Will Zalatoris On Predictive Analytics, Fantasy Golf And Tips For Picking A Masters Winner

IBM, the Masters digital partner is using golf’s annual quest for the green jacket, which tees off in just eight days, to showcase the predictive powers of Watson, their artificial intelligence platform.

The AI system that once trounced Ken Jennings in Jeopardy, has pored over thousands of golf shots and taken into account a multitude of factors that can impact player performance. The new feature on the Masters app and website analyzes everything from wind chill to more granular data based on course characteristics in order to serve up daily projections on every player competing in the tourney. Couched as an amenity to make locking in fantasy picks a breeze, predictive analytics tools have applications in a myriad of industry lanes that Big Blue swims.

Will Zalatoris, the 2021 Masters runner-up feels the same big data crunching capabilities that facilitate the Masters projections could one day be used to help pros make real-time club selection decisions.

“The beauty of the data we’ve gotten from IBM Watson is they are now able to look at the difficulty of conditions and pin locations. Right now, it is built for fantasy and the fans but that’s stuff that down the road that absolutely we’ll be looking at,” Zalatoris says.

“Last year using the Masters app on my end on Saturday and Sunday I was watching how guys were playing certain holes, what clubs they were hitting, the reaction of balls on greens and seeing if there were trends or mistakes that guys were making,” he adds.

For fantasy golf players looking to do a little extra homework when rounding out their Master picks, they may be well served to key into strokes gained on approach, a statistical category where Zalatoris currently ranks second on tour. Augusta National’s firm and speedy greens put a premium on landing in just the right spots.

“Last year I hit a ton of greens but if I was hitting greens on the wrong section, sometimes that’s even worse than missing a green. The guys that are the really good iron players typically have a big advantage because they know where they can and can’t miss it,” Zalatoris says.

“The reality is the great iron players will get it around the hole and they miss it in the right spots.You’ll see crazy things like Adam Scott one year out of the left rough on No. 7, barely catches that hill, runs all the way down the hole and it takes around 25-30 seconds for the ball to go in from the fairway,” he adds.

Coming In Hot

Zalatoris’ old Walker Cup teammate and longtime buddy Scottie Scheffler has in the space of 42 days gone from winning his first PGA Tour tournament to vaulting to World No. 1. That’s the fastest ascent between a debut win and climbing pinnacle of the official rankings on record. It took Tiger Woods, the prior record holder, 252 days to complete the feat.

“Coming into Augusta hot really gives you confidence. You can’t fake your way around this golf course. It is decently wide off the tee but at the same time any little mistake, or maybe you barely mishit one on No. 5 and you’re hitting 3-iron in, instead of 6-iron. That’s a massive difference,” Zalatoris says.

Rory and DJ at 32, and 37 respectively are currently elder statesmen of the top-10 in the official world rankings. While that demographic cohort isn’t going out to pasture anytime soon, twenty-somethings have been dominating the upper echelon of the leaderboard of late.

“The trend is definitely heading younger but at the same time the thing about Augusta is we’ve seen guys win in their 15^thor 20^th try. I think what makes the Masters so fun, is Tiger Woods wins [his fifth] Masters in his 22^nd appearance and then I’m contending in my first. At Augusta you never know,” Zalatoris says.

The Wake Forest alum is happy to extend his predictive powers from inside the yellow ropes to the hardcourt. He’s sanguine about the Golden State Warriors chances this season.

“When Steph is on, he’s the best player in the world and no one can stop them. They need Draymond Green to facilitate plays and Clay has been showing signs of life. They have a pretty young core and I think it depends how healthy they get. Kuminga keeps getting better and better and Jordan Poole put up 30 the other night. It’s fun to watch and on top of that, they’ve got some guys on that team that are pretty good golfers.”