With a WGC event on the horizon and three straight high-octane events, quite a few players are taking this week off as the Honda Classic takes place at PGA National. This event is here for the 15th time on the Champion Course in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. This will end the Florida swing, as the golfers won’t be back until the Valspar Championship at Innisbrook in early May.

Coming out of the WGC, two Invitational tournaments, and then the PLAYERS Championship, the PGA Tour’s signature event, some strong players are at the top of the board, but the overall strength of this field is quite a bit lower with the Dell Match Play next week and The Masters just two weeks after that.

We’ll break this one down for you with the odds from BetAnySports.eu down at the bottom of the page.

The Field

Daniel Berger and reigning champion Sungjae Im headline this week’s field. Lee Westwood will give it another go after playing a round at Augusta National with his son on Monday to decompress from what happened last week at the PLAYERS Championship when he came up one shot shy of Justin Thomas. Joaquin Niemann is also on hand, along with Brian Harman and Talor Gooch, who both had strong showings at TPC Sawgrass.

To give you an idea of where this field stands, though, Adam Scott is +2500. Rickie Fowler is down at +4500. This is not a heavy field at all. It’s a good time to go price hunting for sure. I hate to harp on who isn’t here when there are a lot of good players that are on hand, but this field is lacking top-end talent to say the least.

Per BAS, Berger is the +1100 favorite, followed by Im at +1200, Westwood at +1800, Niemann at +2000, Scott at +2500, Harman at +2800, Shane Lowry, who also played well last week, at +2800, Gooch and Russell Henley at +3000, and Chris Kirk at +3500.

Course Profile

PGA National is a par 70 that comes in at 7,125 yards. The Bear Trap is what this course is known for with lots of water in play on holes 15 through 17. Wind can be a huge issue on this course because there are not a lot of trees to obstruct the breeze. Club selection is really important, just as we saw on Sunday’s final round at Sawgrass when the winds picked up.

Aggression can be really punished here. Players tend to be a little bit risk-averse off of the tee, going with long irons and fairway metals over the driver. Getting in trouble and having to scramble when par is a good score can be challenging.

How tough is scoring on this course? Rickie Fowler, Rory McIlroy, and Camilo Villegas are the only players to win with a score of at least 10-under par. When Im won last year, he was just 6-under. The winning score is typically around 8 or 9-under. There are only two par 5s and some big par 4s.

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Yay or Neigh?

This is our Horse for Course section. The players that have played well here are guys that have been in good form because this is a very hard course to consistently score well at for a variety of reasons.

Several recent winners are in the field. Im is the reigning champ. Keith Mitchell won in 2019. Fowler won in 2017. Scott in 2016. Padraig Harrington won in 2015. Russell Henley won in 2014. Michael Thompson won back in 2013. Rory Sabbatini is here again and he won in 2012. So is Villegas with his 2011 win.

The problem is that virtually none of those guys are in great current form. Henley was eighth here for his third straight top-25 finish, but he has been 30th or lower in his last four events. Im is in the best shape of past winners, but that’s why he’s second on the board at +1200. Fowler missed the cut last year and also last week, but was second two years ago. He has three top-10 finishes here lifetime.

Westwood was fourth here last year and has racked up back-to-back runner-up finishes, hence the low price at +1800. Scott has three top-15 finishes to go with his lone win here.

If Westwood has turned back the clock, maybe Luke Donald can do the same. He was 11th here last year and has several top-10 finishes in the past. Speaking of older dudes, Graeme McDowell has four top-10 finishes and a 14th in his career. Charl Schwartzel has been 17th and 16th the last two years to go along with top 10s in 2013 and 2012.

Outside of the guys with a win or a lot of high finishes here, Wyndham Clark has been 11th and seventh the last two years. Byeong Hun An has a couple of top-five finishes over the last three years. Berger was fourth last year and second back in 2015. Luke List has a couple of top-10 finishes, but has missed the last two cuts.

Handicap & Picks

The shortest price on my list this week is going to be Brendan Steele at +4000. Steele has made seven cuts in a row overall and was fourth in The Honda Classic last year. He had three straight top-15 finishes from 2015-17. He was seventh in SG: Tee-to-Green here last season.

Matthew NeSmith is +9000. He’s tied for second in ball striking among the players in this field. He was in a great form cycle for a seventh, 16th, and 20th recently, but has missed two straight cuts. He was 38th in his first career start here. This is a good price on a ball striker and we’ve seen how well ball strikers do in Florida with the most recent winners.

