Shriners Hospitals for Children Open

[Bamford]

A true birdie-fest in Las Vegas this week at TPC Summerlin. Expect -20/264 or a score of close proximity to be required for the win this week. I like driving accuracy a little over power this week and naturally a red-hot putter will be required. We see golf at altitude this week and pure Bentgrass greens. Weather will play no part this week, so expect perfect scoring conditions around a course where it's difficult to get the ball close, especially from off the fairway. Winners are varied with prices wide-open so I'm covering course specialists Laird (40) and Martin (75). Murray (50) ticks plenty of boxes from a web.com graduate perspective as does Mackenzie Hughes (150). Finally resort scoring specialist Johnson Wagner (80) is playing some lovely stuff right now as is Ryo Ishikawa (80) who needs a result to fulfil his Major Medical Extension and could well take some motivation from Matsuyama's performance in China.

[clubgowi]

Golf PGA: Shriners Hospitals for Children Open

Wide open leaderboard with 20 players within four stroke of the lead. I only want to discuss one of those, Geoff Ogilvy, he was a seven time winner on Tour between 2005-2010 when he simply oozed class , winning the US Open and finishing top six in all four majors. He has won just once since then , in 2014, but before you feel too sorry for him, he has banked $40m+ in prize money alone. Still only 39, he should have double that number of wins. However, class is permanent and you might get out of the habit, yet rarely totally forget how to win. When he won in 2014, he nearly followed up a couple of weeks later at a big playoff event and whilst we have seen little of him at the top of the leaderboard since, he finished 2016 with a couple of eyecatching finishes (this is technically a 2017 tournament........... don't ask !). He shot a Sunday 63 at the Canadian Open in July and in August was 67-68 over the weekend at the John Deere and 68-66 at the Wyndham. He has played the back nine in -11 this week, which is as good/better than almost everyone and if he can reach the turn within a shot or two of the lead, he could turn back the clock today.

39 is that funny age, golfers should not really be having a stellar or comeback year at 29 or 39, it ought really to come at 30 or 40, once you have got the "trauma" of that milestone birthday out of the way. But when chances for Ogilvy come along rarely nowadays, I think we have to forget that, anyway, his wife just turned 40 and maybe that will provide the inspiration and knowledge that life just keeps rolling on ! He likes the hot dry weather and lives in the desert, so should be happy here in Nevada and his last win, came at the Barracuda Championship in this state, so omens are good.

We can "waste" a little at big odds............ Geoff Ogilvy to win outright 17.0 general quote...........there is a little at 17.5/18.0 on Betfair

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