We turn the page from The Open to an Open, as the PGA TOUR schedule resumes in Minnesota. 2022 3M Open odds will require handicapping TPC Twin Cities.
It will be far less “open” on the course itself than what we’ve grown accustomed to in the links swing overseas after back-to-back events exposed to the elements in sloping, firm and fast fairway conditions at The Renaissance Club and The Old Course in St. Andrews. Instead, it’s a return to the familiar confines of parkland golf with more grown out rough and fairways lined with trees and ample water hazards. That means a reward for control off the tee once again, and creates an appealing buy-low opportunity for any players that have shown us that links golf may just not be for them over the last couple weeks.
We’ll run through the key facts and info about TPC Twin Cities, hoping for a winning outright ticket from 2022 3M Open odds.
Scroll to the bottom of this post to compare complete golf odds across legal sportsbooks for the 3M Open.
It would be hard to expect the masses from the The Open Championship to make the journey overseas to Minnesota for this fledgling event, but the strength of field will still be an improvement over the last primary stateside event we saw on the PGA TOUR at the John Deere Classic.
Despite the complications of overseas travel, this event has attracted a handful of top players jockeying for FedEx Cup positioning with just three events remaining before the FedEx St. Jude Championship.
There is a clear upper tier of talent this week, with three OWGR top-25 players – Hideki Matsuyama, Tony Finau and Sungjae Im. Interestingly enough, each of these three players have found early success with a top-15 prior finish here. So we can surmise they’ve committed to play because they see this as an opportunity to stockpile another PGA TOUR victory for their resumes.
Beyond the big three, other notable names crossing over from The Open Championship include Sahith Theegala, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, JT Poston, and Cameron Tringale. Additional contenders who won’t have to deal with jet lag include Maverick McNealy, Davis Riley, and Adam Hadwin. As an added bonus, Minnesota native and former tennis pro Mardy Fish is in the field on a sponsor’s exemption.
Past winners of this event include Matthew Wolff, Michael Thompson, and Cameron Champ; the latter two are back in action in this week’s field.
TPC Twin Cities is your quintessential TPC layout we’ve grown accustomed to seeing on the PGA TOUR, and features a steady mix of birdie opportunities on short par-4s, reachable par-5s for longer hitters, and stadium-style par-3s to keep the crowds engaged. Water hazards threaten throughout, however, so Bogey Avoidance and control OTT will be at a bit more of a premium here than most other TPC courses.
This will be the 4th iteration of the 3M Open, which was added to the PGA TOUR rotation in 2019. TPC Twin Cities was previously home to the 3M Championship on the PGA TOUR Champions from 2001-2018, and went through a renovation project following the 2018 event in order to adapt the course to present more of a challenge to modern PGA TOUR players. That project primarily consisted of pushing the tees back, finding up to 300 yards in added length, and expanding the water hazards on property to pose more of a persistent threat on tee shots and approaches. As a result, we’ve seen this new layout reward the best total drivers who are able to best control their misses, avoid hazards, and position themselves to attack pins on these large, receptive greens.
Tournament founder Hollis Cavner gave an honest description of how they want the 3M Open to play, quoted as saying “We want birdies and train wrecks, and we don’t want to be the hardest golf course on the tour”. Birdies and train wrecks are, in fact, the easiest way to capture the interest of fans at large, and this event, despite lacking the star power in its field as others on the schedule, has done an excellent job of capturing dramatic conclusions, with ample hazards putting both birdie and bogey in play down the stretch, depending on where players can position themselves off the tee.
TPC Twin Cities is a par-71 standing at 7,431 yards, which is slightly above-average in terms of length on the PGA TOUR. The layout includes three par-5s, each sitting between 550-600 yards, four par-3s (each over 175 yards), and 11 par-4s, with a very balanced distribution of hole ranges. There are two par-4s listed as under 400 yards on the official scorecard, however we’ve commonly seen the tee boxes on the 411-yard par-4 16th pushed up to become a driveable par-4 as well. In total, 13 holes have a scoring average under-par; the five holes on property which do not are the four 450+ yard par-4s and the longest par-3on the course, the 228-yard 13th.
While it may lack the historical significance of other finishing holes on TOUR, the par-5 18th is one of my favorites on TOUR. The hole doglegs with water on the right throughout, which is in play on both the tee shot and approach if players want to get aggressive with a 220+ yard approach over water to reach in two. Matthew Wolff won in climactic fashion at the inaugural 2019 3M Open, responding to Bryson DeChambeau’s eagle on 18 with an eagle of his own from just off the fringe. In 2021, Cameron Champ bailed out into the left trees, but scrambled his way to a 5 to claim victory.
There are a number of unique characteristics of TPC Twin Cities that make it stand out on the PGA TOUR schedule. The greens are above-average in size, measuring 6,500 square feet on average, which has produced a gaudy 73% of greens in regulation from the field. That’s helped in part due to the 3-inch rough, which has not posed much of an impediment to players who narrowly miss the fairway. Players are also producing above-average driving distance and fairways in regulation at TPC Twin Cities, meaning this is a layout where the best total drivers can thrive, as long as they can mitigate any wayward shots towards the hazards.
Just under 50% of approach shots will come from over 175 yards, a distinct change of pace from the driver-wedge set ups we’ve seen the last two weeks at the Scottish and British Opens. That creates an interesting buy-low opportunity for the top long iron players in this field. The top-10 in Prox: 175+ are Brendan Steele, Cam Davis, Hideki Matsuyama, Lucas Glover, Michael Kim, Hayden Buckley, Tyler Duncan, Lee Hodges, David Lingmerth, and Jared Wolfe.
Cameron Champ’s field day on the greens last year would suggest that these must be easy greens to read, and the data supports that notion as well. In each of its first three years on the PGA TOUR, TPC Twin Cities has ranked in the bottom-3 of putting difficulty. Without much nuance or undulation to these greens, it opens the door for ball strikers who are deficient in putting to still contend. All poor putters are not immune however, as Sergio Garcia still managed to erase his 13.2 strokes gained T2G with 7.3 strokes lost on the greens.
Though we’ve only had a three-year sample of events to reference from, course history has not proven to be predictive at all for the eventual winners. Matthew Wolff won here in his fourth career start as a PGA TOUR professional, Michael Thompson finished last amongst those who made the cut at the 2019 3M Open before his victory in 2020, and Cameron Champ missed the cut in his only prior appearance at this event. Considering the winner has finished No. 27 and No. 16 in the field in SG: T2G respectively, it’s understandable that recent performance on the course can be overlooked, if you’re able to make up for it on the greens.
Between the LIV defectors and the 3M Open’s new position on the PGA TOUR schedule in the week immediately following The Open, there are plenty of players with sustained course history at this event who will be absent. In fact, six of the top-20 players in terms of total strokes gained at the 3M Open – Schwartzel, Wolff, DeChambeau, Oosthuizen, Ortiz, and Perez – have since fled to the LIV T0ur.
Although course history hasn’t necessarily led to wins at this event in its short history, there are a handful of players who have enjoyed steady success repeatedly each year. Tony Finau leads the way from a total strokes gained perspective. He contended here in 2020 with a T3 finish, and joins Brice Garnett as the only two players to finish inside the top-30 in all three 3M Open events.
There are just eight players who have made it through the cut in each of the first three years of play: Tony Finau, Cameron Tringale, Charles Howell III, Brice Garnett, Michael Thompson, Hank Lebioda, Patton Kizzire, and Jason Dufner. Only eight players have recorded multiple top-25 finishes in this event: Finau, Garnett, Tringale, Howell III, Adam Hadwin, Bo Hoag, Adam Long, and Roger Sloan.
Players to record a top-15 finish in their one prior debut include Hideki Matsuyama, Brian Stuard, Chez Reavie, and Brandt Snedeker. Notables with poor history across multiple appearances at the 3M Open include James Hahn, Nate Lashley, Matthew NeSmith, Erik Van Rooyen, and Joseph Bramlett. The top-10 players in Course History at TPC Twin Cities are Finau, Tringale, Hadwin, Howell III, Garnett, Hoag, Long, Sloan, Cam Davis, and Ryan Armour. Adam Hadwin has notably finished inside the top-10 in each of his first two appearances at this event.
After last year’s 3M Open concluded, I left myself one note to pay close attention to the 2022 Zurich Classic, as Cameron Champ, Louis Oosthuizen, Charl Schwartzel, Keith Mitchell, Brandt Snedeker, and Pat Perez each finished top-20 in both events in 2021. Additionally, Brian Stuard was the last to win the Zurich Classic at TPC Louisiana as an individual Stroke Play event in 2016, and posted a T6 finish in his debut 3M Open appearance last year. Notables to finish inside the top-10 at the 2022 Zurich Classic who are in the field this week include Doc Redman, Sam Ryder, Davis Riley, Brendan Steele, Matthew NeSmith, Garrick Higgo, Justin Lower, Dylan Wu, Wyndham Clark, Cameron Tringale, and Jason Day.
Aside form the overlapping leaderboard trend, it also makes sense that TPC Louisiana would reward a similar profile of player as TPC Twin Cities, as both TPC layouts sit at 7.4K yards with water hazards threatening throughout, rewarding an aggressive style of play to attack pins for birdies. PGA National, host of the Honda Classic, features a similar challenge of persistent water hazards in play off the tee, and has also produced overlapping success from players like Michael Thompson (a winner at both), Keith Mitchell, and Sungjae Im.
