The market expects a birdie fest at Black Desert Resort. The 72 hole winning score is posted at 261.5 on a par 71, roughly 22 under, and the golf course explains why.
Black Desert is a Tom Weiskopf design that only opened in 2023, and its scorecard is unlike anything we have covered this season. The four par 3s average just 175 yards, with two of them under 155, against 226 at East Lake and 209 at Walnut Cove. The eleven par 4s have the widest spread we have seen, running from two realistically drivable holes at 320 and 322 out to 532, 519, 506 and 501. Three par 5s all sit near 590. Matt McCarty holds the course record at 261 from his 2024 win here, and he is in the field.
Four golfers have withdrawn and the ownership snapshot has not caught up, so one of them is still carrying projected ownership on a golfer who is not teeing off. That matters for how you read every ownership number this week, and it is covered below.
Below is the full FTA Sims breakdown for DraftKings and FanDuel: golfer grades built on a price residual model, make cut and finish probabilities, why the course record holder is this week’s trap, where the real leverage sits, and four sample builds.
Bank of Utah Championship DFS Picks and Lineups: 2026
The market expects a birdie fest. The 72 hole winning score is posted at 261.5 on a par 71, which is roughly 22 under, and the golf course explains why. Black Desert is a Tom Weiskopf design that only opened in 2023, and its scorecard is built for scoring in a way none of the venues we have covered this season were.
The Course: Black Desert Resort
Start with the par 3s, because they are the most extreme feature on the card. There are four of them and they average 175 yards, with the 8th at 152 and the 17th at 151. For context, East Lake played its par 3s at an average of 226 yards two months ago and Walnut Cove at 209. These are wedges and short irons, not the long iron tests the playoff venues demanded.
The par 4s run the other way, and their spread is the widest we have seen. Eleven of them, from 320 and 322 yards, both realistically drivable, out to 532, 519, 506 and 501. That is not a course asking one question repeatedly. It is asking a driver-and-wedge question twice, a long-iron question four times, and something in between the rest of the day. The three par 5s all sit near 590, so they are not free, but at this elevation in the southern Utah desert they play shorter than the number.
Matt McCarty holds the course record at 261 from 2024, set when he won here, and he is in this field. Hold that thought, because the model has a strong opinion about him.
How We Graded This Week
Every golfer is measured against what his own salary implies. We fit projection, ceiling, floor and projected ownership against price across the field, then grade on the gap, which keeps the grade tier neutral. Make cut probability is live again, so it is back in the grade.
Four golfers withdrew and the ownership numbers have not caught up. Austin Eckroat, Kyoung-Hoon Lee, Taylor Pendrith and Zach Johnson are all out, and they are removed from every board here. But Eckroat is still carrying 4.87 percent projected ownership in the source data, because the ownership snapshot predates his withdrawal. Roughly one in twenty lineups is on a golfer who is not teeing off, which means everyone else’s real ownership is a little higher than the numbers below.
EAT: What The Model Is Paying For
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own | Own for price | Pts vs price | Make cut |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jackson Koivun | 10,800 | 87.1 | 25.8% | 19.9% | +9.62 | 84.4% |
| Andrew Putnam | 6,600 | 63.7 | 3.4% | 2.4% | +6.94 | 64.8% |
| Matthieu Pavon | 6,700 | 64.0 | 5.6% | 2.9% | +5.89 | 64.1% |
| Paul Peterson | 6,400 | 59.3 | 1.2% | 1.4% | +5.36 | 59.4% |
| A.J. Ewart | 6,700 | 63.2 | 2.7% | 2.9% | +5.09 | 65.0% |
| Zac Blair | 7,000 | 66.6 | 7.6% | 4.4% | +4.69 | 67.9% |
| Hank Lebioda | 6,300 | 57.0 | 1.0% | 0.9% | +4.53 | 56.1% |
| David Lipsky | 6,400 | 58.1 | 0.9% | 1.4% | +4.16 | 57.8% |
| Takumi Kanaya | 6,700 | 61.8 | 2.1% | 2.9% | +3.66 | 62.0% |
Jackson Koivun is the favourite at 12/1 and the model agrees, for the third week running. At 10,800 he projects +9.62 points above his own price curve with a ceiling +9.34 above it and an 84.4 percent make cut number, the best in the field. He is 25.8 percent owned against a 19.9 percent fit, so he is chalk, but he is correctly priced chalk. Fading the best golfer in a weak field to be different is how you lose a cut event.
