Arnold Palmer Invitational Betting Preview

The Spring Swing continues with the first PGA Tour tournament in March. The Arnold Palmer Invitational (API) at Bay Hill drew 12 of the top 25 players in the World Golf Rankings, led by defending champion Tyrrell Hatton (No. 5). Also joining from the top 10 in the world are 2018 API winner Rory McIlroy and 2018 runner-up Bryson DeChambeau.

I provide an early tournament preview at TheLines, with Arnold Palmer Invitational odds posted Monday and additional chip-ins and information you can bet on. That includes course information, key stats and Golfers to Watch, which cashed in last week on winner Collin Morikawa at The Concession in the WGC Workday Championships event.

Arnold Palmer Invitational Odds 2021

We hit two more tournament match-up winners plus a push in three posted plays on last week’s WGC Championships event, and we’ll update this page as match-ups are released and additional research and work is completed. That includes more Golfers to Watch outside of the top favorites at each event, which often take a majority of the outright win bets.

By now you should know how difficult that is, even though we were able to identify Morikawa last week. Betting top finishing position is a more prudent play as part of your portfolio when wagering on golf, and tournament match-ups and select props are still the focus.

Recent tournament match-up results posted on these PGA Tour event pages are now 4-0 (plus 2 pushes) going back to the Genesis Invitational at Riviera and Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale, and 5-1 including the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines.

Course and Tournament Information – Arnold Palmer Invitational

  • Course: Bay Hill Club & Lodge
  • Location: Orlando, FL
  • Date: March 4-7
  • Par: 72 / Yardage 7,454
  • Purse: $9.3 Million / Winner $1.67 M
  • Fairways/Rough: Bermudagrass
  • Greens: : Bermudagrass
  • TV/Online: Golf Channel, NBC (Sat/Sun), PGA Tour Live
  • Twitter & Hashtag: @APinv
  • Defending Champion: Tyrrell Hatton

Read more course details and information in my preview at TheLines, along with key stats and strokes gained info. We’ll add more here as researched and available.

KEY STATS

Generous fairways allow golfers to hit their driver often, but missing fairways presents problems with Bay Hill ranking as one of the hardest courses to get the ball close to the hole from the rough. Players with strong strokes gained stats in Tee-to-Green play are ones to identify.

Arnold Palmer InvitationalI research and provide stats from various sites including Fantasy National, Data Golf and numberFire, where I am a contributor as part of FanDuel sports sites. Also, additional player performance history and course info from Golf Stats, and FanShare Sports data, trends, form guides and more.

Players to Win and Top Finishing Position (Top 5, 10, 20):

Fairway’s Favorites: Viktor Hovland, Sunjae Im, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Jason Kokrak
Fairway’s Longshots: Tommy Fleetwood, Will Zalatoris, Cameron Davis, Matthew NeSmith

Tournament Match-ups: Will Zalatoris (-145) over Kevin Kisner

First Round match-up: Justin Rose (-110) over Jordan Spieth

Author: FairwayJay is a leading national sports betting analyst, writer, handicapper and sports betting insider providing insight and information you can bet on for nearly two decades from Las Vegas. He chips in additional sports betting coverage and reporting on industry news and events for leading media and sports betting sites and companies. Follow him on X (Twitter): @FairwayJay