Below, we look at the fantasy golf power rankings and odds for the 2021 WGC Workday Championship. UPDATE: Patrick Cantlay withdrew Wednesday night. The tournament was renamed and relocated from Mexico due to COVID-19 restrictions and this will be the first PGA Tour event to be held at The Concession, designed by Jack Nicklaus and Tony Jacklin. PGA Championship Betting Odds & News SportsBetting.ag covers PGA golf betting for the major tournaments, including the PGA Championship. Make sure to head to the sportsbook for PGA Championship Odds. You can bet on the winner, head-to-head matchups, and other exotic golf odds.

1. Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Wins
2. Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Payouts
3. Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Odds
4. Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Predictions
5. Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Leaderboard

The interest in golf betting on the PGA Tour continues to grow. And for the bigger events like this week’s THE PLAYERS Championship, and majors – starting with next months Masters – wagering action reaches peak levels as the stakes intensify.

THE PLAYERS Championship was canceled last year after one round due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Hideki Matsuyama had been the leader after tying the course record with a 63. In 2019, RoryMcIlroy took the title and the $2.25 million top prize. The purse has increased since then to the highest on tour, other than the Tour Championship finale in the FedExCup.

The iconic TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida has hosted the event since 1982, and is also the home of the PGA Tour headquarters.

THE PLAYERS Championship odds

Dustin Johnson unsurprisingly opened the week as the favorite at top US sportsbooks. DJ was +1200 at DraftKings as of Monday morning. He was followed on the odds board by Bryson DeChambeau (+1500), Rory McIlroy (1600), Jon Rahm (+1600) and Xander Schauffele (+2000).

View all the odds for The PLAYERS Championship at top US Sportsbooks like DraftKings Sportsbook, FanDuel Sportsbook and PointsBet.

Notable players in the field

A total of 154 players representing 25 countries and territories will compete for the huge $15 million purse and $2.75 million first place prize.

How strong is the 2021 field? There will be 113 PGA Tour winners teeing it up at TPC Sawgrass. That’s tied for most of any tournament since the 2000 RBC Heritage. In total, 49 of the top 50 players in the Official World Golf Rankings, and 29 of the top 30 in the current FedExCup Standings will shoot for THE PLAYERS Championship title at TPC Sawgrass.

Top golfers in THE PLAYERS Championship

• Dustin Johnson (No. 1)
• Jon Rahm (2)
• Justin Thomas (3)
• Collin Morikawa (4)
• Xander Schauffele (5)
• Tyrrell Hatton (6)
• Patrick Cantlay (7)
• Rory McIlroy (8)
• Patrick Reed (9)
• Webb Simpson (10)
• Bryson DeChambeau (11)
• Viktor Hovland (13)
• Tony Finau (14)
• Daniel Berger (15)
• Matthew Fitzpatrick (16)
• Sungjae Im (17)
• Paul Casey (18)
• Harris English (19)
• Tommy Fleetwood (21)
• Louis Oosthuizen (22)
• Hideki Matsuyama (23)
• Adam Scott (24)
• Kevin Na (25)
• Ryan Palmer (26)
• Cameron Smith (27)
• Abraham Ancer (28)
• Joaquin Niemann (29)
• Scottie Scheffler (30)
• Jason Kokrak (31)
• Billy Horschel (32)
• Victor Perez (33)
• Kevin Kisner (34)
• Marc Leishman (35)
• Justin Rose (36)
• Christiaan Bezuidenhout (37)
• Max Homa (38)
• Lee Westwood (39)
• Shane Lowry (40)
• Sergio Garcia (41)
• Bernd Wiesberger (42)
• Robert MacIntyre (43)
• Carlos Ortiz (44)
• Gary Woodland (45)
• Jason Day (46)
• Will Zalatoris (47)
• Brendon Todd (48)
• Matt Kuchar (49)
• Lanto Griffin (50)

Other notable players include world No. 51 Mackenzie Hughes, 2017 PLAYERS Championship winner Si Woo Kim, 2015 PLAYERS Championship winner Rickie Fowler, Bubba Watson, Russell Henley, Jordan Spieth, Henrik Stenson, 2007 PLAYERS Championship winner Phil Mickelson, and other players moving up in the current FedExCup Standings: Stewart Cink, Sam Burns, Peter Malnati, Hudson Swafford, Martin Laird, Brian Gay, Branden Grace and Wyndham Clark.

