This article is part of our Golf One and Done Pool Expert Picks series.
Arnold Palmer Invitational
All the top players are back on the course to take on Bay Hill Club & Lodge in the 2026 edition of the Arnold Palmer Invitational. The season's third Signature Event features a $4 million top prize, which is certainly significant to One and Done players. Nail the winner here and it could be the difference between cashing your pool in September or coming up short.
Headlining an elite 72-man field are Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy. Both are off to strong starts and both have exceptional records in this event. The expectations are that the top two ranked players in the Official World Golf Ranking should be rather popular at the API.
Last year, Russell Henley outdueled Collin Morikawa down the stretch to win at Bay Hill -- a result that propelled Henley into the top 10.
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Course Tidbits
- Course: Bay Hill Club & Lodge (7,466 yards, par 72)
- Location: Orlando, Florida
- Purse: $20 million -- $4 million to winner
- Defending Champion: Russell Henley (-11)
- 2025 Scoring Average: 72.58
- Average Winning Score Last 5 Years: -10.2
Bay Hill is one of toughest venues on the PGA Tour. It almost always plays firm and fast. The rough is among the most difficult on the schedule and the greens are as slick as they come. Miniature versions of the U.S. Open have broken out here over the last handful of years, with three of the last six tournaments featuring a winning score a single digit under par.
The biggest keys to success at Bay Hill will be hitting fairways, controlling distances on approach and touch around the greens. Last year, the top three players on the leaderboard were Henley, Morikawa and Corey Conners, who are not only among the best ball strikers on Tour but were among th eleaders in scrambling that week.
Bay Hill features one of the hardest sets of par-3s all season. Simply finding the putting surface and walking away with a two-putt par is bound to earn you some strokes against the rest of the field. Where the scoring comes on the course is the four par-5s. Each of them can be reached by the longer hitters, and birdies and eagles are needed to offset the damage likely to occur on the rest of this challenging track.
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Arnold Palmer Invitational: One and Done Picks
McIlroy has a sterling record at Bay Hill. He won this event in 2018, plus finished second, fourth, fifth and sixth while finishing inside the top 15 eight of the past nine years. Any course that puts a premium on distance without overly penalizing accuracy is in McIlroy's wheelhouse. As it often does, it could come down to McIlroy's putter. He's ranked 77th on Tour in SG: Putting, which is not a deal-breaker when he's also first in SG: Approach and Tee-to-Green. --Len Hochberg
I really wanted to use Scheffler, but then I realized that if I did, I would be assuming he has put his opening-round struggles behind him. While I believe he may have I have no proof, and you really can't afford to waste Scheffler if you want to win your one-and-done league. As such, I'm going to wait on Scheffler and go with Fitzpatrick, who seems to have all the metrics working in his favor this week. He's among the best ball strikers on the PGA Tour -- rather key at Bay Hill -- and his track record here is very strong. There are a lot of good picks to consider, but Fitzpatrick is as good as any of them. --Greg Vara
Fitzpatrick is worthy of being clicked in a big-money event. If you're going to do that, it's hard to come up with a much better spot than Bay Hill. The Englishman finished top-15 in six of his last nine starts here, and he gained strokes on the greens in every previous trip to Bay Hill. I've been very encouraged with his ball striking this season, as he ranks top-5 in SG: Approach, GIR percentage and scrambling. Fitzpatrick is also top-20 in SG: Off-the-Tee and driving accuracy. A lot of things seem to be aligning for the 2022 U.S. Open champion, and he may not be all that popular this week. --Ryan Andrade
Schauffele started the year with a missed cut in his hometown event but has improved in each start since. He had a strong ball-striking week in Phoenix, posted a top-20 at Pebble Beach and then ranked third in SG: Tee-to-Green en route to a top-10 at Riviera. He has always been an excellent long iron player, which will help him take advantage of the par-5s and lengthy par-3s. I'm not going to look much into his T40 last year -- a result that should keep him from being overly popular -- considering it was his first start back from a two-month layoff. --Ryan Pohle
