Sentry Tournament of Champions Betting Preview: PGA Tour's Best Shine in Hawaii

The PGA Tour returns to play in Hawaii after a midseason hiatus. We break down all you need to know and offer up our outright, matchup, and prop picks for the Sentry Tournament of Champions.

The Plantation Course at Kapalua hosts a field of 39 this week and Rory McIlroy is the only winner from the 2020-21 PGA Tour season not in attendance. 

Jon Rahm and Collin Morikawa headline the field in their battle for the top spot in the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR), while Harris English is back to defend his title after winning twice on Tour last year to snap a seven-year win drought.

This is the first of back-to-back events in Hawaii. The Sony Open will follow next week before the West Coast swing starts with The American Express in California from Jan. 20-23.

Here are my outright, matchup, and prop picks for the PGA Tour's Sentry Tournament of Champions at the Plantation Course at Kapalua in Maui, HI.

Sentry Tournament of Champions Odds

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Sentry Tournament of Champions Odds Analysis

English won this event in 2021 at +3000 in the star-studded field. Even with the top-heavy odds board, value exists in the middle tiers. The odds for the two-time winner last season are even higher this year, with DraftKings Sportsbook posting the highest number of +3500 for English to defend his title.

Rahm is the consensus favorite, though FanDuel Sportsbook and BetMGM have him sharing top odds with Justin Thomas. Thomas won this event in 2017 and 2020, and he won the 2021 Players Championship.

Stewart Cink, another two-time winner last season, has at least a share of the longest odds in the exclusive field. FanDuel offers Cink and Lucas Glover each at +21000 to win outright.

Plantation Course at Kapalua Betting Profile

The only par-73 course on the PGA Tour rotation, the Plantation Course measures 7,596 yards and features dramatic elevation changes. The Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw design runs alongside the Pacific Ocean and offers awe-inspiring views throughout the entire course.

Despite the length, driving is not an essential top skill at Kapalua. The fairways are abundantly wide with little punishment for wayward tee shots. There are no water hazards but 97 sand bunkers are spread throughout the course. The greens are comprised of Bermudagrass.

Three par 4s top 500 yards with four shorter than 400 yards, another four lie between 400 and 450 yards. The par 5s range from 526 to 677 yards, while the par 3s range from 161 to 219 yards.

Sentry Tournament of Champions Stats

As touched upon, we need not pay much attention to Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee this week. The sheer length of the venue helps level the playing field by making the Plantation Course a second-shot track. We'll instead focus on the following stats for our Sentry Tournament of Champions picks:

Strokes Gained: ApproachSG: Around-the-GreenSand save percentagePar 4 efficiency: 400-450 yards

All but one of the last seven champions finished better than 20-under par. Each of the last two and three of the last seven runnings of the event went to a playoff, including English's victory over Joaquin Niemann last year. As such, we'll also look to birdie or better percentage.

Jordan Spieth is the field leader with 2.81 strokes gained per round over 16 rounds played at the Plantation Course. Patrick Reed leads all golfers in attendance with 28 career rounds played at this venue. He has averaged 1.60 strokes gained on the field per round. Ten golfers are making their debut at Kapalua this week, headlined by Phil Mickelson and Sam Burns.

Sentry Tournament of Champions Picks

To win: Morikawa (+1000 via DraftKings), Sungjae Im (+2200 via BetMGM), Talor Gooch (+4100 via FanDuel)Tournament matchup: Bryson DeChambeau vs. Morikawa (+102 via FanDuel), Max Homa vs. Mickelson (+162 via FanDuel)Top-5 finish: Spieth (+360 via FanDuel)Top Asian: Im (+140 via FanDuel)Round 1 leader: Gooch (+3400 via FanDuel)

Sentry Tournament of Champions Outright Picks

Morikawa (+1000)

The 24-year-old tees it up this week with a chance to become the No. 1 golfer in the world. He went into the midseason break on a stretch of four straight top-10 finishes across the PGA Tour and DP World Tour, including a win at the DP World Tour Championship Dubai.

