2024 U.S. Open Pinehurst Course Preview and Betting Trends

The 124th U.S. Open will take place this week at Pinehurst No. 2. This will be the fourth time that Pinehurst No. 2 has hosted the U.S. Open, with its first hosting duties having come back in 1999 when Payne Stewart famously outdueled Phil Mickelson. It last hosted the event in 2014. Martin Kaymer won that season, having landed a wire-to-wire win and having beaten the field by a whopping eight strokes.

The U.S. Open is one of the most revered events in golf thanks in large part due to the tougher setups that the USGA employs at some of the most unique courses in the United States. We often see winning scores at this event come in close to par, and there have been several U.S. Opens won with scores of even par or worse.

With that in mind, I will do a separate breakdown of this year’s U.S. Open course in full detail before posting my main betting preview tomorrow. I’ll have a lot of placement and outright targets in that second article, but for today, I first want to give a solid breakdown of Pinehurst No. 2 so that you know what to expect before diving into the different bets.

I’ll also get into some basic trends we’ve seen from past winners of this event (in their leadup to this major) and give my favorite early-week pick. A quick preview: I think that he’s a player who gels very well with this year’s setup (more on that below).

Let’s dive in and get our U.S. Open week started!

2024 U.S. Open Course Preview

Pinehurst No. 2 (North Carolina) 

• Par: 70, 7,543 yards
• Greens: Champion ultradwarf bermuda
• Fairways: Average fairway widths in landing areas are between 35-45 yards
• Rough: Sandy native areas with wiregrass
• Design: Donald Ross (1907); Redesign: Bill Coore + Ben Crenshaw (2009 -11)
• Defending Champion: Martin Kaymer (2014 U.S. Open); Wyndham Clark (event - 2023 LA Country Club)

This will be the eighth-longest course played on the PGA so far this season, but it will also be the longest par 70 the players have seen all year. Just to give you an example of how long Pinehurst No. 2 is, the PGA Championship venue (Valhalla) played to just over 7,600 yards and was a par 72 with four par 5s. Pinehurst No. 2 is nearly the same length but has two fewer par 5s for the players to score on.

The venue plays as a traditional par 70 (two par 5s and four par 3s). There are four par 4s that measure over 500 yards and will certainly test players' ability to hit a solid mid-to-long iron this week.

Pinehurst No. 2 is also a traditional Donald Ross design, a preeminent architect from the early 1900s. Ross has designed several other PGA TOUR courses, including Sedgefield Country Club (host of the Wyndham Championship) and East Lake (host of the TOUR Championship).

Much like various other Ross designs, Pinehurst contains open, shallow, and larger greens that allow players to run the ball up on their approach shot. The greens at Pinehurst can be a double-edged sword, though. While players can run the ball up if they so choose, with the speeds the greens play at along with the sharp contours, it's also easy for players to run their balls through and off the green.

Jun 10, 2024; Pinehurst, North Carolina, USA; Dustin Johnson punches out of the sand onto the sixth green during a practice round for the U.S. Open golf tournament at Pinehurst No. 2. Mandatory Credit: Katie Goodale-USA TODAY Sports

The greens at Pinehurst were a major story back during the 2014 U.S. Open. Generally, hitting the ball close to the pin is an advantage. But hitting it to the wrong place off the green at Pinehurst No. 2 can leave a player in a dead spot and having to pitch back even further away from the pin than he initially landed, bringing big scores into play. That means aggressiveness will have to be tempered somewhat this week, and impatient players will likely pay the price.

A long course with fast greens isn’t necessarily anything new for the U.S. Open, though. Last season, the LA Country Club played as a par 70 at just over 7,400 yards. And in 2020, Winged Foot played nearly as long as Pinehurst and featured equally impossible greens. Where Pinehurst No. 2 really differentiates itself is in how the non-fairway areas are set up.

Normally, one feature we’re used to seeing at a traditional U.S. Open course is thick rough that gets perpetually tougher to play out of as the ball gets further from the fairway. However, Pinehurst No. 2 has no rough. Instead, it has what's described as “native areas”, generally filled with sand and native plants (mainly small areas of wild grass).

That means that if a player drives it off the fairway, whether or not his ball will be playable for his approach (second shot) essentially becomes a roll of the dice. While some balls may land harmlessly in flat sandy lies or in thin grass/brush, others could nestle into a sandy embankment or small bush and become unplayable.

This setup gives Pinehurst a higher degree of variance off the tee than at most other U.S. Open venues. Traditionally, big hitters like the U.S. Open because they can drive the ball closer to the pin off the tee and then “muscle” their way out of the rough on their second shot if needed. Pinehurst No. 2 takes away that advantage and makes it a more level, albeit more volatile, playing field.

