World Golf Championships Dell-Match Play Golf Odds, Predictions

Is your NCAA Tournament bracket already busted? Don’t worry, the PGA Tour & European Tour are joint to the rescue this week as they stage the most unusual golf event of the year with the bracket-style World Golf Championships-Match Play from Austin Country Club in Texas. Action tees off on Wednesday, not Thursday like a usual Tour event, and the tournament features 64 of the world’s top players. Sports Interaction golf odds have Northern Ireland’s Rory McIlroy as the World Golf Championships Dell Technologies Match Play+659.

WGC-Dell Match Play Odds

WGC-Match Play Background

The WGC-Match Play is the most bettor-friendly event of the year as well because not only are there odds on the winner but also for each match and group, among many other props available at Sports Interaction. This tournament has been around since 1999 but was moved to its current date two weeks before the Masters and to Austin only last year.

One problem with the schedule change is players not wanting to compete three straight weeks on the PGA Tour heading to the Masters. The field for the WGC-Match Play is set by the Top 64 in the world rankings, but five of those players have opted to skip the event: Henrik Stenson, Adam Scott, Rickie Fowler, Justin Rose and Canadian Adam Hadwin, who has been playing the best golf of his career with a win and sixth-place finish in his two tournaments. Alas, Hadwin is busy getting married this week. So there are no Canadian players in Austin but a few playing in the opposite-field Puerto Rico Open. A total of nine are set to play in their first WGC-Match Play.

Two years ago, the PGA Tour changed the WGC-Match Play format. It had been straight single elimination like the NCAA Tournament. However, too many top players were losing in the early rounds and the Tour and TV networks didn’t like that.

There remain four overall groups of 16 players (regions in the NCAA Tournament), but they are comprised of four four-man pools. From Wednesday-Friday, each player competes against one another in those pools. A match play win is worth one point and a tie worth a half-point. Matches will not go longer than 18 holes in pool play, and the player with the most points in each pool advances. Should there be a tie for first, there will be a sudden-death playoff.

After pool play, the event is single elimination and matches will extend past 18 holes if necessary to determine a winner. The Round of 16 and quarterfinals are on Saturday and the semifinals and final (and third-place match) on Sunday. If you are match play newbie, it’s more about playing the opponent than the course. That’s the biggest difference from stroke play.

WGC-Match Play Groups

Here are the 16 groups with world ranking in parentheses. The guys listed lower than 64^th got in thanks to the five listed above skipping the event. The Group 1 winner would face the Group 16 winner in the Round of 16 and Group 2 vs. 15, etc.:

GROUP 1: Dustin Johnson (1), Jimmy Walker (22), Martin Kaymer (46), Webb Simpson (64)

GROUP 2: Rory McIlroy (2), Emiliano Grillo (30), Gary Woodland (37), Soren Kjeldsen (68)

GROUP 3: Jason Day (3), Marc Leishman (32), Lee Westwood (49), Pat Perez (62)

GROUP 4: Hideki Matsuyama (4), Louis Oosthuizen (27), Ross Fisher (53), Jim Furyk (57)

GROUP 5: Jordan Spieth (6), Ryan Moore (36), Yuta Ikeda (41), Hideto Tanihara (60)

GROUP 6: Justin Thomas (7), Matt Fitzpatrick (31), Kevin Na (52), Chris Wood (55)

GROUP 7: Sergio Garcia (10), Jon Rahm (25), Kevin Chappell (42), Shane Lowry (59)

GROUP 8: Alex Noren (11), Francesco Molinari (29), Bernd Wiesberger (40), Thongchai Jaidee (63)

GROUP 9: Patrick Reed (12), Brooks Koepka (24), Kevin Kisner (38), Jason Dufner (65)

GROUP 10: Tyrrell Hatton (14), Rafa Cabrera-Bello (26), Jeunghun Wang (45), Charles Howell III (67)

GROUP 11: Danny Willett (15), Russell Knox (21), Bill Haas (47), K.T. Kim (70)

GROUP 12: Paul Casey (16), Charl Schwartzel (28), Ben An (51), Joost Luiten (66)

GROUP 13: Bubba Watson (17), Thomas Pieters (34), Scott Piercy (43), Jhonattan Vegas (61)

GROUP 14: Phil Mickelson (18), J.B. Holmes (35), Daniel Berger (39), Si Woo Kim (69)

GROUP 15: Branden Grace (19), Brandt Snedeker (23), William McGirt (54), Andy Sullivan (58)

GROUP 16: Matt Kuchar (20), Tommy Fleetwood (33), Zach Johnson (50), Brendan Steele (56)

There are three previous winners of this event in the field: McIlroy (+659), Aussie Jason Day (+1700) and American Matt Kuchar (+4800). The favoured McIlroy won in 2015 in San Francisco, beating Gary Woodland 4&2 in the final. McIlroy is an excellent 22-8-1 in this event overall. Last year, he lost in the semifinals 1 up to Day and then in the third-place match to Spain’s Rafa Cabrera-Bello 3&2.

Day beat South African Louis Oosthuizen 5&4 in last year’s final and won this tournament in 2014 by beating France’s Victor Dubuisson in 23 holes when it was held in Arizona. Day is looking to join Tiger Woods as the only three-time winners of the WGC-Match Play. McIlroy and Day would meet in the semifinals again if both advance that far. Day has played the Match Play six times and has finished in the Top 10 in four with an overall record of 21-6. He’s not having a great season, though.

Kuchar won in 2013, also in Arizona, 2&1 over Hunter Mahan in the final. Kuchar could be looking at a Round of 16 matchup vs. world No. 1 Dustin Johnson (+900), who has won his past two stroke-play tournaments. This is the only WGC event he hasn’t won and Johnson is just 7-9 all-time in it. The last player to win three straight tournaments entered on the PGA Tour was McIlroy in 2014.

WGC-Match Play Odds And Prediction

This tournament really is a crap-shoot, so it’s often better value to wager on a match or group winner. There will be some big-name players knocked out in group stage because there always are. For example, No. 4 Hideki Matsuyama (+2100) is an especially dangerous group.

If looking for a longer-shot player to advance out of group play, consider Belgium’s Thomas Pieters (+5100 to win tournament) in Group 13. He was terrific at last year’s Ryder Cup.

The pick to win is Jordan Spieth at +800 because he knows this course better than anyone as a former star at the University of Texas in Austin. Spieth went 3-0 in group play last year but lost to Oosthuizen in the Round of 16.