Deutsche Bank Championship: Its outsiders all the way for The Punter

Ben Crane, one of The Punter's picks at the Deutsche Bank Championship

As hard as he's tried, Steve can't find a value pick towards the head of the market so he's gone much further down the list for pre-event selections at the second FedEx Cup playoff event...

Tournament History
This will be just the tenth staging of the Deutsche Bank Championship, an event originally set up by the PGA Tour and IMG with a goal of raising money for the Tiger Woods Foundation. It's been the second leg of the FedEx Cup playoff series since 2007, with the event restricted to the top-100 players on the FedEx Cup standings only. Please note, the tournament starts on Friday and finishes on Monday (Labor Day in the States).

Venue
TPC Boston, Norton, Massachusetts

Course Details
Par 71, 7214 yards
Stroke index in 2011 - 69.91
This Arnold Palmer design opened in 2002. It's a very easy par 71 with several doglegs and larger than average fast greens. In 2007 the course underwent a renovation by Gil Hanse, with help from Brad Faxon, reducing its original length of over 7,400 yards. The biggest change was on the par 4 4th, which is now drivable.

In the four years following the renovation work, only the 18th has played easier than the 4th but that might change this year as the final hole has undergone its own changes since last year's renewal. The reachable par five green has been raised by a couple of feet and halved in size and it might not be such a doddle this year.

Useful Sites
Course Details
Tee Times

TV Coverage
Live on Sky all four days, 8.00pm on Friday, 9.00pm on Saturday, 6.00pm on Sunday and 4.30pm on Monday.

Last Five Winners
2011 - Webb Simpson -15 (playoff)
2010 - Charley Hoffman -22
2009 - Steve Stricker -17
2008 - Vijay Singh -22
2007 - Phil Mickelson -16

What will it take to win the Deutsche Bank Championship?
The course is fairly long but it's not just a case of bombing it off the tee. Jason Day was the only player in the top-seven to rank inside the top-40 for Driving Distance twelve months ago and he was one of only two players to rank inside the top-ten for that stat amongst the top-30 finishers.

The stats that count at TPC Boston are Par 5 performance, Greens In Regulation and Birdie Average. Five of the nine winners to date have ranked first for Par 5 Performance and two have ranked second. Seven of the nine winners have ranked in the top-10 for GIR and making lots of birdies is essential too - Hoffman made 28 in 2010!

Analysing those three stats last year put me onto the winner, Webb Simpson, and I've again looked at all three when considering plays this year. The best fit is Bubba Watson but I backed him last week at a much bigger price and although he managed a top-ten finish, he was far from at his best and I've reluctantly left him out here.

In-Play Tactics
Third round leaders could be vulnerable again. All year on the PGA Tour 54-hole leaders have been struggling to get across the line and past results suggest that could be the case again this week. Steve Stricker is the only third round leader or co-leader to go on to win in the last six years and the first two event winners, Adam Scott and Vijay Singh, are the only players to convert a clear third round lead.

Market Leaders
With so many quality players in attendance, it stands to reason that the event is extremely open and that nobody trades in single-figures. Both Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy are vying for favouritism at 14.013/1 and both could improve considerably on their efforts last week. The pair struggled to come to terms with the greens at Bethpage and Tiger struggled at times with a problematic back. Both are too short for my liking though.

Third best is Luke Donald, currently trading at 16.5n/a, and at the prices, I prefer him over the front two but it's too fiercely a contested tournament for me to even start thinking about backing anyone so short.

Seven players trade between 20.019/1 and 30.029/1 and of the seven, I liked Dustin Johnson, Jason Dufner (in particular), and the aforementioned Bubba but again, they're all too short in my eyes, which is slightly annoying because Hoffman and Olin Browne are the only shock winners of the event to date and I expect that the winner will be one of those towards the fore in the betting.

Selections
I really like Dufner this week but I missed the early value. I'd have played at 27.026/1 if I'd gotten my backside in gear but unfortunately I didn't start looking at the event early enough and I'm cross with myself about Jason Day too...

I greedily looked to get matched at 70.069/1 when there was plenty of more-than-acceptable 65.064/1 available and the next time I looked in on the market he was down to 50.049/1! He's now trading at less than that and I've stubbornly rejected him also. He has great course form (3rd and 2nd in the last two years) but he's only ever won one PGA Tour event and he's been out of form for a while now too.

So after much deliberation, I haven't backed any of the shorter priced players at all. I've had a small bet on Phil Mickelson at 60.059/1, who wasn't awful last week, but after that all my picks are 210.0209/1 and bigger!

Although I expect to see a fancied runner win, it's far too competitive a heat to pick any of them out before the off at a restrictive price and as Paul Krishnamurty points out in his Find Me A 100 Winner column, there's plenty of value further down the list, so I've gone for a plethora of picks at huge prices from the get-go.

The majority of my selections rank highly on at least one of the three aforementioned stats lists but it's the injury-prone Ben Crane who looks the best fit stats wise and he rates as my idea of the best value of my dozen picks, closely followed by Graham DeLaet, who finished 5th last week when backed at a huge price.

Selections:
Phil Mickelson @ 60.059/1
Seung-Yul Noh @ 210.0209/1
Scott Piercy @ 220.0219/1
Kyle Stanley @ 240.0239/1
John Huh @ 300.0299/1
Graham DeLaet @ 300.0299/1
Scott Stallings @ 380.0379/1
Brendon De Jonge @ 390.0389/1
Ben Crane @ 420.0419/1
Troy Matteson @ 460.0459/1
Matt Every @ 560.0559/1
Charley Hoffman @ 580.0579/1

I'll be back on Saturday morning with the In-Play Blog.