Flag Hunting: PGA Betting Picks - 2024 ZOZO Championship

After a four-leg tour from California wine country to the Deep South and the desert of America's southwest, the 2024 PGA Fall Swing has reached it's International stage: jumping from Chiba, Japan, to Los Cabos, Mexico, and Southampton, Bermuda in the space of three weeks.

The ZOZO Championship is the youngest (and the last remaining), event from the Asian Swing of the mid-2010s, but in its short history, it has crowned some incredibly meaningful champions. Tiger Woods captured his 82nd career win here in the inaugural event back in 2019 - tying Sam Snead for the most wins in PGA Tour history. Two years later, Hideki Matsuyama won the second iteration of the ZOZO on home soil, becoming the first Japanese man to win a PGA Tour event in his native country. And in the last two years, we've seen Keegan Bradley and Collin Morikawa break notable winless droughts with emphatic Sunday performances.

As has become tradition in recent seasons, the ZOZO will provide one last look at some of the Tour's truly elite names before we head into the doldrums of the 2024 offseason. With three of the world's top seven players in attendance, as well as a host of ascendant, in-form commodities, this week's title carries as much weight as we've seen in World Golf since the conclusion of this year's FedEx Cup Playoffs. This piece will serve to break down every key trend and statistic I'm weighing to project a player's viability in the outright market and set our readers up to make the crucial decisions necessary on pre-week betting boards. Without further ado, here's everything you need to know about Accordia Narashino and the 2024 ZOZO Championship!

The Golf Course

Narashino Country Club - Par 70; 7,079 yards

Past Champions:

• 2023: Collin Morikawa (-14) over Eric Cole and Beau Hossler
• 2022: Keegan Bradley (-15) over Rickie Fowler & Andrew Putnam
• 2021: Hideki Matsuyama (-15) over Brendan Steele & Cameron Tringale
• 2019: Tiger Woods (-19) over Hideki Matsuyama

Tipping out at just 7,080 yards, Narashino would initially profile as your standard short, positional wedge party (a la TPC Summerlin, River Highlands, or Waialae). However, course yardages are often very deceiving when taken at face value, and one look at the 18-hole routing this week will tell you that Narashino is not likely to be playing like the traditional short Par 70 we see in the U.S.

With 5 Par 3’s (all under 210 yards) on the scorecard, the total yardage really disguises the length of some of the par 4s and 5s. In fact, 5 of the 10 par 4s on this course measure over 480 yards and each carries a Bogey or Worse rate of >23%. The other 5 two-shotters on the property each measure under 430 yards, so there are some wedge opportunities available on this course. But make no mistake, the longer set of par 4s around Narashino are not to be messed with. With tight fairways and some of the smallest greens we've seen to this point in the season, two high-quality shots will need to be executed to earn a birdie opportunity.

The Par 5’s aren’t exactly complete pushovers either: The 608-yard 14th hole has surrendered just one eagle to these touring pros in 12 competition rounds, and its 15% Bogey/Worse rate with just a 22% birdie rate is almost unheard of from a Par 5 in the modern game. With so many seriously challenging holes within its routing, and only two legitimately scoreable par 5s, players this week will have to do a lot of their scoring on Narashino's softer side: the par 3s and aforementioned shorter par 4s.

With four of its five par 3s playing under par, Narashino actually presents one of the easier sets of short holes on the PGA Tour. Outside of the 205-yard 5th hole, no other par 3 on the property measures over 185 yards and each of these four shorter holes features a birdie or better rate of 17-20%. The other five par 4s on property measure from 360-425 yards and will provide players with a bit of a breather between the five behemoths we discussed earlier. This stark contrast between relatively benign shorter holes and championship-caliber long ones is one of the quintessential themes of Narashino Country Club. I can't think of another course where there isn't a single hole measuring between 425-480 yards, but this layout makes the objective very clear: take advantage of the wedge/short irons you do have, because a failure to do so will make it almost impossible to make up ground as Narashino bears its teeth.