No Englishman has ever won The PLAYERS Championship. The top English players that will shoot to end that streak in 2021 include: Tyrrell Hatton, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Paul Casey, Tommy Fleetwood, Justin Rose, IanPoulter and last week’s third round leader at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, 47-year-old LeeWestwood.

Recent THE PLAYERS Championship winners and runner-ups:

• 2019 – Rory McIlroy (-16), Jim Furyk
• 2018 – Webb Simpson (-18), Xander Schauffele, Jimmy Walker, Charl Schwartzel
• 2017 – Si Woo Kim (-10), Louis Oosthuizen, Ian Poulter
• 2016 – Jason Day (-15), Kevin Chappell
• 2015 – Rickie Fowler (-12), Sergio Garcia, Kevin Kisner

In the last event in 2019, Rory McIlroy won by 1-stroke, and 19 players shot 10-under par or better.

Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Wins

Top finishers from 2019 returning in 2021:

Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Payouts

• Rory McIlroy (Win)
• Jhonattan Vegas (T3)
• Dustin Johnson (T5)
• Tommy Fleetwood (T5)
• Brandt Snedeker (T5)
• Hideki Matsuyama (T8)
• Jason Day (T8)
• Justin Rose (T8)
• Brian Harman (T8)
• Jon Rahm (T12)
• Abraham Ancer (T12)
• Adam Scott (T12)
• Joel Dahmen (T12)

Tommy Fleetwood and Jason Day also finished top 10 in the 2018 event.

Golfers to watch

The top talent on tour will really be on display this week at THE PLAYERS Championship. Justin Thomas is 5-for-5 in cuts made here with a T3 and T11 making him one of the favorites to watch and consider as a bet. You won’t get him too often at +2000, but we don’t include those golfers at +2000 or below in our bag of Golfers to Watch.

Last week, Tommy Fleetwood and Will Zalatoris both finished top-10 as our Golfers to Watch at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. The previous week, Collin Morikawa cashed in as the winner at +4500 as a Golfer to Watch at the WGC Workday event.

Now it’s on to TPC Sawgrass and THE PLAYERS Championship, where you better be playing well and showing signs of good form and improved play, or the Stadium Course will find your flaws.
Here are four players outside of the leading favorites to consider for your Fairway Foursome to win or for a top finishing position at TPC Sawgrass.

Abraham Ancer (+7500 FanDuel): Ancer finished T12 on debut here last year, and shot under par all four rounds. While lacking experience on this course, he’s making up with a solid stat profile and playing well with six top-20 finishes in his last eight starts on tour. He’s a small and short hitter, but his skill sets fit better than his strokes gained stats show. Ancer ranks No. 1 on tour this season in driving accuracy, which provides the basis for strong play at Sawgrass. Add in top-20 in Greens-in-Regulation and Birdies average, plus excellent Strokes Gained stats of +6.5 or better in Around the Green and Tee-to-Green in his last event at the WGC at The Concession, and Ancer looks like he could contend for another high finishing position as he shoots for his first PGA Tour win.

Cameron Smith (+5500 DraftKings): Cameron Smith is no longer offered in the +8000 or better range. That’s what happens when you finish T2 at the Masters, and continue your solid play while rising up the ranks to top 30 in the world. The 27-year-old Aussie is proving that power is not essential, but that a strong Short Game, Around the Green and Putting profile will keep you competitive most weeks. Nothing to like in his three stars at Sawgrass with a pair of missed cuts. But Smith has been consistently solid across most Strokes Gained categories over his last 50 rounds. And he’s one of just a handful of players in this field that ranks top-30 in SG: Around the Green, along with better than average in SG: Approach, Off-the-Tee and Putting.

