Daily Fantasy Golf

DFS golf has been one of the fastest growing segments in the industry recently, handing out millions in prizes along the way. Daily Fantasy Cafe will be your trusted source for picks and content every tournament, every week. We will use a statistical driven approach to help you build smarter, more profitable lineups. You can expect a tournament preview/picks article every Tuesday that will take an analytical dive into that weeks upcoming event. There will also be other PGA content posted throughout the week to help your build your understanding of fantasy golf. Draftkings and FanDuel are our top destinations for daily fantasy golf. Use our Draftkings promo code or FanDuel Promo Code when signing up.

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Featured PGA Articles

The First Tee: John Deere Classic

RecapAnother week, another close one for us for having a positive R.O.I. %. Having Robert Garrigus and Andrew Putnam really killed our chances after Friday. Looking back at it now, I think I still wou... Read More


PGA The First Tee: A Military Tribute at The Greenbrier

RecapWow! What a weekend we had at The Quicken Loans. This was a domination display of ball striking I have ever seen! Molinari was near perfection for hitting greens in regulation and his bogey avoid... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Quicken Loans National

RecapThis past week will be a week to forget and move on. You make a nice player pool, and you're confident going to bed on Wednesday night, thinking you could have a chance this week. Sadly, that was... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Travelers Championship

RecapU.S. Open was one that we'll never forget! First the winds switched on Thursday making it harder to play in the afternoon. Friday was a cut sweat and a half with Tiger; Spieth; and Rory trying to... Read More


PGA The First Tee: U.S. Open

RecapThis week was rather a disappointing week after having a good run for 3 weeks in a row. I had 5 guys missing the cut and 4 of them were off by 1 stroke. That's how it goes sometimes. Out of 20 li... Read More


PGA The First Tee: FedEx St. Jude Classic

RecapWhat a weekend we had for golf! Tiger was in the mix again, most of the bigger names made the cut, except for Spieth, and we a lot of guys within a few shots of the lead headed into Sunday! I had... Read More


PGA The First Tee: The Memorial

RecapThe last 2 weeks have been really exciting to see where our process takes us. This week, we had only Xander missing the cut and that cost me. If you used the 5 guys I wrote up, you had enough for... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Fort Worth Invitational

RecapLast week was one of the great sweats for one of our guys, CH3! I had a lineup with him paired up with Andrew Putnam in the $33. Unfortunately, the course was too receptive and there were a lot o... Read More


PGA The First Tee: AT&T Byron Nelson

RecapThe Players was exciting from start to finish. We basically had 3 sweats throughout the tournament. We first had our annual cut sweat, then the MDF sweat was even more thrilling to watch because... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Players Championship

RecapWells Fargo did not disappoint us this past weekend with a nice sweat with one of our guys, Nick Watney, being in the hunt right up until Jason Day hit that amazing tee shot on 17 to bring his le... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Wells Fargo Championship

RecapIt was a good week to have off just to relax and enjoy the Zurich Classic with its new format, including the 'walk-up music'. It was interesting to hear the choices that some of the players made... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Valero Texas Open

RecapLast week started with some drama and ended with more drama. By Wednesday, we've learned that Adam Hadwin withdrew, who would've been one of the most popular plays being only at $8,100. Then on S... Read More


PGA The First Tee: RBC Heritage

RecapIt was an exciting Masters on the weekend! Unfortunately, we didn't get the Tiger of old contending or having Phil in the mix. However, we couldn't have asked for a better Sunday! I think we were... Read More


PGA The First Tee: The Masters

RecapIt was one of those weeks if you played at least two of the top of the guys at Houston, you probably had a good week. I decided to fade the top guys and that was a losing battle from the beginnin... Read More


PGA The First Tee: Shell Houston Open

RecapLast week we decided not to do an article for the Match Play just because we felt that it was too high variance on what might happen, and it showed by Friday night. Out of the 16 top seeds, 11 of... Read More


Growth of PGA Daily Fantasy Golf

The growth of Daily Fantasy golf has been exponential recently, with no signs of slowing down anytime soon. DFS powerhouse Draftkings ran a Masters Millionaire Maker tournament, and have already announced another one for the US Open that's still months away. The prizes are only going to get bigger, with other daily sites poised to start offering larger payouts as well.