To the eye, Narashino presents a similar driving test to what we see stateside at courses like Colonial or Riviera: tight, tree-lined corridors and pronounced doglegs that will force players to shape the ball both ways off the tee. The fairways and rough here are Zoysia grass, and although the rough measures just 2-2.5" in length, the small targets players will be faced with on approach (just under 5500 sq. foot on average), will make it virtually impossible to consistently hold second shots on the putting surfaces. This emphasis on driving accuracy has shown up time and time again on ZOZO leaderboards. In fact, over the last two iterations, only one player has managed to finish inside the top 10 while ranking below field average in Good Drive Percentage.

In terms of key proximity ranges to focus in on, Narashino once again does a really good job of mixing up the tempo of a round. Guys will have everything from wedge to 5-iron into these Par 4s, so it’s hard for me to really pin down a key range here. Instead, I’ve shifted a bit more of my weighting into general iron metrics like GIR %, SG: APP, and Birdie Chances Created. All four of our past champions at Narashino finished inside the top 3 in Greens in Regulation for the week, and with such a stark contrast in scoring averages from hole-to-hole, guys will need to be both well-versed in creating birdie opportunities with their scoring clubs and grinding out pars on 500-yard par 4s.

For the first time all swing season, I’ll be weighing around the green play comparably putting amongst the short game categories. With a below-average GIR % and generally difficult scoring conditions, you’re going to have to get up-and-down much more here than in your traditional swing-season birdie party. I’ve weighted Bogey Avoidance, SG: ARG, and Sand Saves within my modeling. Still well below the two ball-striking metrics, but I predict scrambling as a whole will be much more of a factor than we’ve seen over the last month on Tour.

If you’re a fan of ball-striking, and guys that can’t putt, you’ll likely love the top of the leaderboard here this week as well, as players like Hideki Matsuyama, Brendan Steele, Luke List, Keegan Bradley, Collin Morikawa, Corey Conners, Ben-An, Emiliano Grillo, Cam Champ, Tom Hoge, and Gary Woodland have all finished inside the Top 10 here at the ZOZO in its first four iterations. We have seen a bit of crossover between recent winners and bentgrass pedigree, but with a laundry list of #TeamNoPutt mainstays filling the first page of the first three leaderboards we've seen here, it's clear that elite ball-striking can easily make up for some putting deficiencies around this layout.

• Total Driving (slight lean to accuracy over distance, but in general more interested in players who rate out favorably in more general OTT metrics like SG: OTT, Total Driving, Good Drive %, etc.).
• Again taking a more general stance on iron play given the variety of this week's layout. Strokes Gained: Approach, Opportunities Gained, and GIRs gained are among my most heavily weighted stats of the week, but will also be leaning into Proximity splits >150 yards to hone in on
• As opposed to the typical swing season stats of SG: Easy Scoring Conditions, Birdie or Better %, or Wedge Proximity, I’m choosing to take most of these auxiliary scoring stats from Bogey Avoidance, SG: ARG, and Scrambling. Bonus points if they’ve had prior success worldwide, particularly in Japan. We’ve seen a fair amount of leaderboard crossover in the first three iterations of this championship.

ZOZO Championship Betting Card

Kurt Kitayama (27-1)

Eagle-birdie to take a share of the lead 😤@Kurt_Kitayama | @BDChampionship pic.twitter.com/pKlARdtyDz

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) October 10, 2024

With the history this event has had in crowning elite winners, it was difficult to wake up Monday morning and see the top three in my modeling priced so aggressively by bookmakers. Had they fallen in the 7, 10, or 12/1 range respectively, a very compelling case could be made for Xander, Collin, or Hideki as betting options here, but as things stand, we've been priced out of all three of the top-ten players in attendance.

No matter, though, as a host of lesser known, but equally in-form commodities reside on this betting board: starting with Kurt Kitayama at 27-1. His T9 finish at last week's Shriners Children's Open came with the third-best ball-striking rating in the field (+8.8), and wasn't even his best performance in that category for Kitayama this month.

One week before, Kurt gained a whopping 12.7 strokes from tee-to-green at the Black Desert Championship (+10.6 on approach), and two starts prior to that, the UNLV-product registered another world-class performance with his driving and iron play: gaining 10.4 strokes ball-striking at the 3M Open.

