This season’s four major championships are now behind us, which means we’re unlikely to see any of the PGA Tour’s big names tee it up again in the United States until the start of the FedEx Cup playoffs in mid-August. So we’re back to target golf in events like this week’s 3M Open, where a bevy of second-tier players are almost certain to post loads of gaudy red numbers outside Minneapolis. Last year’s tournament, won at 24-under by journeyman Lee Hodges, says it all.
Tony Finau opened as the odds favorite for the event, which will also feature Justin Rose and Billy Horschel—both fresh off co-runner-up appearances in the Open Championship at Royal Troon. While there’s not a lot of star power on display this week, that does mean opportunity for sports bettors, given the number of potential value wagers on the board. Hodges was an +8000 bet to win before he teed it up last season in the 3M, having missed cuts in three of his previous four starts.
The field this year will include just two players ranked in the world top 20—No. 11 Sahith Theegala, and Finau at No. 19. And while Open Championship winner Xander Schauffele is taking this week off to prep for the Olympics, the 3M field will include Nick Dunlap, who claimed last week’s alternate-field event to win for the second time on the PGA Tour this season—the first coming as an amateur, in the American Express in February.
PGA Tour 3M Open Odds
| Golfer | Odds |
|---|---|
| Tony Finau | +1050 |
| Sam Burns | +1800 |
| Akshay Bhatia | +2000 |
| Sahith Theegala | +2100 |
| Billy Horschel | +2500 |
| Luke Clanton | +2700 |
| Cameron Davis | +3000 |
| Keegan Bradley | +3300 |
| Tom Hoge | +3300 |
| Keith Mitchell | +3300 |
| J.T. Poston | +3300 |
Odds as of July 24
PGA Tour 3M Open Picks
Akshay Bhatia to Win (+2000)
Yes, the California native missed the cut at the Open Championship and is playing at TPC Twin Cities for the first time. But on these PGA Tour layouts that are set up to be birdie-fests, Bhatia just keeps getting better and better. He was 14th or better in three straight events early in the season, won the Valero Texas Open, and more recently went top-five back-to-back in the Travelers and the Rocket—playing in the final Sunday group both times, and giving away the victory in the latter with poor approach on the 72nd hole. Bhatia knows how to go low in these events, knows how to win, and is due to win again.
Tony Finau Top-5 Finish (+270)
Big Tony has an excellent record in the 3M—he won this tournament in 2022, tied for third in 2023, and tied for seventh last season. Like Bhatia (and a ton of other notable players, to be honest), he missed the cut last week at Troon. But with few exceptions Finau has been playing very well since the late spring, with just two finishes worse than T18 since Hilton Head. His Open Championship MC ended a great run that had included T8 at the Memorial, T3 at the U.S. Open and T5 at the Travelers. Say what you will about Finau’s struggles to close out tournaments, but he still deserves a place in anyone’s betting portfolio this week.
Luke Clanton Top-10 Finish (+315)
The rising junior at Florida State has been a phenomenon this summer on the PGA Tour, where Clanton shot two rounds under par in the U.S. Open, tied for 10th at the Rocket Mortgage, and then tied for second at the John Deere Classic, four strokes behind winner Davis Thompson. We’ve already seen one amateur win on Tour this season (the aforementioned Dunlap), and Clanton certainly looks capable of doing the same. He took a step back to T37 in the alternate-field event opposite the Scottish Open, but the guy has still shot in the 60s in 11 of his 16 career rounds on the PGA Tour.
PGA Tour 3M Open Betting Tips
Theegala is the highest-ranked player in the 3M field, and opened as the No. 4 odds choice behind Finau and Sam Burns. But he’s been all over the place this summer—missed cuts at the British and Canadian opens, T48 at the Travelers, T52 at the Wells Fargo, T4 at the Scottish Open—and that degree of inconsistency doesn’t inspire confidence. Burns, coming off an also-ran finish at the Travelers and a disastrous 80 in the final round at Troon, is trying to recapture the form that netted four straight top-10s early this season.
Horschel and Rose, by dint of their strong showings in the Open Championship last week, seem certain to draw a lot of attention in the Twin Cities from spectators and bettors alike. Horschel finished T13 in the 3M last season, and now owns two top-10 finishes since his victory in the alternate-field Puerto Rico event opposite the RBC Heritage in April. Rose, who is playing TPC Twin Cities for the first time, had missed cuts in three of four starts prior to Troon, which produced just his second top-10 this season.
How much faith, by the way, should you put in those alternate-field events? Dunlap and Horschel are two winners who have definitely proven themselves on bigger stages. Could the same be coming for Mac Meissner, solo fourth and T16 in alternate events the past two weeks? What about Patrick Fishburn, third and 15th in that same span? The most likely candidate to break out of that group might be Taylor Pendrith, T5 in last week’s alternate-field tournament in Truckee, Calif., who won a PGA Tour event similarly bereft of star power in May.
