Top Tournament Group Picks for the U.S. Open

The PGA TOUR heads to Oakmont Country Club for what should be a great week of golf at the third major championship of the season. With a great field that includes the best players from both the PGA TOUR and LIV Golf, there are plenty of golfers to consider for your betting card and fantasy lineups. While picking the winner from the entire field can be extremely challenging but also extremely rewarding, Tournament groups are another great way to get in on the action by selecting the winner from a smaller pool than the entire field. It’s a nice “sweet spot” that balances risk and reward as these picks only need to finish higher on the leaderboard than the other players in their group. Let’s dive into the 12 groups on the board this week and find some golf best bets.

The format of tournament groups is very straightforward–the lowest scorer from the group for the week wins. The groups are available on the Tournament Groups section of the U.S. Open page on DraftKings Sportsbook.

While the U.S. Open is held on a different course each season, there are some similarities for this event each year. As a result, past U.S. Open history does matter along with current form and how players typically perform in difficult scoring conditions. Check out my preview for more on the history of the event and the difficulty of the course.

Here are my three golf best bets from the groups on the board this week

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Group B: Joaquin Niemann (+280)

Group B is the second tier of golfers on the board this week just behind Group A’s Scottie Scheffler, Bryson DeChambeau, Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm and Xander Schauffele. Getting Niemann in this group is actually a pretty good value at almost 3:1 since the rest of this group is deep but hasn’t been quite as strong as Niemann lately.

In the LIV Golf season, there have been eight tournaments this season, and Niemann has won four of them. He won in Adelaide, Singapore, Mexico City and last week in Virginia. He has six career wins as part of LIV Golf after winning twice on the PGA TOUR.

This year at majors, the 26-year-old from Chile has finished T-29 at the Masters and T-8 at the PGA Championship. Over the last five years, he has made the cut in 15 of the 17 majors he has played in, with that T-8 at Quail Hollow his first career top-10 at a major. Last year, he didn’t play the U.S. Open, but he has made the cut in each of his last four appearances at this event.

Let’s take a quick look at the other options in this group to contrast with Niemann’s recent form. Morikawa has been around the leaderboard this year but has not won on the PGA TOUR. He finished T-50 at the PGA Championship. Fleetwood has also been consistent with three top-10 finishes in his last five events, but also finished back at T-41 at the PGA Championship.

Aberg is the only player in this group aside from Niemann who has claimed a win this year. He won the Genesis Invitational but faded since then with a missed cut at the PGA Championship. He did get a pair of top-20 finishes at the Memorial and the RBC Canadian Open and is a good sleeper for DFS, but I like Niemann’s upside better. Koepka finished second to Niemann in Singapore but missed the cut at both the Masters and PGA Championship before finishing T-33 behind Niemann in Virginia last week.

Based on his spike upside and good recent form, I’ve got Niemann as one of my golf best bets from the groups this week, since I like his chances to take down Group B.

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Group D: Shane Lowry (+280)

I normally avoid favorites in these groups to grab longer odds, but I really like Lowry at almost 3:1 in this group. He’s actually at the same number as Niemann, but he has the shortest odds in this group since everyone’s odds are more bunched together.

Lowry hasn’t won this season, but he has been very consistently near the top of the leaderboards. He has 10 top-25 finishes in his 14 events this season, four top-10 finishes and a pair of runner-ups. He missed the cut at the PGA Championship but has posted five top-25 finishes in his last six events aside from that.

Lowry is also a proven producer at major championships. He has 19 top-25 finishes and nine top-10 finishes in his career at majors, including two top-10s in the U.S. Open. His most recent runner-up finish was the last time the U.S. Open visited Oakmont back in 2016. Lowry was 29 years old for that event and finished three strokes behind Dustin Johnson. He’s 38 years old as he returns this year, but his all-around game is in a good spot, and he could definitely contend again in 2025.

Hatton and Henley have shown spike potential but haven’t been very consistent lately, while Griffin has been red-hot with two wins and a runner-up over the last few weeks, but he has never played the U.S. Open before.

Spieth is definitely more proven than Griffin and the other options here aside from Lowry, but he has been even more of a roller-coaster than usual lately and his “adventurous” play could get him in trouble at Oakmont where taking creative routes to the green are discouraged by all the bunkers and rough along the way.

Lowry has one major championship victory in his career, and he’ll look to add a second this week. Even if he falls short of that, he has a good chance of finishing high enough on the leaderboard to win Group D this week.

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Group I: J.T. Poston (+330)

For my longshot pick in this week’s golf best bets, I’m going with Poston over this interesting international grouping. Poston has a nice, well-balanced game and has put together some good finishes this season.

He missed the cut at the Memorial in his last start, snapping a string of 14 straight made cuts dating back to the Sony Open in Hawaii. He made the cut at the Masters and the PGA Championship during that run with six top-25 finishes and one top-10, which came at the PGA Championship, where he finished T-5.

His putting has been excellent this season, and he ranks fifth in Strokes Gained: Putting over the last 30 rounds and sixth in Strokes Gained: Short Game. He has made the cut in two of his last three U.S. Opens with a career-best T-32 last year at Pinehurst.

Clark won the U.S. Open two years ago but doesn’t have much current form, which is why he’s the longest shot on the board. Taylor has been trending recently as well, but he has only made the cut in one of his last 10 majors over the last four seasons. He was low amateur in 2009 at the U.S. Open but has only made the cut in one of four appearances since then.

The two young guns in this group are Min Woo Lee and Akshay Bhatia. Bhatia has made the cut in both of his U.S. Opens with a T-16 last year, but he hasn’t had many good showings this season. After a T-3 at THE PLAYERS in March, he missed three cuts in seven events with no finishes better than T-40. He did look a little better in his last two tournaments, at the Schwab Challenge and the Memorial.

Lee got his breakthrough win earlier this season at the Texas Children’s Houston Open, but since then he missed the cut at the PGA Championship and finished no better than T-49 in any of his five events.

While Bhatia or Lee have the potential to go low, Poston has enough of a proven track record with his short game and putting that he should be able to avoid trouble at Oakmont more than the other players in this group.

He’s a longshot play for sure, but if he can have a week like he did at Quail Hollow, Poston should be able to get the win in this group.