The betting favorites, value picks and long shots to win the 2024 Masters

It’s April. College basketball is nearly over. The forecast is warming. The azaleas are blooming. It’s Masters week!

Practice rounds begin Monday for the 88th edition of the Masters, with tournament rounds beginning Thursday at Augusta National Golf Club.

Can Jon Rahm defend his title just months after defecting from the PGA Tour to LIV? Can Scottie Scheffler — perhaps the hottest golfer in the world right now — win two green jackets in three years? And could a past Augusta champion again out on the green jacket, something that’s only occured twice in the past decade (Bubba Watson, 2014, and Tiger Woods, 2019)?

There’s much to ponder and, thankfully, the oddsmakers have given us fodder.

Note: All betting odds current as of April 7 via Draft Kings:

Favorites

For the second-straight year, Scheffler is the betting favorite to put on the green jacket. The 2022 Masters champion was a 7-1 favorite to repeat last year and comes into the 2024 tournament as a 4-1 front runner.

Scheffler, who finished T-10 at Augusta last year, has been on a tear of late. The 27-year old has already won a pair of tournaments this year (the Players and the Arnold Palmer Invitational) and finished in the Top 10 seven times.

How much of a favorite is Scheffler? Bettors don’t seem to think anyone is even in his stratosphere. The lowest odds after the Texan belong to Rory McIlroy (10-1), Rahm (12-1), Brooks Koepka (18-1) and Xander Schauffele (18-1), who has never won a major.

McIlroy would perhaps, aside from a Tiger victory, be the biggest story. The Northern Ireland native has put an arm in the green jacket — blowing a lead in the 2011 Masters — but still needs a win at Augusta National to cap off the career grand slam.

Basically cast as the unofficial spokesperson against LIV, McIlroy has spent the past two years struggling to focus on golf as he navigates inter-tour drama, as shown in Netflix’s “Full Swing” series. Last year in Augusta, after finishing third two weeks earlier, McIlroy missed the cut.

Good value picks

Wyndam Clark (28-1): The reigning US Open Champion has had an up-and-down start to the 2023 season, placing outside the top 25 five times but finishing T-2 or better three times, including winning at Pebble Beach. This will be his first Masters, which might not bode well, but Clark has the talent to be in the mix.

Ludvig Aberg (28-1): If you’re looking for the next candidate to have a breakout performance at Augusta — à la Tiger in 1997 — Aberg is the candidate everyone’s looking at. The 24-year-old from Sweden (who played college golf at Texas Tech), has never played in a major but is already ranked ninth in the world with a win on the PGA Tour.

Will Zalatoris (35-1): The 27-year old seems to always be in the hunt at majors. In the six majors he’s finished, he’s finished in the top 10 five times. This will be his third trip to Augusta after placing second in 2022 and T-6 last April. Sometimes it’s smart to identify the guys who won’t get overtaken by the moment.

Long shots

Cameron Young (55-1): If you’re looking for someone hot coming into Augusta, Young is your guy. The 26-year old, who’s still winless on the PGA Tour, finished second at the Valspar Championship in late March. Even better: He finished T-7 at the Masters last year and ended the 2023 major season with another top-10 finish at the Open.

Brian Harmon (55-1): Not often does the eighth-best player in the world have the 30th-best odds heading into a major. Harmon, the reigning champ at the Open who also played on the U.S. Ryder Cup team, is less than a month off of finishing T-2 at the Players. Though he missed his last two cuts at Augusta, there’s a chance he could be the fourth lefty to win the Masters this week.

Phil Mickelson (130-1): Speaking of lefties ... who’s to say it’s impossible? Twenty years after hitting a putt on the final hole to win not just his first Masters, but his first major, Mickelson — now with the LIV Tour — is back at Augusta for the 31st time. Some forget, last year Mickelson finished T-2 at Augusta at 52 years old.