The PGA Tour heads to the Texas Hill Country for the inaugural Austin Championship at Omni Barton Creek’s Fazio Canyons Course. Tom Fazio designed it in 1999 and recently restored it, and the layout winds through limestone cliffs and the Short Spring Branch creek. The scorecard reads 7,451 yards as a par 72, with the traditional layout of four par 3s, four par 5s and 10 par 4s.

With no PGA Tour history at Fazio Canyons, we don’t have the data to say what this course rewards, so I went looking at how new venues have played in the past. Since 2015, 25 full-field events have been played at a course hosting the PGA Tour for the first time. In those events, a player’s last 24 rounds lined up with his results slightly better than at familiar courses. That implies that recent form will be more correlated with success this week than in many other weeks.

If you think the field this week looks similar to last week’s, you’d be spot on. As of publishing, there are 99 players in the field this week who also played in Cabo last week, making up nearly 80% of this week’s field.

Blades Brown on how he views goals after winning so early in Tour career

Here are a few of my favorite plays for this week’s Austin Championship, using odds from DraftKings Sportsbook.

We are clearly in the “youth invasion” era of the PGA Tour, with Ben James, Jackson Koivun and Blades Brown all leaving their mark on the PGA Tour this year. Don’t let those names distract you from David Ford, who is starting to find his footing in his first PGA Tour campaign.

The 24-year-old played well in Cabo last week and was dynamite off the tee. He gained more than six strokes in that department, which marked the eighth consecutive event that he beat his peers off the tee. His approach play has been streaky, but he’s starting to find some consistency in that facet as well. He’s gained multiple strokes on approach in three of his last four starts, which has been the key to his two best finishes of the year — a T3 in Utah and a fifth-place finish last week.

He’s clearly still raw, but he’s maturing quickly. It’s evident that he’s got plenty of talent to contend on a regular basis on this circuit, and he’s someone whose name will likely appear in this article a lot in 2027. But I’m not waiting until next year to deploy Ford; he’ll be on my card this week as a top-20 play, which is currently listed at +164.

David Ford taps in for birdie on No. 14 at World Wide Technology

I’ve loved everything I’ve seen from Seamus Power this fall. He’s played four times and has three top-eight finishes. His worst finish was a T21 at the Bank of Utah Championship. He’s combined elite putting with strong approach play to vault himself to the top section of these leaderboards. Last week, he showed something that is a bit more unquantifiable — guts!

Power opened the week 69-70 and made the cut on the number, truly nothing noteworthy. Then he flipped on the jets, firing rounds of 65-66 to close and finishing T8. He gained eight strokes on the field over the final two days, the second-best weekend of anyone in Cabo.

He’s certainly more volatile than some of his peers, but it’s difficult to leave Power off the card this week. He’ll be earning a spot in the top-10 market, where he can be found at +340.

It was a mixed bag for Chris Kirk last week, who looked poised to contend countless times throughout the event. He led after the first round and was T3 going into Sunday, but too many big numbers kept him from truly being a contender. Over the final three rounds, Kirk made six bogeys and three double bogeys, which was the most of anyone who finished inside the top 20.

The good news is that Kirk has quietly found his iron game again. He gained +7.99 strokes on approach last week, second-best in the field. Over his last 24 rounds, he’s gained +1.06 strokes per round on approach, the best mark in this field, and that stretch includes a T10 in Asheville, a T21 in Utah and a T6 in Bermuda. His +1.48 strokes per round over his last 24 rounds is fifth-best in the field.

Few players are having a fall as good as Chris Kirk’s, and he still seems to be leaving plenty of shots on the table. If he’s able to clean up the crooked numbers, he’ll have a chance to win. I’m taking a more tempered approach and deploying Kirk in the top-10 market, where his odds can be found at +245.

Doug Ghim's 121-yard approach sets up birdie on No. 12 at Mexico Open

Doug Ghim is putting together the most consistent stretch of his career. He’s finished inside the top 20 in six straight starts, dating back to the Rocket Classic. During that run, he has had a few close calls, including a runner-up in Utah and a T6 at the Mexico Open. Over his last 24 rounds, he’s gained +1.97 strokes per round, second only to James in this field. He also ranks second to James in strokes gained tee-to-green over the last 12 months.

The critique of Ghim has been the same for his entire career — can he actually win a PGA Tour event? He’s made nearly 200 career starts on Tour and has yet to find victory. In this field, only Patrick Rodgers, Mark Hubbard, Beau Hossler and Zac Blair have more starts without a win.

However, “that” version of Ghim is not “this” version of Ghim. He’s having the best year of his career by a wide margin, has filled the biggest hole in his game — the putter — and has contended routinely over the past few months. For those reasons, Ghim is my pick to win the Austin Championship at +1900.

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