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Fortinet Championship Each-Way Tips: picks from 70/1 to 125/1 at Silverado

Dave Tindall
12 September 2023
4:00 min read

Laird is one of three tips for Dave this week

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It's the start of the PGA Tour's Fall season and Dave Tindall has three bets for the opener in California...

70/171.00 Garrick Higgo knows how to win trophies
70/171.00 Chesson Hadley holds the course record
125/1126.00 Martin Laird has course and current form

For those always slightly fidgety at the PGA Tour golf season being spread over two years, change is coming.

While the term 'wraparound' was a neat enough way of explaining the awkwardness, this year we'll have clarity: a 2024 season that starts with the Sentry Tournament of Champions in early January and finishes at the Tour Championship in September.

Which is all great. Except, you know, what about all the stuff that used to be played between September and December?

This, of course, was the Fall season. It still is the Fall season but now it's a standalone seven-tournament chunk that acts as a second-chance saloon rather than a starting gun.

The top 50 at the end of the recently concluded 2022/23 season have already booked their places for all eight designated events of 2024.

But doors remain open and these Fall tournaments now offer a way through. Those finishing 51st-60th at the end of this seven-tournament run will be exempt into the first two signature events of 2024.

And further down the scale, there's the familiar scrap of trying to finish in the top 125 and be fully exempt for the new 2024 campaign.

Garrick Higgo @ 70/171.00

Looking at Strokes Gained stats here over the last five years shows that every winner in that period ranked in the top three for SG: Tee To Green.

But - and this is far from being the case usually in PGA Tour events - to achieve that ranking, each of the five were in the top 25 for all components that make up Tee To Green: Off The Tee, Approach and Around The Green.

Take Max Homa last year for example. He ranked 1st Tee To Green, 7th Around The Green, 9th Off The Tee and 18th in Approach.

Not that we can rule out good putting either. The SGP rank of those winners from 2018 to 2022 reads 18th, 28th, 13th, 14th and 15th.

In short, Silverado in California - a short-ish 7,123-yard par 72 with small bent/poa annua greens - is a course where you need to perform strongly across the board.

Garrick Higgo was doing just that towards the end of last season. In his four starts in July, the South African finished better each week, posting 33rd at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, 21st in the John Deere, 19th at the Scottish Open and 13th in the 3M Open.

His All-Around rankings in those four starts were 15th, 4th, 7th and 22nd.

The last seven winners here all ranked in the top 55 for Driving Distance last season so longer hitters do well. That bodes well for Higgo, who was 33rd for DD in the campaign just gone.

While a missed cut on his debut here last year isn't ideal, he played the California events well, as a rule, in 2023.

Higgo was 11th at the American Express, made the cut at Torrey Pines and added a 20th at Pebble Beach.

Having gone to college at UNLV, he's familiar with the West Coast and let's remind ourselves that at the age of just 24 he's already a three-time champion on the DP World Tour and also a PGA Tour winner having landed the 2021 Palmetto Championship.

He'll start the week at 76th in the points race so knows that a big week somewhere can push him into that 51st to 60th slot and secure his spot the early designated events of 2024.

Back Garrick Higgo each-way @ 70/171.00

Bet now

Chesson Hadley @ 70/171.00

Chesson Hadley really found some form at the end of last season.

He made six of his last seven cuts and finished 33rd or better in five of them, the highlight a sixth place in the Barracuda Championship.

That run wasn't enough to get him into the Playoffs which this season required a top 70 finish.

Hadley ended in 121st so still has work to do to nail down that top 125 position which will secure his full playing privileges for 2024.

But he'll have his sights higher than that and if this turnaround continues a top 60 place isn't out of the question.

Silverado is a place he knows extremely well having played in eight of the nine events held there.

Despite some missed cuts, there have been plenty of good days too. He was third in 2017, 14th in 2020 and 23rd in 2019.

His third place included a blistering Friday 61 and that's the course record at Silverado. "It was a pretty magical round from start to finish," he said later.

Hadley ranked 2nd on the All-Around charts when sixth at the Barracuda and he was 24th for AA at the Wyndham last month, his most recent start.

Perhaps this change in the schedule will work perfectly for a player in his position: one who ran out of time at the end of last season but now has the Fall Series to cash in on his good recent play and get his ranking up for the start of 2024.

Back Chesson Hadley each-way @ 70/171.00

Bet now

Martin Laird @ 125/1126.00

While Max Homa 7/17.80 goes for a threepeat and Justin Thomas 14/115.00 tries to prove he was a worthy wild card pick, I'll look way down the odds for my final selection.

The massive 125/1126.00 for Martin Laird seems a funny old price for a player who was runner-up two tournaments ago and 20th in California the start before that.

The Scotsman's second place came at the 3M Open where he shot 68, 68, 67, 64 and the top 20 at the Barracuda Championship.

On that alone, Laird would be worth a look at those odds but he has some course form too.

True, he's missed his last three cuts at Silverado but winding back, Laird was third on debut in 2014, eighth in 2016 and 17th in 2017. Clearly, it's a course where he can score.

Looking back to his first start, he said in 2015: "It was my first year here and I loved the place."

More recently, Laird talked us through his 2023 after finishing second at the 3M Open.

"This year's been a struggle. I've been trending in the right direction for the last few months. It was pretty bad to start. I had an injury in the winter and started the season with an injury. You can kind of get yourself in a hole when you do that and my swing kind of changed because of it.

"You know, in this game when you're struggling, it seems like a long way to get back to where you know you can be. So I'm obviously, I'm very happy with this week.

"Last week (20th at Barracuda) I played great, just didn't make any putts. I played well enough to have a chance last week and didn't make any putts. This week was nice to finally make some putts."

At 112th on the FedEx list, he's in the same boat as Hadley in terms of having the motivation to move far more comfortably inside that top 125.

The four-time PGA Tour winner could just sneak another win while most of the big guns are absent or contesting the DP World Tour's BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth.

Back Martin Laird each-way @ 125/1126.00

Bet now

Recommended bets

Back Garrick Higgo each-way @ 70/171.00

Back Chesson Hadley each-way @ 70/171.00

Back Martin Laird each-way @ 125/1126.00

Staked: £1280
Returned: £974.36
P/L: -£305.64

Previous:
2021/2022 P/L: -£315.35
2020/2021 P/L: +£1475.87
2019/2020 P/L: +£13.83
2018/2019 P/L: -£338.25
2017/2018 P/L: +£362.84
2016/2017 P/L: +£1179.89

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Prices quoted in copy are correct at time of publication but liable to change.

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Fortinet Championship Each-Way Tips: picks from 70/1 to 125/1 at Silverado

70/171.00 Garrick Higgo knows how to win trophies

70/171.00 Chesson Hadley holds the course record

125/1126.00 Martin Laird has course and current form

Garrick Higgo @ 70/171.00

Chesson Hadley @ 70/171.00

Martin Laird @ 125/1126.00

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70/171.00 Garrick Higgo knows how to win trophies

70/171.00 Chesson Hadley holds the course record

125/1126.00 Martin Laird has course and current form

Garrick Higgo @ 70/171.00

Chesson Hadley @ 70/171.00

Martin Laird @ 125/1126.00

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