Fantasy Golf: Second Round DFS Picks For The Arnold Palmer Invitational

Rory McIlroy once again found himself top of the leaderboard after round one at the 2022 Arnold Palmer Invitational. It was the second year in a row that McIlroy has held the lead after the first round. He will be hoping for a better finish at Bay Hill this year and will go into Friday looking to improve upon his two-shot advantage after day one.

Billy Horschel, Beau Hossler, and J.J. Spaun are all just two shots adrift of Rory going into Friday, while a group of six others sits just a shot further back of that at four under par.

Several players look to be intriguing options for our fantasy golf lineups going into the second round at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, let’s take a look at a few players that you could look to build your Friday lineups around.

Please note that the purpose of this article is not to provide an exact lineup for a specific fantasy provider. Instead, the article will aim to highlight a few players that could be used in DFS fantasy golf lineups with the goal being to hopefully assist the reader in creating a unique lineup that could potentially win a GPP (Guaranteed Prize Pool) contest.

Friday fantasy golf options for round 2 of the 2022 Arnold Palmer Invitational

Will Zalatoris

Zalatoris was a trendy pick for many people making fantasy golf lineups this week and he did not disappoint on Thursday as he fired an opening-round 68. His opening round performance leaves him just three shots adrift of leader Rory McIlroy going into the second round at Bay Hill.

Willy Z has been on fire with his irons over the course of his last three starts and he continued that trend on Thursday at the Arnold Palmer as he gained 2.52 strokes on his approaches. The thing that has most plagued Zalatoris traditionally has been his putter, but on Thursday he had that cooperating also as he gained 1.28 strokes with the flat stick.

The 25-year-old gained over three strokes from tee to green during the first round and he has a solid recent history of excellent second-round performances. Will was 10th at this event in 2021 and looks to be poised for another terrific week.

Lanto Griffin

Things appear to be looking good for Lanto so far at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, so I’ll stick with the theme of rolling with players who were popular to begin the week. Griffin had a slow but steady start to his week at Bay Hill and this is reflected in the stats as he gained marginal strokes in every category on Thursday.

The 1.90 strokes he gained from tee to green is nice, but what really sticks out is his performance in the second round of events, both this season, and in two previous starts at the Arnold Palmer. Lanto leads the field in total strokes gained when looking at second-round performance this season, he also has gained an average of three strokes on Friday in his past two appearances here.

If there was ever one day to buy in on Griffin it would seem that Friday is that day!.

Lee Westwood

Westwood may have come into this week a bit under the radar even after finishing 2nd at the 2021 Arnold Palmer Invitational. His mediocre performance at the Honda Classic last week no doubt contributed to this.

There is a lot to like this week about Lee though and he may find himself near the top of the leaderboard once again at the end of the week. He has started his week by gaining over four strokes from tee to green, and 1.22 on approach. The only area that gave him trouble on Thursday was with the putter.

Westwood has gained strokes in 5 of his last 7 Friday rounds at Bay Hill. The short game did give him problems last week at PGA National and that undoubtedly contributed to his fall down the leaderboard over the weekend at the Honda. I’m cautiously optimistic that he can flip the putter this week, however, as he has gained strokes on the greens at the Arnold Palmer Invitational in 16 of his past 24 rounds.

Additional options to consider in your fantasy golf lineups: Viktor Hovland, Cameron Young, Adam Svennson