Our expert liked Collin Morikawa's chances this week.
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Welcome to our weekly PGA Tour gambling-tips column, featuring picks from GOLF.com’s expert prognosticator Brady Kannon. A seasoned golf bettor and commentator, Kannon is a regular guest on SportsGrid, a syndicated audio network devoted to sports and sport betting. You can follow on Twitter at @LasVegasGolfer, and you can read his picks below for the FedEx St. Jude Championship, which gets underway Thursday in Memphis, Tenn.. Along with Kannon’s recommended plays, you’ll also see data from Chirp Golf, a mobile app that features both Free-To-Play and Daily Fantasy golf contests where you can win cash and prizes with each round and tournament.
And then there were 70.
The postseason has begun on the PGA Tour, with the top 70 players in FedEx Cup points making their way to TPC Southwind in Memphis, Tenn., to kick-off Round 1 at the FedEx St. Jude Championship.
When this event concludes and the FedEx Cup points have been recalculated, the field gets trimmed to the top 50 players in points and it is those players who will move on to Round 2 for the BMW Championship in Colorado next week. And then finally, the top 30 players after that tournament will move on to the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta to ultimately compete for the FedEx Cup and its $25 million purse.
TPC Southwind has been a regular stop on Tour for over 30 years. This will mark the third straight year that it has been the host course for Round 1 of the FedEx Cup playoffs. It is a good-sized par 70, just shy of 7,250 yards. It has always been a very fair test, with many players voicing their strong support of TPC Southwind over the years. The average winning score over the last nine years here has been just slightly better than 14 under par.
Ron Pritchard designed the golf course with help from Fuzzy Zoeller and Hubert Green. The course features narrow, tree-lined, zoysia-grass fairways bordered by thick, Bermudagrass rough, and very small Bermudagrass greens. Water comes into play on 11 holes. Accuracy off the tee trumps distance, as playing from the fairway here is crucial. Hitting these small greens in regulation is a huge piece in trying to tame this track — and when those greens are missed, one needs to be a very sharp scrambler.
In addition to Strokes Gained: Approach, Greens in Regulation, SG: Ball Striking, and Good Drives Gained, I also honed in on Par 4 Scoring, as it has proven to be a vital area for success at this golf course, and specifically looked at the Par 4s measuring 450-500 yards. The majority of the approach shots at TPC Southwind will come from 150-175 yards.
As for the correlated courses this week, there are a few tracks in the nearby southeast that I believe set up similarly: Sea Island in St. Simons Island, Ga., home to the RSM Classic, Innisbrook, where they hold the Valspar Championship, and The Concession Golf Club where they held the WGC Workday Championship in 2021.
I also looked at two recent hosts of the RBC Canadian Open, St. George’s and Hamilton Golf & Country Club, as they match up quite nicely with the areas of emphasis this week.
It is important to note that this week, there is no cut, so all 70 players are in for all 72 holes.
Collin Morikawa (14-1)
Morikawa’s game was red-hot from April through early June but for the last month or so, while he’s had solid finishes, it doesn’t feel like he’s as close to winning as he was earlier this season. But I still can’t quit him. When Scottie Scheffler, Xander Schauffele, and Rory McIlroy are all going off at single-digit prices, I find myself trying to find someone that can beat them at a juicier number. Scheffler especially, has proven this to be a fool’s errand and no, I would not be surprised if he won here again this week, but the truth is, his history at this course has not been spectacular. In his last four trips to TPC Southwind, Scheffler’s average finish position has been 26th.
Morikawa’s average finish position has been 16th, with his last two trips ending in a 13th and a fifth. Over the last 24 rounds, he ranks top 5 in this field on approach, SG: Ball Striking, Good Drives Gained, and on the 450-500 yard Par 4s. With the way he’s played this season, it would actually be a little weird if he went winless in 2024. He did win in 2021 at The Concession, one of our correlated courses. Here’s to Morikawa getting that elusive victory this week.
Hideki Matsuyama (28-1)
I’ve seen this number bump higher to above 30 but I’ve also seen it as low as 25-1. Odds of 30-1 or better is very solid in my opinion. Unfortunately, I took a little worse. Like they say, “Just win, baby.”
Matsuyama returns to action for the first time since wearing a bronze medal on the podium at Le Golf National in France two weeks ago. And I don’t mind the fact that it took accuracy off the tee to avoid both the rough and the several water hazards at that golf course, as it does here stateside. Matsuyama is also one of the finest scramblers in the game, ranking second in this field over the last 24 rounds. He also ranks top 20 in this field for SG: Ball Striking, Approach, and on the long Par 4s. He has three top-10 finishes in his last six starts and finished runner-up here at TPC Southwind in 2021.
Russell Henley watches his tee shot on the third hole during the final round of 2024 Wells Fargo Championship.Getty Images
Russell Henley (35-1)
Like Morikawa, Henley is another player who is deadly accurate off the tee, especially sharp with the irons, and ranks top-10 in this field on the Par 4s measuring 450-500 yards. He has two top-10 finishes in his last two starts and has two more here in the past at TPC Southwind. Henley has also racked up finishes of 6-4-10-13 at the RSM Classic. The Georgia Bulldog seems to flourish on Bermudagrass and in the humidity, both of which can be found here in Memphis.
Billy Horschel (48-1)
A Florida Gator, Horschel is another player who is plenty comfortable on Bermudagrass and in the humidity — as evidenced by his play last week at the Wyndham Championship, which was his fifth top-10 finish there in eight years. He has a similar comfort level here at Southwind, with five top-10 finishes and two top-25s going back to 2013. Horschel also has runner-up finishes at the RSM Classic and at The Concession. In addition to the current form and the course fit, I also really like the fact that Horschel ranks No. 1 in this field over the last 24 rounds in Scrambling. That is a key factor this week. He also happens to rank sixth in SG: Putting on Bermudagrass. It looks to be lining up well in 2024 for the 2014 FedExCup champion.
Ben Griffin (130-1)
We had to save room for one long bomb and with that we’ve landed on a ball striker with a serious putting touch. Griffin was runner-up at one of our correlated courses, Hamilton Golf & Country Club at the RBC Canadian Open back in June. He took fifth at the John Deere Classic in July, and was seventh last week at the Wyndham Championship. Over the last 24 rounds, he ranks fourth in this field for SG: Approach, sixth for Hole Proximity from 150-175 yards, and is No. 1 in SG: Putting (Bermudagrass). Griffin is also 24th on Tour in Scrambling. Last season was his first time playing this tournament and he finished top 25. He’s also finished top 10 at the RSM Classic. Some may argue that that 130-1 is not long enough and yes, this is against a loaded field, but I feel his skill set is a very good match for this golf course.