Morikawa led the PGA Tour with 1.12 SG: Approach per round last season and he's second through four measured rounds with 1.46 SG: Approach this season. He's tied for second over eight qualifying rounds in par 4 efficiency: 400-450 yards, and he's T-12 in birdie or better percentage.

Most importantly, this is about the value for Morikawa, who tied for seventh in each of the last two runnings of this event. With a chance to take over the top spot in the OWGR, this is likely to be one of our last chances to bet him without him being the tournament favorite. Two golfers have better odds to win than Morikawa at each of our four books of choice.

Im (+2200)

We're going by order of the odds here but Im is my favorite pick to win the 2022 Sentry Tournament of Champions.

The two-time PGA Tour champ returned to the winner's circle at the Shriners Children's Open in the fall. He followed that with a T-9 at The CJ Cup and a T-19 at the Houston Open before the break. Through 16 measured rounds on the fall swing, he's averaging 0.83 SG: Around-the-Green and 0.48 SG: Approach per round. He's also T-17 in par 4 efficiency from our key distance, 12th in sand save percentage, and T-22 in birdie or better percentage.

Im tied for fifth at minus-21 in his debut at this event last year, despite losing 0.81 strokes per round with his putter.

Gooch (+4100)

Gooch entered the holiday break at a career-high No. 32 in the OWGR off of his first career win at The RSM Classic. It concluded a fall swing in which he had two other top-5 results and two finishes of T-11. While this field is considerably stronger than many of those events, it's a small field and many of the top names didn't play regularly in the fall.

Over 19 measured rounds to start this season, Gooch is averaging 1.09 SG: Approach, 0.71 SG: Around-the-Green, and 1.72 SG: Tee-to-Green per round. He's fourth in this field with 2.03 strokes gained on the average Tour pro per round across his last 20 rounds.

Sentry Tournament of Champions Matchup Picks

Morikawa (+102) vs. DeChambeau

DeChambeau's sure to be a public favorite at the lengthy Plantation Course after leading the PGA Tour with 1.22 SG: Off-the-Tee last season. However, as we discussed above, it's Morikawa's superior iron play and short game that'll prove the difference in this event. 

DeChambeau tied for seventh with Morikawa and Rahm last year, but he fared significantly worse on approach and around the green while leading the field with 1.63 SG: Off-the-Tee per round. He previously tied for seventh in 2019 with a field-best 1.83 SG: Putting per round while losing strokes on approach and around the greens.

Mickelson (+162) vs. Homa

This is about the odds in a volatile head-to-head matchup. At +162, Mickelson, the reigning PGA Championship winner at the 7,876-yard Kiawah Island Ocean Course, is being given just a 38.17% chance of beating Homa.

This is Mickelson's debut in this event, but Homa finished just T-25 in a 34-man field in his lone appearance to date in 2020.

Sentry Tournament of Champions Top Prop Picks

Spieth to finish top 5 (+360)

Lean on Spieth's excellent course history that includes a win by eight strokes at minus-30 in 2016. He's playing this event for the first time since a ninth-place finish in 2018 after snapping a three-year winless drought at the Valero Texas Open last season. He led the field with 1.14 SG: Around-the-Green per round in his last appearance.

Im for top Asian player (+140)

It's best to find ways to hedge our outright bets in an elite field such as this. Im's competing in a four-man field in which reigning Masters champion Hideki Matsuyama is the favorite at +130. Im has the better course history, albeit in a small sample, and he's been better around the greens this season.

Gooch to lead after 18 holes (+3400)

Likewise, let's double down on Gooch and not need to worry about the strength of the field by focusing on just the first 18 holes. The recent PGA Tour champ ranks sixth this season with a first-round scoring average of 65.50 through six events.

SEE ALSO: All picks and odds. Be sure to check out SportsbookReview.com’s community forums and betting tools.

Picks made on 1/3/2021 at 10:05 p.m. ET.