The PGA Tour rolls into Dublin, Ohio this week for the time honoured Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club, commonly known as Jacks Place.
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Muirfield Village GC was designed by Jack Nicklaus and opened in 1974. It is a Par 72, 7265 yard course with 73 sand bunkers and 13 water hazards. Last year it ranked 19th most difficult from 51 courses played on the tour. The greens are Bentgrass. The Memorial Tournament was established in 1976 and has seen many great winners over those years.
Tiger Woods has won here on five occasions which includes three in a row from 1999-2001. His win in 2001 was by a whopping 7 strokes. Kenny Perry is next with 3 Victories in 1991, 2003 and 2008. Jack himself has been successful here on two occasions. His first win was in 1977 then again in 1984. His 1977 win gave him a winners cheque of US$45,000. This year the winner takes home US$1,116,000 from a prize pool of US$6,200,000. Other two time winners have been Hale Irwin, Tom Watson and Greg Norman.
This years field is once again choc full of World Class players. The Top 5 in betting are- 15/2 Rory McIlroy, 11/1 Adam Scott, 16/1 Justin Rose, 16/1 Matt Kuchar and 22/1 Dustin Johnson.
McIlroy and Scott are both coming off wins last week while Kuchar is the defending champion. It is sure to be great viewing!
A lot of the crowd is sure to be found on the 18th hole which has room for 20,000 spectators around the green. It is the most difficult hole on the course and has 4 bunkers surrounding it. Two to the front of the green and two to the rear so you dont want to be missing the green on your second shot. So what does it take to win here? Looking at the past winners of the tournament they have all had one thing in common. Experience.
The Top players all play well here. You don’t find first timers fairing to well. Look at the last 7 winners- Matt Kuchar, Tiger Woods, Steve Stricker, Justin Rose, Tiger Woods, Kenny Perry and KJ Choi. All great players and all with experience on the big stage. These guys are all great ball strikers as well.
Keeping the ball in play is also very important. Driving accuracy will take you a long way in this tournament. Past winners have all ranked highly in driving accuracy and ball striking. Past winners have also ranked highly in Greens in regulation stats, so keep this in mind when looking for the winner.
So now we come to our selections. There are several players who are coming into this tournament with good form and have also got good course form. None more so than our first selection.
Justin Rose $17 at Sportsbet.com.au
While Rory McIlroy and Adam Scott both hit their straps last week with wins is a tough ask to go back to back after all the mental preparation, celebration and mental exhaustion. One player who comes into this week a little under the radar is the World Number 9, Justin Rose.
From 10 starts in 2014 he has achieved 4 Top 10’s. These all came one after another. T14 The Masters, T8th Zurich Classic of New Orleans, 5th Wells Fargo Championship and T4th The Players Championship. He then played in the BMW PGA Championship last week on the European Tour and finished 25th. This week he is back on US soil and ready to continue the great run of form.
This will be Justin’s tenth start at The Memorial Tournament where he was the Champion in 2010. Add to that another four Top 10’s and you get the feeling he likes the course. His last two starts here were both 8th place finishes.
Rose represents a golfer in great current form who also has fond memories of a course that suits his game. This makes him a stand out selection this week.
Charl Schwartzel $51 at Sportsbet.com.au
This is an interesting selection this week. I love a golfer who has an upwards curve in form and that is exactly what Charl has when you look at his past results at Muirfield.
His six starts here have been 62nd, 62nd, 27th, 22nd, 19th and 8th. Now that is an upward curve! For that reason alone he is a must have this week. Then you can add his form in 2014. From 12 starts he has out together 7 Top 20 finishes. That is pretty consistent golf in anyone’s book.
Schwartzel’s price is inflated due to his last start which saw a missed cut at the BMW PGA Championship. This was his first start on the European Tour in 15 weeks after basing himself on the PGA Tour for this season. Prior to this missed cut he was T11th at the Byron Nelson Championship
When it comes to ball striking Charl is one of the best in the business when he is in form. He is right on the cusp of producing a big finish soon and this week could be that time. At 50/1 he makes for a great long price selection.
Good Luck and Good Punting.