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Fantasy Golf Podcast: Can Jason Day salvage his season at the BMW Championship?
Keyur Khamar
For the third time, Conway Farms will host the third leg of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. And judging by the first two BMW Championships played there we have a great understanding of what type of golfer fares well on the Lake Forest, Ill., course. Zach Johnson won the tournament in 2013 and Jason Day in 2015. OK, so those guys couldn’t have more different playing styles. Never mind.
But never fear, fantasy faithful. As always, we’ve done the research for you. And to give our BMW picks, discuss Justin Thomas’ historic campaign and talk about the opening weekend of the NFL season, Joel Beall joined me for our weekly chat. Please have a listen:
And if you're more old school and would rather just read my normal weekly fantasy golf picks, here's my fab foursome at Conway Farms:
Jason Day: The Aussie enters No. 28 in FedEx Cup points so he’ll be grinding to the end to get into the top 30 and earn a spot in next week’s Tour Championship. It’s been a lost season for Day, but he’s finally showing some consistency by finishing T-27 or better in his past five starts, including top 10s at the PGA and the Northern Trust. Then this happened. . .
We'll have to see what effect this has on Day's performance, but for now, I'm banking on it not making much of a difference.
Daniel Berger. The runner-up here in 2015 (By 6 shots. Day was really rolling then.) isn’t off to a great start to the playoffs, but another strong week at Conway Farms will put him in good form heading into the Presidents Cup in a couple weeks. Speaking of that event, a couple of his teammates, Justin Thomas and Jordan Spieth, both finished T-13 here in 2015. I’m banking on the two PGA Tour Player of the Year candidates to better that this time, but we’re looking elsewhere in our top four for better value. Speaking of. . .
Patrick Cantlay: This is Cantlay’s first time playing in this event, but he’s already handled himself nicely in his playoff debut with a T-10 at the Northern Trust and a T-13 at the Dell Technologies Championship. It’s been a remarkable season for Cantlay, who after returning after a 27-month layoff due to a back injury made the cut in all 11 events he played in, including close calls at the Valspar and blank. He doesn’t have enough rounds to qualify among stat leaders, but he would rank 6th in Strokes gained/off-the-tee and seventh in strokes gained overall, in front of Rory McIlroy and just behind Paul Casey and Justin Thomas. At No. 41 in the FedEx Cup standings, Cantlay needs a big week to advance. But considering he seems to perform well every time he tees it up, I’m confident he gets it done.
Paul Casey: Remember when Steve Stricker earned the nickname “Mr. September” for his FedEx Cup Playoff prowess? Well, Casey has taken that title now with five consecutive top 5s in postseason events dating back to last year’s Deutsche Bank Championship. Incredibly, Casey is still stuck on one career PGA Tour title, but when it comes to making playoff pushes -- that don’t involve actually winning -- no one is better.
Just missed: Justin Thomas and Dustin Johnson.
And for those of you playing other fantasy golf formats:
Yahoo! lineup: Jason Day, Paul Casey, Justin Thomas, Daniel Berger (Starters); Dustin Johnson, Kevin Na, Kevin Kisner, Patrick Cantlay (Bench).
Knockout/One-and-done pick: Jason Day.
And here's the podcast link again, if you want to hear Joel and I jabber: