No One Can Hassle Him Now - DontHasseltheHoff Captures First Career Victory at Farmers Insurance Open

The whispers started to accumulate last summer. The 2020 season was slowly coming to a close despite a solid rookie performance DontHasseltheHoff had no wins to his name. "Does he have what it takes to close out a fantasy golf tournament?" children would ask their fathers as they went to bed each Saturday night. A winless season is nothing unheard of but when you nearly lead the league in Top 10s, well, then a trophy-less shelf is just a waste of space and must be used to store unread books. 

The pressure was indeed mounting and the monkey was growing fat perched atop DontHassel's shoulders. But as 2021 kicked off it was clear that DontHasseltheHoff was pouring all his energies into irrevocably altering his winless status, much to the detriment of his job, family and friends who all were put on the backburner as he trained to win his first fantasy event. He was starting to feel the heat from the fantasy media once again, nearly a month into the new season, but destiny was on his side as he strolled onto the grounds at Torrey Pines last week, determined to put an end to the whispers. 

Before anyone knew it DontHassel was vying for the lead. His top-notch pick of Patrick Reed was bold indeed just one week after he missed the cut. But a solid opening 36 holes put him in 2nd as the cut line rolled around. There was only one problem - a fellow second year veteran who was also looking for his first career win was in first. And he had Patrick Reed too. Over the next two days No 3 Putts Ever and DontHasseltheHoff would duel it out on the cliffs of Southern California in a do or die battle to the finish. No more than a couple points separated them as they came down the back nine on Sunday and in one final blow - a par on 18 by Jon Rahm - DontHasseltheHoff threw off the monkey and secured the win of his career by just 3 points. Congrats DontHasseltheHoff. 

2nd Place

In what could have easily been the same story but a different name on the check the 2nd place finish at the Farmers is bittersweet for No 3 Putts Ever as he did almost exactly what he wanted to do. He put himself in position all week, leading the tournament through much of the week. Like DontHassel he was also looking for his first career win after a year and change on fantasy tour. The whispers had not quite caught up with though as he'd only carded 3 Top 10s in his rookie year. But if this high finish is any predictor of things to come it won't be long before the fantasy media start asking 'when will No 3 Putts ever close it out?'

3rd Place

In a surprise 3rd place finish Halve Ouimet and Bag Lady lept across the finish line together in a tie - seemingly coming out of nowhere to capture their first Top 3 of 2021. Halve Ouimet started off his week in a lowly 27th place but he stuck with his guns on Friday and slowly plotted his course from there. Bag Lady was fighting for ground inside the Top 10 as the week progressed and both were leaning on Patrick Reed to get the job done. And in a final push they charged up the leaderboard on Sunday on the back of Reed and his deft rulebook interpretations to land in 3rd by day's end. Ouimet now sits atop the leaderboard for the Winter Segment with 5 weeks to play while Bag Lady sits in a lonely 29th place. 

Notables

T5th - Talkeenta98 & Roll Up - While Talkeetna was capturing his first Top 10 of the season Roll Up was busy heaping another serving on his plate as he's got 3 Top 10s in 4 events. Both teams have shown pop throughout their careers. Roll Up - in just his second year on fantasy tour - is hot off an opening 9th place finish in 2020 and looks to improve on that. Talkeetna is the all-time 3rd place team in the career win column with 11 and knows what it takes to mount the podium. Both will be in contention throughout the year without a doubt. 

7th - Grandpa Levs - Capturing his second Top 10 of the season Grandpa is looking to be in good form. Positioning yourself inside the segment Top 10 within the first month of play is a key indicator of fantasy success. Grandpa is currently in 9th place for the winter segment and just outside of 100 points off the pace. 

8th - Driving Mrs. Daisy - Mrs. Daisy is no stranger to the Top 10 and has accumulated quite the nest egg of them throughout her career. In her 4 full years on fantasy tour she's racked up 53 Top 10s at just over 13 per season. She averages just over 1 win per year as well and ranks 15/50 in career earnings. Expect many more finishes like this throughout 2021. Especially heading into the Waste Management Phoenix Open where she is the defending champ. 

9th - Sugar Hill - the 9th place finish is Sugar Hill's second Top 10 in 4 events and sets him in good position to build his standing from here. In 13th overall he's got plenty of room for growth ahead and is already ahead of his Top 10 pace from his rookie season of 2020 where he had 10. 

T10th - Freeside Links & Couch Seat Driver - currently in 11th and 14th for the winter segment, respectively, both Freeside and Couch Seat are jockeying for position so as not to fall off the first page of the segment leaderboard. Both carded their second Top 10 with this T10 finish but Freeside is already enjoying a fresh title trophy on his shelf this year - one indicator of a successful season. 

NEXT UP is the annual favorite Waster Management Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale. As the west coast swing continues the boys will go back into the desert for this usually rockus event. Famed for it's massive record-breaking crowds and noisy par-3 16th hole. There'll be no roaring fans this year of course so we'll see how the players respond to a low energy stadium course this go round. 

The defending champs this week are Driving Mrs. Daisy on the fantasy side and Webb Simpson on the reality side. There's only one course they'll be playing this week so bonus points for long drives, long putts and hole outs are back in the mix. This week marks the halfway point for the Winter Segment so it'll be moving day, figuratively speaking, following this week. 

One thing you've probably noticed is that teams tend to bunch up close to each other in points as many have very similar rosters. Don't let the power rankings fool you from taking a look at the other pros who've been playing well to start the year.