2021 RBC Heritage: PGA Tour Betting Odds
World No. 1 Dustin Johnson is favoured on the golf odds.
Tournament organizers here welcome families and have concerts, etc., as they try to lure as many top players as possible from the Masters, although few like to play the week after any major championship. This has been the week after the Masters for years but was shifted to June in 2020 due to the COVID pandemic. That actually led to a much stronger field than normal.
The RBC Heritage is played at Hilton Head’s Harbour Town Golf Links, a par 71 at approximately 7,100 yards and this is the only course to ever host this event.
Conditions should be quite different this week – i.e. more wind – than last June when the course was essentially defenceless and Webb Simpson won at 22-under 262, breaking by two the tournament record set by Brian Gay in 2009.
Simpson shot a final-round 64 and had five birdies in a six-hole stretch on the back nine to edge Abraham Ancer by a shot. The top seven finishers all shot 66 or better in the final round. Simpson was one of four players to share the 54-hole lead, and the tournament finished in near-darkness after a three-hour weather delay.
Just for a point of comparison, the 2019 winner was C.T. Pan and he finished at 12-under 272. A handful of players have won here multiple times, led by Davis Love III’s five.
Bryson DeChambeau originally was in the field but opted to withdraw on Monday. Hideki Matsuyama, who on Sunday became the first Japanese winner of the Masters (or any major championship), is not playing this week. Runner-up Will Zalatoris is +2500 to win.
The RBC Heritage Golf Odds
Johnson was the favourite to win the Masters as the defending champion but shockingly missed the cut. He’s the +1000 favourite this week, too. He finished T17 here last year at 15 under.
Simpson is +1200 to repeat with Patrick Cantlay +1600, Collin Morikawa +2000 and Daniel Berger +2200. Simpson comes off a T12 at Augusta and also was runner-up at the RBC Heritage in 2013, losing in a playoff to Graeme McDowell.
Cantlay last played this tournament in 2019 and was T3. He also missed the cut at the Masters. Morikawa was T64 here last year and T18 at the Masters. Berger missed the cut Sunday and was T3 at Hilton Head in 2020.
No Canadian has won this tournament. Jim Nelford finished second by two shots to Fuzzy Zoeller in 1983. Last year, Corey Conners finished T13, Adam Hadwin T41 and Mackenzie Hughes T70, while Michael Gligic, Roger Sloan and David Sloan missed the cut.
In the absence of the RBC Canadian Open for the second consecutive year, Gligic is among the sponsor exemptions this week but is a +50000 long shot. Conners is +2800 off a T8 at Augusta. Hadwin is +10000 and didn’t play the Masters. Hughes is +15000 off his T40 on Sunday.
The RBC Heritage Golf Predictions
Back Simpson and Johnson for Top 10s, but the winner is Cantlay. He hasn’t been worse than seventh in three trips to this event. Not having to play all weekend at Augusta might be a benefit.