5 our expert’s favorite picks

Welcome to our weekly PGA Tour betting tips column, featuring picks from GOLF.com’s expert prognosticator, Brady Kannon. A seasoned golf bettor and commentator, Kannon is a host and frequent guest on SportsGrid, a syndicated audio network dedicated to sports and sports betting, and is a golf betting analyst for CBS Sportsline. You can follow Brady on Twitter at @LasVegasGolferand you can read his picks below for the 2026 Arnold Palmer Invitational, which starts Thursday in Orlando, Fla.

As the PGA Tour moves from west to east and the first major tournament of the season draws ever closer, a heavy dose of big boy events currently dominates the Tour calendar. The Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill will mark the third Signature Event in four weeks – and next week is another one with the Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass. Like Riviera two weeks ago, the API is another 72-player field that includes a 36-hole cut. The top 50 players and ties will come into the weekend, along with anyone sitting within 10 shots of the lead.

Bay Hill Club & Lodge was originally designed by Dick Wilson and Joe Lee but later became the brainchild of Arnold Palmer and as Arnie loved to do, he renovated the golf course many times. What we have now feels like a masterpiece: a par 72 course that stretches to nearly 7,500 yards and features narrow fairways and large, firm and fast Bermudagrass greens. This will mark the third consecutive season that the tournament has been designated as a Signature Tour. It is a very Florida style track with 84 sand bunkers, palm trees, thick, hard. It is prone to strong winds, and nine of the 18 holes feature water hazards that are heavily played.

Of course a lot of the agronomy is different at Bay Hill than at Riviera but what remains the same is that both are rigorous golf tests that will require the player to do almost everything right. Both accuracy and distance are needed off the tee. Hitting the ball is important, and even though the greens are big, hitting them legally is difficult. Rough is especially thick. Paddle around the green is very important – then putting these fast and tight spots is a real challenge.

It is not necessary to emphasize one or two areas that lead to success on the golf course but in addition, every club in the bag needs to shoot at a high level. A specific statistic to note is Hole Proximity from 200+ yards, as Bay Hill, when covering 3 holes, has more shots approaching this distance than any other Tour stop golf course. So add playing a long instrument to your long list of needs this week.

Course form has proven to be a powerful indicator here at Bay Hill as well as the Open Championship or link to golf success. The forecast calls for winds in the 10-15 MPH range with a chance of thunderstorms in the afternoon. For this week’s related courses, I used TPC Scottsdale – Scottie Scheffler as a recent example of a player who won twice at both venues. I also used TPC Craig Ranch, another home of Scheffler’s victories. Finally, from a links perspective, I used the Renaissance Club where he plays the Genesis Scottish Open, Royal Portrush (yet another place Scheffler won), and Royal St. George’s, home of the 2021 Open Championship.

Tommy Fleetwood (20-1)

The last time we caught up with this England player, he got us a win at the Tour Championship last August. He has played twice so far on Tour this season, finishing fourth at Pebble Beach and seventh two weeks ago at the Genesis Invitational. He has been 10th twice here at Bay Hill and once finished third. Fleetwood finished second at Royal Portrush in 2019 and finished fourth and sixth at the Scottish Open. In the last 24 rounds, he ranks third in the category in Scrambling and 13th in Hole Proximity from 200+ yards.

Matt Fitzpatrick (25-1)

Another Englishman who has played impressive golf this season, Fitzpatrick finished in the top 10 earlier this year in Phoenix at TPC Scottsdale and is ranked fourth on the Tour for Strokes Gained: Approach. In the last 24 rounds, he is fourth in the category in Hole Proximity from 200+ yards. He finished ninth, 14th, and 22nd here at Bay Hill, 20th and fourth at Royal Portrush, and fourth and sixth at the Scottish Open.

Hideki Matsuyama (37-1)

Last time we were on Matsuyama, he lost in the Phoenix final to Chris Gotterup. That was his second-place finish in Phoenix, where he has won twice. He finished sixth here at Bay Hill and third at TPC Craig Ranch. Matsuyama is ranked second in the category for Hole Proximity from 200 yards or more and is No. 1 on Tour in Scrambling. His kryptonite this season is out. If he can get some road runs this week, he’ll be hard to beat. Despite losing streaks to start this season, Matsuyama has finished 13-11-2-8-28 in five games. I have to hope that the one week off has helped him work things out with the driver. I believe that if Matsuyama has his A-game, he is one of the few players in the world who can beat Scheffler and McIlroy.

Robert MacIntyre (58-1)

Like Matsuyama, the Scotsman has only one soft spot this season and that is with his style of play. Everything else was solid and the short game was pretty good. MacIntyre finished fourth in Hawaii to start the year and was 20th two weeks ago at Riviera. He finished 11th here at Arnie’s last season and in two starts before that, he took sixth at Phoenix. His linking skills are among the best in the game, finishing sixth at Royal Portrush in 2019 and seventh last summer. He was eighth at Royal St. George’s in 2021 and went from runner-up to runner-up at the Scottish Open in 2023 and 2024.

Nicolai Hojgaard (60-1)

Hojgaard was on fire last week at the Cognizant Classic over the weekend. After making the cut, he shot 66-65, the lowest weekend in the field, to finish in sixth place. A few weeks before that, he was third at TPC Scottsdale. He was 14 at The Open Championship at Royal Portrush last July and finished fourth and sixth at the Scottish Open. In the last 24 rounds, Hojgaard ranks 15th in the field in SG: Approach, sixth in Driving Distance, and 19th in Hole Proximity from 200+ yards. He is 10th on the SG Tour: Off the Tee and 44th in Scrambling.