Detroit Golf Club, Silverado Resort, TPC Deere Run, TPC Summerlin, TPC San Antonio all share similar scoring conditions, yielding winning scores in the high teens under par and a premium on SG: OTT, with avenues for success from players with elite accuracy or distance.
Combine performance across this list and the top-10 players in Comp Course History here are Sungjae Im, Adam Hadwin, Cameron Tringale, Maverick McNealy, Hideki Matsuyama, Tony Finau, Cam Davis, Matthias Schwab, Martin Laird, and Mark Hubbard.
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2021 3M Open champion (and triple-digit longshot) Cameron Champ was bottom-10 on the PGA TOUR in SG: P on the 2021 season entering the 3M Open and proceeded to lead the field in SG: P, gaining 8.5 strokes for the week. As someone who held tickets on Charl Schwartzel and Jhonattan Vegas, who each finished runner-up to Champ and his out of body putting performance, I’m not even a little bitter about it.
On the surface, a tournament which has produced Cameron Champ and Matthew Wolff as champions would scream bomber narrative. The data doesn’t exactly support that this is a tournament won off the tee however, as Champ gained less than one stroke OTT in last year’s event, and Michael Thompson won in 2020 despite losing strokes to the field OTT. With that said, the sample size is still small, and looking at a list of contenders over the last three years that also includes the likes of Bryson DeChambeau, Wyndham Clark, Sam Burns, Max Homa, Charl Schwartzel, Jhonattan Vegas, and Keith Mitchell, we start to paint a clearer picture that elite total drivers with plus distance have positioned themselves well in this event. The top-10 players in SG: OTT entering this week are Brendan Steele, Cameron Champ, Sungjae Im, Hayden Buckley, Tony Finau, Nick Hardy, Paul Barjon, Emiliano Grillo, Davis Riley, and Austin Smotherman.
While there hasn’t been a linear correlation between SG: OTT and winning the 3M Open, SG: APP tells a much better story, which makes sense on an easier layout with wider fairways that reward an aggressive style on approach to attack pins. The top-10 approach players entering this week are Hideki Matsuyama, Tony Finau, Matthew NeSmith, Mark Hubbard, Martin Laird, Adam Svensson, Brendan Steele, Wesley Bryan, Erik Van Rooyen, and CT Pan. To take a step further beyond approach play, this shapes up to be the perfect set up to lean into the Opportunities Gained stat, which identifies the players who generate the highest volume of birdie opportunities. That top-10 includes Matsuyama, Tom Hoge, John Huh, Vaughn Taylor, Austin Smotherman, Satoshi Kodaira, Maverick McNealy, Brendan Steele, Chris Gotterup, and Finau.
Like the John Deere Classic, we should see another week with ample birdie opportunities and winning score nearing the high-teens under par. That creates a good opportunity to look beyond pure recent form, and instead for those who thrive in easier scoring conditions. The players best equipped to score in a birdie fest this week, capitalizing on the driveable par-4s and reachable par-5s are Lanto Griffin, Maverick McNealy, Mark Hubbard, Danny Lee, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Davis Riley, Sungjae Im, Tyler Duncan, Troy Merritt, and Hideki Matsuyama.
It may sound like a given every single week on the PGA TOUR, but in an event that described to generate birdies and train wrecks, it’s going to be crucial to find the players who are in control of their games in terms of both Birdie or Better Gained and Bogey Avoidance. There are just 10 players who rank top-25 in both categories: Tony Finau, Hideki Matsuyama, Sungjae Im, Davis Riley, Lanto Griffin, JT Poston, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Adam Schenk, Adam Long, and Hank Lebioda.
The perfect player profile for this week should be above average in SG: OTT, SG: APP, Opportunities Gained, Bogey Avoidance, and Comp Course History. There are eight players who rank top-40 in each of those categories: Tony Finau, Hideki Matsuyama, Cam Davis, Doug Ghim, Martin Laird, Matthew NeSmith, Lucas Glover, and Brendan Steele.
When plugging in all 18 hole ranges with with respective weighting, the top-10 players best suited for this course’s layout are Matsuyama, Riley, Huh, Finau, Steele, Howell III, Gotterup, Bezuidenhout, Im, and Long.
Looking at the correlation charts this week, we have limited data from the three years of this event, but it is starting to tell a more consistent story. Par-3 Scoring and P4: 450-500 see a great decline in importance compared to TOUR average. Some outlier performances from Cameron Champ and Michael Thompson have driven SG: OTT down the board in favor of SG: P, however it’s still fair to say that trending OTT form entering this event is far more predictive than putting form.
