Travelers Matchups: Don't Fear the Champ

The PGA TOUR travels across the country for this week’s Travelers Championship at TPC River Highlands.

This event is known for handing out sponsor invites to youngsters with potential. The result is generally that those pros return the favor when they make it big, returning on a yearly basis.

Adding the field strength this year, the Travelers received the designated event tag which means that most of the world’s best are making the long journey from Los Angeles Country Club.

There is not much evidence that fatigue can be all that predictive in golf so let’s ignore that travel narrative and head straight to the tournament matchup board to see what stands out.

Russell Henley over Collin Morikawa - Tournament Matchup (+100)

If you’re like me then this matchup price looked a bit off. Morikawa generally boasts a higher baseline rating than Henley and has that extra gear that makes him so enticing in the outright market.

However, Henley has found his groove in recent months, posting top 20s in six of his last seven starts.

Morikawa has just a T36 and missed cut in two tries at the Travelers. Henley has top 20s in three of five starts at TPC River Highlands.

So, despite my gut liking the other side of this matchup, I think Henley is the better head-to-head play after looking at the data.

Viktor Hovland over Xander Schauffele - Tournament Matchup (+105)

Hovland won the Memorial a few weeks ago but cooled off with a T19 last week at the U.S. Open.

It was still a steady result and that is the name of the game when betting head-to-head matchups.

Looking at these two and their crossover events this season, Hovland is crushing Schauffele 8-to-3 which implies that Hovland may be the deserved favorite in the matchup.

Instead, we are seeing an inflated price, likely because Schauffele is the defending champ and was right in the mix last week at LACC. I don’t fear the champ here so I will grab Hovland in this one.