US Open Longshots 2024

If there’s one thing that we’ve learnt about Akshay Bhatia since he started playing on the PGA Tour full time last year, it’s that he’s the type of player who can quickly turn poor form into winning form.

Take the early part of last summer for instance. Finishes of 43/56/MC/68/MC suggested little in the way of form, before he went to the John Deere Classic where a much-improved ball-striking week saw him tie for 35^th. 9^th the week after at the Barbasol was fuelled by a stronger putting week, and he then put it all together 7 days later to win the Barracuda Championship and break through at the top level.

It should have been no massive surprise then when he turned a run of 3 missed cuts in February and March of this year into an improved 17^th at the Valspar Championship, 11^th at the Houston Open and then a second PGA Tour title at the Texas Open.

After another quiet period, the 22 year-old arrives here having broken a pair of Missed Cuts with 60^th in Canada, followed by a much improved 22^nd last week at Muirfield Village, having sat in 7^th place heading into the weekend. 1^st for SG Off the Tee last week at the Memorial is an eye-catching stat ahead of a week that’s going to ask an awful lot of questions with the driver, and he backed that up with traditional stats of 8^th for Driving Accuracy, 11^th for GIR and 5^th for Total Driving.

The Californian is still at an early stage in terms of his Majors career, however a personal best of 35^th at this year’s Masters is a solid enough foundation, particularly when you consider he’d won the weekend before. With Bhatia’s stock on the rise once again and his long game back on song, I’ll take a chance on him recording a big Major personal best here this week and sneak into the each-way paying places for us. RESULT: T16

There’s undoubtedly some common ground between Pinehurst and the home of golf, St Andrews.

Now the style of course is undoubtedly different and there are plenty of miles between North Carolina and Scotland, nevertheless plenty of connections have been made between the two properties over the years. For instance, Donald Ross spent his apprentice year at St Andrews in the 1890s before eventually designing 4 courses at Pinehurst, including No.2 which is of course this week’s task.

From a betting perspective, perhaps there’s a little more substance to this than just a romantic notion linking two iconic courses. 2005 US Open champion Michael Campbell’s two best Open Championship finishes, 3^rd and 5^th, both came on the Old Course, and runner-up Tiger Woods won the 2000 and 2005 Open Championships there as we well know. 2014 Pinehurst winner Martin Kaymer’s best Open Championship result was 7^th at the 2010 Open at St Andrews, and the German went on to win the Alfred Dunhill Links there later that same year.

Perhaps it’s all a little tenuous or maybe not, however having a St Andrews winner on the team doesn’t seem a bad move to me and in Victor Perez we’re also getting someone who’s flashed some decent form in the recent past to boot.

The Frenchman, who lives in Dundee nowadays, got his DP World Tour breakthrough at the Dunhill Links back in 2019, and has since gone on to win the KLM Open and Abu Dhabi Championship, accolades also both shared with Martin Kaymer albeit on different courses.

When at his best the 31 year-old is an excellent ball-striker with a strong iron game, and we’ve seen evidence of increasing form with his approach play over the past 3 weeks with SG Approach ranks of 10^th, 9^th and 7^th at Colonial, Hamilton, and at Muirfield Village last week, with 12^th overall last week impressing at Signature level.

Like Bhatia, it will need to be a personal best for Perez to reward each-way backers this week, however 12^th at last year’s PGA Championship shows increasing comfort at this most elite of levels. RESULT: MC

Finally I’ll take a chance on talented Spaniard David Puig who cut college short to join LIV Golf back in 2022.

The talent-spotters on the LIV circuit had clearly been doing their homework with the then Arizona State student, who has gone on to win twice on the Asian Tour in Singapore last October and in Malaysia this February, as well recording 3 further top-10 finishes on his excursions outside of LIV in 2024.

5^th at Valderrama, which is another challenging course with very small target areas for approach shots, caught the eye from his LIV efforts last year, and 3^rd last week at LIV Houston is his best result on that circuit since finishing in the same position at LIV Greenbrier last August, so he enters this week with some momentum in his game.

One of the longest hitters on the LIV and Asian Tour circuits, that power showed enough control last week – 9^th for Driving Accuracy – for the 22 year-old to rank 2^nd for Total Driving, a statistic which gives us some hope that he can take to Pinehurst No.2 on his debut, plus he regularly backs his long game up with some strong performances on the greens too.

Three times in his last ten starts David has topped the putting average stats on the week, either on the Asian or LIV Tour that he’s been competing in, and although like my other two selections he’s pretty inexperienced at Major level, his best finish came in this event last year at LACC when he snuck inside the top 40.

A year further on and with 2 wins under his belt, Puig could be a different prospect this week as he continues his quest to accumulate enough OWGR points away from the LIV circuit to give him the opportunity to represent Spain at this year’s Olympics. RESULT: T55