The PGA Tour returns to your televisions! A star-studded field heads to Hawaii for the 2024 Sentry on the Plantation Course at Kapalua. As always, here is your early deep-dive on the 2024 Sentry preview of how to bet.
The 2024 Sentry Preview
The Field
2024 marks yet another reconfiguration of the PGA Tour schedule. Several tournaments known as “Signature Events” are comprised of the Top 50 players from last year’s FedEx Cup standings, along with other players that can qualify through sponsor exemptions, performance in non-signature events, and current year FedEx Cup standings.
The Sentry is the first “signature event” of the 2024 PGA Tour season. No longer is the field comprised solely of winners from last year’s PGA Tour season, but also everyone else who finished inside the Top 50 in the FedEx Cup standings from 2023. In total, 59 players will compete on the Plantation Course at Kapalua next weekend.
Most of the names you’d expect to tee it up at Kapalua will play. Highlighting the field are Scottie Scheffler, Viktor Hovland, Jordan Spieth, Patrick Cantlay, Xander Schauffele, and a handful of other popular and talented names on the PGA Tour.
But there’s one glaring omission from the field – and it’s the biggest one of all. Rory McIlroy will not play at Kapalua this week. He typically doesn’t play this event anyway, but that’s not why it’s a glaring omission.
It’s a bad look for the PGA Tour that he won’t play. It was unable to secure a deal with the PIF, meaning that the future of the sport remains up in the air. And given the PIF essentially bought Jon Rahm as a negotiating tactic to gain more power in the new PGA Tour entity (if it ever comes to fruition), the PGA Tour needs to show the golf world that its new Signature Events are to be taken seriously. Rory McIlroy skipping its first one is not a signal of strength.
For the full field, click here.
The Golf Course
The Plantation Course at Kapalua was designed by Ben Crenshaw and Bill Coore in 1991. It has played host to the Tournament of Champions since 1999. Pros and amateurs alike rave about the course. From its breathtaking views overlooking Honokahua Bay and Molokai Island to its wide fairways, the course is both fun and challenging to play.
The round kicks off on the downhill 520-yard Par 4, running towards the bay. Those who successfully navigate the ball down the slope will set up the perfect angle to a left-to-right sloped green with a mid-iron. Because of the helping wind and the downhill routing, driver is overkill for this hole.
After taking on the Par 3 2nd, the golfers start the climb up the hill from the 3rd to the 5th hole. The total elevation change over this stretch is about 250 feet. If the wind is up, tricky crosswinds will make the golfers uncomfortable, especially on the uphill approach shots.
Once at the top of the hill, Holes 6 through 8, take the golfer all the way back down the hill towards the bay and then wrap up the Front Nine uphill to the clubhouse.
The first half of the Back Nine loops around in a counterclockwise fashion at the bottom of the golf course and features the dueling banjos of the 12th and 13th holes:
The golfers will have the wind at their backs at the downhill 420-yard Par 4 12th. They’ll lick their chops as they attack a 70-yard wide fairway with the driver. This hole routinely yields the longest drives of the year on the PGA Tour, as even the shorter hitters have little trouble sending their tee shot 375+ yards down the slope.
The 12th was the scene for one of the best drives ever on the PGA Tour:
Their feelings as world-beaters are short-lived as they step onto the tee at the uphill 407-yard 13th. The aiding wind from the 12th is now punching them right in the mouth, and if the winds are howling, even the longest hitters will have trouble clearing the fairway bunker 230 yards out. Anyone who scrapes out a par at this hole will count their blessings.
After another three-hole stretch up the hill, the round concludes from the highest point of the golf course at the Par 4 549-yard 17th down to the 663-yard Par 5 18th. Despite their behemoth yardages, the holes play much shorter thanks to a helping wind and a 300-foot drop in elevation from the 17th tee to the 18th green.
The 17th is definitely reachable in two as a long Par 4. The 18th is reachable as long as players hit the speed slot down the hill. Otherwise, the ball can get caught up on a slide slope far away from the green. This makes reaching in two almost impossible, even with the wind and downhill assist.
The Plantation Course is a few years removed from a significant renovation. By now, the rebuilt greens have softened up after a lot of foot traffic. The greens also run much truer with the new TifEagle bermuda surface. As such, how difficult or easy the scoring is at the 2023 Sentry Tournament of Champions will come down to the weather. Specifically, how windy it is will drive scoring.
Betting Strategies
To begin the 2024 Sentry Preview, here is general information about the Plantation Course at Kapalua:
General Information:
Yardage: 7,596
- The course plays a lot shorter than the nearly 7,600-yard billing on the scorecard. Specifically, dramatic downhill shots significantly alter the club choices players face to shorten up the holes.
Par: 73
- The golf course only features three Par 3’s. This adds an extra stroke to par on the scorecard with the addition of one more Par 4.
Average Green Size: 8,722 sq. feet
- Kapalua features the largest greens by area on the PGA Tour.
Agronomy:
- Fairways: Celebration bermudagrass
- Rough: Celebration bermudagrass (2.5″ in height)
- Collars/Approaches: Celebration bermudagrass
- Greens: TifEagle Bermuda
The following golf courses on the PGA Tour also feature (non-overseeded) TifEagle Bermuda:
- Sea Island (RSM Classic)
- Port Royal Golf Club (Bermuda Championship)
- Bay Hill Golf Club (Arnold Palmer Invitational)
- PGA National (Honda Classic)
- The Concession Golf Club (WGC Concession)
Past Champions
- 2023: Jon Rahm (-27)
- 2022: Cameron Smith (-34)
- 2021: Harris English (-25)
- 2020: Justin Thomas (-14)
- 2019: Xander Schauffele (-23)
Scoring Average:
- 2023: -4.07
- 2022: -4.78
- 2021: -3.68
- 2020: -0.77
- 2019: -2.08
To par, the Sentry annually yields some of the lowest winning scores on the PGA Tour. It’s important to keep in mind, however, that the Par is 73. And all the Par 5’s are reachable in 2. However, there’s no denying that the modern PGA Tour professional can rip this place apart with a barrage of birdies.
