Dark Horses for Valero Texas Open: Akshay breakthrough?

Before I jump into this week, I want to start off with a recap from the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play. The website was down so I posted it on my Twitter. My dark horses were Brian Harman, Shane Lowry, and Jason Kokrak. Lowry and Kokrak did not make it out of the first round, but Brian Harman did find his way to the quarterfinals though! This was big because he made it through guys like Cantlay, Matsuyama, and Bubba. He than lost to Matt Kuchar in the quarterfinals. Overall was not a great week, but to get one as far as Brian Harman, I will take it.

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This week the PGA Tour is heading to TPC San Antonio in San Antonio, Texas for the Valero Texas Open. This is an average field, with not a ton of the top players in the world. Dustin Johnson withdrew, but we still have Tony Finau, Jordan Spieth, Scottie Scheffler, and Hideki Matsuyama. In 2019, we had Corey Conners who came out on top, Charley Hoffman who came in second, and Si Woo Kim who came in fourth. These are guys who towards the top of the board this year, but were far from it in 2019. These are the so called “dark horses” that you want to look for to come out on top in DraftKings tournaments.

This week I will be providing three dark horses, meaning players that are longshots, but could play really well for their salary. These dark horses are players that are $7,500 and below. Also I only use DraftKings, so these prices will be for their website, but the players can be used on FanDuel as well.

Dark Horse Number 1

Sam Ryder: Ryder is one of my dark horses because he has been playing incredible the past two events. He had a T2 (Corales) and a T8 (Honda) in the past two events. Both events consist of a pretty average field, so I expect another solid week from Sam Ryder. He had a T42 here at the Valero in 2019. From what I see he was average on Thursday, but went low with a 66 on Friday, and than stagnant over the weekend which is not to exciting. He is in form though which makes me excited to plug him in a few lineups this week where I am struggling to find good value. The problem is the normal good value is towards the top of the board, leaving scrubs at the bottom.

The stats I like for the course:

SG Ball Striking: 31st

Driving Distance: 100th

Par 5s Scoring Average: 99th

Dark Horse Number 2

Chase Seiffert: Seiffert is another one of my dark horses because he as well has been on a hot streak. Surrounded by scrubs in the low 7k range, he has a T18 (Corales), T3 (Honda), and T15 (Puerto Rico) which are very average to below average fields. This is going to be another average field week, so I can see him climbing the board over the four days of the event. He did not play here in 2019, so I cannot results for him here. His stats do not really line up here, so this is strictly off of form.

The stats I like for the course:

SG Ball Striking: 109th

Driving Distance: 157th

Par 5s Scoring Average: 132nd

Next. WGC-Match Play: Winners and Losers from Austin. dark

Dark Horse Number 3

Akshay Bhatia: Akshay is going to be my final dark horse and a huge punt! This is more of a personal play because we do not have a whole ton of stats to go off of. He is going to probably be a future top player on the tour and he is already showing some flashes of that. This is a FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) play for me because he is going to break out and win eventually. Why not here? He had a T30 at Pebble, but his best result on tour that I can see on DraftKings is the Safeway Open back in September. I have been keeping up with him on social media and his game just keeps looking like it gets better and better. Like I keep saying, this field has scrubs, which only makes Akshay have a better chance in this low 6K range to shine.

The stats I like for the course:

SG Ball Striking: N/A

Driving Distance: N/A

Par 5s Scoring Average N/A

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Dark Horses for the Valero Texas Open

By Richard McCusker | Mar 31, 2021

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