There have been exceptions, but traditionally the Travelers Championship has always been the PGA Tour’s post-U.S. Open stop on the schedule and that proximity has impacted on the list of winners. It’s as if anyone who contended the week before – so often, of course, a brutal test – emerged at TPC River Highlands so mentally exhausted they just weren’t up to the task.

Of the last 10 winners in Cromwell, Connecticut, only one had finished in the top 30 at the U.S. Open (Freddie Jacobson when he was T14th in 2011). None of this is to say that the likes of Brooks Koepka, Patrick Cantlay, Paul Casey, Francesco Molinari and Jason Day can’t win this week. But they all made the top 25 last week so the weight of historical evidence would have to make us golf betting fans think twice.

Ryan Moore One to Watch at Travelers

Ryan Moore, on the other hand, has consistently found himself enjoying this week and he knows why.

“Being the week after the U.S. Open definitely helps,” he said in 2014. “Golf just seems so much easier when you're not playing a U.S. Open golf course where you’re standing over every shot trying not to make double bogey. It allows me to relax a little bit and kind of go play golf again.

“That's part of it. I’m also from the Pacific Northwest, and the grass and the greens are very similar to this week, which just adds a certain amount of comfort. Besides that, the course fits my eye really well – the tee shots and second shots into the greens, I'm very comfortable with them.”

Moore’s Recent Travelers History Favorable

The weight of numbers is strong. Moore has played the course 11 times and collected seven top-20 finishes. Twice (on his debut in 2006 and then again in 2011) he was the runner-up and in total he was tied seventh or better five times.

That’s a solid bank of work and he recently has shown signs of being ready to hit the heights. In particular his first-round efforts have been especially impressive. There was 67 in the Players Championship (fifth place), 66 at the Heritage (second) and 65 last time out in the Memorial which led the field (he didn’t play the U.S. Open). Meanwhile, at the Texas Open, he closed with a dazzling 64 to claim third.

He’s great each way value at +6600 with 888Sport and with seven places up for grabs he’d have returned a profit in five of his previous 11 starts on the course.