To put that in perspective, this week's five favorites: (Xander Schauffele, Collin Morikawa, Hideki Matsuyama, Sungjae Im, and Sahith Theegala), only recorded five comparable ball-striking weeks over the course of the 2024 season. Kitayama's done it thrice in his last four starts, and when you zoom into his specific fit for Narashino Country Club, his place as the seventh-most expensive entity on this odds board becomes a lot clearer.

Outside of ranking inside the top 20 in virtually every short-term ball-striking metric, Kitayama also ranks as one of the elite long-iron players in the golfing world. From 150 yards and out, no player in this field can match his proximity splits over the last 12 months, and from a strokes gained perspective, only the Scottie Scheffer's, Xander Schauffele's, and Corey Conners', of the world have gained more on a per shot basis than Kurt Kitayama.

Kitayama's logged two respectable finishes of 16th and 29th in two career starts here in Japan, but at no point in his entire PGA Tour journey has the 31-year-old felt this primed for a victory. Of course, his only top-level win to date came at a similarly long-iron intensive golf course against an elite field at Bay Hill, but he can also claim three worldwide wins in Oman, Mauritius, and Malaysia prior to earning his way onto the PGA Tour. By my numbers, the stage is very much setup for a repeat trick from the Las Vegas-native.

Max Homa (60-1)

🎣Max Homa fast start to Sunday singles!pic.twitter.com/6LuEgBtOD9

— Underdog Golf (@Underdog__Golf) September 29, 2024

From a mid-tier player looking to break into the upper-echelon of the golf's elites, to a marquee name looking to recapture his past status, 2024 has been a tumultuous year for the career of 33-year-old Max Homa. After logging six top 20 finishes in his first 11 appearances of the season (including a third-place finish at Augusta National), Homa found himself in a prolonged rut in the summer months.

In seven starts from the Charles Schwab to the FedEx St. Jude, Homa finished inside the top 40 just once, and for a time, could have been considered one of the worst drivers of the ball on Tour. One three separate occasions in that three-month span, Homa lost over five strokes to the field off of the tee -- a floor he'd shown just once in his previous 188 PGA starts.

Light appears to finally be appearing at the end of this tunnel for Max, however, as not only has he recorded positive driving performances in his last two appearances (Procore Championship/President's Cup), but the elite iron play he's become known for over the last five seasons has begun to emerge as well.

Max first recorded his best approach performance in nearly 18 months at the BMW Championship (+6.5), before pacing the entire President's Cup field with his iron play on a per-round basis (+6.25). Of course, Max only returned 1 point from three matches for the American team, but much of that lack of end-product was due to his foursomes playing partner Brian Harman: who turned in the worst strokes gained performance in the field over his three matches.

Homa's lackluster record could well be a blessing in disguise for golf bettors in his first appearance since Montreal, as a 60-1 price tag in a 78-man Swing Season field would have been completely unheard of just a few months ago. I believe Max has shown us enough life in his underlying metrics to explain away his nightmare summer stretch, and he's got every chance to correct public perception on the state of his game in short notice. I'm more than happy taking a shot at prices >50-1.

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Final 2023 Golf Betting Results:
(Individual breakdowns of all sections in thread) @RotoBaller

2023 (+16.634 Units)
2022 (+67.485 Units)
2021 (+68.846 Units)
2020 (+37.015 Units)
2019 (+27.743 Units)
2018 (+55.88 Units)
2017 (+54.26 Units)

Overall: (+327.863 Units) pic.twitter.com/tuaDfwFXlo

— Spencer Aguiar (@TeeOffSports) November 21, 2023

Rico Hoey (75-1)

Back-to-back birdies 💪@RicoHoey ties the lead @ShrinersOpen. pic.twitter.com/MYsgEYdddl

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) October 19, 2024

One of my top breakout candidates heading into the Fall Swing very nearly paid off our faith without us on board last week in Las Vegas: ending each of his four rounds inside the top three on the leaderboard and finishing just three shots back of Champion J.T. Poston by week’s end. 

