2025 Arnold Palmer Picks, Bets, Course Preview + LIV/TGL/PRO

Mar 04, 2025

Field: 72 Players
Cut: Top 50 and Ties
Lineup Lock: Thursday, March 6
Defending Champ: Scottie Scheffler

Xander Schauffele returns to action for the first time since a rib injury sidelined him following the opening event of the year at Kapalua.

Rafael Campos, Mac Hughes, Jackson Koivun, Min WOOOOOO Lee, and Justin Rose are in on sponsors exemptions.

Quick Bets

API

McNealy 55
Pendrith 75
Akshay 85

PRO

Hoey 45
Kohles 50
Gotterup 66
Vilips 80
Hastings 125

LIV HK

Burmester 28
Herbert 30
Mickelson 500 (With 5 Places)

Key Stats

Strokes Gained: Approach
Proximity 200+ Yards
Opportunities Gained
Par 3s Gained 200-225 Yards

Mayo’s Key Stats powered by FantasyNational.com

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Course

Bay Hill
Yardage: 7,466
Par: 72
Greens: Bermuda
Holes With Water: 9
Sand Bunkers: 84
Average Green Size: 7,500 sq. ft.

Par 3's (4): Average distance - 217 yards

- Three of these hold a bogey-or-worse rate of 23% or higher (3.3% double-or-worse rate at #17 can swing a round in a hurry)

- Scheffler ended the tournament with seven straight pars on the Par 3's

Par 4's (10): Average distance - 437 yards

- The three toughest holes on the course are Par 4's and two come in the final four holes (when playing things in order)

- Scheffler bogey'd the Par 3 2nd on Thursday ... five of his six bogeys for the rest of the week came on Par 4's (#11 got him on Friday and Saturday)

Par 5's (4): Average distance - 558 yards

- The four easiest holes on the course, including a must get #16 that has a 51.7% birdie rate (6.5% bogey)

- Scheffler was at least -2 in every round on the Par 5's a season ago

DFS Streak

If you're going back-to-front, you have to face four of the six toughest holes in succession (Holes 17-18-1-2). Good luck with that -- none have even a 12% under par rate.

Playing this course in order isn't easy, but it's certainly easier. Hole 10 is the fifth easiest on property and that's enough to make it the way to go if you're chasing Showdown points. Holes 8-9-11 all play more difficult than course average (Hole 8 being the toughest of the bunch), but do have a birdie rate north of 10.5%. I don't love your chances at getting many streaks bridging either nine, but when they occur, they are very likely to come from those playing front-to-back.

Past Winners

2024: Scottie Scheffler -15
2023: Kurt Kitayama -9
2022: Scottie Scheffler -5
2021: Bryson DeChambeau -11
2020: Tyrrell Hatton -4
2019: Francesco Molinari -12
2018: Rory McIlroy -18

2024: Scottie Scheffler (+650)

- Scheffler was the fifth best putter for the week -- all five players on that list cashed a T-8 paycheck or better.

- Byeong Hun An was the only top-10 finisher to lose ground on the field on the Par 5's

2023: Kurt Kitayama (+20000)

- In order, the top-3 putters for the week finished T-2, 1, and T-8 (all picked up over 5 strokes with the flat stick)

- Ryan Fox was the only top-23 finisher to loss ground on the field off the tee (10 of those players lost ARG)

2022: Scottie Scheffler (+2000)

- The top-10 finishers all gained Good Drives -- but only three of them gained distance AND fairways. Pick one route and stick with it!

- 10 of the top-12 finishers gained strokes putting from 20-25 feet for the week

2021: Bryson DeChambeau (+1200)

- Bryson and Rory were 1-2 in distance, 39 yards clear of anyone else (Rory finished T-10 for the week) ... Corey Conners, Andrew Putnam, and Christiaan Bezuidenhout all finished 7th or better on the final leaderboard while losing over 30 yards of distance.

- 8 of the 9 players to gain over 4 strokes on approach cashed at least a share of a top-10 paycheck for the week.

