Paulie’s Picks: 2018 Tour Championship

This week, the Tour heads to Atlanta for the FedEx Cup finale at Eastlake. Eastlake is a very demanding golf course as it requires players to hit the fairways off the tee in order to have the best chance to control their iron shots into the green. If looking for a particular skill set this week, I would look toward elite drivers of the golf ball who are also solid with the irons. With a limited field of only 30 players, it makes it very interesting for DraftKings and One-and-Done this week.

DraftKings:

With only 30 players this week, you will need to differentiate your team by playing one or two low-owned players if you want a chance at having a unique team in a large field tournament on DraftKings. Here are two possible choices:

Francesco Molinari $8,200

Molinari is one of most accurate drivers and best iron players in the field. His skill set should suit this course very well. Molinari should be fairly low-owned this week as everyone will flock to similarly-priced players in Fleetwood and Dechambeau, who I expect to be highly-owned.

Paul Casey $6,800

Casey has a great track record at Eastlake, finishing in the top 5 in his last 4 starts. However, I think some people will be afraid to roster Casey this week after he withdrewWD for the final round at the BMW. Casey has struggled with back issues this year, but I think this WD might have been more precautionary than anything, especially with the bad weather that day.

One-and-Done

This is the last week of the 2017-18 season and your last chance to move up in the standings in your league. With limited options available to choose from, you should follow this process for determining your pick for this week:

• Determine which of the 30 players you are still able to use (most likely only a handful)
• Look at the people who are above you in the standings and see who they have left to choose from
• The best choice this week will be someone who has already been used by most teams ahead of you as this provides you the most upside to jump up in the standings. The difference in actual chance to win this week between most of the players in the field is very slim. So don’t be afraid to go a bit off the wall as the upside of the increased payout you get with a higher finish is well worth the minimal risk of dropping down in the standings.