PGA Championship 2023 betting guide: PGA pro details Oak Hill's East Course, provides best bets for second major

Here we go! The PGA Championship — the season’s second major championship — is about to begin, and the field of contenders for the 105th Wanamaker Cup is nearly as vast as nearby Lake Ontario. Playing host this year is Oak Hill Country Club’s East course, a venue with a storied major championship tradition. OHCC has hosted three US Opens, three previous PGA Championships, and a Ryder Cup.

As 99 of the top 100 golfers in the OWGR (Will Zalatoris is injured) travel to upstate New York in May, let’s hope they have all brought a couple of layers with them. While writing this on Wednesday, the predicted high is 52 degrees with wind. The forecast for the week covers three different seasons: fall, winter, and spring. Thursday’s first round at 7:00 a.m. ET might compete with a frost delay, while Friday afternoon is supposed to be 72 and partly sunny!

Throw in some rain on Saturday and this championship exam will include the full gamut of tests that tend to go along with tournaments. I remember 2019, when the PGA of America made the move to May at Bethpage Black outside New York City. Brooks Koepka dominated a cold and damp course and blew past the field for his fourth major title. This week is eerily similar to those conditions and that overall feel.

While sitting through the press conferences this week and walking the practice areas, a quiet calm surrounds the players. Sure, most are just trying to stay focused, but the new normal of golf is settling in. Don’t be thrown off by the media making up stories about any conflicts between players. The only narratives on the range are related to Rory McIlroy’s possible return and Jordan Spieth’s health.

The players aren’t concerned with rival tours and lawsuits. Looking closely at their faces and following their body language, I believe these guys are all locked in on Oak Hill. The East Course is no joke — and since the 2019 renovation, it will provide a much different test than when we last saw it at the 2013 PGA Championship. Let's dive into the odds, discuss the relevant course conditions and changes, go over the major power players of the weekend, and make our best bets for the 105th PGA Championship. 

PGA Championship 2023: Odds

PGA Championship 2023: Course conditions and changes!

Andrew Green was hired by Oak Hill in 2015 to renovate the East Course. The project was completed in 2019 and has transformed this traditional Donald Ross design into a modern masterpiece. Through archived aerial photography, Green’s team was able to take Ross’ original blueprint and enhance it. The player experience this week will be really entertaining to watch.

Throughout the process, they removed over 600 trees. This has opened up the course in ways the members have not seen in decades. Ironically named Oak Hill, the original landscape Ross worked with was not a hallway of trees. By clearing out some of the sightlines, the field will now be able to take a variety of angles off the tee. This will encourage aggressive driver play and certainly add to our viewing enjoyment.

The greens were expanded as well. Sand splash and maintenance practices will shrink putting surfaces over a long period of time. Oak Hill’s East Course is over 100 years old. By 2013, the greens effectively had a punch bowl effect propelling the ball toward the center. Green scalped the bunker residue and smoothed out the edges. What looked like a serving dish in 2013, now lays more like Salvador Dalí clock.

Over one-third of player approach shots are launched from over 200 yards away. With larger surfaces, the Tournament Committee can really set the course to challenge the TOUR’s best taking advantage of more hole locations. The last major change you’ll experience on site or through coverage are the bunkers. These penalty areas will cost any player who lands inside at least a half stroke. Even worse, the faces are grass covered. Those sticky surfaces have been grabbing the ball and holding it along the steep edges.

The winning score of the PGA Championship is trending down. It seems the PGA really has built an identity for itself in that eight-to-ten stroke winning score range. Walking around, eight seems a little low if I’m being honest, but these guys are good — especially the ones I have listed below in my best bets.

PGA Championship 2023: Major players

The PGA Championship is a blend of the best attributes of all the other major championships. We have the 20 qualifiers just like both of the Opens, scoring and tradition like the Masters, and epic venues year after year just like all three. Since all majors test a similar skill set, I took a deeper look at the field and their scoring history at golf’s top tournaments.

Since 2017, the top 10 scoring averages in major championships belong to (in order):

• 10 - Hideki Matsuyama
• 9 - Jordan Spieth
• 8 - Rickie Fowler
• 7 - Dustin Johnson
• 6 - Jon Rahm
• 5 - Xander Schauffele
• 4 - Rory Mcilroy
• 3 - Collin Morikawa
• 2 - Scottie Scheffler
• 1 - Brooks Koepka

In his last 22 major starts, Koepka has finished inside the top 10 a whopping 10 times. Keep in mind, that includes several majors where Brooks played with an injury. Overall, the list really tells a specific story. These are the dominant players in the game. They are powerful, they hit the ball with a high trajectory, and they can score in a multitude of ways. Looking ahead to this championship, all of those specific skills are vital toward contending.

Preparing my betting card has been exciting in advance of Oak Hill. I love a good parkland test, and this par-70 (7,394 yard) is definitely catching everyones’ attention. With 79 bunkers (45 greenside), eight holes where water comes into play, and intricate Ross-style green complexes, everything about the East Course screams major championship.

PGA Championship 2023: Best Bets

All odds are from DraftKings Sportsbook.

Best bet to win: Brooks Koepka (+2200)

Koepka leads the field in major championship scoring over the past six years. He has the lowest par-70 scoring average on the PGA TOUR over the last five years and he’s in great form. He held the 54-hole lead at the Masters, and in his last four LIV starts he has finished 1-19-3-6. Brooks is back to the player who blew away the field at Bethpage Black in cold, damp conditions. We’ll see those factors in play again this week and Koepka reunited with the Wanamaker Trophy.

Best bet to finish in the Top 20: Tyrell Hatton (+150)

Make the golf course difficult, and Hatton emerges on the leaderboard. Look at his finishes just this year: fourth at API, third at Wells Fargo, and second at THE PLAYERS. He’s ranked third in the field for strokes gained tee to green and second in par-4 scoring. This course has 12 challenging par-4s, and that edge alone should land him inside the top 20.

Best bet to finish in the Top 5 in Round 1: Jon Rahm (+400)

Let’s build our bankroll early this week and prepare for some weekend live or in-play betting. Jon Rahm has the lowest round one scoring average on TOUR. On this difficult test watch him establish himself as a contender on day one with that world class long iron game. Ranked first in the field on approach, birdie or better percentage, and approaches over 200 yards, that skill set gets him inside the top five after Thursday’s opening tour.

For a complete list of my betting predictions covering the PGA Championship winners, placements, and H2H matchups, please go to Read The Line and subscribe.

Read The Line is the leading golf betting insights service led by 5-time award winning PGA Professional Keith Stewart. Read The Line has 15 outright wins in the last year and covers the LPGA and PGA Tour, raising your golf betting acumen week after week. Subscribe to Read The Line’s weekly newsletter and follow us on social media: TikTok, Instagram, Twitter.