2020: Tyrell Hatton (+5000)

-He progressively got worse (68-69-73-74), but so did the conditions. Hatton did enough down the stretch on Sunday by closing with seven consecutive pars

- The top three in SG: APP for the week all finished inside the top-10 (Collin Morikawa and Joel Dahmen joined Hatton on that list, with the two of them bleeding over 1.5 strokes with the flat stick)

- The top six in ProxFG:200+ all finished with a share of 18th or better (Hatton didn't excel here, but he and Sungjae Im thrived in the 175-200 bucket, allowing them to cashe top 5's without much success with the real deep irons)

-Note: Matt Every went full Keegan (65 in Round 1 with an 83 in Round 2). Of note, 11 of the top-12 finishers gained on proximity in that 100-125 yard bucket (nine of them lost in either the 175-200 or 200+ range)

2019: Francesco Molinari (+2500)

- Molinari fired the round of the tournament on Sunday (64, nine shots better than his Saturday and seven better than Fitzpatrick)

- Each of the top nine finishers gained strokes putting from either 20-25 feet or 25+ (Molinari was a plus in both buckets)

13 of the top 14 finishers gained Good Drives on the field (four of them lost in distance and four of them lost fairways)

Six of the top-7 for the week in SG:OTT cashed top-10 paychecks when all was said and done.

2018: Rory McIlroy (+1600)

- His 64 on Sunday matched the best of the tournament and was four better than Bryson. Rory was the only golfer in the field that shot 70 or better in all four rounds

- Rory and Bryson were the top two at the end of the week and they were the two best in Prox:200+

-McIlroy road a red-hot putter (+10 strokes on the field), and four of the top-5 putters for the week finished T7 or better on the final leaderboard.

FIRST ROUND LEADER HISTORY

2024

66 - Shane Lowry (his only round in the 60's)
67 - Hideki Matsuyama ( his only round in the 60's) and Justin Lower (shot a 76 on Friday and a 78 on Sunday)

2023

65 - Jon Rahm (shot 76 in each of the next two rounds)
67 - Kurt Kitayama (nine shots better in the first two rounds than the last two), Cam Young (his only round better than 71), and Chris Kirk ( his only round better than 73)

2022

65 - Rory McIlroy (matching 76's on the weekend)
67 - Billy Horschel (his best round of the week by four strokes), Beau Hossler (went 74-75-75 the rest of the week), and J.J. Spaun (went 75-75-79 the rest of the week)

2021

66 - Rory McIlory ( progressively got worse: 71-72-76) and Correy Conners (progressively got worse: 69-71-74)
67 - Bryson DeChambeau (71 or better in all four rounds, this was his best of the event)

SINGLE HOLE PROPS (HOLE 16)

This may only be available in play at the begining of each day however if the weather isn’t a disaster, TARGET lower birdies or better on 16 on Underdog. Maybe even Eagles made for players if you wanna get frisky. Plus, there’s a bunch of best ball drafts available in the lobby now too!

Use code “MAYO” at underdog for a FREE PICK and deposit bonus up to $1000

PME LIVE SHOW

June 7. Rec Room. Toronto. Save the date. Tickets on sale soon

Notes

This is your yearly reminder to consult the weather report before submitting lineups or making any wagers. A clear wave stack due to wind may emerge and you’ll want to take advantage of that. If the gusts are up, that will dramatically change the type of player you may want to target this week. The wind is up at this course as a default and it may not be too big of a deal.

Then there was 2020. Weekend wind made the course a scoring death trap for the field. Matthew Fitzpatrick (69 in Round 4) was the only player to crack 70 on the weekend. Tyrrell Hatton was the first player since Geoff Ogilvy at the 2006 U.S. Open to fire two rounds over par on a weekend and still win.

Three years ago, Scottie Scheffler charged from the pack Saturday when the leaders started to get dealt treacherous conditions. Rory McIlroy and Francesco Molinari both staged at least six-stroke Sunday comebacks in 2018 and 2019, so no one is ever dead at Bay Hill. This can provide an excellent live betting opportunity if you have the guts to believe in a massive comeback from someone not necessarily showing the form in the moment.

Water ripples in the eye line of almost every shot and sand is ubiquitous (84 bunkers), not to mention that the rough tends to be longer than the opening in Deer Hunter. That wedding scene makes The Neverending Story feel like a pulp novella.

Bay Hill actually plays longer than its 7,466 yards. With the prevalent water and series of doglegs, the holes have more distance to carry than they are actually measured on the scorecard. More so when you consider the average drive is over five yards shorter than the average PGA TOUR event (277 yards to 283 yards). While there are only nine officially listed water hazards, the wetness directly affects those nine holes in an impactful way. Fortunately, the greenside bunkers at Bay Hill are some of the easiest on the PGA TOUR annually, so bailing out to the non-water side of the greens is the preferred option on the longer approaches.