It’s SG: APP and Par-4: 350-400 that make the biggest jump in importance at this event, which checks out considering the number of driveable par-4s and premium on generating birdie opportunities from these wider fairways.
Only 10 players in the field rank above average in each of the above 10 key stat categories: Tony Finau, Hideki Matsuyama, Sungjae Im, Adam Svensson, Mark Hubbard, Maverick McNealy, Davis Riley, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Nate Lashley, and Satoshi Kodaira.
In many ways, Chris Gotterup embodies the amalgamation of the 3M Open’s first three champions.
Like Matthew Wolff, Gotterup is playing with special status, fresh out of NCAA competition with only six PGA TOUR starts under his belt.
Like Michael Thompson, he’s already shown encouraging comp course form, contending at the John Deere Classic just two starts ago with T4 finish on a similar TPC layout which rewards aggressive ball strikers. Thompson’s predictive comp course history came in the form of a victory at the Honda Classic, which placed similar emphasis on control off the tee to avoid constant water hazards.
And if there’s one player whose game Gotterup’s most closely profiles to in the early stages of his career, it might just be Cameron Champ. Both rank top-5 in driving distance, bottom-100 in driving accuracy, and are below-average, highly volatile putters. Early on, it seems Gotterup may have higher upside with his irons than Champ, but either way it’s encouraging to see that if Champ can find success at TPC Twin Cities, Gotterup possesses the same tools to follow suit.
Gotterup was gaining momentum at a warp speed leading in to the Barbasol Championship in his last start, opening as a co-favorite to win. He was a fairly popular bet for those who did follow the Barbasol Championship, which was contested opposite the Scottish Open, but his early exit may have halted any steam behind him, and should prove to produce an approachable betting number when odds open on Monday. I’m happy to overlook a couple choppy rounds from the recent college graduate, as despite the Barbasol MC, he already ranks top-20 in this field in Opportunities Gained, SG: APP, SG: Ball Striking, Par-5 Scoring, and Driving Distance.
In its brief history, rookies have emerged from 3M Open odds. Matthew Wolff, Collin Morikawa, Sam Burns, and Mito Pereira have found themselves in contention. In 2022, Gotterup looks to be the next man up to fill that role.
With winning scores in the range of -15 to -21 over its first three years hosting this event, we should expect relatively benign scoring conditions, and winning mark in the high teens under par. I’m looking to hone in on the best ball-strikers in the field this week, who can consistently avoid hazards, while also setting themselves up to aggressively attack pins.
3M Open odds have produced a couple of unrewarded Sunday sweats for me over the last two years from an outright perspective. The formula for me has always been reliable players off the tee with plus-distance, elite ball striking, and proven results on comp courses with easy scoring conditions. There are plenty of viable options this week that fit the same mold, so I’m happy to go right back to the well. New this year, we’ll have the jet lag speculation for those on a short week back from The Open. I’m not likely to put much stock behind that narrative, but it will be interesting to see if we get any withdrawals from the big three of Tony Finau, Hideki Matsuyama, and Sungjae Im as a result.
With all the course-fit profiles in mind, I’m leaning early towards the below player pool. Naturally, I’m looking their way in the 2022 3M Open odds as well. I’ve broken the list down by projected pricing/odds tier for DraftKings.
In my model, I’m emphasizing Opportunities Gained and SG: Ball Striking (SG: OTT and SG: APP), followed by a more balanced mix of Prox 175+, Birdie or Better Gained (Easy Scoring Conditions), Par-5 Scoring, Comp Course History, Bogey Avoidance, and SG: P (Bent).
Tony Finau was a disaster overseas for three rounds last week before a Sunday top-30 backdoor push, but without much competition in 3M Open odds, he emerges in the top position of the model, even without any significant weight on prior event history. Finau has been rock solid form tee to green this season, ranking top-5 in SG: APP, SG: OTT, Bogey Avoidance, and Birdie or Better Gained. It’s no secret the putter continues to give him trouble and prevent him from stringing four rounds together, but if Cameron Champ can figure these greens out, then TPC Twin Cities will be a welcomed site for Tony. I won’t be playing him though, and if he decides to channel his inner Champ and miraculously learn to putt here for one week, then so be it.
After Finau, the rest of my model’s top 10 features Hideki Matsuyama, Cam Davis, Mark Hubbard, Lucas Glover, Sungjae Im, Brendan Steele, Davis Riley, Matthew NeSmith, and Austin Smotherman.
When odds open on Monday, I’ll be looking to target Sungjae Im, Davis Riley, and Chris Gotterup, but may extend to a wider card depending on where the odds fall on Monday. Check back in later this week for more updates, and best of luck navigating the 2022 3M Open odds!
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