Jason Day (+5000 DraftKings): Day has three top-10 finishes in this tournament since 2016, when he won the event as the No. 1 player in the world. His experience and proven play here also shows Day with the second-best adjusted scoring average on this course over the last five renewals. He’s rounding into form again with a top-10 and top-20 finish in February, and has gained strokes in most categories over his last five events. Day’s short game and putting really give him an advantage at Sawgrass, where he has proven to be a specialist on the Stadium Course.

Patrick Cantlay (+2200 DraftKings and BetMGM): These are the lowest odds we’ve dipped to in the Golfers to Watch section, but Cantlay still has seven other players with lower odds. He’s too good a fit to pass up this week, as Cantlay has been consistently excellent over his last six starts with six top-20 finishes. That includes a win and two other top 5’s. Entering this event in solid form and playing well is significant towards success. Cantlay has not putted well enough in three starts here, nor on other Pete Dye designs overall. But his Ball Striking, Approach Play and Tee-to-Green are top-10 in this field over his last 36 rounds, and he’s had solid Around the Green stats in a previous start here when he finished top-25. Also of note is Cantlay’s top-5 ranking this season in Bogey Avoidance, which as a strong shot maker makes him appealing at this course as well. Cantlay shot 67 in last year’s opening round before the event was cancelled. He’s Even Money to finish top-20, +225 for top-10, and an interesting look at +4000 to be the first round leader.

Course and tournament information

• Course: TPC Sawgrass (Stadium)
• Location: Ponte Vedra Beach, FL
• Date: March 11-14
• Par: 72 / Yardage 7,189
• Purse: $15 Million / Winner $2.5 M
• Fairways/Rough: Bermudagrass
• Greens: : Bermudagrass
• TV/Online: Golf Channel, NBC (Sat/Sun), PGA Tour Live
• Twitter & Hashtag: @THEPLAYERSChamp
• Defending Champion: Rory McIlroy (2019)

The Stadium Course at Sawgrass is one of the most mentally challenging in the world. So many superlatives are bestowed upon TPC Sawgrass, and the Pete Dye design challenges all players without favoring a single style of play. The course was redesigned in 2017 and now features pure TifEagle Bermudagrass on the putting surfaces. Moving the event to March provides softer conditions and more lush rough. Water looms and becomes a hazard on no less than 12 holes with the short signature hole and world famous island par 3 at the 17th one of the most recognized in the world. The closing stretch concludes with three of the toughest par 4 scoring holes at 14, 15 and the finishing hole at 18 – which is annually the most difficult with water lining the entire left side.

The big bombers hold little advantage on the Stadium Course at Sawgrass, where accuracy off the tee and precision iron play is required. Controlled power and placement is advantageous however, as a variety of shots are needed to navigate the 7,189 yard Par 72 layout. Small greens by PGA Tour standards require placement on approach and are now even more pure for putting.

Harbour Town and TPC River Highlands are two other Pete Dye designed courses to navigate in your research of player performances.

Key stats

Course management is critical, as is precision Ball Striking and Approach play with the ability to chip, scramble and score all part of the process when researching strokes gained stats. Arriving with your golf game in good shape is particularly important this week.

Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Odds

In 2019, THE PLAYERS Championship winner Rory McIlroy led the field in strokes-gained off-the-tee. Yet short-hitting but accurate runner-up Jim Furyk outscored McIlroy across the 16 par-5s. Those two players are most diametrically opposed, yet Sawgrass allows golfers with different styles to showcase their skills against the strongest, world class field.

