US Open Preview

The 3rd major of the year is upon us this week, and with many major champions in the field the world is asking one question. Who is poised to win this years US Open?

Some obvious choices would be the two major champions this year, Scottie Scheffler and Justin Thomas who have both had outstanding seasons this year, being model’s of consistency. However some key stats might lead us in a different direction. 

According to numberfire.com the best stats to use when determining the winner for this year’s US Open are as follows: Strokes Gained Approach, Strokes Gained Putting, Strokes Gained Around the Green, and Bogey Avoidance. So based on these statistics who is most likely to win?

If you break down these categories and give them points based on where they finish on the PGA Tour in these statistics, we can take the top players based on betting odds and determine who is really the most likely to win.

The first thing we need to do is figure out which players we are looking at. Since Vegas typically know what they are talking about were going to take the top 40 golfers in betting odds out of Vegas

The first statistic is Strokes Gained Approach, the top players in this category out of the top 40 in Vegas odds are as follows along with their PGA Tour rank.

• Will Zalatoris: 1
• Cameron Smith: 3
• Sam Burns: 4
• Colin Morikawa: 5
• Justin Thomas: 6

Being able to hit greens on a consistent basis and put it close to the hole is an obviously valuable statistic to keep track of, no matter the tournament being played. But the fact that these players have been great week-in and week-out makes them far more valuable/reliable in a major. The worst in this statistical category out of the top 40 in odds are:

• Bryson DeChambeau: 201
• Patrick Reed: 175
• Sergio Garcia: 161
• Jason Day: 160
• Louis Oosthuizen: 144

That means despite the fact they are high caliber players anybody picking these men should beware that their price may outweigh their value in 2022.

Now if we break down the top 5 players I mentioned in the next category, Strokes Gained Putting.

• Zalatoris: 160
• Smith: 11
• Burns: 16
• Morikawa: 127
• Thomas: 40

Obviously, this changes things up drastically, Zalatoris and Morikawa have been struggling with the flat stick in 2022, meaning it's unlikely they will be able to win a major this year unless there is some major improvement in that area of their game.

As you can probably tell, there are 3 clear front-runners to win the US Open, Justin Thomas, Cam Smith and Sam Burns. In fact, accounting for all of these categories, Justin Thomas, Cam Smith, and Sam Burns finish 1,2, and 3 respectively.

Here is the full list.

So if you’re looking for some really great picks headed into the biggest tournament in the US to help you make some bank, by looking at the numbers there are some real dark horses here.