Farmers Insurance Open Betting Preview
The PGA Tour heads to San Diego for this week's Farmers Insurance Open at two-time major championship venue Torrey Pines. The event brings extra notoriety this year with the return of Brooks Koepka following his three-year stint on LIV. The 147-player field will rotate between the North and South courses across the first two days, with those making the cut playing the weekend entirely at Torrey Pines South. It's another strong field with 10 of the top 20 players in the OWGR teeing it up, highlighted by hometown favorite Xander Schauffele at 15-1 odds.
Last year, long shot Harris English -- at 100-1 -- defeated Sam Stevens by one stroke for his fifth PGA Tour victory.
All odds via DraftKings Sportsbook as of 12:30 PM ET Wednesday
Event Overview
Torrey Pines North Course: Par 72, 7,258 yards; Torrey Pines South Course: Par 72, 7,765 yards
These are the average rankings of the Farmers Insurance Open champions since 2021:
- SG: Off-the-Tee: 33.2
- SG: Approach: 10.2
- SG: Around-the-Green: 26.0
- SG: Putting: 7.0
- SG: Tee-to-Green: 8.0
- Driving Distance: 39.6
- Driving Accuracy: 35.0
Since only one round is played on the North Course, and the South Course is the only one with strokes gained data, we'll mainly focus on the latter for the breakdown. With that said, the North Course is the easier of the two, with scores on the South typically being around three shots higher. That makes sense considering the North is about 500 yards shorter and has 40 less bunkers.
In watching the tournament over the years, it's not the most exciting venue as a lot of the holes are straightforwards and similar – straight and long. The metrics above tell us that iron play is a key metric with the winner ranking fourth or better in SG: Approach in each of the last four years. Off the tee, players are faced with narrow fairways that average less than 28 yards wide and are surrounded by thick, four-inch rough. That puts more of a premium on distance as it's going to be difficult for even the straight hitters to hit a high percentage of fairways. Overall, I'm targeting long hitters, golfers that approach it well from 200+ yards to take advantage of the par-5s (and survive the long par-4s) as well as those that rank well in bogey avoidance.
Torrey Titans
The following golfers have the lowest scoring average at the Farmers Insurance Open since 2021:
- Will Zalatoris: 69.9
- Xander Schauffele: 70.2
- Max Homa: 70.5
- Tony Finau: 70.7
- Jake Knapp: 70.8
For the sake of these course history stats, we'll focus on this event only but it's important to note that The Genesis Invitational was also played here last year due to the wildfires around Los Angeles, and the U.S. Open was held at Torrey Pines in 2021. Notably, Patrick Cantlay and Daniel Berger are the only two players in the field to post a top-15 in each of those events. Getting back to this list, Zalatoris stands out having lost in a playoff in 2022 along with three top-15s across four appearances at the event since 2021. After missing five months due to back surgery, he had a solid top-20 in Palm Springs last week and enters the week at 47-1 odds. Moving up the betting board slightly we find Knapp (37-1), who impressively tied for third as a rookie two years ago. He looks poised for a breakthrough season after posting a pair of top-5s last summer, and he started the year with a T11 in Hawaii after skipping the fall schedule.
Iron Play Specialists
These five golfers, on a per-round basis, have gained the most strokes on approach across their last 20 rounds:
- Aaron Rai: 1.26
- Si Woo Kim: 1.09
- J.J. Spaun: 0.96
- Justin Rose: 0.88
- Patrick Cantlay: 0.65
With iron play being a key stat this week, Rai jumps out at the top of the list, although the oddsmakers aren't giving him much respect at 84-1 odds. The downside of course is that he's one of the shortest hitters at a long course, but that didn't stop him from finishing T6 in his debut in 2022. Rai had a strong fall on the DP World Tour against difficult fields, finishing T3 at the BMW PGA Championship and later won the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship. Meanwhile, it's easy to be drawn to Spaun at a course that emphasizes his elite iron play, and we know that the reigning U.S. Open champion can play his best golf at difficult venues. He'll look to prove that last year wasn't a fluke, and it's difficult to find a weakness in his game. Spaun finished T15 at the event last year.
Farmers Insurance Open Bets: Outright Picks
Cameron Young (19-1)
Young has a lot of momentum to build off following a strong end to 2025 that included a win and five straight top-15 finishes on top of going 3-1 at the Ryder Cup. Young has been dialed in with his irons at Torrey Pines, gaining 1.50 strokes on approach per round across four rounds.
Adam Scott (45-1)
Surprisingly, Scott is teeing it up in the first three events to start the year and has been dialed in with his ball striking, where he's gaining 1.42 strokes per round off the tee and on approach combined. He's only played here twice but has strong showings with a runner-up in 2019 and a top-10 two years later.
Christiaan Bezuidenhout (100-1)
Bezuidenhout quietly had a strong end of the year with a pair of top-10s on the PGA Tour in October and two on the DP World Tour last month. Outside of being a short hitter, he does everything else really well. It's always nice to have excellent scramblers at a tournament where you'll need your short game to bail you out.
Farmers Insurance Open Bets: Top-10 Wagers
Denny McCarthy (+620)
McCarthy ranked sixth in SG: Approach at the Stadium Course last week and when you combine that with excellent putting, he should have a chance to get into contention. McCarthy had a pair of top-20s across three events during last year's West Coast swing.
Matti Schmid (+980)
Schmid's strengths of length and putting makes him a good fit around Torrey Pines, which he showed last year with a T25 result. He's started the year slow with a pair of missed cuts which has created some value. He can be hit-or-miss, but Schmid did have six top-10s last year.
Austin Smotherman (+1150)
Smotherman is coming off a strong year on the Korn Ferry Tour that included two wins, and he led the field in SG: Tee-to-Green last week at the Stadium Course en route to a top-10 result. He posted a T11 here in 2022 as well.
Farmers Insurance Open Bets: Head-to-Head Matchups
Maverick McNealy (-118) over Jason Day
The California native played well at Torrey Pines last year, finishing runner-up to Ludvig Aberg at The Genesis Invitational. He's only missed the cut once across eight appearances at the venue and showed a high ceiling last year with five top-5 finishes. Day started off the year well in Palm Springs, but he putted lights out and this will be a much different test. He's gone T50-T32-MC in his last three trips to Torrey.
Max Greyserman (-114) over Davis Thompson
Thompson is coming off a missed at The AMEX, an event he's historically played well at. His game hasn't been the same since 2024 as his short game has let him down. As a result, I'll side with Greyserman, who makes for a superior course fit as the longer driver and much more reliable putter.
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