2025 RBC Heritage Picks, Bets, Course Preview

RBC HERITAGE

• Field: 72 Players

• NO CUT

• First Tee Time: Thursday, April 17

• Defending Champion: Scottie Scheffler

Rory McIlroy & Hideki Matsuyama are not playing at Harbour Town this week. Matt Kuchar received the final sponsor exemption into the field.

EARLY BETS

• Robert MacIntyre +5000

• Aaron Rai +7500

• Lucas Glover +10000 (8 Places)

• Ryo Hisatsune +17500 (8 Places)

LAST WEEK FOR PME CANADIAN OPEN EXPERIENCE TRIP GIVEAWAY

I’ve partnered with Coolbet and they’ve set up an all expenses paid trip to Toronto this summer: Flights, Hotel, 2 Jays Tickets, 2 Days at the Canadian Open, PME Live Experience. This only available for people who can actually use Coolbet, which are Canadians outside of Ontario.

This is big initiative for me and them and your support on this is massive for me and future giveaways and live show. So, make an account and OPT-IN to the PME Canadian Open Experience and try to win. For every $10 you bet on Valero, Masters & Heritage, you’ll get a ballot into the draw.

ENTER THE PME CANADIAN OPEN GIVEAWAY HERE

KEY STATS

• Strokes Gained: Approach

• Good Drives Gained

• Strokes Gained Putting

Mayo’s Key Stats powered by FantasyNational.com

HOT LINKS

RBC Heritage Picks & Bets, One & Done + Corales Puntacana Championship

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2025 RBC Heritage Picks, Research, Trends, Sleepers, Course Preview

COURSE

• Harbour Town GL

• Par: 71

• Yardage: 7,213

• Greens: Poa trivialis overseed

• Average Green Size: 3,700 sq. ft.

• Number of Sand Bunkers: 54

• Number of Holes Water is in Play: 18

• Changes to the course since last year include converting No. 2 and No. 6 fairway bunkers back to waste areas.

• Rough height was 1.25” last year.

• A pro tee was added on No. 7 before the 2023 tournament.

• Ahead of the 2022 event new tees were added on No. 2, 5 and 17 and a palm tree was added to No. 10 greenside bunker.

• A renovation will start in May, including bunkers, laser leveling tees, replacing bulkheads.

Par 3's (4): Average distance - 202 yards

- Three of the seven most difficult holes are Par 3's (all four have an over-par rate north of 17%)

- Scheffler had a three birdies on the front 9 Par 3's through three rounds

Par 4's (11): Average distance - 428 yards

- Three of the four most oft-par'd holes are Par 4's in the first 10 holes (Holes 1-6-10 all have a par rate over 69%)

- Played the Par 4's on the front 9 even for the week (-5 on the back 9 Par 4's)

Par 5's (3): Average distance - 569yards

- Three of the four easiest holes on property, including #2 which sees the majority of players go under par (50.3% birdie rate on top of a 2.6% eagle rate)

- Played the Par 5's at -3 on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday

DFS Streak

Holes 8, 11, and 18 are tough Par 4's that rank among the six toughest holes on the course (all holding a sub-13% birdie rate), making a streak bridging either nine a tough sell. If I absolutely had to pick, I'd go back-to-front -- holes 16-17-1-2 are all gettable, making #18 the only crazy obstacle while those going in the other direction have two trouble holes.

PME LIVE JUNE 7TH

Join Mayo, Cust, Geoff, Cam, Garion, Pizzola, and Friends at The Rec Room in Toronto on June 7th for a LIVE episode of CUST CORNER!!!!! Stay around after the show for a meet and greet with everyone. We may try and book somewhere else to go have drinks with everyone later that night too if we can find a willing venue.

BUY TICKETS FOR PME LIVE ON JUNE 7Th HERE

For anyone coming from out of town, the venue is next to Rogers Centre in downtown Toronto if you’re looking for hotels. If you’re lloking to make a trip out if it, the Jays play the Phillies Thursday, and the Canadian Open is happening about 90 mins from Downtown Thursday-Sunday. There is likely a shuttle leaving from close to the venue every day of the tournament.

Thanks to everyone for the support over the years and we all hope to see you this summer!

PAST WINNERS

• 2024: Scottie Scheffler -19

• 2023: Matt Fitzpatrick -17

• 2022: Jordan Spieth -13

• 2021: Stewart Cink -19

• 2020: Webb Simpson -22

• 2019: CT Pan -12

• 2018: Satoshi Kodaira -12

• 2017: Wes Bryan -13

• 2016: Branden Grace -9

PAST WINNER NOTES

2024: Scottie Scheffler (+500)

- Of the top-10 finishers, three were top-5 in SG:ARG (Cantlay, Poston, and Morikawa)

- Seven of the top-8 finishers all gained strokes putting from 15-20 feet

2023: Matt Fitzpatrick (+3000)

- Finishing positions (in order) for the top SG:APP golfers for the week: 15-4-2-11-31-5-1

- Nine of the top-10 and 13 of the top-15 players for the week finished at least +1.5 strokes on Par 3's

2022: Jordan Spieth (+5000)

- Spieth was top-10 for the week OTT, APP, and ARG ... allowing him to overcome bleeding 2.5 strokes with the flat stick (27th worst in the field for the week)

- Five of the top-9 finishers for the week lost fairways to the field (Harold Varner II finished T-3 for the week and was tied for the third least accurate off the tee, losing 8.5 fairways)

2021: Stewart Cink (+10000)

- Three of the top 6 putters for the week cashed top-5 paychecks

- 11 of the top-17 finishers lost ground on Prox:200+

FIRST ROUND

2024 ROUND 1

• 63 - JT Poston (his best round of the week by five strokes)

• 65 - Collin Morikawa (progressively got worse: 65-66-68-72), Seamus Power (up-and-down week: 65-70-66-72)

2023 ROUND 1

• 63 - Aaron Rai (his best round of the week ... by eight strokes!)