One thing I would look to do here is fade Lee Westwood in matchups. Westwood spoke about being tired for the final round in his post-tournament media scrum. I’m a little surprised he isn’t skipping this event, but he’s in the field for now. He’s 47 and the Florida sun can be a lot. He’s been in the thick of two straight events on tough courses and he really sprayed the ball around on Sunday. He’s a fade guy for me.

Coverage of The Honda Classic will be on Golf Channel and NBC.

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ODDS FOR THE 2021 HONDA CLASSIC PER BETANYSPORTS

Daniel Berger +1100
Sungjae Im +1200
Lee Westwood +1800
Joaquin Niemann +2000
Adam Scott +2500
Brian Harman +2800
Shane Lowry +2800
Talor Gooch +3000
Russell Henley +3000
Chris Kirk +3500
Cameron Davis +4000
Gary Woodland +4000
Brendan Steele +4000
Cameron Tringale +4500
Rickie Fowler +4500
Sam Burns +4500
Martin Kaymer +5000
Doug Ghim +5000
Dylan Frittelli +5000
Keegan Bradley +5000
Matt Wallace +5500
Wyndham Clark +5500
Mackenzie Hughes +6000
Byeong Hun An +6000
Brandon Wu +6000
Alex Noren +6000
Jhonattan Vegas +6600
Russell Knox +6600
J.T. Poston +6600
Ian Poulter +6600
Luke List +7000
Kevin Streelman +7000
Aaron Wise +7000
Adam Hadwin +7000
Keith Mitchell +8000
Harold Varner III +8000
Erik Van Rooyen +8000
Matt Jones +8000
Zach Johnson +8000
Richy Werenski +8000
Michael Thompson +8000
Patton Kizzire +8000
Phil Mickelson +8000
Lucas Glover +9000
Henrik Norlander +9000
James Hahn +9000
Ryan Moore +9000
Kyoung-Hoon Lee +9000
Matthew NeSmith +9000
Lucas Herbert +9000
John Huh +9000
Adam Long +10000
Chez Reavie +10000
Maverick McNealy +10000
Tom Hoge +10000
Rafa Cabrera-Bello +10000
Patrick Rodgers +10000
Will Gordon +10000
Rory Sabbatini +10000
Wesley Bryan +11000
Nick Taylor +11000
Tom Lewis +11000
Mark Hubbard +11000
Charl Schwartzel +11000
Jim Furyk +11000
Ted Potter, Jr. +12500
Cameron Percy +12500
Grayson Murray +12500
Doc Redman +12500
Henrik Stenson +12500
Steve Stricker +12500
Nate Lashley +12500
Bronson Burgoon +14000
Peter Malnati +14000
Scott Piercy +14000
Sepp Straka +15000
Rafael Campos +15000
Padraig Harrington +15000
Pat Perez +15000
Rob Oppenheim +15000
Denny McCarthy +15000
Harry Higgs +15000
Kristoffer Ventura +15000
Adam Schenk +15000
Brian Stuard +16000
Kramer Hickok +16000
J.B. Holmes +16000
Chesson Hadley +16000
Graeme McDowell +16000
Roger Sloan +17500
C.T. Pan +17500
Jason Dufner +17500
Brice Garnett +17500
Bo Hoag +17500
Robby Shelton +17500
Ryan Armour +17500
Stewart Cink +17500
Scott Stallings +17500
Scott Brown +17500
Vaughn Taylor +17500
Sung Kang +20000
Tyler McCumber +20000
Sam Ryder +20000
Austin Cook +20000
Jamie Lovemark +20000
Hudson Swafford +20000
Chase Seiffert +20000
Kevin Chappell +22500
Andrew Landry +22500
Anirban Lahiri +22500
Tyler Duncan +22500
Scott Harrington +25000
Sean O’Hair +25000
Luke Donald +25000
Beau Hossler +25000
Brian Gay +25000
Jimmy Walker +25000
Troy Merritt +27500
Camilo Villegas +27500
Robert Streb +27500
Satoshi Kodaira +30000
Vijay Singh +30000
Xinjun Zhang +35000
Ryo Ishikawa +35000
Michael Gligic +35000
Jim Herman +35000
Kelly Kraft +35000
David Hearn +35000
Hank Lebioda +40000
Michael Kim +40000
K.J. Choi +40000
Bo Van Pelt +40000
William McGirt +40000
Seung-Yul Noh +50000
Vincent Whaley +60000
Chase Koepka +60000
Hunter Mahan +75000
Kamaiu Johnson +100000
Alan Morin +100000
Martin Trainer +100000