RBC Heritage odds, predictions, picks: Our favorite long shots at this week's PGA Tour event at Harbour Town

The RBC Heritage occupies a tough spot on the PGA Tour calendar.

Scheduled the week after the Masters, it feels like an obvious event for the game’s biggest stars — and fans — to skip.

But this year’s trip to Harbour Town has been designated as an “elevated event,” which means there’s a $20 million purse and other incentives for the top players on tour to participate.

Scottie Scheffler and Jon Rahm, fresh off winning the Green Jacket, are the co-favorites to win the RBC Heritage at +850, but they’ve got plenty of contenders to deal with at the top of the board.

Patrick Cantlay (+1100), Collin Morikawa (+1800), and defending champion Jordan Spieth (+1800) round out the top-five on the oddsboard, but other big names like Cam Young (+2000), Viktor Hovland (+2500), Xander Schauffele (+2600), Justin Thomas (+2600) and Sungjae Im (+2700) are lurking.

Harbour Town is a Pete Dye-designed track that counts on tree-lined fairways, small greens, and water to keep players honest. You can’t just bomb-and-gauge this course, which means having a reliable short game is a big deal in this event. Additionally, the fact that shorter hitters can succeed at Harbour Town has made it a happy hunting ground for long shots over the past few years (though the fields were never this strong).

Either way, let’s look at some tempting prices on a few players that have what it takes to make some noise at one of the Tour’s most idyllic courses:

Tommy Fleetwood (+5500, FanDuel)

If you’re tired of hearing about Tommy Fleetwood, I don’t blame you. But it’s just hard to quit a golfer this talented with a strong short game this week. Especially at this price, which is longer than he was at the Masters last week.

Of course, there’s a reason that the Merseysider seemingly always has value in these events. Fleetwood is still looking for his maiden PGA Tour win and he burned backers with a pedestrian performance at Augusta.

That said, Fleetwood did finish T3 at the Valspar two weeks ago, so it’s not like he’s out of form.

Si Woo Kim (+6500, Caesars)

Si Woo Kim has a reputation for being a bit of a Pete Dye specialist and he’s had success at this course over his career. Kim lost in a playoff to Satoshi Kodaira at this event back in 2018 and his game has come a long way over the last five years.

In those days, Kim was known as a low-floor, high-ceiling player that could go boom or bust on a moment’s notice.

But the South Korean seems to have corrected that flaw so far this year. Kim has missed just one cut in 2023 and has a win to go along with four top-25 finishes and six top-30 results in nine starts.

Kim has enough win equity at this event to justify a play at this number.

Mackenzie Hughes (+27500, Caesars)

Mackenzie Hughes’ name will pop at courses that reward a nifty short game. Harbour Town ticks that box.

Of course just being good around the greens is not going to win you a tournament alone and you can certainly question whether or not the rest of Hughes’ game is strong enough for him to threaten a field like this, but you should have him circled as a potential outright bet, a top-20 play or as a cheap DFS option.

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