2021 WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play: PGA Tour Betting Odds
The most interesting PGA Tour event to wager on arrives this week with the big-money World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play from Austin, Texas. Bryson DeChambeau and Justin Thomas are favoured on the golf odds.
It’s not a coincidence that this bracket-style event with a field of 64 is held during the men’s basketball NCAA Tournament. While the Masters draws by far the most betting action of any golf event annually, this does very well in that regard because of the one-on-one matchups instead of having to wager on one guy trying to win against a full field of 156, etc.
The Match Play was a casualty of the COVID pandemic in 2020 but it’s back at Austin Country Club, a par 71 at around 7,100 yards – although, par doesn’t really matter this week. It’s a pure match-play format. The Top 64 players in the world rankings qualify, although a few every year choose not to play because of injury (Tiger Woods and Brooks Koepka are two of a few skipping this year) or simply not liking the format, etc. To fill out the field, the Tour goes to No. 67, 68, etc. in the rankings as needed.
The players are split into 16 groups of four players with each group having a player seeded 1-16, 17-32, 33-48 and 49-64 (group draw is Monday at 11 a.m. ET). There is round-robin play inside each group from Wednesday-Friday and the player with the most points in each advances to the Round of 16 – there’s a sudden-death tiebreaker if needed after the three rounds. One point is earned for a win and matches can be halved (half-point each) in the round-robin play but not after.
It’s single elimination from then on. The Round of 16 and quarterfinals are Saturday and the semifinals and final (and third-place match) Sunday.
The top overall seed (via world ranking) has won this tournament five times and three were by Tiger. The worst seed to win was No. 62 Kevin Sutherland in 2002. The 2019 champion was No. 48 Kevin Kisner, who beat Matt Kuchar 3&2 in the final – Kisner had to beat Ian Poulter in a group playoff to advance.
Kisner had lost the 2018 final 7&6 to Bubba Watson, so he became the first player to lose the championship match one year and win it the next. Kisner’s victory was the third in a row in this event by an American; the three before that were by international players.
World Golf Championship-Match Play Golf Odds
Usually, world No. 1 Dustin Johnson is favoured in every tournament, but he’s a +1400 third favourite despite winning this event in 2017. He hasn’t contended in the past two, however, and also has been outside the Top 40 in his past two PGA Tour events.
Thomas won The Players Championship two weeks ago and has a best result of fourth here. DeChambeau won the week before The Players and then was third there. He was 40th in this tournament in his lone trip two years ago.
Jon Rahm is also +1400 with Collin Morikawa and Rory McIlroy each +2000. Rahm was runner-up to DJ in 2017. Morikawa won the first WGC event of the year last month in Florida. McIlroy won this tournament in 2015 at a different course.
Not many Canadian players reach the Top 64 in the world, so not a shock that one hasn’t even been a runner-up in this event. Corey Conners is +6600 to win, while Mackenzie Hughes is +20000. Conners has been Top 10 in his past two events this year but hasn’t competed in the Match Play. Hughes comes off a T36 on Sunday at the Honda Classic and hasn’t played here.
WGC-Match Play Golf Predictions
Take Kisner and McIlroy for Top 10s, but the winner is Louis Oosthuizen at +4000 as the South African seems to thrive in Match Play. He hasn’t been worse than 17th in the past four trips to this tournament with a runner-up in 2016.