This article is part of our FanDuel PGA DFS Picks series.
ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP
Course: Narashino Country Club (7,079 yards, par 70)
Purse: $11,000,000
Winner: $1,980,000 and 500 FedExCup points
Tournament Preview
2022 marks the fourth edition of the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP. The first could not have gotten off to a better start with Tiger Woods winning for the 82nd time on the PGA Tour and tying Sam Snead's all-time wins record. The 2020 edition was moved from Japan due to the COVID-19 pandemic and was instead contested at Sherwood Country Club in California. Patrick Cantlay would win with a tournament-record score of 23-under-par. Cantlay's aggregate score of 265 would be matched by fan-favorite Hideki Matsuyama in the return to Narashino Country Club's par 70 layout in 2021. Matsuyama put together one of the most dominant wins of the season a year ago en route to his seventh of now eight PGA Tour victories.
This year the field will feature 11 of the top 30 players in the OWGR. Matsuyama's main competition in his title defense may be from a pair of fellow International Team members in Sungjae Im and Tom Kim. Im has been blazing hot over the last few months, while Kim is coming off his second PGA Tour win last week in Las Vegas at just 20 years old. Xander Schauffele, who won the Olympic Gold Medal in Japan in the summer of 2021, will be in the field looking for another PGA Tour victory. Two of his fellow U.S. Presidents Cup team members will also be making the trip in Collin Morikawa and Cameron Young. This is a global game and so we can't forget about a strong trio of European's hoping to get their PGA Tour seasons off to good starts. Those Ryder Cup mainstays are Viktor Hovland, Tommy Fleetwood, and Tyrrell Hatton.
The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP will be the first of two straight limited-field, no-cut events on the PGA Tour schedule with the CJ Cup in South Carolina up next week. This 78-man field is made up of the top-60 available PGA Tour players from the previous FedExCup seasons, as well as 10 players from the Japan Golf Tour and eight sponsor exemptions. The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP in Japan has been affected by heavy rains in past editions. The first round is projected to be a wet one, but after that the weather looks to be very ideal for scoring with calm breezes and temperatures climbing into the mid-70s.
Recent Champions
2021 - Hideki Matsuyama (Narashino CC)
2020 - Patrick Cantlay (Sherwood CC)
2019 - Tiger Woods (Narashino CC)
Key Stats to Victory
- SG: Approach
- GIR Percentage
- Scrambling
- SG: Putting
Champion's Profile
Narashino Country Club is a par-70 that features five par-3s and three par-5s. At just over 7,000 yards, length is certainly not a requirement to compete for the victory here. With this year's edition of the ZOZO Championship being conducted a couple weeks earlier the the previous two editions in Japan, the rough could be a bit lusher. Especially when it gets wet, driving accuracy will be important to stay out of the three plus inches of rough at Narashino. You'll notice that each hole this week features two greens, which is common in Japan to try to extend the playability of courses throughout the year. In the first two editions here one hole has featured the use of two greens during the tournament and that will continue in 2022. It will be the par-3 fifth hole as it was in 2021. GIR percentage numbers are expected to be the lowest we have seen so far this season, which will give good scramblers the ability to gain shots on the field more easily. Weather permitting, the grounds crew is aiming at what would be a tournament-high 12.5 on the Stimpmeter, which could swing some advantage to those that excel on the greens.
FanDuel Value Picks
The Chalk
Sungjae Im ($11,700)
The combination of Im's ability to drive the ball well, hit a lot of GIR, and be a tremendous scrambler puts him as one of the best course fits for Narashino you could think of. He is coming off a solo seventh last week in Las Vegas which was his sixth straight top-15 finish. It has now been over a year since Im's last victory, but he seems prime to change that in Japan.
Hideki Matsuyama ($11,600)
The only golfer that has beaten Matsuyama in two prior attempts at Narashino CC is none other than Tiger. Playing in his home country will give him a ton of energy and familiar greens should mitigate his biggest weakness. Matsuyama is an excellent iron player as we know and his short game has undergone big improvements in the past couple years. He finished top-25 in his first start of the year in Napa.
Collin Morikawa ($11,300)
Morikawa has finished T22 and T7 in the first two editions of the ZOZO Championship at Narashino CC. He's finally got that cut shot working again and he looked very confident going 2-1-0 at the Presidents Cup. Morikawa hits as many fairways and greens as any of the top players. If the rough is thicker this time around, it should play to his advantage.
Tyrrell Hatton ($10,200)
Hatton comes in riding some positive momentum after scoring two straight top-10 finishes on the DP World Tour. He checks in at a very appealing price and should be pretty low from an ownership perspective. At his best Hatton is pouring in putts, and he has one of the best short games in the field. His iron player has also seen a positive uptick in recent seasons.
Longer Shots with Value
Tom Hoge ($9,700)
Hoge is off to a flying start this season with a T12 in Napa and then a T4 last week in Vegas. That came after a strong 10th place finish in the FedExCup last season. Hoge's iron play and short game will be a reason why he puts up another strong result in Japan. This season he is fourth in SG: Approach. Last season he was 11th in that statistic and also 16th in scrambling.
Matthew NeSmith ($9,300)
I was on NeSmith last week and he turned that into a T2 result in Vegas. There's no reason not to go back to the well again for a hot player at a terrific number this week. NeSmith was second a week ago in both scrambling and GIR. If he's able to do something close to that at Narashino he will absolutely be around on the back-nine on Sunday.
Mackenzie Hughes ($8,800)
I'm typically not a guy that likes to pick a player coming off a victory, but for this price I think it makes a lot of sense. The Canadian took a week off following his second PGA Tour win in a playoff at the Sanderson Farms Championship where he led the field in SG: Tee-to-Green and scrambling. He clearly likes this golf course as well after posting a T4 a year ago at Narashino.
Aaron Rai ($8,300)
Rai is a 27-year-old to keep an eye out for in the coming years. There's a lot to like about his game and the Englishman has shown the ability to be able to get it done in any country. Rai posted a top-five finish a few weeks ago at the Italian Open and followed with a top-20 last week at the Shriners Open. His 65 hit greens in regulation led the field in Vegas and provides a lot of reason for optimism going to this golf course.
Strategy Tips This Week
Based on a Standard $60K Salary Cap
No-cut events always provide bigger potential swings on the final day than regular 36-hole cut events. Nobody is really going to be completely out of cashing going into the final day because everyone is going to get the same number of holes. I think it's always an opportunity to be aggressive and look for players who are going to put down a lot of circles on the scorecard. This field is certainly top-heavy even with just 12 players checking in at five figures. Ownership is going to be really high for those top five or six players, so this is a week where leaving some salary on the table to find some contrarian plays may pay off quite well. Matt Wallace ($8,600), Kurt Kitayama ($8,500), and Russell Knox ($8,100) are some other bargain values not mentioned above that are interesting.
