Wednesday, July 18, 2012

British Open

This week all the major tours, including the US PGA Tour, is in England to play the British Open.

Below is the list of the top 15 players in the CLi rankings for the British Open.

# Player CLi 
1  Padraig Harrington 11.7
2  Tiger Woods 14.7
3  Steve Stricker 17.7
4  Tom Lehman 20.0
5  Zach Johnson 21.1
6  Luke Donald 21.6
7  Marcel Siem 22.2
8  Dustin Johnson 23.2
9  Nick Watney 24.3
10  Fredrik Jacobson 28.3
11  Hunter Mahan 29.3
12  Mark Calcavecchia 30.1
13  Sergio Garcia 31.1
14  Francesco Molinari 31.7
15  Justin Rose 32.4

No big surprises here, except that Lehman (analysis) is in the top 5.  He plays the Champions Tour, He has been playing well and the British Open is back at the course he won the championship in 1996.  However, his low finishes are on the Champions Tour, which might be overweighted when comparing results to players on the regular tours.  So, even though the CLi is suggesting that he will play well again this week, I am going to pass on him.

I am going with Harrington (analysis), Woods (analysis), Stricker (analysis), Z. Johnson (analysis), and Donald (analysis).  Harrington has missed the cut in the last two British Open, but he won the event the two years prior.  He went through several years of playing poorly. He has turned it around this year.  He has finished 16th, 7th, 11th, and 4th in his last four events.

Woods has won three times this year and looks to get back into the winner's circle in a major to add a 4th Claret Jug to his trophy cabinet.  This week could be his week, especially if the weather gets bad.  It will be a good test for him mentally if the weather is tough for the field.

Stricker was in the hunt last week at the John Deere Classic before falling back on the back nine during the final round.  So he is hitting it well.  It will all depend on how he handles the weather and how his neck holds up.

Johnson (Zach) won last at the John Deere Classic, and he has made the cut in the British the past 5 years.  He is a steady player, which bodes well in a British Open where steady wins.  This is especially the case when the weather goes south.

Donald won in the BMW PGA Championship in late May.  Since then he has played 3 events in which he has finished 16th, 108th (missed the cut), and 12th.  The missed cut was at the U.S. Open.  And he hasn't played well in the majors of late.  Hopefully being back in his native England will bring out the best in him.  He has the short game and steady play to do well in a tournament like the British Open.

Below are my 5 picks for the British Open:

# Player CLi 
1  Padraig Harrington 11.7
2  Tiger Woods 14.7
3  Steve Stricker 17.7
4  Zach Johnson 21.1
5  Luke Donald 21.6

Below are the top 5 players in the Power Rankings from Rob Bolton:
  1. Justin Rose
  2. Tiger Woods
  3. Lee Westwood
  4. Dustin Johnson
  5. Sergio Garcia
Here is a link to Bolton's Power Rankings so that you can read more about his thoughts on his top players in this week's Power Rankings:

Bolton's Power Rankings: British Open

We have 1 player in common this tournament: Woods

Below are the settings for the CLi calculation I used for the British Open:

Number of Past Tournaments Looking Back
Number Scoring Avg Weight (SA1) Earnings Avg Weight (EA1)
5 20% 20%
Number of Days Looking Back
Number Scoring Avg Weight (SA2) Earnings Avg Weight (EA2)
30 10% 10%
Number of Tournaments Looking Back
Number Scoring Avg Weight (SA3) Earnings Avg Weight (EA3)
4 20% 20%

If you don't like the configuration of my CLi calculation, feel free to run your own CLi calculation with your own desired settings by going to golfcli.com.

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