2022 Honda Classic Preview: Odds, Best Bets, and Predictions
I’ve been betting on a ton of golf recently, and I’ve got to admit–I love it. Hitting on a golf pick makes you feel like Joe LaCava, and if you miss you can just say: “it wasn’t his week.” It’s that simple.
But betting on golf in and of itself gives you a bit of leeway. Not only can you bet on the tournament winner, but you can place bets on the top 5 (sometimes the top 10) as well as individual round or 3-ball winners.
So all in all you have tons of opportunities to win, and I’m here to help you do just that. The 2022 Honda Classic starts this Thursday, February 22nd, and I’ve got some great picks I’ll be riding with once that first tee-shot is taken.
The odds I’ll be using in this story are taken from BetMGM sportsbook. To find out if BetMGM is available in your area, click here! If it’s not, you can always take a look at the best sportsbooks available in your area.
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The Course: A Breakdown
The 7,125 yard par-70 sounds like no tough task–but you’d be mistaken. The Honda Classic is one of the tougher tests on the annual schedule, and it looks to maintain its reputation this year.
The killer three-hole stretch from 15 to 17 keeps golfers up at night, and add in the fact that early-week forecasts are suggesting winds of nearly 30 mph and we have ourselves a recipe for disaster. The course is also loaded with water hazards, which resulted in 270 balls meeting their wet demise in last year's rendition of the tournament.
Only four times in the tournament's history has the winning golfer finished double-digits under-par, and with the nasty weather forecast for this weekend, I expect that to remain the same.
2022 Honda Classic Picks
Outright Winner
Tommy Fleetwood (+2000)
Fleetwood is making his PGA Tour debut this week (in 2022) and I expect him to come out with a bang. He has a good history at PGA National, having started here twice in both 2020 and 2018. In those starts, he finished 3rd and 4th, and he managed to not lose a stroke throughout the entire tournament in both appearances. That's an incredible feat seeing how difficult this course truly is.
There’s obviously something about this course that catches Fleetwood’s eye, and at +2000 I think we’re getting incredible value.
Christian Bezuidenhout (+5000)
With a weaker field, the Honda Classic is the perfect opportunity to take a chance on some underdogs–and at +4000 Christian Bezuidenhout seems like a great risk to take, Bezuidenhout has a deep history of winning lower-score tournaments, like the Estrella Damn N.A. Andalucia Masters and the Alfred Dunhill Championship in 2019.
Top-5/Top-10 Finishes
Joaquin Niemann (+400/+175)
No one is swinging a hotter club than Joaquin Niemann. Last weekend it looked like he had a heat-seeking golfball, and the hole was hotter than the sun. He played great at the Genesis Invitational last weekend and has a pretty $12 million purse to show for it.
I expect his success to continue this weekend, although I doubt we’ll see a back-to-back victory from the Chilean golfer.
Alex Noren (+700/+333)
Two weeks ago, Noren looked like the top-10 player he once was. A sixth-place finish in Phoenix sent Noren fans to the moon, but that result was sandwiched by two not as exciting finishes at the Farmers and at Genesis. However, the tough nature of PGA National should play to Noren’s strengths, and I expect a solid performance out of him this weekend.
