Few tournaments offer such an explicit demonstration of why analysis should cover contenders, not just winners, as the Travelers Championship.
Spin through the last 10 renewals, before and after its questionable elevation to Signature status, and you'll see names like Bubba Watson, Dustin Johnson, Xander Schauffele, Keegan Bradley, and Scottie Scheffler on the honours board. But if you look at who finished second, you get a very different, much more illuminating list: Tom Kim, Zac Blair, Brian Harman and JT Poston among the most recent.
Not that we should need it. TPC River Highlands has been a regular PGA Tour stop since 1984 and we know all about its key characteristics. It is short, first and foremost, it is designed by Pete Dye, and scoring is typically low – Cameron Young shot an 11-under 59 last year and it wasn't enough to match the course record, still held by Jim Furyk after he became the first and so far only player to shoot 58 on the PGA Tour.
By now we know that McIlroy has gone through a bit of a post-Masters funk, admitting last week that having 'climbed my Everest', he needed to find a new mountain. At least he didn't go as far as saying the only way from there is down and, by the end of the week, he was much more positive.
That's because he led the field in strokes-gained off-the-tee and it's hard to overstate how important that could be, if not for this week then for the rest of summer. McIlroy's non-conforming driver episode at the PGA not only upset him and affected his relationship with the media, but it presented a very real problem, and it looks like at last he and his team might have found the solution.
Results haven't necessarily supported that notion but he's only missed two cuts, latterly because of his putter alone at the PGA Championship, and last week he produced his ninth top-30 finish since February. Given that he had surgery in the off-season, things have gone really well if you ask me.
Spieth was on my list for last week's US Open and played well to be 23rd and, like McIlroy, there was one big positive for all that the form itself doesn't carry as much weight as I'd like. In his case this was his approach play, which was excellent, and if he can marry it with the way he'd been driving the ball then good things should follow.
Consistently strong around the greens and still capable of lighting them up with the putter, albeit that happens less often these days, Spieth can win soon on the right course and we know that this qualifies, as he produced a stunning bunker hole-out to win in a play-off back in 2017.
Granted, he's not done much here since he led after round one a year later, but a short, technical test works well and he has generally performed on other Pete Dye layouts: ninth Crooked Stick, second Whistling Straits, fourth Sawgrass, 30th Kiawah Island, fourth Louisiana, first and second Harbour Town, which was the scene of his latest win and his most recent near-miss.
Like the Travelers, that event takes place immediately after a major championship and if we rewind to 2017, Spieth arrived here on the back of an encouraging but frustrating mid-pack finish in the US Open, where his long-game was good. I think there's a chance history repeats.
When Spieth won it was DANIEL BERGER who could count himself somewhat unlucky and it wouldn't surprise me if he finally gained a measure of revenge and earned another plaid jacket to go with the one they hand out at Colonial.
Berger was going off very short prices as recently as May, when he finished 11th in the Truist as a 28/1 shot and went off not much bigger for the PGA Championship, where he was among the best ball-strikers in the field on a long, soft course, but putted badly to finish 33rd.
Form figures of MC-MC-46 since then have sent him back down the betting but the first was all putter, the second courtesy of one bad round at Muirfield Village, where his record is patchy, and then last week he hit the ball fine and finished 46th in the US Open.
Given his Presidents Cup display last year I think Henley only need keep ticking over to make his Ryder Cup debut in September, but he's just fallen out of the top six automatic qualification spots and with some lesser lights advertising their credentials, and JJ Spaun leapfrogging him, there's no room for a significant dip in form.
He'll be scrapping for every point and he's another player who I felt would open much shorter. Henley was 50/1 last week and is still 50/1 in places for this weaker event, at a course where he finished 11th and first on his first two visits and would have more than four top-20 finishes had his putter behaved.
Hoge is a massive fan of Dye's most famous course, Sawgrass, where he was third back in March, and since then he's generally played well. Three missed cuts in his last four might suggest otherwise but all were narrow and two were in majors, where he rallied after slow starts but couldn't quite claw his way to the right side of the line.
Last week's long-game numbers were outstanding and before that he was seventh in the Memorial, so again he's one who is probably playing just as well as he was when he followed that PLAYERS effort with fifth in Texas, 14th in the Masters, and 18th at the aforementioned Harbour Town.
Another past champion at Pebble Beach, he took an age to get to grips with this place but did so in style last year, shooting rounds of 63 and 62 on his way to third place, and as you'd expect that was courtesy of a top-class ball-striking display. It was Hoge, not Scheffler, who was the best iron player in the field.
His putter would be the main concern but again it was fine on his penultimate start and he looks a value bet at 80s and upwards.
Sticking to the theme, Cauley may appear to have cooled since he contended at Sawgrass but he was third three starts ago and then struck it beautifully at Muirfield Village, where a poor putting display kept him stuck in the middle of the leaderboard.
He started well then faded at Oakmont but if we overlook that he's an in-form, rock-solid ball-striker with all the correlating form you could wish for: third at Sedgefield, sixth Sawgrass, eighth Sea Island, third Colonial, ninth Harbour Town, 11th Louisiana, fourth Greenbrier, fourth Canada. He has an ideal profile for this.
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