Arnold Palmer Invitational

Arnold Palmer Invitational

It was a poor week for us at the Cognizant Classic with four of our six selections missing the cut. The two that did make the weekend, Max Greyserman and Ryan Gerard then played solidly enough over the final thirty six holes however they couldn’t do enough to make the frame so in the end it was a blank week.

The event itself was won by Joe Highsmith. Having made the cut on the number the left hander produced a superb weekend posting back to back 64s to land his maiden tour title.

On the back of the shock victory for Brian Campbell this was another huge price winner and another reminder not to be afraid to roll the dice on a longshot if you fancy them. You only need one of them a year to land to make your season!

So onwards we go to the second leg of the Florida Swing, The Arnold Palmer Invitational. The API was founded in 1979 as a successor to the Florida Citrus Invitational and since then the event has been played at the Bay Hill Lodge and Country Club.

Since the 2015 edition the winner has been granted a three year exemption on the PGA Tour as opposed to the standard two year exemption players usually receive for a win.

This brings it on a par with the winners of World Golf championships, The Memorial, the Tour Championship and the Genesis Invitational.

This year the event is the fourth of this season’s ‘Signature Events’ and like the previous two there is a limited field of between 70-80 in attendance. The final field will be made up of last seasons top 50, ‘the next ten, the ‘swing five’ and sponsors invitations.

In addition like the last Signature Event, the Genesis Invitational, this week a cut will be in play with the top 50 and those within ten shots of the lead through 36 holes playing the weekend.

The market is headed up by Scottie Scheffler who is followed by Rory McIlroy. This duo are then followed by Ludvig Aberg and the returning Xander Schauffele.

COURSE

Bay Hill is a Wilson & Joe Lees design, which underwent a redesign from Arnold Palmer in 2009.

Bay Hill is a Par 72 playing to just over 7400 yards of the tee. Compared to last week’s venue PGA National there is more room of the tee.

The greens are TiffEagle Bermuda.

With more room of the tee Bay Hill can be seen as a second shot golf course. The rough has been grown up more around the greens over recent years so finding the greens and the right spots on them is important.

 HISTORY

So let’s take a look at the past ten winners;

2024 Scottie Scheffler

2023 Kurt Kitayama

2022 Scottie Scheffler

2021 Bryson Dechambeau

2020 Tyrrell Hatton

2019 Francesco Molinari

2018 Rory McIlroy

2017 Marc Leishman

2016 Jason Day

2015 Matt Every

2014 Matt Every

Looking at this list of winners I have to be honest and say that it is hard to pin down completely an angle as to whether course form or current form has been more of a driver over the years.

Obviously if we take Tiger’s historical wins as an outlier and put them to one side we are left with Hatton, Molinari, McIlroy, Day, Leishman, Every [twice], Dechambeau,  [x2] and Kitayama to look at.

2021 winner Dechambeau had posted just one top 20 in the year, which was in Sentry ToC, while 2020 champion Hatton arrived here having made just one start in the calendar year after returning from a wrist injury. That start had come a fortnight before though in the WGC Mexico where he finished sixth so he should have arrived in a positive mindset.

Molinari had only made two starts on the year prior to his victory, however again a couple of weeks before he had finished an eye catching 17^th at the WGC Mexico. In addition he was seen as something of a course specialist posting three top ten finishes and nothing worse than 34^th place in his six previous starts here. This could also be said for Dechambeau who had notched two top fives here in four previous starts.

2018 winner Rory McIlroy was in no real forming coming in last year but had finished 4^th here the year before, his best result in Orlando.

In essence though he is of course simply a world class act who can find his best at any given moment.

The same can be said for Jason Day who hadn’t done much here prior to his win, nor was he in great touch leading in in 2016, his year of victory.

Leishman had nothing particularly in his course or current form leading in to telegraph his win…and then of course there is Matt Every….

The year Matt first won in 2014 a case could certainly have been made for him as he had posted two top 10s in his previous three starts including an 8^th place finish the week before at the Valspar.

In addition Every is of course a Florida guy through and through and had played steadily here over the previous two years.

The following year though when Matt defended, other than the fact that we had the course form to go on, it was impossible to make a case for him as his best finish all season prior to his defence was a 27^th in the limited field, year opening, Tournament of Champions!

In 2022 Scheffler arrived here in the early stages of his heater that would see him go on to triumph both in the Matchplay and of course at Augusta over the forthcoming weeks, at this stage though he had landed his maiden tour title at Phoenix two starts ago and followed it up with a seventh place at Riviera so clearly he was on the crest of a wave. With regards to course form though he had made just one previous start at Bay Hill in 2020 when he finished 15^th.

Meanwhile having been in superb form in the run last year and as a former champion here his win was as obvious as it comes.

Kitayama won here on the back of nothing better than 23^rd in five starts on tour that year and on his debut in the event so well done if you picked him coming in to that week!

As you can see then a bit of mixed bag with no specific pointer.

What has historically struck me here though looking at the list of past winners is that the event as a whole clearly favours aggressive players who can take advantage of the par 5s and this is backed up by the fact that par 5 scoring has historically been a key statistic here.

