3M Open 2023
The 3M Open 2023 is the fifth running of this tournament, marking one of the last stops before the remodeled FedEx Cup Play-Offs begin in Tennessee. Held at TPC Twin Cities, this event is one of the most northerly American venues on the season's PGA Tour calendar, sitting around 900 feet above sea level.
Owing to its scheduling close to The Open Championship, the field is relatively weak by PGA Tour standards with only two of the world's top 20 teeing-up. Nonetheless, this brings an exciting unpredictability to the event.
Course History and Design
Opened in 2000, TPC Twin Cities was designed by Arnold Palmer in consultation with Tom Lehman. Originally a part of the Champions Tour for 18 years from 2001, it switched allegiance to the PGA Tour, prompting a significant revamp of the layout to accommodate golf's bigger hitters and younger pros.
The modification, overseen by Tom Lehman and Steve Wenzloff, involved narrowing fairways, adding new tees and bunkers, and growing areas of rough. The result? A course ripe with challenges and brimming with drama.
Water hazards, looming on 13 holes, are a constant menace, demanding precision and strategy from the golfers. Sand traps further amplify the course's difficulty. The fairways, changing direction frequently, navigate through a parkland course where the undulating greens form a huge part of its defense.
The putting surfaces, slightly larger than the Tour average, are sown with Bentgrass. This grants a unique challenge to the players, adding another layer to the strategic gameplay at the 3M Open 2023.
Deciphering the Metrics
Let's delve deeper into some pivotal course statistics and their implications:
- A forgiving battlefield: TPC Twin Cities is easier than the average Tour course in almost every ball-striking category, barring the penalty strokes off-the-tee (OTT) due to the plentiful water hazards. A golfer's accuracy will be truly tested here.
- The Long Haul: All three par-5s approach a daunting 600 yards. This results in the Tour's furthest proximity to the hole when going for the green in two shots - an average of 96 feet, leading to lower eagle/birdie rates.
- Precise Recovery: Despite not many greens being missed, scrambling from the short grass or fairway areas proves 7% tougher than average. The mastery of recovery shots can tilt the game in a player's favor.
- A Putters’ Paradise: TPC Twin Cities is the second easiest course to gain strokes putting on Tour, especially inside 15 feet. Golfers who excel in their putting game can seize a significant advantage here.
Monday Qualifier highlight: Alex Gaugert
In a delightful twist, Alex Gaugert, who usually caddies for Erik Van Rooyen, has Monday Qualified this week. Interestingly, he is paired for the first two rounds with Van Rooyen, making for a fascinating dynamic to follow.
Betting card and thoughts
This years 3M Open has rather interesting field partly because only top 70 will get the ticket to Playoffs that start after next weeks Wyndham.
We go again with the model dominated selections with +EV lines that will fill or not. At least for a month most have filled during R1 and this strategy has brought us winners such as Taylor (130) @ RBC Canadian, Straka (75) @ Travelers and last week's Bhatia (55).
Although the Open brought us around 32% of loss, the week went well with Bhatia's excellent week and clutch finish combines with Rodgers bad break at the first playoff hole. Since there's been quite a run in the winner market, our focus will be mainly in that market and topX plays are limited (in bet size) while we work with better prediction model. Now it has been pretty much +/- 0 for the new model that was launched after disappointing May.
Here is the card and preview of data for the week is in the Tools section. Note that Justin Thomas ranks 67. in this field which feels crazy but the data does not lie.
Aaron Rai 50
J.J. Spaun 65
Alex Noren 120
Chad Ramey 300
Partly filled / R1 in-plays:
Sepp Straka - 36
Ludvig Aberg - 36
Adam Hadwin - 55
Vincent Norrman - 95
MJ Daffue - 290
Grayson Murray - 510
Risking around 15 units for potential payout of around 100 units.
Note that we play with 300 unit bankroll and risk around 25-35% of it every week. Our lowest bet will always be 0.5 unit bet.
*means a in-play / not filled bet.
Cameron Young, 3.4
Ludvig Aberg, 5.3
Gary Woodland, 5.6
Aaron Rai, 5.5
Eric Cole, 8.6
Beau Hossler, 6.6
Alex Noren, 11
Greyson Sigg, 11
Grayson Murray, 19.50
James Hahn, 21
Partly filled / R1 in-play lines:
Sepp Straka, 5
Emiliano Grillo, 5.2
J.T. Poston, 7
Austin Eckroat, 8
Mark Hubbard, 8.4
1 unit for under 7/1 and 0.5 unit to all others.
Cameron Young, 2.2
Stephan Jaeger, 3.33
Aaron Rai, 3.25
Eric Cole, 4.5
Beau Hossler, 3.62
J.J. Spaun, 3.50
Patrick Rodgers, 3.85
Doug Ghim, 4.3
Alex Noren, 5.4
MJ Daffue, 7
Chad Ramey, 7.6
James Hahn, 8.8
Tano Goya, 12.5
Partly filled / R1 in-play lines:
Hideki Matsuyama, 2.32
Sepp Straka, 3
Ludvig Aberg, 3.1
Emiliano Grillo, 3.1
Gary Woodland, 3.4
Adam Hadwin, 3.65
J.T. Poston, 3.9
Austin Eckroat, 4
Mark Hubbard, 4.5
Vincent Norrman, 4.8
Greyson Sigg, 5.1
Chez Reavie, 5.4
Stewart Cink, 9
2 units for under 3/1 and 1 unit to all others except 0.5 units to over 7/1. These have been performing quite well lately - note that it's okay that all of these will not fill and then one must cancel or make decision about ones that are out of reach / otherwise not wise after R1.
Winner and top bets are placed in Betfair Exchange. Sign up here.
Chairman's note:
I've had some questions from members who've struggled with this system and I understand the frustration since this strategy needs bit of manual work and updating. We will bring back the more straightforward strategy of just investing in numbers in the near future.
And at the same time there's now time for updating the results section which will be updated before the PGA Tour season ends. It will feature different types of bets and their profit/loss statements and ROI numbers with some notes on the variance and other key numbers.
Good luck for the week!
