Travelers Championship Betting Picks

The nature of golf betting has plenty of ups and downs, and now I’m going through a stretch of positive results. The last time I wrote in this space, I was coming off a win with Patrick Cantlay at the Memorial (it was a lucky win due to 54-hole leader Jon Rahm being forced to withdraw after a positive COVID-19 test).

I followed up the Cantlay call with a 45/1 winner on Garrick Higgo at the Palmetto Championship and wrote up Rahm in the same article as an early U.S. Open pick. It’s ironic that Rahm helped me win the Cantlay bet at the Memorial and came back to cash a 10/1 U.S. Open ticket for me.

Now after a fun week in Southern California, the PGA TOUR heads to Connecticut for the Travelers Championship. It’s an event that brings back good memories from last year when I bought the dip on Dustin Johnson and he won the event at 28/1, which is a number we won’t see Johnson priced at for a long time.

TPC River Highlands is the course this week and it’s a short track (6,841 yards) designed by Pete Dye. Players from any skillset can win at a course like this, which brings a lot of contenders into play to win.

Note: I will tweet out my official bets when I place them before the event. I discussed my early golf thoughts and other sports betting topics on Stadium’s newest podcast, Sharp Lessons. Subscribe on Spotify and Apple for episodes and follow Stadium Bets on Twitter for more sports betting content.

Here are the players I’m looking to target in the betting market this week:

Favorites

This is a pretty good field the week after a major. It’s probably going to be a much stronger field than it will be during the next two weeks, as players make their way over to Europe for The Open Championship in the middle of July. There are several big-name players in this event that were in the mix at the U.S. Open on Sunday, including Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Paul Casey and Scottie Scheffler. Johnson is back to defend his win from last year, and Cantlay, Patrick Reed and Tony Finau make up the rest at the top of the board.

I’m going to bypass betting on one of the favorites because I’m not sure how motivated some of the players are after a grueling week at a major. There’s a chance I could bet on one of them in-tournament if they get out to a slow start with their putting, but I’m going to focus on players who I have bet on multiple times in 2021.

Abraham Ancer (28/1)

My top choice this week is Abraham Ancer who I have bet outright three times this year. He made my card in back-to-back weeks in January and at THE PLAYERS Championship in March, which was at a course designed by Pete Dye.

Ancer is always a player I have my eye on because of his strong approach game and stellar finishes. He had three top-8 finishes in May highlighted by a solo second at the Wells Fargo Championship.

Ancer missed the cut at the U.S. Open, but did continue to put up strong approach numbers in his two rounds at Torrey Pines. I like that Ancer has had extra time to prepare for this event after having the weekend off, and he had a tied for eighth finish at this tournament in 2019 and tied for 11th finish last year in Connecticut.

Joaquin Niemann (44/1)

Niemann is a player I usually target at longer courses, like the PGA Championship at Kiawah Island last month. But as we saw last year with Johnson, a player long off the tee can win at a compact TPC River Highlands and Niemann is at a discounted price in this field.

He finished tied for 31st last week and finished tied for fifth two years ago at this event. I’ll give him a pass for his 63rd-place finish last year because it was a week after he made a run at the RBC Heritage (another Dye course) and a final-round 75 dropped him down the leaderboard.

Charley Hoffman (44/1)

Hoffman made the article for bets at the Charles Schwab Challenge and the Memorial. Despite two lackluster finishes at the Memorial and U.S. Open, he has nine top-20 finishes in 2021 and has been one of the best ball strikers this year. Hoffman has a nice course history at the Travelers, including three top-7 finishes between 2012-17.