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No recommended bets
Throughout the men’s majors that have taken place in 2020, there has been a trajectory that Dustin Johnson will look to continue on Sunday. The PGA Championship was probably over the moment Collin Morikawa’s drive came to a stop within 10 feet on the 16th hole of the final round. The US Open appeared around the 11th, when Bryson DeChambeau scored a six-shot victory. Johnson, four clear entering Augusta’s final round, could undermine his maxim, that the Masters doesn’t start until the top nine on Sunday, by making it incidental.
Of course, it would help the laconic American to take a more circumspect view and recognize that there is still work to be done. That shouldn’t be a problem for the man who would have won the 2010 PGA Championship if he hadn’t punished his club in a bunker, just a couple of months after shooting 82 when he was apparently in command of the US Open. However you look at it, this fabulous player, the most consistent winner of his generation, has not matched tour-level feats in major championships. He is one of the few select golfers for whom a career is not enough. To some extent, you still have questions to answer.
It seems unlikely that it won’t, given what we know. We know that the closest tested challenger is six shots behind, that man is Justin Thomas, who became sloppy and sloppy after playing so well for two and a half rounds. Thomas is to blame for not being in the final group and will likely shoot at will in the final round, making him a prime candidate for shooting the lowest score of the day needed to keep his dashed hopes alive, at least for a while. . It also means we risk seeing him plummet down the leaderboard, but he’s balanced well enough to outrun Saturday’s setbacks and finish in the top five.
We know for sure that Johnson is the best golfer in the world. It seemed wrong that he was not the favorite on Monday, and now it seems silly. Sadly, the price change that followed last week’s second place in Houston (1/12 to 1/9) was enough to put idiots like me on slightly higher prices. This is not to regret the sequence of events actually, simply to say that the best player in the sport is the one with all the aces, and he also came here with a strong Augusta form bench behind him.
We know the closest ones are pretty new to this too. The admirable Cameron Smith has managed, to be fair, a couple of top-five finishes in the majors, even here, but he hasn’t really competed yet and did well to hold on towards the end of the third round thanks to a short game. of dynamite. So did Masters rookie Abraham Ancer, but he has yet to win a PGA Tour event. Sungjae Im has done it, but he’s in this position for the first time and while he may enjoy the role of predator, the one he played to win the Honda Classic, we can see that this experience pays off later.
This is an indirect way of saying that I can’t find holes in the favorite, except to say that this is the Masters, and winning a green jacket should never be considered a simple task, particularly now that there is some breeze in the forecast. Reference will be made to Greg Norman’s collapse in 1996 and also to Jordan Spieth’s in 2016, along with conversations about Johnson’s troubles at Pebble Beach, Whistling Straits, Chambers Bay, and Royal St George’s. It all, of course, came with the added pressure that spectators bring and respectfully against more experienced opponents. I think he will be fine with the wind and win, probably by more than four.
Johnson’s record with a clear 54-hole lead is six of 11, but the most pertinent fact here is that he is three of four when leading by four or more, even as he walks away to win by 11 as recently as August. His only failure was three years ago in China when he collapsed spectacularly, but he’s an even better player now, and the way he drives the ball gives the rest very little hope.
Sky Bet goes 6/1 and wins by six or more, which seems fair, but the truth is that there is nothing in direct markets that I want to recommend. Many will turn to ‘no Johnson’ to show interest, but it’s very difficult to weigh, especially in a scenario where he strays a lot, and I’ll just sit back and wait for the four senior picks, each of which is T15 or better, can fill some of the places.
Perhaps Smith will benefit from being in the penultimate group rather than the last, but he was the most tattered of the trio that is tied for second and, in frank terms, I think he is marginally the least capable of them. Since he is almost the favorite therefore he cannot be presented to the prices and would prefer Im, who did not flinch at the Presidents Cup and seems the man most likely to stun the leader or just make a decision distant. second.
But with Thomas, Jon Rahm, Rory McIlroy, Brooks Koepka and Hideki Matsuyama all four out of second place, there’s a good chance a Sunday shakeup will see the places dominated by the best players, and the best of them are ready to pick up a well deserved. and backward in many ways, welcomes Green Jacket. Johnson has no excuses here and I don’t think they will come close to him.
Other options include McIlroy to win his three balls at 6/4, which seems reasonable given the way he has played rounds two and three. He’s exceptionally handling the ball and can represent Koepka and Tommy Fleetwood with what some would consider a classic McIlroy performance, which is a top-five finish that gave the leader and likely winner a 10-shot outing in the first. round.
I would not dissuade anyone from that bet and McIlroy is equally interesting in the upper market of Great Britain and Ireland. This will again require topping Fleetwood and holding a two- and three-shot lead over Paul Casey and Shane Lowry, respectively. With my hand on my heart, I’m surprised McIlroy isn’t a shadow of probabilities rather than the 13/10 you can find with a couple of companies.
Speaking of Lowry, he could beat Tiger Woods and Scottie Scheffler. Woods complained of exhaustion after a busy Saturday and didn’t seem to be moving well toward the end of the round. An early start on Sunday means he has a brief change of course to face and Lowry has beaten him in both the second and third rounds, the pair having played from the start.
Scheffler complicates matters, however, and prices around the 10/21 mark for Lowry stay quiet for that reason. It’s around 2/13 that he and McIlroy win all three of their balls and that’s advice for those looking for interest in a final round that may be lacking if Johnson’s top nine come close to what he produced on Saturday.
If Dustin Johnson makes the power clear and wins by half a dozen, we won’t have had the Augusta drama we’re used to, but we will have had a Masters, and for that we can be thankful. And there is another in April.
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