19th Hole

Monday 4th March 2013 : Golf Betting - Frustration and the Importance of Bankroll Management

Over the past few weeks, this blog has been lucky in securing two 60/1 winners on the European Tour whilst also challenging for further "riches" on the PGA Tour. Sports betting in general is challenging and will often leave the punter going through periods of good runs and more often than not, periods of losing runs. This is moreso with golf betting, and its always my approach to be aware of these periods. Each way betting is vital if one is to try and protect one's bankroll and lately on the blog I have advised to place bets with bookies that have been offering 6 places. Granted, those two 60/1 winners would have returned more had I taken just 5 places with other bookies who offered 66/1, but my aim will always be to pick the value and hopefully pick up consistent enough returns on placed golfers to ensure the bankroll stays fairly under control.The winners will always be welcome and I treat these as the real bonus. Excluding the WGC Matchplay, the last two strokeplay events on the PGA saw the blog go through real anguish and frustration as both Sundays saw us right in contention for a winner, not with just one player but three (Northern Trust) and two at the weekend's Honda Classic. We ended up with two players at Riviera and one player placing at the National PGA. Two of these were in a tie resulting in further reductions to our payouts !When this happens, one tends to get really frustrated and decide "that's that, I aint doing e/w anymore" but anything coming back into your pot is better than nothing, there's always next week.  That frustration is the least of it though!



 Let's take Riviera two weeks ago when all 3 picks were lying 1,2,3 after 8 holes in the final round and we didn't end up with eventual winner John Merrick on our books. Who did ? From 5 picks and 12 pts outlay we managed to pick up 14.13pts and make a small profit. But the sheer frustration of having been so close ! It does serve to mind though the importance of each way betting in golf. Yesterday, we had Lee Westwood and Keegan Bradley poised to make a serious challenge to the final pairing. Steady starts offered hope but as their rounds progressed it was becoming inevitable we were hanging on for the much needed place money. Suddenly the leaderboard was bunching up behind Michael Thompson and Geoff Ogilvy and the calculator was out to see how much the bookie was going to reduce my return.I was almost wishing I had backed Rory McIlroy to win with Paddypower instead, because they would have given back my money based on their "Justice Rule", yet it looked like if my two players were going to share 4th place with just about everybody else, I'd end up with less. Going up the 72nd hole, Lee Westwood was in a tie with Keegan Bradley and 4 others. Bloody typical I thought! "He'll par this now and join the dead heat clan!But wait a minute, I'll get some more excitement in this tournament yet, a birdie will give him outright 4th and therefore Bradley's reduced placing wont be quite as bad. Nice one" I thought to myself.....Westwood bogeyed and finished tied 9th. Within minutes the 7.25 pts return vanished and we were left just 5.55 pts return for Bradleys showing. Better than nothing.

Frustration in golf betting ? Two weeks on the PGA Tour (strokeplay) we had 6 players in conetntion for the weekend, with 5 eventually being in contention on Sunday. The winner eluded us but we are making the right picks. Punters may feel frustrated but what about the player? Billy Horschel, our 110/1 shot was nicely poised after two rounds, but was "blown" out of it in rd 3 in the Honda. He responded magnificently yesterday returning a level par 70. (only 5 players bettered it). Oh, what might have been.

Frustrating? We were on Van der Walt in the augural Tshwane Open on the European Tour. His namesake won and I tweeted afterwards asking if anyone had made a mistake placing their bets on Dawie instead of Tjaart. And yes, some had. Well done to them.Maybe they were frustrated after day one when they realized thay had backed the "wrong" player.

Finally, to compound the frustration, the Honda Classic winner Michael Thompson was 300/1 pre-tournament. This blog put him up at the Sony Open last month ! Oh well, we can take heart in that we are getting some cash back whilst we wait for the next winner to come along and we are at least looking at the right players, and names(!).....we just have to pick the right week !

This week is another tournament and another market to sink our investment into. One thing is guaranteed....more frustration....but we love it !



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3rd January 2013 - Who to watch out for this year.


I read the Racing Post this afternoon to see who Steve Palmer was tipping for the USPGA seasons opener in Hawaii (the Tournament of Champions). His top tip is Dustin Johnson. I had considered DJ too but plumped for Simpson ahead of him. But Steve has also tipped DJ for bigger & better things in 2013, even suggesting that this could be the year that he takes world golf "by the scruff of the neck" and outshine the exploits of Rory McIlroy & Tiger Woods. Great praise for the lanky American and its hard to disagree with the potential of a player who could easily have a couple of majors under his belt already. I'm a fan of the big hitting 28 year old from South Carolina and the 6ft 4" giant could indeed rise the world rankings this year but whether he out performs either Tiger & Rory this year will raise a few eyebrows.
It will be an interesting year with so many established European players setting up stall in the US. Westwood and Kaymer will feature strongly I'm sure and its Kaymer in particular that I'm hoping to get some value in on the PGA Tour this year. He has a USPGA Title under his belt already, and his game will be well suited to many courses on offer this season. Having turned 28 only last week there is a lot of years at the top for this Dusseldorf man and I believe he is making the move at the right time. He may be my "Top European" bet for the US Order of Merit this year at 16/1 (3 places) with Bet365. Rory is however set for another great year.
Staying with the PGA Tour there are some great young talents about to burst through making the year ahead a very exciting prospect.Ryo Ishikawa has not excelled yet but is an amazing talent and could be about to put all that right this year. Luke Guthrie is another who could pop up now and again whilst Harris English had some degree of success last year that he too could kick on this term. The Tour will be quite competitive and I genuinely fear for the European Tour over the next few years despite a revamped end of season Championship, involving 4 events, non of which will be hosted on European soil ! (2 in China, 1 in Turkey and the final in Dubai). Ok ok, we have to go where the money is, but 2 in China !

