Wells Fargo Preview
Course: Quail Hollow
Purse: $20 million
The first Wells Fargo Championship took place in 2003 and has almost always been hosted by Quail Hollow. 2017 saw the event hosted at nearby Eagle Point because Quail Hollow was hosting The PGA Championship that year. 2022 saw TPC Potomac host the WF due to Quail Hollow hosting The President’s Cup. We’ll get to it in the course preview section, but clearly Quail Hollow is a respected course.
When we pull event history for modeling, I’ll remove 2022 and 2017 from the pull. The President’s Cup does not collect ShotLink data to use and the varying formats make any value anecdotal. The 2017 PGA Championship here was won by Justin Thomas, who will be in the field this week.
On the topic of the field, this is another ‘designated event’ with the huge purse. With it, we have a loaded field.
When we look at the list of past winners (only showing those held at Quail Hollow), we can clearly see that those big names are winning this more often than not. It’s usually a stern test that hosts a major, so not that surprising to see longshots have little chance here. James Hahn winning is a total outlier if we look even further back.
2023: Wyndham Clark
2021: Rory McIlroy
2019: Max Homa
2018: Jason Day
2016: James Hahn
I don’t have any winner trends documented for this event, but will say that course history has an above average correlation per DataGolf. Rory McIlroy has won it three times - it’s a course seemingly made for his game, few ‘player:course’ relationships are as strong as this one through the entire schedule. If we do not bet Rory, targeting young players with a similar profile is a good place to start.
Quail Hollow Preview
The club is located just outside Charlotte, NC in a neighborhood called Quail Hollow. The private club was founded in 1959 with the course opening two years later in 1961. The course was originally designed by George Cobb, who also designed the Par 3 course at Augusta. In the mid-80’s Arnold Palmer was brought in to modify a few holes, but the current course was mostly established by Tom Fazio in the late 90’s. Fazio would again adjust the course in 2016 in preparation of the 2017 PGA Championship at Quail Hollow.
Being private, this is not a place many of us will be able to play. From a 2021 Golf.com article, it sounds like there are only roughly 300 members at any given time, invite only. Initiation fee stands at $100K and monthly dues run $800. Simply living in the neighborhood of multi-million dollar homes is not enough to obtain membership, something that has to annoy some homeowners.
Tom Fazio is among most famous course designers still active today. Golf course design is an industry rich with nepotism, and Fazio fits the bill - his uncle George owned and operated a golf course design business. Since going out on his own, Tom Fazio has designed more top 100 ranked courses than any other designer. Most of them are on resorts or within gated communities, but reviews consistently sing his praises despite rarely being seen on the PGA Tour schedule. Pete Dye is the “thinking man’s designer”, Fazio more of the “photographer’s designer” - think obvious beauty over strategy.
The main defense of Quail Hollow, and most Fazio designs, is the distance. Any course measuring 7550 is long, but even longer when you consider it’s a Par 71. When listing the past winners, I noted that James Hahn is a total outlier…he definitely is: in the past decade, only Hahn was not top 20 in driving distance the year of his Quail Hollow win.
With the course’s length and lack of hazards or penal rough, the entire set-up is perfect for bombers. Average driving distance is well above tour average each year, fairways gained coming out somewhat meaningless.
Editor’s Note: There is one laughably long hole here: a 250 yard Par 3. For anyone reading this, I have to imagine that’s going to be a driver in your hand - it will be for some of the shorter hitters on Tour as well, a rough state for any par 3.
The usual PGA event sees 40% of approach shots come from longer than 175 yards - that number is 53% at Quail Hollow. We’ll use that in our approach modeling this week, focusing on guys who have good long iron play. I’m also going to look at approach stats from the past couple years on all long courses. I don’t see perfect comparable courses for Quail Hollow, so I want to look broadly at long courses when we can.
As often happens with lengthened approach shots, the GIR% is about 5% lower here than average. With that, I want to consider Around The Green and Bogey Avoidance as stats to value this week. It does not appear to be overly challenging ARG tests, but they will be a factor for literally everyone in the field.