The Course Record Holder Is The Trap
Matt McCarty shot 261 here in 2024 and he is the single biggest ownership underlay on both sites. He is 5.3 percent owned on DraftKings against a 13.4 percent fit, and 5.1 against 12.8 on FanDuel. On the surface that is exactly the shape of a leverage play: a proven winner at the venue that nobody is on. Then look at the projection column. He is -9.90 points against his price, the worst mark in the field by a distance. The field is not overlooking him. The field has already worked out that 2024 was two years ago, and the model agrees. Low ownership on a golfer the numbers dislike is not leverage, it is consensus.
Where The Actual Leverage Is
Michael Brennan is the second favourite on the betting board at 16/1 and he is 13.4 percent owned against a 17.9 percent fit, so the crowd is underweight on a golfer the model has +1.75 points above his price with a 79.6 percent make cut number. That combination, a short price in the market and ownership below what his salary implies, is the cleanest leverage on the board.
Projected ownership correlates with our projections at 0.45 on DraftKings and 0.57 on FanDuel. That is looser than the playoff weeks, where it ran past 0.90 and there was nothing to attack, but tighter than Biltmore at 0.14. There is leverage here, just less of it than a full field usually offers.
FADE: Popular Beyond The Price
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own | Own for price | Pts vs price | Make cut |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jordan L. Smith | 8,000 | 74.4 | 27.7% | 9.1% | +2.41 | 74.8% |
| Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen | 7,500 | 70.2 | 16.3% | 6.8% | +2.76 | 71.3% |
| Ben Kohles | 7,800 | 72.0 | 14.8% | 8.2% | +1.69 | 73.4% |
| Nick Taylor | 7,800 | 71.5 | 13.3% | 8.2% | +1.21 | 73.4% |
| Kevin Roy | 7,600 | 69.4 | 9.9% | 7.3% | +0.92 | 69.9% |
| Will Gordon | 6,300 | 51.4 | 2.8% | 0.9% | -1.07 | 48.6% |
| Pierceson Coody | 7,700 | 70.0 | 9.4% | 7.7% | +0.60 | 71.0% |
Jordan Smith is the largest overlay on the DraftKings board at 27.7 percent owned against a 9.1 percent fit, more than eighteen points beyond what his salary implies. He is not a bad golfer and he projects +2.41 above his price, but that is a modest edge carrying a very heavy ownership load. You are paying full market rate for a small advantage.
PIVOT: Ceiling The Field Has Not Priced
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own | Own for price | Pts vs price | Make cut |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kris Ventura | 7,400 | 69.3 | 13.5% | 6.3% | +2.90 | 69.5% |
| Luke Clanton | 6,600 | 57.9 | 1.2% | 2.4% | +1.10 | 56.4% |
| Chandler Phillips | 7,200 | 65.2 | 4.3% | 5.4% | +0.90 | 65.3% |
| Ben Silverman | 6,600 | 57.7 | 1.2% | 2.4% | +0.94 | 56.6% |
| Joe Highsmith | 6,400 | 53.9 | 0.7% | 1.4% | +0.02 | 51.4% |
| Isaiah Salinda | 6,700 | 57.3 | 1.3% | 2.9% | -0.79 | 55.2% |
| Davis Riley | 6,300 | 52.7 | 0.7% | 0.9% | +0.25 | 49.6% |
| Sudarshan Yellamaraju | 7,200 | 64.6 | 2.9% | 5.4% | +0.31 | 65.2% |
| John VanDerLaan | 6,800 | 58.6 | 1.6% | 3.4% | -0.78 | 57.9% |
| David Ford | 7,100 | 62.2 | 2.5% | 4.9% | -0.96 | 61.9% |
FanDuel Is Not The Same Board
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own | Own for price | Pts vs price | Make cut |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ben Kohles | 9,200 | 75.2 | 22.8% | 6.7% | +4.28 | 73.4% |
| Jordan L. Smith | 9,800 | 77.9 | 20.7% | 9.4% | +2.43 | 74.8% |
| Zachary Bauchou | 8,900 | 73.0 | 15.5% | 5.5% | +4.66 | 70.8% |
| Jackson Koivun | 12,200 | 92.4 | 31.6% | 22.7% | +9.41 | 84.4% |
| Benjamin James | 11,400 | 87.5 | 25.7% | 17.8% | +5.08 | 81.7% |
| John Parry | 8,800 | 71.5 | 12.9% | 5.1% | +4.16 | 70.0% |
Ben Kohles is the clearest divergence. On FanDuel he is 22.8 percent owned against a 6.7 percent fit, the biggest overlay on either site, and on DraftKings he barely registers. Koivun is also a much heavier concentration on FanDuel at 31.6 percent than his 25.8 on DraftKings. Build them separately.
