Golf Bets

Rocket Mortgage Classic Each-Way Tips: Come back for Moore at 50/1

  • Dave Tindall
  • Published on
  • Updated on
  • 4:00 min read
Taylor Moore
Taylor Moore is Dave's headline pick

The US PGA Tour heads to Detroit and Dave Tindall has three bets for this week's action...

  • 50/151.00 Taylor Moore is already a winner this year

  • 80/181.00 Brandon Wu performs well on easier tests

  • 300/1301.00 Chesson Hadley is showing signs of form


Last July, Tony Finau had briefly turned into Tiger Woods and turned up here to blitz the field by five shots and make it back-to-back PGA Tour wins.

The first had come at the 3M Open which is a clue that the schedule is different this time.

The 2022 Rocket Mortgage Classic was played a fortnight after the Open Championship but this week the event reverts to its usual late June/early July slot and again follows on from the Travelers Championship.

Keegan Bradley will be trying to do his own version of the Finau having triumphed at the Travelers and is 25/126.00 to follow up that emotional home-State win.

Finau, meanwhile, is one of three co-favourites alongside Justin Thomas and Rickie Fowler at 14/115.00.

The addition of 16/117.00 Hideki Matsuyama and 18/119.00 Collin Morikawa, Max Homa and Sungjae Im give the front end of the market a quality look.

But it also creates some decent prices elsewhere and that's going to be the plan this week: to look further down the betting.

Taylor Moore @ 50/151.00

Taylor Moore, unlike Thomas, Fowler, Matsuyama, Morikawa and Im, is a winner on the PGA Tour this year.

That came when he shot a final-round 67 to power through and take victory in the Valspar Championship in Florida.

He'd laid down the foundations with a trio of straight top 15s on the West Coast at Torrey Pines, Pebble and TPC Scottsdale.

Since his victory, Moore has added an 11th at Hilton Head and a fourth in April's Zurich Classic pairs event.

So why 50/1? The answer is an obvious one as he heads to Detroit having missed his last three cuts: the Charles Schwab Challenge at Colonial, the US Open and the Travelers Championship.

That's not ideal but he'd opened with a 69 at Colonial, shot 71-72 in the US Open to miss the cut by one and rounds of 71-70 at the Travelers were hardly a crime.

Perhaps all he needs is a return to a place where he's played well before.

TPC River Highlands and Colonial certainly weren't those venues as he'd never made the top 50 on either course.

But here at Detroit GC he has a level of comfort having finished tied sixth last year after closing with rounds of 65-66.

We're on a Donald Ross track this week - a 7,370-yard par 72 - and that's when things become interesting when building the case for Moore.

Taking out this year's PGA Championship (although he made the cut), Moore has played three non-Majors on Ross tracks and cracked the top 10 in all of them.

As well as his top six here, he was fifth in last year's Wyndham Championship at Sedgfield while in May 2021 Moore took ninth in the Knoxville Open at Ross's Holston Hills.

Strokes Gained: Putting has been key in the four editions here as you might expect for a birdie-fest so Moore's ranking of 27th for SGP this season bodes well.

At 50/151.00, the 29-year-old, who sits 28th in the FedEx Cup standings, is well worth an each-way bet.

Back Taylor Moore each-way @ 50/151.00

Bet now

Brandon Wu @ 80/181.00

Brandon Wu has had mixed form of late but when we apply a filter and cut out designed events and Majors, it looks rather good.

And it seems reasonable to do that given that this isn't exactly one of the highlights of the calendar.

So, removing form from the recent elite gatherings, we see Wu placing ninth in the Canadian Open earlier this month, 23rd in the Byron Nelson Championship and third in the Mexico Open.

In the latter two he shot a round of 64 (Sunday at the Byron Nelson, Friday in Mexico) and that highlights Wu's ability to make lots of birdies.

He racked up 21 in Canada to rank eighth for the week and on the season-long standings, the 26-year-old is 28th in both Par Breakers and Birdie or Better Percentage.

Wu shot 19-under in Mexico on his way to third spot while he was 15-under when runner-up at Pebble Beach back in February.

And wind back to 2020 and he won the Korn Ferry Tour Championship with 18-under.

As for course or correlating form, more good news emerges.

The Stanford University grad, who played on the USA's winning Walker Cup team in 2019, was a solid 30th on his course debut here last year.

He followed that with eighth place at the Wyndham Championship at Sedgefield while there is further Donald Ross form to be found via his 10th place in the Knoxville Open at Holston Hills.

Back Brandon Wu each-way @ 80/181.00

Bet now

Chesson Hadley @ 300/1301.00

Rickie Fowler or Hideki Matsuyama would be my picks if playing the top end of the market. But I'm going to throw a dart at Chesson Hadley at a massive price.

The 35-year-old suffered a miserable run from March to May, missing five cuts and posting a 60th in six starts.

But he made the weekend in Canada and finished 43rd while he shot bookend 66s to crack the top 25 in last weekend's Travelers Championship.

His putting was vastly improved as he gained 5.355 strokes on the greens to rank 9th for SGP. He was 12th for Around The Green.

Something must explain that huge price then and the obvious answer is course form. It ain't great. In fact it's downright poor, with three missed cuts and tied 52nd.

But when looking at past winners at Detroit GC, Finau's only previous effort was 53rd, DeChambeau has course form here of 1-MC and Cam Davis had missed both Rocket Mortgage cuts before his victory in 2019.

The message is clear: course form is far from a pre-requisite at this track.

That's good news for Hadley and it certainly helps that he has some decent Donald Ross form too.

Hadley's Web.com Tour Championship win in 2013 came on Ross's Sawgrass Valley while he has further top eights at TPC Louisana, Harbour Town and TPC River Highlands (fifth in 2022).

Speaking after an opening 67 in Canada two starts ago, he said: "I putted great. I did a lot of things well. My iron play was pretty sharp. But the putter was the MVP. That's the strength of my game.

"I wasn't in the PGA, Colonial or Memorial, so I needed to get out here and play. I'm fresh, obviously, with the three weeks off. I feel like my game's moving in a really good direction."

There seems quite a lot to like for someone so low down in the betting.

Back Chesson Hadley each-way @ 300/1301.00

Bet now

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Dave Tindall avatar

Dave Tindall

Dave is a passionate sports fan with a particular love for football, golf and snooker and he is one of Betfair's long-standing football and golf tipsters

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