Pebble Beach Pro-Am Preview: Insights and Top Betting Picks
This week marks the first signature event of the season with the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am taking place on the Monterey Peninsula, two hours north of San Francisco. Weather can be an issue this time of year and we saw that last season when the event was shortened to 54 holes with Wyndham Clark winning by one shot over Ludvig Åberg after shooting a course-record 60 in the third and ultimately final round. The weather looks to be a non-issue this year with average temperatures and a slight chance of rain over the weekend with typical moderate winds.
Gone are the three long and laborious pro-am rounds over three different courses from Thursday through Saturday as now being a signature
event, the field has been shortened to 80 players with no cut. Players will alternate between Pebble Beach Golf Links and Spyglass Hill on Thursday and Friday during the pro-am portion and finish with both rounds at Pebble Beach over the weekend with just the professionals playing and it will be that course data we will rely on considering there has been no Shot Link data from Spyglass.
With many courses getting longer, Pebble Beach is one of the outliers being one of the shortest on tour at 6,972 yards but that does not make it easy. Driving distance can be an advantage but that can bring inaccuracy into play and that is a problem here. Thus, use of the driver is scaled back and last year, driving distance averaged 277 yards with the tour average being 293 yards and that led to more greens being hit, 72 percent with the tour average being 66 percent. The average green size at Pebble is 3,580 square feet, making the greens the smallest on the PGA Tour so keeping the ball in the fairway for easier approaches is essential. Because the greens are so small, there are still plenty of missed putting surfaces so getting the ball up and down is another key to success.
With recent history of playing only two of four rounds at Pebble Beach, only half of the rounds are factored into the Strokes Gained metrics so while course history is important, looking at outside stats are just as big, especially correlating events, with the top two being the RSM Classic at Sea Island Resort and the RBC Heritage at Harbour Town. As far as course history, knowing the lay of the land is vital just like most everywhere and past winners here need to have not only experience but successful experience as the last two decades plus of winners have made the cut at least once prior to their win.
From a statistical standpoint, it is pretty straight forward with our top three key categories being:
Strokes Gained: Off The Tee
Strokes Gained: Approach
Strokes Gained: Around The Green
Each bet is Win/Top Five/Top Ten. The typical recommendation is 50%/25%/25% with odds, payouts, and results based on a $1000 unit (easy round number for bookkeeping) on each of the following players. The payouts are listed right below the odds which are all from DraftKings:
Patrick Cantlay
Odds: Win 1,800 ~ Top Five 350 ~ Top Ten 160
Payout: Win 900.00 ~ Top Five 87.50 ~ Top Ten 40.00
Cantlay came into this tournament last season with similar odds yet was off to a poor start with finishes of T12, T52 and T56. It has been much better in 2025 as he was T15 at The Sentry and T5 at The AMEX so he comes in with much better form and he fits here. He did not start in 2023 and has gone T11 in 2020, T3 in 2021, T4 in 2022 and T11 in 2024 and over his last 21 starts, he has 14 percent top five and 24 percent top ten percentages. He has also been great at the correlating RBS Heritage with four third place finishes and a second.
Jason Day
Odds: Win 3,500 ~ Top Five 550 ~ Top Ten 260
Payout: Win 1,750.00 ~ Top Five 275.00 ~ Top Ten 65.00
Day has arguably the best course history without a win as he is 14-14 here while finishing in the top seven nine times and now that it is no cut
for a second straight year, his chances are better and despite worse odds due to the shortened field, there is still value. Similar to Cantlay, he came into last year in not great form with a T10, T34 and MC and finished T6. He opened this year with a T40 at The Sentry but came back with a T3 at The AMEX and he was -3 after 54 holes at The Farmers but a closing 76 knocked him down to T32.
Taylor Pendrith
Odds: Win 5,000 ~ Top Five 800 ~ Top Ten 360
Payout: Win 2,500.00 ~ Top Five 200.00 ~ Top Ten 90.00
Pendrith came through for a T7 at The Farmers last week so he continues to play exceptional. He is in the midst of the best run of his career as following a cut at the PGA Championship last May, he has made the weekend in 14 consecutive starts including 11 top 25s and finishing top ten four times with a pair of top fives. Before this run, he won at the Byron Nelson which was sandwiched between a T10 and two T11s. He was T49 here in 2022 and followed that up with a T7 in 2023 prior to not qualifying last season.
Maverick McNealy
Odds: Win 5,000 ~ Top Five 850 ~ Top Ten 360
Payout: Win 1,100.00 ~ Top Five 212.50 ~ Top Ten 90.00
McNealy is on a downward trend going T8, T45, T52 in his three starts but this is the place to get back on track as the Stanford native knows this place well and has had success as a pro. He has two top five finishes here in his six appearances and despite the average finishes over his last two starts, he has been in fine form. He closed the fall season with his first career win which was at the correlating RSM Classic while finishing T4 at the RBC Heritage. Over his last 30 starts, he has 17 percent top five and 30 percent top ten percentages.
Mark Hubbard
Odds: Win 12,000 ~ Top Five 1,800 ~ Top Ten 750
Payout: Win 6,000.00 ~ Top Five 450.00 ~ Top Ten 187.50
Hubbard is the longshot this week but has trended the right way and he has also trended right at Pebble Beach. He is coming off a T68 at The Farmers in brutal conditions but prior to that in his previous six starts, he had four T21 finishes or better including a T3 in Bermuda. Granted, the field is elite this week but all he has to do to contend is play the course and after a missed cut here in 2020, he has gotten progressively better with finishes of T55 in 2021, T33 in 2022, T20 in 2023 and T4 in 2024.
Results through The Farmers Insurance open (2 Tournaments):
Win: -4,000
Top Five: -2,000
Top Ten: +450
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