This week, Rico Hoey will tackle a golf course I find even more conducive to his skillset, as the ZOZO Championship here at Narashino has provided a happy hunting ground to a laundry list of A1 ball-strikers through the years. Hoey certainly fits comfortably in that category, as he rides a string of eight positive tee-to-green performances in nine starts dating back to the Rocket Mortgage in June.

Hoey’s ball-striking prowess has been well documented since his days at Southern Cal, but the sudden progression of his greatest historic deficiency has propelled him to far greater heights than his most ardent fans could have expected in his first full season on Tour. 

After spending much of his first season in the in the depths of despair on the greens, Rico has found a real groove with the flat stick over his last 10 starts. He’s gained an average of 1.1 strokes putting per start since the U.S. Open at Pinehurst, and has produced his two best individual putting weeks to date on the bentgrass greens of Detroit GC and TPC Summerlin.

If this putting progression can prove sustainable, it truly is a matter of “when” not “if” for the Manila-native. The strength of field is undeniably greater this week than what he’s faced thus far in the Fall Swing, but at 75-1 on odds boards, I don’t feel books have truly caught up to his rapid development. 

Gary Woodland (75-1)

A year removed from brain surgery and @GaryWoodland is already in contention again. 👏 pic.twitter.com/21SuxHUdu3

— GOLF.com (@GOLF_com) October 20, 2024

In a field full of Major Champions, marquee names and compelling up-and-comers, the player I’m perhaps most excited to track in Japan this week is Gary Woodland. After a terrifying diagnosis of a brain lesion that required emergency surgery last fall, the 2019 U.S. Open Champion looks back to vintage form just 13 months later.

With finishes of 9th, 16th, and 28th already to his name within the last two months, Woodland has recorded three of the best four results of his 2024 season in his last four appearances. But it isn’t just his final positioning that has me excited for Gary as a potential year-end breakout, it is instead the return of his peak ball-striking splits. 

Dating back to the 3M Open in July, Woodland has recorded strokes gained splits of +6.7, +10.2, +1.9, +4.1, and +8.7 when combining his driving and iron play. Only Kurt Kitayama can boast a more impressive recent record on approach, and even Woodland’s lofty career-long baselines (+1.2) cannot compare with this recent run of driving form (+1.7/start).

Even Gary’s notoriously balky putter has managed to gain >2.5 strokes in two of his last four appearances, which gives me full faith that he’s more than capable of exceeding the fifth-place finish he had at Narashino on debut in 2019. Like we’ve mentioned with Hoey and Kitayama before him, the ZOZO slipper absolutely fits Woodland’s elite combination of Total Driving/Long-Iron play. At 75-1, why not buy-in to chase what could become one of the stories of the entire 2024 season?

Mac Meissner (75-1)

A birdie on 2 to move inside the projected top 30. 💪

Mac Meissner sticks his approach close and taps it in. He is now projected as No. 29 on the Points List. pic.twitter.com/l8cDaQn1pL

— Korn Ferry Tour (@KornFerryTour) October 8, 2023

In full disclosure, I had a Mac Meissner write-up ready to go leading into last week’s Shriners Open. The SMU-product ultimately decided to pass on Vegas after playing the first three events of the Fall Swing, but this week in Japan, my numbers continue to point to Mac as one of the premier values on the betting board.

Similar to the previous few players we’ve outlined in this piece, Meissner’s place at the top of my projections rests on a recent run of elite approach play that puts him in a similar category to many of the elite ball-strikers that have frequented the top of recent ZOZO leaderboards. Over his last 36 rounds, Mac ranks as the fifth-best iron player in this field per Strokes Gained. He rates out second in Birdie Chances Created, and sixth in Weighted Proximity.

Mac is far from a one-note tune from a ball-striking perspective, however, as he also sits inside the top 20 in both SG: OTT and Good Drive Percentage over his last 50 rounds. Admittedly, his putting splits on bentgrass are far from ideal, and the most likely reason he struggles this week, but given the historic proclivity for sub-par putters to overcome their deficiencies around Narashino Country Club, I’m comfortable taking a shot on this trending profile.

Best of luck, guys, and happy hunting!

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