The 2019 winner Molinari broke this mould as he would hardly be seen as an ‘aggressive type’ in the vein of a Dechambeau, Woods, McIlroy, Day etc and he was only -3 for the week on the par 5s and it could be that thicker rough than usual was responsible for this.

2020 winner Hatton though as most will remember triumphed here in conditions that due to a combination of wind, thick rough if you missed the fairways and firm greens, which were brutal, bordering unplayable over the weekend and his winning score of 4- under saw him be one of only four players to finish under par. Look behind that though and the Englishman who ranked tenth on the PGA Tour last season in par five scoring finished the week 6- under for the par fives so it is clear to see where his score was predominantly made.

In 2022 Scheffler made hay on the par fives playing them in 11- under through the week while being a combined 6+ over for the par three’s and four’s to tally his over 5- under winning total. This again tied in with the Texan’s season long par five scoring average which saw him fifth in this department.

Last year though it must be said other than on day one Kitayama struggled on the par fives playing -3 on the first day but level on them for the rest of the week.

One streak that was broken by Scheffler in 2022 is that prior to his win every one of the winners here since Ernie Els in 2010 had played in the event the previous year to their victory and made the cut. This trend was again broken by Kitayama last year who as noted earlier was making his debut in the event.

In addition, with the exception of Laird who finished 74^th the year prior to his success, none of those eight previous winners in the past ten years had finished worse than 34^th twelve months prior, while the last seven had all finished in the top 30 the year before, with the five winners prior to Hatton who finished 29^th had all finished top 20.

Scheffler though bucked this trend simply because he didn’t tee it up here in 2021, however perhaps more pertinently in his previous start to his win here, which was in 2020 he finished 15^th so the hint of his suitability to the track was there.

Returning to the list of winners and the other thing it is impossible to not pick up on is that of the last 15 editions [if you include Els in 2010] only eight of them have been won by American’s with Every, Woods and Scheffler accounting for four of these in addition to Dechambeau and Kitayama.

In simple terms then allowing for the fact that Tiger won here in 2008 and 2009, whilst Singh and Pampling were victorious in the previous two years, outside of Tiger, Kitayama, Scheffler, Dechambeau and Every are the only Americans to win here since Kenny Perry in 2005. Quite a stat!

From a correlating course point of view the obvious reference to me are the other big boy par 72/71 tracks such as Muirfield Village home of the Memorial and Quail Hollow while also of course general form on the Bermuda in Florida is always a good pointer.

Finally the winning score over the years has varied somewhat dependent on the level of rough and also, as is always the case in Florida, the weather.

In 2021 Dechambau posted -11 however as noted earlier conditions transpired to make the event play incredibly tough in 2020 with Hatton triumphing on -4 and it was a similar story in 2022 with Scheffler grinding out a winning score of 5- under. In 2023 things played  a fraction easier with Kitayama posting 9- under while last year things were easier again with Scheffler posting 15- under. It should be noted though he finished five shots clear of the second man home Wyndham Clark who was the only other player to finish double digits under par.

In 2019 Molinari posted a -12 total to take home the trophy while the previous year McIlroy posted -18.

Prior to that the winning total had varied from -11 to -19 over the recent years.

WEATHER FORECAST

We look set for a week of temperatures of around the high 70s to low 80s. While sunshine will prevail as a whole as is often the case in Florida we can’t rule out the chance of a storm, particularly on Saturday.

Wind, which has certainly played its part over recent years in bringing tough conditions, looks like it could well be a factor this week with gusts of 20mp+ in the forecast for the first three days in particular.

As I always so though, this could all change!

PICKS

I have gone with five players this week as follows;

WYNDHAM CLARK –  55/1 – 1pt E/W - 1/5 odds 1st 7 - FINISHED 22nd 

I will start this week with a player I was on here last year, Wyndham Clark.

Clark’s record at Bay Hill was nothing to get excited about prior to his visit here last year however I was convinced that the layout should be ideal for him and while he was a distant second to Scottie Scheffler he certainly rewarded our confidence.

Longer off the tee than average Clark scores strongly on the par fives while he is also renowned for strength on the greens when on song so he really is the ideal prototype for the test here.

In addition having landed his maiden tour title at Quail Hollow and of course having bagged a US Open trophy he has correlating course form and performs strongly on tough scoring ‘big boy’ courses.

Wyndham arrived here last year having already bagged a trophy at Pebble Beach, however this year he is yet to get out of second gear. That said two starts ago in Phoenix he opened with a 64 and although he struggled to follow that up on Friday he was solid over the weekend finishing 17^th. Granted he finished mid division next time out at Torrey Pines, however that 31^st place finish was actually his best at that venue so positives can be taken.

A player who is certainly not afraid to win, nor in this company I am always happy to chance Clark on a layout that I believe suits him and I am keen to have him onside here.

SAHITH THEEGALA  100/1 - 1pt E/W - 1/5 odds 1st 7 - FINISHED MC

In a team, which I will admit has a degree of speculation in it I will next take a chance that Sahith Theegala turned a corner last time out at Torrey Pines.

