2025 Open Championhsip Picks, Bets, Rankings, Course Preview

QUICK BETS

• Henely +6500

• Fox +8000 (With 5 Places)

• Straka +10000

*Hold off on making too many bets at The Open before the tee times are released

OPEN RESEARCH

Mayo takes a deep dive into tournament and player stats at Fantasy National making his early 2025 British Open Picks. He’s join by Niall Lyons to break down Royal Portrush from his experience at the course and which players should fit the mold, then by Tom Jacobs to talk deep sleepers from the DP World Tour.

WATCH: Open Picks & Research

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2025 Open Championship

• Field: 156 Players

• Top 70 & Ties Make The Cut

• First Tee: Thursday, July 17

• Defending Champion: Xander Schauffele

KEY STATS

• Strokes Gained: Approach

• Strokes Gained: Around the Green

• Par 4s Gained

• Par 3s Gained 175-200 Yards

Mayo’s Key Stats powered by FantasyNational.com

The greens at Portrush, like most Open venues are going to be slow. Here’s a list of the best per round putters on slow greens over the past two years. Note the amount of rounds for each player, turns out, there simply aren't a lot of rounds on the PGA TOUR played on slow greens.

COURSE

• Course: Royal Portrush

• Yards: 7,381

• Par: 71

• Greens: Fescue

• Green Size: 5,400 square feet

• Bunkers: 35

• Holes with Water Hazards: Zero

  • Fewest bunkers in Open rota.

  • The greens are known for their undulations and slopes, making putting challenging.

  • Dangerous Misses: Long rough, steep runoffs, and gorse punish errant shots—especially with wind swirling off the coast.

  • Risk-Reward: The drivable 5th and reachable 7th contrast with long, grind-it-out stretches like holes 14 through 18.

Par 3's (4): Average distance - 199 yards

-Three is a fine score … the three holes on this course with a par rate north of 70% were all Par 3’s (Holes 3-6-13)

-Shane Lowry didn’t make a Front-9 bogey until Sunday, a run that included three Par 3 birdies on that side of the course

Par 4's (11): Average distance - 439 yards

-The three toughest holes on the course all come on the Back-9 and two of them are Par 4’s (Holes 11 and 14)

-All eight of Shane Lowry’s bogey’s during the 2019 win here came on Par 4’s (#14 was the only hole he bogey’d multiple times)

Par 5's (3): Average distance - 564 yards

-The three easiest holes on the course, all of which hold an eagle rate over 1.5%. The two shorter Par 5’s (Holes 2 and 12) have an under-par rate that is more than 4x the over-par rate

-Shane Lowry birdied exactly one Par 5 in all four rounds

PAST WINNERS

• 2024: Xander Schauffele at Royal Troon (-9, +1200 as the second favorite)

• 2023: Brian Harman at Royal Liverpool (-13, +12500)

• 2022: Cam Smith at St. Andrews (-20, +2000, tied for the fifth shortest odds)

• 2021: Collin Morikawa at Royal St. George’s (-15, +3000

• 2019: Shane Lowry HERE (-15, +3000, tied for the eighth shortest odds)

Most SG: TOTAL gained per round at The Open since 2021:

SCOTTISH OPEN PERFORMANCE

Since the Scottish Open became a co-sanctioned event between the PGA TOUR and DP World Tour, not only have all all three Champion golfers of the year played at the Renaissance Club but all have finished pretty well. Not great, but between 10th-20th:

• 2024: Xander Schauffele; T15 in Scotland

• 2023: Brian Harman; T12 in Scotland

• 2022: Cam Smith; T10 in Scotland

Does this mean one of these guys are going to win?

Probably not, but it’s fun to look at. Is this why Hovland decided to miss that 1.5-foot putt on 17 Sunday in Scotland? I’d like to think, yes.