Greens are pure Bermuda and run fast. We’re to the point of the year now that we should be done with mixed seed greens, so expect me to value putting splits more again. I want to look at guys who have done well putting on fast surfaces as well as Bermuda surfaces. Likely there is some overlap in those, but someone like Homa is a good example - Bermuda stats are fine, fast stats are elite. His success putting at Quail Hollow should not be a huge shock.
Three-putt percentage is one of the highest on Tour at 3.77% despite the greens being barely above average size. It is routinely one of the harder places to gain shots putting, a huge difference compared to the last few stops.
As always, let’s summarize what we know about the course and event history to think about who we want to target this week.
Quail Hollow presents an opportunity for longer hitters to play aggressively off the tee and separate themselves from the pack. Hitting a 7-iron in vs a 5-iron will naturally lead to landing more greens and setting up birdie chances necessary to contend. We want guys who thrive with longer proximity ranges and are competent around the green. These players should be above average on fast Bermuda putting and adept at avoiding 3-putts. They should have a track record of success on longer courses the past couple of years and ideally have experience at Quail Hollow as well.
The Green Mile
Quail Hollow is tough from start to finish, but especially at the finish. Holes 16, 17, and 18 are called ‘The Green Mile’ and routinely play over par during tournament events. These holes frequently lead to a climactic finish to the tournament.
First, players face a 506 yard par 4 (seen above from behind the green). A fairway bunker in the landing zone will create bogeys for anyone who hits it. Water becomes a threat on approach, especially due to the strong slope into it for anything missing left. This is really the best example of long range approach being a differentiator.
After that beastly hole, we’ll see a 190 yard par 3 with a peninsula green. That’s a pretty beefy par 3 with no water, so the obvious water threat you see above will lead to more than a few lost balls. There is room to miss right, but the green slopes hard towards the water, so any up-and-down from there would be impressive.
Finally, players reach the close of the mile, the #1 handicap 494 yard par 4. That’s an extremely narrow window to drive into, with trees and a fairway bunker to the player’s right and a hole-long creek on the left. A meandering hazard like that can be tough to avoid, sometimes bringing luck into the equation when it’s a close call. Guys will be hitting up into a green split into two sections by a central ridge, making an already difficult approach shot even more challenging to execute.
Early Leans
I will not be considering Rory McIlroy as an outright bet this week. With the course history being just insanely strong, I will likely add a Top 10 wager on him if we see close to even odds there.
The name at the top of my mind is Cam Young. Young’s obvious advantage is his distance. If anyone resembles Rory on that front, it’s Young. Issue is that he’s going to be super popular and we might see some unfair odds. I’ll be looking for other long hitters at more reasonable prices, but do expect this is a week where I end up with only 2-3 guys on the card.
How to Watch
We have a lot of streaming opportunities now, but I still want to know the TV schedule (all times EST).
Thursday: 2:00-6:00pm, Golf Channel
Friday: 2:00-6:00pm, Golf Channel
Saturday: 1:00-3:00pm, Golf Channel; 3:00-6:00, CBS
Sunday: 1:00-3:00pm, Golf Channel; 3:00-6:00, CBS
Closing Thoughts
We have this elevated event this week and then we’re on to the second major of the year next week. The majors have always been the most important events in golf, kind of the ones that actually matter in the big picture. With the segmentation of pro golf and the seemingly endless run of bad news, each major has been even more of a joy for fans.
Quail Hollow is a course that clearly favors a certain profile - long drivers, good putters on fast greens. Valhalla next week (PGA Championship host) is incredibly similar in the profile it will reward. With that, we can likely glean some information around guys playing well this week - I don’t want to bet someone to win both, but if we see a surging Sunday from someone in Charlotte, they could be someone to start considering for next week.
I’ll be back on Wednesday with a post on data and my bets. Unfortunately I am once again traveling for my other job, so it’s possible we have another short one ahead. That being said, happy to reply to anyone with questions on plays you are thinking. Until then, best of luck with all your bets.
Matt / Ziggy