Rather like our first pick Clark, Sahith has struggled to get out of third gear so far this year, all the more disappointing as you can normally rely on him to produce some strong results in his home state of California.

A look at Theegala’s stats in 2025 so far show us what the problem is as he currently ranks 116^th both off the tee and in approach play, compared to last seasons final rankings of 28^th and 44^th respectively.

Back to last time out at Torrey Pines though and after just sneaking in to the weekend Sahith produced a really eye catching final 36 holes posting 69 & 68 to move himself up to 17^th place in the final standings. Furthermore Saturday saw him rank second on the day in approach play.

A look at Theegala’s three visits to Bay Hill to date give us plenty of cause for encouragement as after missing the cut on debut in 2022 he has gone on to finish 14^th and then sixth last year in his most recent visit. We can then take further positives from the fact that he has posted finishes of sixth and 12^th in two of his three visits to the correlating Muirfield Village while a top ten on his debut at Augusta also sits very nicely here.

As noted earlier Theegala is yet to really get going this year with his 17^th last time out his first top 20 of the campaign, however that is very much factored in to his odds and I am happy to take the leap of faith that he can build on that performance and get his year fully up and running this week.

PATRICK RODGERS -  100/1 - 1pt E/W - 1/6 odds 1st 7

Next up and having been kicking myself for not having put up Patrick Rodgers at Torrey Pines recently I am not going to make the same mistake and ignore him this week on another layout, which is on paper ideal for his game.

Patrick arrives at Bay Hill for his ninth straight start and admittedly that is a cause for slight concern, that said he has been known to go on long runs like this before so he is obviously comfortable playing many weeks in a row.

More pertinently then and having struggled to really get going on his first four starts of the year the third place at the Genesis seems to have sparked him in to life as he has followed that up with two further top 25 finishes including 18^th at PGA National last weekend.

Looking at that most recent effort and while 18^th is nothing spectacular that represented Patrick’s best ever finish in nine attempts on the layout, so clearly it is not a course that particularly suits him.

Looking at Rodgers’ record at Bay Hill and while it is nothing hugely special he does have a seventh place finish here to his name. In addition if we delve back in to Patrick’s CV we have some big performances at Quail Hollow and Muirfield Village, which as we know sit well here.

I’ll take my chances once more at juicy each way odds then that Patrick can produce a similar performance to his recent one at Torrey Pines and at least make the frame.

STEPHAN JAEGER -  125/1 - 1pt E/W - 1/5 odds 1st 7 - FINISHED MC

Next up I am going to take a chance on Stephan Jaeger.

Jaeger landed his maiden PGA Tour title last year in Texas when he memorably saw off Scottie Scheffler.

On to 2025 and Jaeger has started the year strongly notching two top tens in six starts including sixth last time out in Mexico.

A prolific winner in his day on the Korn Ferry Tour there is no doubt that it took Stephan a while to work out life on the PGA Tour and to land his first win, however he seems now to be very comfortable in the big league.

Looking at Jaeger’s record at Bay Hill and while a best of 44^th in two visits doesn’t do much to get our hopes up if we look at that performance last year we will see that he started strongly to sit 5- under through 36 holes before fading over the weekend. A more confident player now though I would expect him to build on that kind of start. Furthermore we can take encouragement from a strong effort at Muirfield Village in 2023, which saw him well positioned after 54 holes while he was sixth at Quail Hollow the previous year.

Jaeger to me is a player who looks ready to take the next step and feature prominently in the bigger events and I am happy to chance him to do that this week.

ADAM HADWIN – 175/1 - 1pt e/w 1/5 odds 1^st 8. - FINISHED 45th

Finally this week I shall take what is undoubtedly a flyer on Adam Hadwin.

A look at the Canadians results over the past couple of seasons will tell you that the one thing you cannot accuse him of being is a model of consistency. Basically Adam’s modus operandi is to play poorly for a few weeks, miss a few cuts and then pop up with a big finish.

While undoubtedly then there is every possibility this turns out to be one of those poor weeks, for a player who has ten top ten finishes on tour in the last two and a bit seasons I am happy to roll the dice at the odds.

Moving on then and if we look at where Adam has produced the goods over the past 12 months and things get more interesting, as what is noticeable is that he is more than capable of mixing it with the game’s biggest names on tougher tests. This can be seen by the fact that he was fourth at Riviera and, even more pertinently for this week, third at the Memorial last year, both of course Signature Events.

From a course form point of view unsurprisingly Adam’s record at Bay Hill is patchy however he does have a best of sixth place here in 2017 so we know he can handle the track, meanwhile again while 2025 has been up and down to date he has already notched a top ten in Phoenix.

Last time out Hadwin struggled at the Genesis, however Torrey Pines is not a venue that he has ever played particularly well at with only one top 20 in nine visits. As a whole though the Canadian plays tough courses well, something he showed again when seventh at the US Open in 2022, and I am happy to chance him at juicy odds this week.