Lineups
Cash maximises projection at the cap. Tournament builds run the same solver under a cumulative ownership ceiling, 65 percent on DraftKings and 75 percent on FanDuel, set by buying as much differentiation as three percent of projection can pay for.
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own |
|---|---|---|---|
| Benjamin James | 9,900 | 82.8 | 21.1% |
| Maverick McNealy | 9,600 | 82.5 | 26.4% |
| Jordan L. Smith | 8,000 | 74.4 | 27.7% |
| Ben Kohles | 7,800 | 72.0 | 14.8% |
| Kris Ventura | 7,400 | 69.3 | 13.5% |
| Zachary Bauchou | 7,300 | 70.0 | 16.9% |
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own |
|---|---|---|---|
| Matt Wallace | 9,700 | 80.8 | 15.8% |
| Doug Ghim | 9,500 | 79.8 | 17.6% |
| Mac Meissner | 8,600 | 74.1 | 12.2% |
| Chris Kirk | 8,100 | 71.0 | 7.8% |
| John Parry | 7,500 | 68.8 | 8.2% |
| Andrew Putnam | 6,600 | 63.7 | 3.4% |
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jackson Koivun | 12,200 | 92.4 | 31.6% |
| Benjamin James | 11,400 | 87.5 | 25.7% |
| Jordan L. Smith | 9,800 | 77.9 | 20.7% |
| Ben Kohles | 9,200 | 75.2 | 22.8% |
| John Parry | 8,800 | 71.5 | 12.9% |
| Denny McCarthy | 8,600 | 70.0 | 11.1% |
| Golfer | Salary | Proj | Own |
|---|---|---|---|
| Maverick McNealy | 11,600 | 87.1 | 22.1% |
| Matt Wallace | 11,300 | 85.1 | 20.9% |
| Mac Meissner | 10,200 | 77.6 | 12.6% |
| Pierceson Coody | 9,500 | 72.9 | 7.9% |
| Emiliano Grillo | 9,300 | 72.0 | 7.6% |
| Andrew Putnam | 8,100 | 65.7 | 3.6% |
How To Play It
- Birdies, not pars. A posted winning score of 261.5 means survival golf does not win here, and the floor plays you have been rewarded for through the playoffs are the wrong shape this week.
- Short par 3s change who benefits. Four holes averaging 175 yards reward wedge and short iron play, not the long iron specialists East Lake and Bellerive favoured.
- The two drivable par 4s are variance. They widen the gap between a good day and a bad one, which helps tournament builds more than cash.
- The cut is live, so make cut probability is back in the grade after three no cut events where it carried no information at all.
- Check ownership late. Four withdrawals are still holding projected ownership in the source data, so everyone else is a little more owned than the board says.
Projections and projected ownership are FTA projections. Ownership moves all week, so treat the ownership columns as a read on the crowd at the time of writing.