Prop Farm: Wind, cooler weather to be big factor in Las Vegas

Just in time for the annual PGA TOUR event in Las Vegas, the local weather turns. Amazing and a bit unfortunate, but it certainly makes for some intriguing storylines coming into this week during the Shriners Children’s Open

It is not uncommon for the wind to blow in Las Vegas during the tournament, most notably back in 2017 when Patrick Cantlay won with a score of 9-under par. Other than that one exception, the winning score over the last eight editions has been better than 22-under. It is telling that one local oddsmaker set the winning score Over/Under this week at 14.5-under par.

It truly has been the hottest summer on record here in Las Vegas. The highest official temperature ever recorded had been 117 degrees. This year it hit 120. It was still in the triple digits on Oct. 7.

Now the pros come to town and the forecast in the area of this week’s venue, TPC Summerlin, is calling for high temperatures of 83, 67, 73 and 73 degrees, respectively, Thursday through Sunday. Add in the fact that the wind is supposed to blow upwards of 20 mph or more on Thursday afternoon and as high as 35 mph on Friday. This ought to be one very interesting golf tournament, and bettors are taking notice.

“Yeah, Seamus Power to beat Davis Thompson has been a good go, moving from -110 to -120,” said Tristan Davis, senior sportsbook manager at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Davis continued, pointing out: “Harris English to beat Adam Hadwin has seen the same move, and Daniel Berger to beat Brendon Todd has gone from -110 to -145.”

That might not look like anything much on the surface, but if you dig in deeper you will find that all of the players being bet ON in these head-to-head matchups (Power, English and Berger) will be teeing off Thursday morning, and the players they are betting against (Thompson, Hadwin and Todd), will begin Thursday afternoon.

Bettors are trusting the weather forecast of being very calm on Thursday morning and Friday afternoon and catching the brunt of the high winds on Thursday afternoon and Friday morning .

“Yep, I’ve seen the movie before,” replied legendary Las Vegas bookmaker Nick Bogdanovich. “Now let’s see if Mother Nature holds up her end of the bargain.”

Renown Las Vegas golf oddsmaker Jeff Sherman is trying to get out in front of it. “I made proactive adjustments to the outright, top 20, and group matchup odds based on favorable start times,” said Sherman, who also personally bet into a number of head-to-head matchups that featured a potential draw bias.

Davis is okay to just sit tight. “We will adjust where we need to by weight of money but weather forecasts can be wrong,” he said.

It was a little bit of both for Bogdanovich, who agreed that quite a bit of the money is just blindly coming in on the perceived favorable starts but also said, “We definitely adjusted to the possible weather.”

If there is an advantage, it clearly looks to be on Thursday morning. The wind is not expected to kick up until around 2 p.m. local time, and it might not even be that bad at that time. Friday morning looks to be pretty bad, but I am not convinced at all that it is going to suddenly come to a screeching halt on Friday afternoon and complete the advantage for the early Thursday wave.

The afternoons are typically when it is the windiest here in Las Vegas. If gusts are touching 35 mph or more in the morning, I’m not so sure the afternoon is going to flip and become a walk in the park. In my estimation, it looks like the early-late draw is favorable, but I’m not sure it is as pronounced as some bettors may believe. We will see. A few players may catch it just right – or just “wrong” – but again, I don’t know if this is going to be a cut-and-dry advantage for one side.

Aside from any weather-based punts, who are they coming to the window for anyway?

“The public is supporting Tom Kim going for a three-peat,” said Sherman. “Also Beau Hossler and local UNLV golfer Kurt Kitayama.”

Sherman added: “We’ve seen sharp play on Nick Taylor and Lee Hodges.”

You guessed it, they both tee off on Thursday morning.

It's a bit of a mixed bag in the outright market for Bogdanovich. “They’re playing Berger, Davis Riley and Stephan Jaeger to win it all,” he said.

Riley and Berger begin early on Thursday, but Jaeger tees off late. “Cam Davis and Tom Hoge are both being bet ‘YES’ to make the cut,” added Bogdanovich. Both Davis and Hoge are late starters on Thursday.

Thomas Gable, race and sports director at The Borgata in New Jersey, has seen action come in on one early wave starter. “Taylor Pendrith has an early tee time on Thursday and is getting some action at +2200, but I haven’t really seen it with anyone else,” he said.

My outright card is a mix as well, with Hodges and Harry Hall being a part of the early wave. I have also landed on Hossler, Davis, Hadwin and Patton Kizzire, who all reside in the late wave.

I said it’s going to be intriguing. We are not only testing our predictive golf skills against the bookmaker this week in Las Vegas, but also matching weather wits with the folks on the other side of the counter as well. Both sides are looking to hit the two-team parlay.