Strokes Gained: Approach leaders in this field over their last 24 rounds, according to research and stats from Fantasy National:

1. Hideki Matsuyama
2. Justin Thomas
3. Jason Kokrak
4. Sergio Garcia
5. Keegan Bradley
6. Talor Gooch
7. Gary Woodland
8. Webb Simpson
9. Dustin Johnson
10. Paul Casey

Next: Cameron Smith, Henrik Stenson, Xander Schauffele, Rory McIlroy, Sungjae Im, Patrick Cantlay

Strokes Gained – Ball Striking:

1. Rory McIlroy
2. Hideki Matsuyama
3. Jason Kokrak
4. Justin Thomas
5. Gary Woodland
6. Dustin Johnson
7. Keegan Bradley
8. Patrick Cantlay
9. Keith Mitchell
10. Sergio Garcia

Next: Paul Casey, Luke List, Xander Schauffele, Sungjae Im

Other stats to evaluate include Bogey Avoidance and SG: Tee-to-Green, which over the last 24 rounds is led by McIlroy, Matsuyama, Thomas, Kokrak and world No. 1 Dustin Johnson.

Following THE PLAYERS Championship, the PGA Tour heads down the South coast on I-95 to PGA National for the Honda Classic in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.

This article is part of our Betting on Golf series.

WGC-Workday Championship Betting Strategy

The PGA Tour heads to Bradenton for the first of four events that comprise the Florida Swing, beginning with this week's WGC-Workday Championship at The Concession Golf Club. It's the first Tour event at The Concession after the COVID-19 pandemic moved the event from just outside Mexico City, where the tournament had been held the last four years. It's an even stronger field than the one we saw at Riviera last week, with 48 of the top 50 players in the Official World Golf Ranking in action, and only Tiger Woods and Paul Casey not in the field. Last year, Patrick Reed made three birdies in the final four holes to win this event by a single stroke over Bryson DeChambeau.

The first WGC event of the year brings a more diverse field than the typical PGA Tour event, with players from all over the globe arriving for a guaranteed paycheck in this no-cut event. This week presents a different challenge when it comes to handicapping the field, in that we don't have any course history to go off of. This Jack Nicklaus designed course plays as a par-72 at over 7,500 yards, making it one of the 10 longest courses we'll see on Tour this year. As such, the longer hitters off the tee will have an added advantage.

Despite a large contingent of players living in Florida, there won't be much of a home course advantage like we saw for Max Homa last week, as most of the players that reside in the state live on the opposite coast and haven't spent time prepping at the course following the late change in venue.

All odds via DraftKings Sportsbook as of 4:00 PM ET Tuesday.

Who's Down With WGC?

The following five players have the lowest scoring averages in WGC events since 2019:

• Rory McIlroy 67.8
• Brooks Koepka 67.9
• Justin Thomas 67.9
• Dustin Johnson 68.4
• Xander Schauffele 68.5

McIlroy is looking to complete the WGC Grand Slam, as the WGC-Workday Championship is the only one that has eluded him. His consistency in these events since 2019 has been unmatched, as he has the lowest scoring average with a win and a total of four top-5 results. Schauffele is the only player on this list that hasn't won a WGC event since 2019, but he does hold one career WGC title. Since winning the Tournament of Champions just over two years ago, Schauffele has finished runner-up eight times without recording a victory despite owning a final-round scoring average of 68.3 in those events.

Striking the Right Chord

These players have gained the most strokes off-the-tee and approach combined over their last 20 rounds:

• Jon Rahm 1.52
• Dustin Johnson 1.48
• Bubba Watson 1.40
• Collin Morikawa 1.33
• Patrick Cantlay 1.21

Ball striking is a key component at any WGC event, and no player has been better in that area of late than Rahm. Although his short game hasn't been great recently, he still comes in with a streak of 12 consecutive top-25 finishes. Meanwhile, Morikawa enters the week a bit under the radar. After winning the PGA Championship last August, Morikawa missed three of his next five cuts – a surprising stretch considering he had missed only one cut in 26 events as a professional before that. Although he only finished tied for 43rd last week, he seems to have found his old form, ranking second at Riviera in Strokes Gained: Approach.

