The Championship Course at PGA National in Palm Beach, Florida is regularly one of the toughest on tour, but this year its teeth appear extra sharp with strong winds and firm, fast greens awaiting an incredibly depleted field tonight. 

The saying ‘avoid it like the plague’ may soon be changed to ‘avoid it like the Honda Classic’, with pre-tournament favourite Daniel Berger joining a large list of withdrawals from an already out of favour tournament that's been shoehorned between The Players and the WGC Matchplay events. 

Unlike the last few weeks at Sawgrass or Bay Hill, the cream is unlikely to remain at the top for all four rounds at this tricky Par 70 track which regularly sees a +4 cut line come Friday afternoon and huge fluctuations in-round with players finding water or trouble or both. 

It's likely to be even more the case this year with some proper 30km/hour winds forecast for all of Day 1. 

The field, course and conditions are pretty unique this week – so after playing around with Stats Insider’s Tournament Futures and Player Rankings pages, I’ve landed on a few that stick out and come up with a new strategy to attack this tournament.  

PGA National (Championship Course)

A short Par 70 with Bermuda greens, PGA National features a lot of water and can be heavily impacted by wind, which is the conditions we will be getting all week but especially Round 1. 

With just two Par 5’s, both of which you must birdie, it’s a real grind and anything under Par first up will be inside the Top 20. 

In terms of waves, the first 1-2 hours tonight looks like it will be significantly less wind, but when that wind kicks up is anyone’s guess so the advantage may only be 3-4 holes. 

Still, if you are off the 1^st early, you have the easiest 4-hole stretch in the easiest wind, or if off 10^th you get a really hard 4-hole stretch in the best conditions and you may even see the back of the Bear Trap before the wind really kicks up, so I’m looking at those early tee times with a lot of interest. 

Adam Scott Outright - $10 @ 31.00 

One of only two outright bets for the event, we missed the 36 early but got Scotty at 31’s. He is now down to 26-1 thanks mostly to Berger’s WD. 

Scott’s last five years here have read 12/1/14/13/MC, so we can be confident he likes the course. He has no issues in wind either and is going off early and off 10 which are big ticks. 

The putter has been very good (for Scotty at least) gaining over 2 strokes on the field in his last four events.

Now, to the problem, and the reason he is 30’s, and not 10-1, is that Scott's lost over FIVE shots off the tee in consecutive events, something he's never (ever) done in his entire career. 

That’s right, since 2004 Adam Scott has not lost 5 strokes off the tee back to back, until last week, so while some see that as a big problem, I’m viewing it as an anomaly to be largely disregarded.

The irons are being impacted by this poor driving, but I’m not too worried. This is a club-down course, so Scotty will only need to pull his wayward driver on 4-5 holes each round, and you have to think he has been working on it this week. 

Ridiculous price even at the shorter 26-1 odds for easily the best player in this field. 

Robby Shelton $5EW @ 200/40 (Top 5)

Finished T11 here last year in what was his first look at this track and has the pedigree to go better this time round. 

The golf world loves Doug Ghim at the moment who is at a stupidly short 56-1, and it is being very over-looked that Shelton is a better golfer, one which may be about to spike a tournament.

The putter caught fire at Sawgrass last week (gained 5.4 strokes in 2 rounds) and his T2G game was not as bad as his missed cut would have it appear. He shot -1 71 on Friday which is very encouraging. 

He is off late and his form in wind so far has been poor which I don’t love, but he was not that far from Scheffler, Wolff, Morikawa and co prior to coming on Tour. He is a birdie machine when on, and in this field, he can spike one at great odds I think. 

First Round Leader Bets $5 EW

• Adam Scott @ 34
• Shane Lowry @ 31
• Wyndham Clark @ 61
• Matt Jones @ 67

The clear best conditions are early so I’m taking four golfers from the first five tee times and hoping those early guys get a 1-2 shot advantage when it's all said and done after the opening round. 

Two front nine at longer odds in Clark and Jones in case the wind gets up after the first hour, and two better players off the 10^th in case the can make it through that horror ‘Bear Trap’ stretch prior to the wind going nuts (a huge advantage potentially). 

This event is one of the best of the entire season to bet after the opening round, so the best thing we can do is sit back, watch as much golf as possible, and use that information to find a few guys who aren’t too far back that the books have written off. 

I’ll definitely be making another 1-2 Outright selections after the opening round so keep a watch on the Club 20 Twitter feed to see who I’ve spied, and also, because I clearly need all the help I can get, by all means tweet through who you like the look of in the opening round. 

Remember, +5 could make the weekend in Florida this week.

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