More than 70,000 unique users created lineups for the Masters Millionaire Maker on Draftkings, and that's only a fraction of golf fans who could be playing daily fantasy. Now is as good a time as ever to show your knowledge and skills, and we'd love to help you make that transition.

According to Draftkings VP Femi Wasserman , they link the growth of PGA DFS to younger audiences who want to use new technology to engage in the sport. With young superstars in the sport like Jordan Spieth, and Rory Mcilroy, I expect the average age of fantasy golf players to continually get younger as they attract more attention and notoriety to an already flourishing sport. I wouldn't be surprised in the PGA Tour reacted to this by partnering up with a DFS site, much like the NBA and MLB have recently. Once this happens, and it will, the sky is the limit for the growth potential of this industry segment.

If anyone doubts the upside or staying power of DFS golf, they only need to look at how much golf has grown from last season to the current one. For each of the four majors last year, DraftKings offered a $100K guarantee, for which the buy-in was $27. That was their “big" tournament. This week, for the QUICKEN LOANS NATIONAL, DraftKings is offering a 350,000 guarantee with a $3 buy in. This comes on the heels of the third installment of DraftKings Millionaire Maker, a $3.3 million dollar guaranteed tournament with a million dollars being awarded to 1st place. Let's recap, in relation to DraftKings biggest tournaments of 2014, tournaments with 1/9 of the buy-in and three and a half times the prize pool is being run almost every week. And a tournament with 33 TIMES the prize pool is being held for each of the four majors. There will never be a growth that matches what golf did this year, not in any sport in any year.

When you think about it, it is perfectly logical though. Golf offers a much smaller pool of players. It allows for four days of splendid televised sweating, and due to the unique scoring system, the difference between first and second place—or in instances 50th place—many times comes down the last hole. It is pressure packed, yet also very easy to learn and play at a recreational level. On top of that, golf fans hold the distinction of having the highest household income of all major sports. While that may be bad for people taking up the sport, it is a great thing for DFS operators and players alike. DFS golf players can expect prize pools to continue to rise throughout the 2016 season. Golf has not even come close to reaching its peak, and when DFS operators begin to branch out to the rest of the world, Golf and Soccer will be the biggest beneficiaries.

Golf used to be seen as a way for DFS operators to poach new users, get them on board and instill brand loyalty, and then hope to hell they stick around for football, basketball and baseball. With as much exposure and media coverage that DFS golf has received this year, those days are over, and there is no question that golf is here to stay.

At some point last golf season, I remember thinking to myself “I wish more people would get into DFS Golf, it has the potential to be huge". Ask and you shall receive.

As one of the big two, DraftKings (FanDuel being the other) had been faced with an uphill battle with respect to catching up to FanDuel in terms of prize pools and users. They had done an admirable job growing their user base, but at the time, DFS was just starting to hit the mainstream. Fast forward 18 months, three merger/acquisitions, $500 million in funding and three Millionaire Makers, we sit at the nexus of DraftKings bid for world domination. Whether you want to attribute their meteoric rise to strategic marketing partnerships or the ability to continuously offer bigger guaranteed tournaments, there is no doubt that DraftKings has become a force to be reckoned with.

Having recently entered the DFS space, Yahoo holds a distinct advantage over anyone else attempting to get into the DFS industry so late in the game. They have users, a lot of users. The biggest barrier to entry in the DFS industry is the millions of dollars—if not tens of millions of dollars—it requires to build a big enough user base to eventually be profitable. Don't let the billion dollar valuations fool you, with an average profit margin of 10%, DFS companies are not the most-wise investment. Both FanDuel and DraftKings have yet to turn a profit, despite owning 90% of the DFS industry between them. With ESPN choosing to back DraftKings via a large investment that doubled as an advertising agreement, Yahoo is left with roughly 35% of the fantasy market at their disposal. And it is not just fantasy sports enthusiasts that they can market to. Yahoo is the third largest retailer of online advertisements, behind the behemoth companies of Google and Facebook. DraftKings had to sink $500 million into an advertising with ESPN, and a large portion of that will go towards television. Digital ads offer a much high conversion rate for DFS companies, so Yahoo has already checked off the biggest hurdle on their list.