• 64 - Viktor Hovland (his only round in the 60's for the week)

2022 ROUND 1

• 63 - Cam Young (10 shots worse on Friday)

• 65 - Joaquin Niemann (his best round of the week by four strokes)

2021 ROUND 1

• 62 - Cam Smith (followed it up with a 71-74 before rebounding with a Sunday 66)

• 63 - Stewart Cink (consecutive 63's to open the week, 69-70 to coast to victory on the weekend)

NOTES

Harbour Town is one of the few courses on the PGA TOUR where driving means relatively little. That’s not to say you can be terrible off the tee and win, but looking at the Strokes Gained history from this event, SG: Off The Tee means less than SG: Around the Green among Top 10 finishers. That’s a rarity.

Over the past six years, Strokes Gained: Approach has been almost three times more impactful than Strokes Gained: Off The Tee and Strokes Gained: Around-The-Green among the top-5 finishers at The RBC Heritage.

Like most Pete Dye courses, overall course strategy from tee to green needs to be on display more so than an average tournament. Hitting fairways is great and all, but a lot of these holes are structured in a way where being in the right rough generates a better birdie opportunity than being situated in the left section of the fairway. With its tiny greens, the field only hits greens at a 58% rate, making it one of the lowest average GIR rates of any course, so taking advantage of the proper angle will be imperative to scoring. Focusing on approach and putting is the path this week. Which makes the leaderboard accessible to all skill sets.

Pete Dye Courses on the PGA TOUR.

• TPC Sawgrass (The Players Championship)

• Harbour Town (RBC Heritage)

• TPC River Highlands (Travelers Championship)

• TPC Louisiana (Zurich Classic)

• TPC Stadium Course at La Quinta (Two rounds at The American Express)

Here are the full per round leaders...

— c/o FantasyNational.com

Along with other Dye tracks, nearby Sea Island Resort (RSM Classic) and The Wyndham Championship are the courses with the most crossover success. Beyond those two, similar length, Bermuda grass green courses which have produced similar names at the top of leaderboards include the Sony Open and Honda Classic.

Harbour Town features tree-lined fairways and measures on the short side of PGA TOUR courses, coming in at around 7,100 yards. Even with three Par 5s, eagles are tough to come by for the field, regardless of distance. Hole 2 has a 2.7% eagle rate and Hole 5 is at 1.9%. It also sports the second smallest greens of any course on TOUR.

Smallest Avg. Greens by sq. ft. Played

• 3,500 – Pebble Beach (AT&T PB Pro-Am)

• 3,700 – Harbour Town (RBC Heritage)

• 4,300 – TPC Southwind (FedEx St. Jude)

• 5,000 – TPC River Highlands (Travelers)

• 5,000 – PGA West Stadium (American Express)

• 5,000 – Muirfield Village (Memorial)

• 5,000 – Colonial (Charles Schwab)

Harbour Town annually ranks as the course with the fewest drives over 300 yards and shortest average driving distance on the PGA TOUR; just 273 yards off the tee (Almost 280 now since it has become a Signature event), compared to the PGA TOUR average of 284 yards. For example, on the Par 4s at Harbour Town in his career, Dustin Johnson averaged around 286 yards per drive. That is well below his average driving distance at almost any other course, you know, when he was allowed to compete on the PGA TOUR.

After years of Harbour Town being THEE spot for big Sunday comebacks (Eight of ten champions have entered Sunday with at least a two-stroke deficit). Four of the past five winners entered the final round leading or with the co-lead). Only Spieth’s comeback victory in 2022 was the outlier. This is likely a product of The Heritage becoming a Signature event with all the best players in attendance. Limit the amount of players in a field at a skill equalizing course and you’ll just inherently have fewer players to go fire low scores.

Seven of the past 14 years The RBC Heritage has gone to a playoff.

The difficulty of the course usually depends on the elements. On Hilton Head Island, while there is usually a consistent, coastal breeze, certain rounds at Harbour Town can be played in full-on gale-force winds. One of the reasons Simpson was able to break the tournament record in 2020 was due to an unusual lack of wind all four days. Of the past 20 rounds at The Heritage, more rounds have been played in winds greater than 17 mph than under 10 mph. If the wind gets down it’s a pure birdiefest. Although there’s plenty of scoring 12 of the 18 holes play over par annually.

PICKS

Aaron Rai +7500 — The 2023 Heritage first round leader just needs to clean up the bad rounds he’s been posting lately, because the the high end T2G greens are certainly in the chamber. Rai lead all players at the Masters Round 1 T2G then lost the ability to hit approaches for two days before rebounding with a closing +2.3 Sunday. While he’s been solid at long courses in his career, Harbour Town’s length plays exactly into his strengths. Plus, there’s been immense crossover for Heritage and Wyndham over the year. And if I call correctly, and I think I do because I was on site, Rai won at Sedgefield a year ago.

Ryo Hisatsune +17500 (8 Places) — Sure, maybe I’m letting my history of backing long shot Japanese players influence my decision making a tad, but here’s actually quite a bit to like in Hisatsune’s recent form. He’s posted Top 5s in two of this past three, gained on approach in four straight, and is averaging over three strokes per start on the greens one this last three. Can he actually win against this quality of field. Probably not. But if he holds his form he could challenge into Sunday. Harbour Town is one of the few courses which hosts elevated event that is gears towards the entire field.