After a pair of Signature Events, the golf world heads back into major season with the PGA Championship at Aronimink Golf Club. Unlike the Masters, the PGA Championship changes venues every year, which creates a fun challenge for golf bettors.

It has been quite a while since the PGA TOUR last visited Aronimink Golf Club. The most recent event here was the 2018 BMW Championship, where Keegan Bradley lifted the trophy. Aronimink is not new to major championship golf, either. It hosted the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship in 2020, the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship in 2003 and the PGA Championship in 1962.

With so few recent trips to the Philadelphia-area course, our data is limited. Unlike the Masters, PGA Championship trends are a fun party trick, but basically obsolete.

While the 7,394-yard par 70 may look long on paper, this is absolutely a course that players can overpower. There are nine par 4s where most of the field should have a wedge in for their second shot if they find the fairway off the tee.

The winning score at the 2018 BMW Championship was 20-under, and let’s be honest, golf has changed quite a bit since then. Driver heads are bigger, swing speeds are higher and players are far more comfortable taking aggressive lines off the tee.

In his pre-tournament interview, Rory McIlroy was asked about the strategy for playing Aronimink.

“Strategy off the tee is pretty non-existent,” McIlroy said. “It’s a course where you can be super aggressive off the tee, and then there’s a little more strategy and a little more thought going into the greens.”

Sure, the rough will be thick, but with a wedge in their hands, thick rough is only so much of a defense. There are plenty of bunkers, but even then, the reward outweighs the risk for the longer players.

There will always be positional players who find a way to have success, but the golfers who can bomb and gouge this course effectively should have a massive advantage. If a golfer can hit it more than 300 yards and still find the fairway consistently, they will be firmly in contention this week.

As I mentioned earlier, the data is incomplete. There is not enough of a sample size to properly map out the key stats for this tournament. That said, we will rely heavily on the eye test. We can use what we know about the course, how it should play, and which skill sets should translate best.

One of the most important data sets I will use this week is driving. Strokes Gained: Off the Tee works, but I do not think it gives enough weight to distance for this specific course.

So I modified it into an 80/20 split, with 80% of the weight on driving distance and 20% on driving accuracy.

Here is that data set over the last 36 rounds, with data via RickRunGood.com:

• 1. Michael Brennan
• 2. Bryson DeChambeau
• 3. Michael Throbjornsen
• 4. Scottie Scheffler
• 5. Jon Rahm
• 6. Pierceson Coody

Scottie Scheffler, Top 5 (including ties) (+100 FanDuel)

This list is interesting because, among the top five, three of the golfers are elite. That makes sense because many elite golfers are both long and straight off the tee. It is the ability to have both that separates them from the rest.

Scottie Scheffler, the best golfer in the world, possesses both of those traits. He isn’t a true bomber, but averaging over 10 yards off the tee while still hitting nearly 63% of fairways is almost unfair.

Sometimes chalky golf bets feel a little too easy, but Scheffler is one of the most consistent golfers in major championships. He is the defending PGA Championship winner, and he has shown time and time again that he can raise his level when major season arrives.

He is also in one of the best stretches of form you will see from a golfer who has not won. Scheffler has finished runner-up in three straight events, and honestly, he probably could have won the RBC Heritage if not for a few misplaced approach shots late in the final round.

The biggest issue has been the putter. He has lost strokes putting in two of those three events and still finished runner-up, which is pretty dangerous for the rest of the field. If he gets even a couple of positive putting rounds, Scheffler could run away with this tournament.

I am not all the way there on him at +500 to win, but you know Scheffler is going to be in contention this week. Backing him to finish inside the top five at this price feels like a strong way to get equity on the best golfer in the world.

Off-the-tee play is important this week because, as McIlroy alluded to, there is not much strategy required with the driver. The real creativity comes on the second shot.

That puts a heavy emphasis on approach play. To get more granular, we can look at approach proximity. Again, there is not a full sample size here, but there is enough to get a feel for the most common approach distances players should face at Aronimink.

The most common approach range this week should be between 50 and 125 yards.

Here are the golfers who have gained the most strokes from that range over the last 36 rounds:

• 1. Alex Fitzpatrick
• 2. Cameron Young
• 3. Tom Hoge
• 4. Kauki Higa
• 5. Ben Polland
• 6. Ryan Gerard

Cameron Young is my favorite to win this tournament

He was extremely close to winning his first major at the Masters. If he had played a little better on Sunday, he might have left with a green jacket.

Young is not only excellent from 125 yards and in, but he is also dangerous with the driver. In his win at the Cadillac Championship, most of his work was done with the putter. That was much different than his win at THE PLAYERS Championship, where he was one of the best ball strikers in the field.

Young has now proven he can win in multiple ways. He can win with the driver. He can win with his irons. He can win with the putter. He has become a complete player, and now he is dangerous.

I already bet him in the futures market, but I have no problem backing him at his current price. I also recommend a wager on Young to finish inside the top 20 at -112 on DraftKings.

A common theme from players during the practice rounds has been the creativity required after the tee shot. Many players have also highlighted how important putting will be this week. These greens average 8,200 square feet, and they are large, fast, and difficult to read. If golfers do not bring their best on the greens, they will struggle.

Here are the best and worst putters over the last 24 rounds of golf.

Best putters

• 1. Sam Burns
• 2. Maverick McNealy
• 3. Akshay Bhatia
• 4. Michael Kim
• 5. Harris English

Worst putters

• 1. Taylor Pendrith
• 2. Andrew Novak
• 3. Tom Hoge
• 4. Garrick Higgo
• 5. Wyndham Clark

Best value on the board: Rickie Fowler, Top 20 (+200)

My favorite part of building these lists and modeling golf courses is finding the random data points that stand out, then figuring out how to use them or whether they have any importance at all.

Rickie Fowler probably would not be a model darling for this tournament, and he may not pop up in many models at all. But there was one thing that made me take a deeper dive into his profile.

Here is the random stat: Fowler is the only golfer inside the top 16 in SG: Putting who is also inside the top 40 in SG: Ball-Striking over the last 24 rounds.

That may seem like a whole lot of nothing, but I think it’s important. It is also a bit concerning for the golfers ranked ahead of him in putting, who do not bring the same ball-striking prowess. At a course like Aronimink, you have to be able to putt well to have success. We have talked about the importance of the second shot and the need for strong driving, but if the putter fails you on these greens, it could be a long week.

Given what we have seen over the last month, the market might be a little too low on Fowler. Since the RBC Heritage, he has finished no worse than T9. Last week at the Truist Championship, he finished T2. In all three of those starts, he gained strokes on approach. He gained at least +2.8 strokes on approach in every event, and he also gained strokes putting in all three.

Fowler might be playing some of the best golf he has played in the past two years. When he won the Rocket Classic in 2023, his game was in a very similar place. He missed the cut at the 2023 PGA Championship at Oak Hill after losing strokes on approach, then followed it with a T5 at the U.S. Open, a T13 and then the win at Detroit Golf Club. In each of those starts after the PGA Championship, he gained at least +2.4 strokes on approach. He also gained strokes putting in every one of those events except one.

His game was trending up, the approach numbers started to spike, and then boom… he won.

I am not saying Fowler is going to win this week. His number around 70-1 is fine if you want to take a stab, but that is not really the point. The point is that we need to pay attention. With Fowler, at least recently, the good runs of form tend to come in bunches. When he gets hot with his irons, it usually lasts a while before fading. I would rather be early on Fowler at a good price than late and stuck on the wrong side of the market.