you’re looking for safer options that raise the overall floor of your lineup.
Let’s break down why I like each of my top three pivot plays this week!
Set your DraftKings fantasy golf lineups here: PGA TOUR $1M Sand Trap [$200K to 1st]
Patrick Cantlay ($9,300)
With Scottie Scheffler ($14,300) and Rory McIlroy ($11,300) at the top of the salary structure and Hideki Matsuyama ($9,500) and Si Woo Kim ($9,200) coming in playing well at a course where they have had success, Cantlay is getting a little overlooked in the low-$9,000s.
While he hasn’t won since 2022, Cantlay has continued to turn in good results even though it’s been a minute since his eight wins on the PGA TOUR. The Long Beach native and UCLA alumnus has a great history at this course in L.A., finishing T4 in 2024, the last time the event was held at The Riviera Country Club. In his last seven tournaments at the course, he posted six top-20 finishes, including three top-five finishes.
Cantlay comes back to the course where he has had so much success with some solid momentum. He missed the cut at Torrey Pines two weeks ago, but he sandwiched a pair of top-15 finishes around that missed cut at The American Express and the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am last week.
The veteran closed out last week with a strong round of 65 on Sunday that included five birdies, an eagle and no bogeys. He led the field in Strokes Gained: Approach in the Final Round and ranked third for the tournament in GIR%.
He isn’t as popular as some of the other high-priced options, but he can be paired with any star but Scheffler in a viable “Stars and Scrubs” build or be used as a core piece of a balanced attack. If he delivers another high finish this week, he will be a great GPP pivot
Akshay Bhatia ($7,500)
With Scottie so expensive and so popular, the ownerships in the $7,000’s are elevated since they are the options easiest to pair with Scheffler’s massive price tag. Some of the popular plays in this price range include Pierceson Coody ($7,300), Ryan Gerard ($7,200), Min Woo Lee ($7,600) and Kurt Kitayama ($7,300). Bhatia is actually getting a little overlooked again, like he was last week when he was in my pivot plays. I’m running it back with him again this week, since he looked so good before the wind knocked him off course on Saturday and Sunday.
Bhatia is almost always a boom-or-bust play, finishing high on the leaderboard or crashing out and missing the cut. He missed the cut at his first two events of 2026 before stacking a T3 at the WM Phoenix Open and a T6 at Pebble Beach last week. As a result of those two great finishes, he ranks third in the field in Total Strokes Gained, fourth in Strokes Gained: Approach, and eighth in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green over the last eight rounds.
He hasn’t played The Genesis at The Riviera Country Club, and last year’s top-10 finish at the Genesis came at Torrey Pines, which has some similarities but definitely isn’t a perfect correlation.
One interesting element to note about the course fit is that Bhatia seems to have an advantage as a lefty. In the last 30 years, Phil Mickelson won twice at Riviera, Bubba Watson won three times, and even lefty Mike Weir won twice. Not all lefties have torn up the course, but there is a track record of some lefties finding that it fits their shot shapes very well. Bhatia could find the same thing in his course debut this week.
He looked outstanding in his last week at Pebble Beach, starting with two bogey-free rounds of 65 and 64 and holding the lead after the third round. Despite his disappointing Sunday and lack of course history, I love the upside he has if he can carry over his early-round momentum and post another high finish this week.
Sami Valimaki ($6,200)
If you’re including multiple stars at the top of your roster this week, one way to compensate is to go extremely cheap with one of your other plays. Sahith Theegala ($6,900) and Sam Stevens ($6,700) are some good options that are more popular options under $7,000, but if you want to go even cheaper with an off-the-radar option that brings upside, check out the 27-year-old from Finland, Sami Valimaki.
Valikami earned his way into this Signature event with a strong finish last season, posting four top-10 finishes throughout the 2025 season. He broke through for his first PGA TOUR victory at The RSM Classic after posting a T18 at the Butterfield Bermuda Championship and a T2 at the World Wide Technology Championship.
With the win, he jumped into the top 50 of the OWGR for the first time in his career and moved up to No. 51 in the FedExCup Fall standings, earning his way into The Genesis Invitational.
Like Bhatia, he got off to a slow start to 2026. He missed his first two cuts of the season but seems to be finding his way after a T41 in Phoenix and a T34 at Pebble Beach last week.
In that event, Valimaki was making his Pebble Beach debut, just like he’ll be making his Riviera debut this week. He looked solid, though, with four rounds under par and eighth in the field in Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green. That strong short game should help him tackle Riviera’s challenges this week.
At such a bargain rate, even if he is just making the cut and delivering a middle-of-the-pack finish will be enough for him to be a value worth including this week. He does offer even higher upside, though, since he has proven he can win and contend when he’s at his best.