2019 PORTRUSH TOP 5 PROFILE

1. Shane Lowry

• Top-10 in three of his four lead-in events (gained 3+ strokes putting in all four)

• Gained 14.2 strokes off the tee, more than double any other week in his career( second best: +6.3 at the 2021 PGA Championship)

• Missed The Open cut in 2018

2. Tommy Fleetwood

• 13th at Traveler’s in his lead-in event (14-month made cut streak)

• Gained strokes on APP in 8 of 10 events for the year prior to this showing

• Finished 12th at The Open in 2018

3. Tony Finau

• 23rd at the 3M Open, his lead-in event (three straight MC prior)

• Was fighting the putter prior (four lead-in events: –6.1 strokes putting in 10 rounds)

• Finished 9th at The Open in 2018

4. Lee Westwood

• Posted the fourth best week OTT of his career (his best in over a decade from when the event occurred)

• 61st at The Open in 2018

4. Brooks Koepka

• Six lead-in events: three top-5’s and three MC’s (two events closest to The Open were a 4th at the US Open and a 5th at Travelers)

• Gained 10.2 strokes OTT (the best week of his career and it’s not close … +7.8 at the 2019 Masters is his next best)

• 39th at The Open in 2018

Current big names who missed the cut in 2019

• Hideki Matsuyama (Friday 74)

• Rory McIlroy (Thursday 79, missed the cut by 1 after a Friday 65, tied for the second best round of the week)

• Jason Day (Friday 74, missed the cut by 1)

• Keegan Bradley (Thursday 73, missed the cut by 1)

• Bryson DeChambeau (74-73)

• Sungjae Im (Friday 80)

After looking at some of the names who missed the cut, this isn’t going to be 1v1 (Sungjae!), but the leaderboard at Portrush in 2019 is basically an all-star team from PGA National. Now, since this is only the second Open at Portrush in 50 years those results may be an outlier.

It does make sense in a lot of ways, though. Unlike most Open Rota courses, Portrush features more elevated green complexes forcing the need to get the ball up in the air from green side and on approach rather than using the ground to run the ball up. Which means more spin control required with chipping rather than putting and bump-and-run play. These are all similar requirements to PGA National. Along with the potential for wind effects.

Anyways, here are the best players (by average round) at PGA National over their past 12 rounds at the course.

Granted, a large portion of the best players simply do not play at PGA National.

Of note: Bryson, Xander, Hovland, Day, Detry, Cam Smith, and Rasmus Hojgaard only have two rounds of experience at the course.

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EARLY WEATHER

Expect a lot of changes between now and Thursday am. So bookmark the page and see if a weather soft spot opens up.

As a reminder, every players goes off from the first tee at The Open, so a good weather window can affect a smaller portion of the tee times. This is what happened in 2016 when Phil, Stenson, and the group of cronies in the surrounding groups all got to play a completely different course. That, of course, is an extreme outlier; however it’s worth burning some extra dollars or lineups to discover if it will happen again since the upside is so enormous.

WINDTOWER: Portrush (Tide)

Wind Strategy: Royal Portrush

Prevailing Wind: Northwest → plays across, into, or downwind depending on the hole's routing. Generally, this means wind with the players for the first five holes then into their faces for almost the remainder.

Wind Notes

• Winds can switch rapidly near the coast — crosswinds often swirl unpredictably around dunes

• Exposed holes (5, 7, 16) are most impacted

• Calm days are rare; be ready for clubbing up/down 2+ clubs

PICKS

Russell Henley +6500 — Henley enters The Open with three consecutive Top 10s, all in Majors or signature events, picked up a win at a longer, wind infused course earlier this season at Bay Hill, and is basically Mr. PGA National with three Top 10s there the past four years and a victory back in 2014. His Open history hasn’t been good, but a spike to T5 a year ago shows now, later in career, he’s capable for storming the leaderboard overseas.

Ryan Fox +8000 (5 Places) — Two wins over the past few months, a victory at the Irish in his career, and a weather of success on links venues, Fox’s number is going to shrink as the week goes on as more and more people bet him. His best result at an Open was here in 2019 (T16) and is 20th in the field over the past two years in SG: PUTT on slow greens.

Sepp Straka +10000 — Besides Scheffler, no player is averaging more SG:APP per round this season than Straka. Likely why he’s already won twice. He’s posted a T2 at an Open previously and has cleaned up at PGA National over the past four years (1st/T5/MC/T11). It’s somewhat worrisome his around the green play has been quite poor with the demand in which may be placed on it at Portrush, but he’ll need to simply hit GIRs at an elite level to mitigate that damage. Which, as we’ve seen in 2025, he’s more than capable of doing. He’s currently still +7500 in most places. Again, that number will drop over the week.