Yahoo Sports Masters odds: After phenomenal round, Hideki Matsuyama is huge favorite to win green jacket
(Follow Sunday's final round of the Masters here.)
Before Saturday, bettors treated Hideki Matsuyama like an afterthought.
Mastuyama was 20-to-1 to win the Masters at BetMGM before Saturday. Only 0.68 percent of tickets and 0.55 percent of the handle on wagers for the Masters champion at BetMGM were on Matsuyama.
Matsuyama is the talk of the tournament and the clear favorite to win now. Funny what one great round can do.
Matsuyama has moved all the way to -125 at BetMGM to win the Masters after taking a four-stroke lead on Saturday, meaning he's favored over the field. Others faded a bit while Matsuyama torched the course.
Hideki Matsuyama takes over as huge favorite
Matsuyama was brilliant on Saturday. He posted a 7-under-par 65 and led by three strokes when he finished his round. Only three golfers were within five strokes of him at that point.
Going into the final round, the other golfers in the hunt will need him to falter. There's not much history of that. Matsuyama has played Augusta well in the past, with five top-20 finishes in his last six Masters. He finished as.high as fifth in 2015. In his last six final rounds as the Masters, he has shot par or better in five of them. He shot as low as 66 in the final round, in 2015.
In other words, it might take an unbelievable round by someone to challenge the 29-year-old looking for his first Masters win. Even a great round might not be good enough.
Who can make a run at Matsuyama?
If you do think Matsuyama can be caught, you can get decent odds on others in the top 10 going into Sunday.
Xander Schauffele has the second-lowest odds at +450. Justin Rose, who had a great first round and has been at par since, is next at +1000, as is Will Zalatoris. Marc Leishman is at +1100. Jordan Spieth, the most-bet golfer to win before the tournament, is +1600 and all others are at least +2500.
It's hard to take Matsuyama at such low odds, but betting on anyone else to win means taking a golfer who is at least four strokes behind with 18 to play. Against a golfer that has a strong history of success at the Masters.
Anything can happen with 18 holes to play, but BetMGM's odds indicate that it will be an anticlimactic Sunday at the Masters.
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