Its only defenses recently were the firm greens post-renovation in 2020 and wind. But for the last two years, the weather conditions were quite benign. And now that the greens have softened since the renovation, Kapalua is almost defenseless to good scoring.
In addition, almost all areas of the game are considered significantly easier than the typical PGA Tour average. Here are its rankings in terms of difficulty (the lower the ranking, the harder the scoring) since 2015 in each area of the game (per DataGolf):
- Off the Tee: 87th out of 87 golf courses
- Approach: 53rd out of 87 golf courses
- Around the Green: 62nd out of 87 golf courses
- Putting: 17th out of 87 golf courses
Kapalua has not challenged the players in terms of ball striking over the last three seasons. In fact, it played as the easiest golf course off the tee and second easiest with the approach shots during the 2023 season. PGA Tour professionals are just too good in 2023 to almost always give them a short iron from the fairway into big, soft greens like what’s happened the last three trips to Kapalua.
Recently, only 2020 posed significant challenges to the players. That year, Kapalua ranked 4th toughest with approach shots and 8th toughest around the green. Windy and firm conditions were the culprit in 2020.
Unfortunately, players won’t see a firm golf course in 2024. December saw several days of significant rainfall, including several consecutive days of rain during the final week of December. However, current forecasts do call for at least sustained winds of 25 MPH+ beginning on Thursday afternoon and extending through the end of Saturday. That will dry out the golf course and make it a bit more difficult.
Predictive Skillsets
Here are the predictive skillset charts for the Plantation Course at Kapalua (per DataGolf). This chart will preview what types of players should excel at the 2024 Sentry:
The only skillset that provides no correlation to success at Kapalua is through driving accuracy. Considering the near football field wide fairways, finding the fairway off the tee is pretty easy. Those who consider themselves at an advantage through their driving accuracy won’t enjoy such edges this week at the 2024 Sentry.
Otherwise, there’s a higher than PGA Tour average correlation in the remaining four skillsets to success at Kapalua. Longer hitters, good iron players, good scramblers, and good putters all have a higher than PGA Tour average correlation to success at Kapalua.
This deserves a bit of a caveat, though. It’s not as though Kapalua throws big challenges at the players where those with these elite skillsets rise to the top. Rather, this is primarily to do with the overall field strength of this event. Better players tend to play in this tournament more often. Hence, better skill sets will have a higher correlation to success than an average (or weaker) PGA Tour event.
But more importantly, Kapalua is one that doesn’t really favor anyone. Because of the relatively easy scoring conditions where lots of players are hitting shorter irons from the fairway, there’s a wide variety of players who can do well here. From Jon Rahm to Cameron Smith and Dustin Johnson to Patrick Reed, players from all walks of life can find success at Kapalua.
If anything, the only area where a player might see an edge is their ability to hit iron shots from uneven lies. Given the dramatic elevation changes, players often have awkward uphill or downhill shots into the green. It’s in this area that so often Kapalua is compared to Augusta National in terms of crossover success.
Speaking of which, here is a list of PGA Tour golf courses (played within the last 5 years) that feature a similar predictive skillset chart as Kapalua (per DataGolf):
- Augusta National
- St. Andrews
- Riviera Country Club
- Nine Bridges
- PGA National
- Silverado Resort & Spa
- TPC Summerlin
- Liberty National
- TPC Craig Ranch
- Pebble Beach
- Renaissance Club
In Tournament Strokes Gained
Here are distribution charts of the variance in total strokes gained based on tournament performance since 2020. These charts demonstrate what forces have an influence on how a player separates themselves from the field (per DataGolf). It also will preview how the leaderboard at the 2024 Sentry will shake out:
2023
2022
2021
2020
These charts are completely all over the map. In some years, driving has taken on a much higher importance in tournaments. Some years it hasn’t mattered at all. The same can be said for putting, iron play, and around the green.
Again, this might be a function of the smaller field and the types of players who did well that week. Not necessarily that Kapalua itself is responsible for it. The only thing that has been consistent over the last few years is hitting fairways does not separate oneself much on the leaderboard, while driving distance can give someone an edge in that category on the week.
As such, trying to figure out what areas will take on a bigger importance at the 2024 Sentry might be difficult to do. If there is something, windy conditions will likely make the importance of in-tournament iron play. That might explain why in 2020, for example, iron play took on a much bigger role in separating the field that week because the weather wasn’t very good that year.
Approach Shot Distribution
Here is the approach shot distribution chart from the 2023 Sentry (per DataGolf). This chart is reflective of past tournaments and a preview of what types of approach shots players will hit at the 2024 Sentry:
This distribution chart suggests a lot higher volume of short irons into greens than the typical PGA Tour setup. But this chart is a bit misleading, given several longer approach shots play significantly downhill. As such, players more comfortable hitting lots of approach shots from less than 175 yards from uneven lies have a big edge in this tournament.
Follow these tips in this preview, and one should put together a solid DFS lineup and betting card for the 2024 Sentry.
