Golf odds: Colonial could be just what Jordan Spieth needs to win on PGA Tour again
Jordan Spieth hasn't won on the PGA Tour since 2017 but has had plenty of success at this week's PGA Tour stop in the past.
The PGA Tour returns for the first time in three months – the last competitive round was Round 1 of the Players Championship on March 12 – Thursday with the Charles Schwab Challenge at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth, Texas. It's a much better field at Colonial than it normally would have been as each of the world's Top 5 is playing; really, the only big name who isn't is Tiger Woods.
World No. 1 Rory McIlroy is playing this event for the first time and to no surprise is the +800 favorite on the moneyline odds at William Hill sportsbook. Rory has yet to finish outside the Top 5 in any PGA Tour event in the 2019-20 wraparound season. A total of 12 percent of all money wagered at William Hill to win the tournament has been placed on McIlroy, the most of any player.
The best value on the board, though, could be Dallas/Fort Worth-area native Jordan Spieth at +4500. Back when he won the 2017 British Open – his second straight Tour victory at the time and third that year – Spieth was on track to be an all-time great as a former No. 1 player in the world who had also won the Masters, U.S. Open and Tour Championship.
However, golf is a funny game and something has happened since then to Spieth as he hasn't won on Tour. Colonial Country Club, though, is a perfect fit for him.
In 2016, Spieth won this event by three shots when it was called the Dean & DeLuca Invitational. He was a runner-up at Colonial by one shot in 2015 to Chris Kirk and by one shot to Kevin Kisner in 2017. Spieth also has a seventh- and eighth-place finish at the track and his only non-Top 10 was a 32nd in 2018. Among all players with at least 12 rounds played in this event over the past 30 years, Spieth's scoring average of 67.8 is first.
So why is Spieth such a long shot? He's down to 54th in the world rankings and has just two Top 10s this season in eight events. His final two tournaments before the coronavirus shutdown resulted in finishes of T59 and T58. Spieth is 227th on Tour in driving accuracy (47.9 percent; only four players are worse) and 221st in greens in regulation (61.3 percent). His putter also has largely deserted him.
That said, Spieth's career numbers at Colonial speak for themselves. Seven percent on all tickets sold to win the tournament have been on Spieth, most of any golfer. He is +900 for a Top 5 and +450 for a Top 10.
So who wins the 2020 Charles Schwab Challenge? And which long shots stun the golfing world? Check out the projected 2020 Charles Schwab Challenge leaderboard, all from the model that's nailed six golf majors, and find out.