So where does that leave DFS Golf? Well, for the players, it is a very good thing. Victiv and FantasyAces have both unveiled DFS golf products this year, but neither have the capital to really make a run at DraftKings. With that in mind, if DraftKings was the only game in town, it would be hard pressed for users to expect incentives, especially as the DFS player pool becomes more and more saturated and core strategies shift from marketing to user-experience. While Yahoo has made no public plans for entering the DFS golf market, they will soon be faced with the reality that golf is their biggest and best opportunity to slice out a piece of the DFS pizza pie. They are #1 in terms of providing leagues for fantasy golf, so it is a no-brainer for them to start marketing to the core audience of DFS golf enthusiasts. Either way, another major player that has the ability to offer large guaranteed prizepools, is only a good thing for players.

With this past Monday being the 22nd birthday of golf sensation Jordan Spieth's life, a hot topic around the golf world is the comparison with him and active G.O.A.T, Eldrick Tiger Woods. Both have accomplishments before their 22nd birthdays that most golfers would be happy with over an entire career. The fact that were even comparing Spieth to Woods is an enormous feat in itself, as for most of us, Tiger Woods' early career dominance is unmatched in the sport. I'm 29 years old, and besides Roger Federers' exploits on the tennis court, Woods is the most dominant athlete my eyes have witnessed. What Tiger has turned into the last couple years is hard for myself, and many others to watch, but that doesn't take away from the freight train he was in the late 90's and early 2000's. I'm going to make the case for both golfers and hopefully come to a concise verdict at the end.

The Case for Jordan Spieth

After a successful campaign in 2014 for Spieth that included some success in a couple majors, he has firmly supplanted himself, with Rory McIlroy, as one of the games best young players. It's only natural to start comparing him to some of the all time greats after he took down the Masters and US Open before his 22nd birthday. One area where Spieth actually has Tiger walloped at age 22 is career earnings, and for that, Spieth has Woods to thank. His career on-course earnings to date are 17.4 million dollars! It's insane to try and think how much money he will make over the course of his playing career, but it will be well over 100 million when it's all said and done. In comparison, Tiger had taken home 2.7 million in on-course earnings by his 22nd birthday. The time in between has seen tournament purses and PGA popularity skyrocket, with most credit going to Tiger. Both were ranked #2 in the world, with Woods only 1 point behind then no. 1, Greg Norman. I will give Spieth a slight nod for what he's done against stiffer competition, as Tiger was so far in front talent wise than the golfers he was competing against, and the gap isn't as wide for Spieth right now. Finally, Spieth has a two to one lead in majors on their 22nd birthdays, with his Masters and US Open triumphs earlier this year.

The Case for Tiger Woods

Woods didn't turn pro until the end of 1996, amassing a longer, and much more decorated career as an amateur. I'm going to start there while making my case for Tiger, because what he did as an amateur might never be done again. Before turning pro, he won three straight US Junior Amateur Championships, and is still to this day the only three time winner. He followed that up by attending the University of Stanford and winning three straight US Amateur Championships, becoming the first person ever to accomplish that. By this time, he was already becoming a household name and being touted the games next big thing. Once he turned pro, he won six times, including the Masters, in his first 29 starts on Tour. This is where he really separated himself from Spieth at the same age. Spieth has won five times, including two majors, which is very impressive, but it's taken him 69 professional starts compared to Tigers 29.

The Verdict

I came to the same verdict I had before diving into all the information. Tiger Woods' reign in the late 90's and early 2000's is unmatched at this point, but what Spieth is doing in 2015 makes me think he could change that narrative in the next few years. To do that, he will need to continue winning, and contending in majors, while also racking up wins in other events. I have a feeling this is something we will be doing every year on Spieths' birthday, and just maybe he will start separating himself from the legendary Tiger Woods.