Bets of the Week- Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions and 2021 Official Money Title

Photo courtesy of Ben Harpring

2021 Bets of the Week are hot off the press for the 25 player Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions. It's only been a month since the CME Group Tour Championship, but once again, 25 players will tee it up in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. It is the third time the tournament is hosted concurrently with the LPGA Tour, with Eun Hi Ji winning in 2019 and Gaby Lopez winning in a three-way playoff in 2020.

Usually, I pick five players for this column and allocate 25 units accordingly. Selecting 25% of a field doesn't feel right, so I'm taking three players and betting 15 units for the season's opening event.

Market inefficiencies to focus on are past success at the tournament and starting seasons, along with an incentive to win this week. The tournament is a very relaxed event with celebrities surrounding each player’s group.

However, I’ll still allocate 25 units this week. Bovada has a bet on the 2021 Official Money List leader, and I'm placing two five-unit bets.

An update for the 2021 column- I’m shopping odds from Bovada, MyBookie, and Intertops. Full odds will have them all listed, and each player bet on will have their website with best odds posted.

Mi Jung Hur (+2800) (Bovada)

Hur played three events after the restart in 2020, with the best finish of T20 at the Pelican Women's Championship. Her best tournament was before the pandemic flipped the world upside down was at the 2020 Diamond Resorts Tournament, missing the three-way playoff by a shot. Last year, her strong start was building off a successful 2019 campaign where Hur won two of her final ten starts in Indianapolis and Scotland.

With the time off in Texas, Hur has had the time to find her game.

This bet is also a bit of a value play- on Intertops and MyBookie, Hur is (+2200). Bovada has Hur in a six-way tie for 10th most likely to win this week, with Stacy Lewis, Cheyenne Knight, Brittany Lincicome, and Mel Reid. I’ll take the extra (+600) for the South Korean, in what would be her third victory in her last sixteen starts.

Bet: 5 Units to win 140 units

Celine Boutier (+3000) (MyBookie)

Remember the return of the LPGA Tour after the pandemic? The Drive On Championship at Inverness Club. Danielle Kang marked the triumphant return with a victory but avoided a playoff after Boutier missed a three-footer right to left slider on the last hole. She returned blistering at the start of 2020, with a 9th place finish at the Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions and a 4th place finish at Gainbridge LPGA the following week.

MyBookie provides (+200) better odds for Boutier.

Bet: 5 Units to win 150 units

Sophia Popov (+3500) (MyBookie)

Call this the revenge tour bet for Popov. The AIG Women’s Open Champion felt left out of the CME Group Tour Championship, as she was awarded no points for winning the major because she was not an LPGA Tour member at the time. Popov did not receive one of two sponsor’s exemptions, and the current Florida residence got an extra week to prepare for her first appearance at the tournament of champions. Now with newly minted sponsor AIG on Popov’s hat, her opportunity for revenge is chomping at the bit like a Chain Chomp from Super Mario.

You can get slightly better odds on Popov on Mybookie than elsewhere, as she’s (+3300) at Bovada and Intertops.

Bet: 5 units to win 175 units

5 Unit Bets to Win the LPGA Official Money List

Brooke Henderson (+1200)

Lexi Thompson (+3300)

As detailed on The 9th Tee Podcast episode released today, the main focus for me in this bet is being stateside. The three odds on favorites, Jin Young Ko (+300), Sei Young Kim (+450), and Hyo Joo Kim (+800) are all currently based in South Korea. There's no official word on when any of them will come back to the Tour. Betting on them feels like you're also betting on the Biden Administration increasing the roll-out of the vaccine. The LPGA Tour has done a fantastic job with no on-site positive tests from players, but the Covid-19 pandemic is worse than it's ever been in the United States.

That factor kept Hyo Joo Kim from coming to the United States, as she tore up the KLPGA to the tune of seven top-four finishes, including two wins in fourteen starts. As podcast co-host Ben Harpring noted, it’s plausible that she doesn’t want to come back to the LPGA and enjoyed her time on the KLPGA last year. It’s an awful lot of uncertainty on those three based upon when they decide to return.

Instead, I’m looking at volume starter and winner Brooke Henderson along with consistent stalwart Lexi Thompson. From 2016 to 2019, Henderson finished in the top 10 in official money. She also had the most starts of anyone in the top 10 each of those seasons. That's a trend I'd expect to anew in 2021, including the restart of her multiple win streak that ended after four years in 2020.

Thompson is a value play, as she’s 13th most likely to win yet has averaged 11th over the last six seasons, including the aberration of 26th last year. She made 12 starts last year, her first season without a victory in seven years. A robust regression to the mean allows Thompson to claim her first money title, as she finished in 3rd place in 2017.

Full odds for Diamond Resorts Tournament of Champions

Full Official Money Odds

Jin Young Ko +300

Sei Young Kim +450

Hyo Joo Kim +800

Danielle Kang +1000

Brooke Henderson +1200

Inbee Park +1200

Nelly Korda +1200

So Yeon Ryu +1800

Minjee Lee +2500

Ally Ewing +2800

Lydia Ko +2800

Nasa Hataoka +2800

Lexi Thompson +3300

Amy Olson +4000

Ariya Jutanugarn +4000

Sung Hyun Park +4000

Austin Ernst +5000

Carlota Ciganda +5000

Charley Hull +5000

Jeong Eun 6 Lee +5000

Jessica Korda +5000

A Lim Kim +6600

Georgia Hall +6600

Moriya Jutanugarn +6600

Jennifer Song +8000

Shanshan Feng +8000

Yealimi Noh +8000

Anna Nordqvist +10000

Marina Alex +10000

In Gee Chun +12500

Jodi Ewart Shadoff +12500

Mel Reid +12500

Mina Harigae +12500

Caroline Masson +15000

Cheyenne Knight +15000

Amy Yang +20000

Ashleigh Buhai +20000

Celine Boutier +20000

Gaby Lopez +20000

In Kyung Kim +20000

Jasmine Suwannapura +20000

Jennifer Kupcho +20000

Hannah Green +25000

Lizette Salas +25000

Sophia Popov +25000

Stacy Lewis +25000

Angela Stanford +30000

Chella Choi +40000

Cristie Kerr +40000

2020 Season Results

Units Spent: 350

Units Won: 547.5

ROI: +56.4%