Outright Picks

Bryson DeChambeau (37-2)

DeChambeau is one of the few players in the field that has course history at The Concession – it's where he won the 2015 NCAA Championship. His game has changed a bit since then, but the prior success is a nice bonus. DeChambeau's prowess off the tee should suit him well here, and his approach play has been much better this season. This feels similar to the U.S. Open, when he came without his best form and won at a discounted price.

Scottie Scheffler (93-2)

I rank Scheffler as the best golfer in search of his first win, and the lack of a victory has him underpriced as a result. He comes in with solid form, having been in the final group on Sunday at the Phoenix Open and having fired the second-best round of the day in the final round of the Genesis Invitational despite losing strokes on the putting surface. Scheffler is not one to be shy in big events – he posted a top-5 at the PGA Championship and another in the first playoff event, in which he fired a second-round 59.

Bubba Watson (110-1)

It's been three years since Watson's last win, and at 42 years old it's easy to write him off. His play has suggested otherwise, though, as he posted top-10 results at The CJ Cup and ZOZO Championship last fall – two similar no-cut events with strong fields. He led the field in SG: Tee-to-Green at The CJ Cup and has looked a lot more like himself since last season's playoff events.

Top-10 Picks

Abraham Ancer (5-1)

Ancer had the misfortune of being stuck in Texas during the winter storm, and he arrived in Los Angeles late last Wednesday without any practice and ultimately missed the cut. Ancer's had good success in WGC events lately, with three straight top-15 results. He's also gained strokes on the field in both off-the-tee and approach play in his last three tournaments.

Lanto Griffin (6-1)

Griffin is a bit of a late-bloomer, but he had a remarkable 2019-20 season and qualified for the TOUR Championship after making the jump from the Korn Ferry Tour. There's no real weakness in his game, as he's sneaky long and is developing into one of the better iron players on Tour. He's getting more starts in more-prominent events like this one, and has top-10s in both the BMW Championship and The CJ Cup under his belt.

Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Predictions

Cameron Champ (12-1)

Champ has one of the highest variances on Tour – he is equally as capable of finishing bottom-10 as he is top-10. At these odds, he's certainly worth the risk, and DeChambeau is the only player in the field that hits it farther. He has two top-10 results in his last 13 events, both coming in events with strong fields: the PGA Championship and ZOZO Championship.

Golf Betting Odds Pga Championship Leaderboard

Head-to-Head Picks

Matthew Wolff (-120) over Marc Leishman

Wolff has saved some of his best golf for the bigger events, with top-5 results in two of the last three majors. He's struggled a bit with driving accuracy this year, but he's typically going to be one of the best ball-strikers in the field. Leishman has had a few good results lately, but that's been in large part due to solid putting the last two weeks, and his T4 at the Sony Open was at a much shorter course. He'll be at a disadvantage this week on a long track.

Carlos Ortiz (-143) over Mackenzie Hughes

Talk about two guys trending in the opposite direction: Ortiz has been one of the better golfers on Tour of late, while Hughes hasn't looked the same since the end of last season. Since winning the Houston Open last fall, Ortiz has been in contention in the final round in three of his last six events. Hughes hasn't finished top-30 in any of his three WGC appearances, and like Leishman, he is a shorter hitter that will be at a disadvantage.

Jason Kokrak (-106) over Tommy Fleetwood

Fleetwood is a slight favorite in this matchup, and I'm struggling to figure out why. Since the Tour's restart last year, Fleetwood's best result in 10 events was a share of 19th at the Masters. Kokrak showed good form in Los Angeles, entering the weekend with a share of second place. He also stepped up his game last fall with a top-20 finish at the ZOZO Championship and his first Tour title at The CJ Cup.