Even if a player hits a near-perfect drive at Pinehurst No. 2, if he misses the fairway even slightly, he could be dead for his second shot (or need to take a penalty drop). On the other hand, even a very poor drive at Pinehurst No. 2 could still land harmlessly in a sandy area way off the fairway with a great approach vantage to the green.

Just to give you an idea of how variable Pinehurst No. 2 can and is likely to play, here’s the final leaderboard from the 2014 U.S. Open:
 

While names like Koepka and Dustin Johnson are big hitters we traditionally associate with the U.S. Open, names like Kuchar, Snedeker, and Erik Compton are not. In this sense, while we can’t simply ignore the big hitters or players with good U.S. Open pedigree, it’s quite likely that we’re going to see some non-traditional names on the U.S. Open leaderboard this week.

So how should we approach Pinehurst No. 2 for betting?

I wouldn't over-emphasize past U.S. Open results this week, and I'm also open to the idea that this course may play entirely different than most U.S. Opens, even akin to a PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP or Open Championship. Good iron play is still certainly going to play a huge role in determining the winner, and few were striking the ball than Kaymer in that regard back in 2014.

I also wouldn't be overly reliant on off-the-tee stats this week. The off-the-tee play of names like Snedeker, Na, and Kuchar were the weakest parts of their game (now and in 2014). However, where those names tend to excel are on and around the greens. Looking at around-the-green stats (either in short-term trends or at specific locations like the Open or TPC Sawgrass) makes sense to me this week.

Betting Facts and Stats for the 2024 U.S. Open

Below are the previous 10 winners of the U.S. Open and their pre-event odds from the beginning of the week of the event (odds courtesy of SportsOddsHistory):

Here are a few other notes to consider:

• After Wyndham Clark won the U.S. Open in 2023, two of the past five winners went off at +5000 or longer odds, and three of the past five winners have had pre-event odds of +3000 or greater.
• Over the last decade, there have been five winners with pre-event odds of +3000 or greater.
• In contrast, the betting favorite has only won the U.S. Open twice this decade (Spieth in 2015 and Rahm in 2021).

2024 U.S. Open Betting Trends

Betting trends aren’t a great thing to follow blindly in handicapping, but they can be useful for tie-breaking scenarios. Trends also tend to carry more weight in golf betting at events where course history plays a bigger role.

Since there's relatively little course history to play off this week, we’ll be focusing more on event, statistical, and major championship trends. Here are some of the more relevant PGA Championship betting trends for 2024:

• 11 of the past 13 winners of the U.S. Open had recorded at least four top 10s on the season prior to their U.S. Open victory. 
• Four of the last five winners of the U.S. Open all placed inside the top 10 at the PGA Championship the month prior and had gained over 7.0 strokes tee to green at that event.

Apr 11, 2024; Augusta, Georgia, USA; Wyndham Clark plays his shot from the fourth tee during the first round of the Masters Tournament. Mandatory Credit: Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports

Major experience of past U.S. Open winners

• Six of the last seven winners of the U.S. Open have been first-time major championship winners.

Recent statistical form of the last five U.S. Open winners

• Each of the past five winners gained over 7.0 strokes tee to green in one of their final four starts before winning the U.S. Open. 

Recent results of the last five U.S. Open winners

• Each of the past five winners had achieved a top-10 finish in one of their final four starts before winning the U.S. Open.

Early Bet for 2024 U.S. Open

Hideki Matsuyama Outright (+5500, FanDuel)

• Top 10 (+330, DraftKings)
• Top 20 (+140, DraftKings)

Given the course in play this week, Matsuyama makes plenty of sense as a potential upside target. His game is based more on accuracy with his irons, and he has great skill and scoring ability around the greens.

Although Matsuyama hasn't really thrived in the more heavy-handed setups of most U.S. Open courses, he did manage a T2 at this event at the much softer Erin Hills in 2017, where wider fairways allowed the less inclined off the tee to flourish (remember that Brian Harman led that event after three rounds).

He also finished T4 at the Country Club in 2022, a shorter U.S. Open setup (7,200 yards) where we saw Matthew Fitzpatrick, who tends to thrive more with his putter and around the green play, win his first major.

Matsuyama hasn’t necessarily thrived at the Open Championship, but he has played well at TPC Sawgrass, another high-variance venue where accuracy and around-the-green play tend to trump power. He’s also landed four top-10s at the PLAYERS over the last seven years, and given Kaymer’s success at both Pinehurst No. 2 and Sawgrass (he won on both courses in 2014), the correlation is at least worth mentioning.

From a value perspective, I also like the fact that Matsuyama is coming in far more under the radar this week than he was for the Masters, where his pre-event odds got pushed down to +2500 at some books. We can currently get Matsuyama at double or better than those odds despite the fact he finished T8 last week and gained over 6.0 strokes on approach and around the green combined.

It seems like a good time to buy in on the 2021 Masters winner, as Matsuyama is one of the few top players to have won this year in an event where Scottie Scheffler was also in the field.