So who do we watch out for in Europe ? Thorborn Olesen became a popular choice for bettors last season and he has the confidence to improve upon those performances this time round. With so many of the events missing the big name players, there will be an opportunity for some of the lesser known players to make an impression and grab some vital R2D points. Ireland's Shane Lowry got a win in Portugal towards the end of 2012 and decided not to pursue a card for the US Tour as a result. He has mapped out his schedule for next year and with a bit off his shoulders this time round (he started last year on the sidelines) , I am expecting another win soon. A few have mentioned Kistoffer Broberg and there is no doubting his ability but it could be a year to keep an eye on Matteo Mannesero in certain fields. Chris Wood needs to step up, Paul Casey needs to put a couple of good performing tournaments together to get going and rise the rankings and return to where he was was and my old favourite Michael Campbell could show he has something still. So does Europe this season offer hope to the old boys as opposed to the young guns in USA? Maybe so but here's hoping new winners do come to the fore!

The other questions for 2013 are will Tiger win a Major? Will Rory win one or more or will it be all -American sweep? Tiger will be desperate to win a Major this year and where better than Augusta in April. I think he can go well at Muirfield too but as mentioned above 2013 could see a very competitive season and the trend of a new major Champion may continue beyond the 15 in a row currently.....but I doubt it. Rory v Tiger at Augusta (with Padraig having a go too). But I agree with Steve on another thing, we may have seen the best of Phil Mickelson and he could slip away down the rankings this year.

We shall see !






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Where is Padraig Harrington's game right now?


Three time Major winner, Padraig Harrington is without a win since October 2009. In fact his previous win to that, which he won in Malaysia, was the 2008 USPGA Championship. He is currently outside the top 50 in the world, he is now ranked 91st and one would wonder if the Dubliner is a spent force. Last week at the Transitions, Padraig opened up with a scintillating course record 61 to establish a 4 stroke lead over the field. He failed to break par each of the remaining rounds eventually finishing in a tie for 20th and slipping 2 places in the OWGR. His mental attitude to the game is well documented and some would argue that this is his downfall, that there is too much going on between the ears. Perhaps that is so.

Confidence is key in top level golf, its key right down to the weekend club player too, but Harrington has played 6 events already this year, 4 in the US and 2 in Europe and I read this as a man who recognizes the need to play more competitively to ascertain where his game is at. Ignoring last weeks event, he could easily have won 2 of the 5 previously and to be fair he should have won at least one of them. The Volvo Champions was won by Branden Grace with Harrington finishing tied 10th. He opened with a solid 69 which had him well placed but it could have been a 67, considering his finish to the opening round saw him double bogey the 18th.In the 2nd round he was -4 for his round with just 3 to play.That put him at -8 for the tournament but he finishd bogey-bogey and double bogey 2nd day running! He would have been leader after round 2! He produced a -3 round on the Saturday but again dropped shots on a par 5 before finishing off with a poor 76 on the Sunday, obviously deflated. A tournament that a confident Harrington would have won. At the AT&T at Pebble Beach he again opened up solidly with a 68 and followed up with a 66 on day 2 to get to -10. Phil Mickelson produced a stunning 64 on Sunday to win by 2 and 7 shots clear of Padraig. Over the weekend Lefty outscored Padraig by 8 shots.

Padraig Harrington is not far away from returning to his best! He needs to eliminate the mistakes. He probably tried too hard last week to eliminate the mistakes following such an incredible 61, his lowest ever on tour, on the Thursday and didn't push on. Ok, course records one day usually are followed by par rounds the day after, but not to kick on yet again the weekend is where the confidence, or lack of, seems to take its effect. He clicked on the Thursday, he can click again and he just might decide to do it for 4 days in a row very soon and return to the winners enclosure and when he does achieve that, we should see the old Padraig Harrington of 2007/2008.

He will tee it up next week at the Shell Houston Open, his last event before the Masters. He finished tied 11th here last year again after a non eventful weekend. Bookies will have him marked up at about 40/1 or better next week, if so I'll be on him and if he dosn't win next week then he could just "click" at Augusta the following week. I have him backed already at 66/1 as I firmly believe we are going to see the goods very soon.There is huge excitement about the season ahead and indeed the Masters in a couple of weeks as so many players are hitting form at the same time. A good performance by the Irishman next week will ensure he is on my shortlist for the first Major of 2012.










Welcome to the 19th Hole, where all the best golf gets "played". The analysis and the forum for the upcoming event will be here plus the aftermath of the yet again another 6th placing or lost play-off ! Player analysis, course anlaysis, form analysis - it will be voiced here. It will be my own opinion but I would dearly love to hear the readers comments here and encourage you to make this a forum where the discussion on what players are best suited to the weeks event etc. can be hosted. Of course this is a betting tipsters website so the "what-if" I did him for top 10 instead of 100/1 e/w chat should be regular and interesting and make for an interesting insight as to how I should be approaching my weekly selections. Its just 3 weeks to the 2012 US Masters, and my shortlist is under compilation. I will have this here within the next few days. Will it match yours ? Stay tuned......updates to follow very shortly