Waste Management Phoenix Open One And Done Pick Strategy (2024)

The 2024 Waste Management Phoenix Open has defending champ Scottie Scheffler plus a deep field of players to consider for One and Done.

The PGA Tour moves from California to Arizona this week for the Waste Management Phoenix Open. Last year, this event was among what are now called the Signature Events, with a first place prize of $3.6 million. That has changed, though, this year, and it is a standard event, with a total purse of $8.8 million, and a first-place prize of $1,584,000.

If you want to see where this tournament ranks in your specific One And Done pool, you can set up your pool entry in our One And Done Golf product.

Last Week

The string of longer shots winning extended for another week, and this time under really unusual circumstances. Last year’s U.S. Open champ Wyndham Clark set a course record by shooting 60 in the third round on Saturday, and leapfrogging around a large group of golfers who were above him on the leaderboard entering the round. Then, severe weather canceled the final round, and Clark was declared the champion after the event was shortened to 54 holes.

We did not have Clark, who was +7500 to win, 26th-highest for the week, among our top recommendations. (In a sampling of One And Done Pools, he was picked by less than 0.4% of entries last week.) Among those top six recommendations across most pools, four finished inside the top 15: Ludvig Aberg (2nd), Justin Thomas (6th), Patrick Cantlay (11th), and Collin Morikawa (14th). Jordan Spieth and Max Homa were the two that finished lower.

2024 Phoenix Open Field Overview

This analysis serves as a compliment to the data we provide in our Data Grid once you set up your One And Done Golf Picks entry, where you can get customized pick grading based on things like the number of picks you need each week, and the number of tournaments used in your pool.

Here are some notable highlights for the Pebble Beach field:

• Only two golfers inside our top 15 are playing in this event: Scottie Scheffler, returning as defending champion, and Max Homa.
• Wyndham Clark, fresh off his Pebble Beach win, is the third-highest rated golfer after his ranking improved with his most recent results included.
• While most of the top-ranked golfers are sitting this out, it’s heavily represented with good golfers that should be a big part of your One And Done selections over the course of a full season, as 15 of the 18 golfers ranked between No. 16 and No. 33 are playing this week.

2024 Phoenix Open One And Done Pick Strategy

Scheffler is the Favorite, But You Probably Should Save

It’s going to be really tempting to pick Scottie Scheffler this week. He’s got the shortest winner odds we have seen in any event so far this year (+500). He has won this event each of the last two seasons in Scottsdale, playing in front of the raucous Phoenix Open crowds.

The difference, though, is that the Phoenix Open does not have the same elevated purse status that it did in 2023. A win here is only worth just under $1.6 million, compared to the $3.6 million or more that other Signature Events and Majors could bring in.

Basically, if you pick Scheffler, he (a) needs to win the Phoenix Open again this year, and (b) have only a very small percentage of your pool opponents pick him in a week where he finishes 1st or 2nd in a Major or Signature Event. With about 13 of those events remaining, and Scheffler one of the top contenders in each, that’s a pretty thin bet.

You can justify it more in a really small pool, where your opponents might not pick Scheffler in the right big money week(s) at all, but in a pool of any size, you are likely giving away points to enough of the field that it is a strategic error.

Justin Thomas: Top Play, But Likely Popular

Justin Thomas had a rough 2023, missing out on the FedEx playoffs, where he missed the cut in five of seven events in June and July. (Those results are impacting why he’s still only 30th in our golfer ratings.) He’s been in good form, though, recently, finished third at the Hero World Challenge in December, and finishing top 10 in both events he has played in 2024.

He also has excellent history at the Phoenix Open, with three different top fives, and no finish below 13th in the last five years.

Thomas is second in the betting market win odds, behind only Scheffler. All of that makes him a very good option, to ride his current form. It also, though, makes it highly likely that he will be a very popular pick this week. (Recent top 10 finishes and top finishes at the same event tend to be predictive of popularity.)

It’s early in the season to be worrying too heavily about uniqueness versus making the best plays, but it should at least be in the back of mind now. If you are playing multiple One and Done entries across different pools (or in the same pool), the best strategy here might be to use Thomas on your entry that ranks best in the standings so far (so if he hits, you are blocking/maintaining a lead over several other entries), and use other golfers on those ranking lower.

Lots of Other Options Among the Top 30 Golfers

The Phoenix Open may not have many of the golfers ranked in the Top 10, but it is a deep field full of options for One And Done. Given the relative purse size, the ideal targets are the guys that you will definitely want to use at some point in a One and Done season, but are fine using now rather than in a Signature Event. Among the guys ranked outside of the Top 15 of our overall rankings, here are the ones (other than Thomas) with the best win odds this week.

• Jordan Spieth (No. 25, +1800)
• Sam Burns (No. 23, +2000)
• Wyndham Clark (No. 16, +2500)
• Byeong-Hun An (No. 33, +2800)
• Min Woo Lee (No. 27, +3000)
• Sungjae Im (No. 23, +3300)
• Matt Fitzpatrick (No. 21, +3300)
• J.T. Poston (No. 17, +3300)
• Sahith Theegala (No. 30, +3500)

Longer Shots

We’ve seen some real long shots win early this season. While U.S. Open champ Wyndham Clark may not have been quite as big a longshot last week, he was still outside the top 20 entering the tournament.

Here are the longer shots picks for this week:

• Hideki Matsuyama (+4000)
• Shane Lowry (+6000)
• Erik Van Rooyen (+7500)

2024 Phoenix Open One And Done Picks

Here are our highest graded picks for the Waste Management Phoenix Open in One and Done pools (in a sample single-pick pool using all tournaments through the BMW Championship) as of Tuesday afternoon. However, the odds can and do change, so check back to our One And Done product up until your pick deadline to see the latest rankings. Your individual pool may also differ slightly in the specific golfers, based on how many tournaments you use and how many picks you need to make in the pool, as well as by who you have already used.

• Justin Thomas
• Jordan Spieth
• Sam Burns
• Byeong-Hun An
• Min Woo Lee
• Sungjae Im