Players are forced to lay up off the tee to keep dry or set themselves up for a clean look at the green, the reason driving accuracy at Bay Hill (64%) is slightly higher than PGA TOUR average (62%). Do that, or risk paying the price — like on the Par 5 sixth hole. You can take the water on to save some distance (RIP Bryson DeChambeau in this event) and try to get on the green in two, or you can end up carding an 18 like John Daly in 1998. Since 1983, No. 6 has produced 23 scores in the double-digits. That’s the most on PGA TOUR by a large margin.

Second lowest made putt percentage between 10-15 feet (Harbour Town No. 1). Likely why so many statistically poor putters have spike gains at Bay Hill.

With the wind playing a factor, there has been an inordinate amount of international players who’ve succeeded over the years at Bay Hill. I theorized it would be lower in 2024, now that the API is a signature event featuring all the best PGA players, and that ended up being the case. Lowry (3rd), Grillo (T8), and Ben An (T8) were the only international players inside the Top 10. Still, the ability to navigate the wind and scramble from all over have proven to be valuable skills which are simply more practiced on DP World Tour courses.

Strokes Gained: Approach has been over two times as influential on the Top 5 finishers as SG: Off The Tee, and three times more impactful than SG: Around The Green. The gap between each of the SG stats shrinks if expanded to the Top 20 finishers. Looking at winners only, SG: APP is 2.7 times more impactful than SG: OTT and 4.2 times against SG: ATG. Yes, SG: APP is always the most important stat to look at, however it tends to be more pronounced this week with so many approaches coming from beyond 200 yards. Historically, around 30% of approaches will come from that distance, one of the largest distributions of approach shots from 200+ yards of any course on the PGA TOUR.

Much of that has to do with the Par 3s, as they average over 215 yards in length. Nico Echavarria, Billy Horschel, Shane Lowry, Bern Griffin, and Ludvig Aberg are the top players on holes from this length over the past 36 rounds.

The greens at Bay Hill have annually played extremely quick in comparison to most courses. The players with the most Strokes Gained: Putting per round on fast + LIGHTNING greens per round over their past 36 rounds are: Sahith Theegala, Wyndham Clark, Ben Griffin, Brian Campbell, and Matt Fitzpatrick.

Isolating those fast and lightning greens to just Bermuda putting surfaces: Max Greyserman jumps to the top but only has five qualified rounds to his credit.

Marc Leishman and Jason Day have won both at Bay Hill and Torrey Pines in the past decade. Other Farmers champs Harris English, Justin Rose, Luke List and Max Homa have multiple Top 10 results at Bay Hill as well. Tiger Woods historically dominates both courses. That’s everywhere but Riviera, though.

Stats from 2023 (Only ones I could find in this format)

PICKS

Mav McNealy, Akshay Bhatia & Taylor Pendrith — Clearly I haven’t committed to anything at the top of the board so I took a few names with single skill sets at long odds who I can see getting into the mix. Until the weather situation becomes clearer, I’ll likely hold off from anything else.

Early Weather

WIND TOWER: Orlando Executive Airport

2025 Puerto Rico Open

Course: Grand Reserve Golf Club (Coco Beach)
Yardage: 7,506
Par: 72
Greens: Paspalum
12 Holes with Water in Play
63 Sand Traps

Winners

2024: Brice Garnett -19 (Playoff over Erik Barnes)
2023: Nico Echavarria -21 (By 2 over Akshay Bhatia)
2022: Ryan Brehm -20 (By 6 over Max McGreevy)
2021: Branden Grace -19 (1 over Jhonny Vegas)
2020: Viktor Hovland -20 (By 1 over Josh Teater)

NOTES

Brice Garnett, Vincent Whaley, Ben Kohles, Henrik Norlander, and Martin Laird, have not finished worse than T20 any of the past four years.

Cut Line had been EVEN PAR for 3 years until 2024 when it was -3.

Hayden Springer, ADDC, and Norman Xiong all finished Top 10 in their first appearance in 2024 while Chad Ramey (2022) and Matthew NeSmith (2020) have notched Top 10s in their only historic starts.