If you missed out on his $1.8M runner-up payout at The Genesis Invitational, now's the time to gain leverage on previous McIlroy selections with a $4M first-place prize up for grabs at Bay Hill. This is a place where McIlroy owns five top-6 finishes -- including a win here back in 2018. Among this stacked field, McIlroy ranks second in both SG: Approach and rough proximity, fourth in scrambling and No. 1 in bogey avoidance this season. --Bryce Danielson
Fitzpatrick arrives with five top-10s across his last 10 starts, and he has finished as high as T2 at this event -- back in 2020. He currently ranks fourth on Tour in SG: Approach and fourth in this field for Hole Proximity from 200+ yards. The West Coast putting struggles are a non-issue here, as he has gained strokes on the greens in all 10 of his Bay Hill appearances. Fitzpatrick is a solid play for anyone looking to gain ground in their OAD leagues. --Lauren Jump
Fleetwood has a bit of a checkered history at Bay Hill, but he does have three top-10s -- including a T3 -- over nine career appearances plus a T11 last year. That checks both the familiarity and success boxes. He has only played twice stateside in 2026, but those resulted in a T4 and a T7, so he is right where he needs to be. Fleetwood has been a little off on approach but still ranks fifth in SG: Total, so if he can dial in with the irons the sky is the limit for the world's third-ranked player. --Kevin O'Brien
Arnold Palmer Invitational: One and Done Fades
Schauffele has played Bay Hill four times and has never sniffed a top-20. it doesn't make a lot of sense, but some things don't have to. Some guys just like -- or don't like -- certain courses. We're not saying Schauffele doesn't like Bay Hill, only that he hasn't played great here. And it's hard to see a guy ranked 59th on Tour in both SG: Approach and Putting finding a next gear all of a sudden. --Len Hochberg
Matsuyama seems to have recovered from his recent final-round meltdown, but he has never really had much success at Bay Hill. He has teed it up here 11 times, and while he made the cut in 10 of those appearances, he has only cracked the top 10 once. That's actually an amazing stat for a golfer the caliber of Matsuyama. There are simply too many good options to click outside of Matsuyama. --Greg Vara
Schauffele seems to be trending in the right direction after a T19 at Pebble Beach and then a T7 at Riviera. The ball striking has taken a nice surge forward as well. That said, Bay Hill is one of the most predictive courses on the PGA Tour, and despite all his talent, Schauffele has never contended here, with a best finish of T24 in four starts. Hopefully he can get his game back where it was in 2024 here before long because golf is better when the best players are playing their best. There are going to be some more interesting spots to use the two-time major winner down the road. --Ryan Andrade
Fitzpatrick has struggled with his ball striking at Bay Hill since this became a Signature Event, losing shots with his long game each of the last two years. Overall, his track record here and start to the year are solid, which should lead to him being selected by several. I'll look to gain leverage by fading and targeting him for better spots like Harbour Town -- where he's a past champion -- or Muirfield Village. --Ryan Pohle
I'm just as high on Fitzpatrick's outlook as everybody else, but his OAD ownership could really balloon while disregarding his actual win equity. He's not necessarily the profile of giga-chalk you want to chase in this format given the fact that he has gone nearly three full years without a victory -- especially if you're playing from further back in the standings. Finding an odds boost on Fitzpatrick in the outright or each-way betting market seems like a more profitable API portfolio inclusion, and in DFS lineups you have more levers to pull to get unique than you do with a single OAD click. --Bryce Danielson
Schauffele has never finished better than T24 in four tries at Bay Hill, a spot where eight of the last nine winners had a previous top-15 finish before breaking through. He will still attract OAD attention based on his name and ranking. Let others make that mistake. --Lauren Jump
Aberg has three top-25s in three trips to Bay Hill, but he stands no better than 82nd in SG: Off-the-Tee, Approach and Putting, and that's tough to overcome in a tough field. Aberg is going to get things figured out at some point, but I want to see it before I believe it. --Kevin O'Brien
Don't get burned by late withdrawals. Visit RotoWire's PGA tournament field page for a live-updated summary of the field for the current week and list of players who have dropped out.
