FedExCup Fall is going international this week, as the PGA TOUR heads to Japan for the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP. This event will feature the strongest field we’ve seen since the Fall series got underway, as 16 of the top 50 in the Official World Golf Rankings are scheduled to be in the field this week.
Defending champion Keegan Bradley, Collin Morikawa, Xander Schauffele, Hideki Matsuyama, Sungjae Im and Rickie Fowler headline the field which also includes some rising talent from both the U.S. and international play. Sahigh Theegala, Nicolai Hojgaard and Min Woo Lee are some of the biggest rising stars in the field, along with several up-and-coming options from the Asian Tours.
The field of 78 will all play four rounds in this no-cut event, barring injury or withdrawal. With no cut, it’s an especially good week to take a shot at GPPs with a “Stars and Scrubs” style lineup since even the lower-priced players will deliver four rounds of scoring.
The event will be held at the par-70 Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club, just east of Tokyo. After the 2020 tournament was held in the U.S. due to COVID-19 restrictions, the last two years the event has returned to Narashino, where it began in 2019. For more on the course and stat profile, check out our DFS Stats Preview from Matthew Vincenzi.
This weekly GPP post focuses on players with lower ownership projections than their potential performance. Finding high-leverage plays is critical for GPP success. The picks here are designed to go against the grain and take advantage of players who may be overlooked or not selected due to risk factors.
Since these are GPP picks, we can accept more risk if it raises the lineup’s ceiling. High-risk, high-reward options with low ownership create the “boom-or-bust” style lineups that usually lead to large-field success.
GPP contests are contests that have large numbers of entries and pay out huge prizes to the top few percent. Since this week is a major, the largest GPP on DraftKings is the $300K Sand Trap, which awards $100K to first place.
The players highlighted will be good options if they deliver in all formats, but they come with risk factors that usually keep them from being the safest plays. Safety and reliability should be the focus of lineups in cash and double-up contests, where finishing in the top spot isn’t quite as important. To find specific guidance for all contest types, check out our full Daily Fantasy Golf coverage each week.
No matter what type of format you prefer, be sure to use the FantasyLabs PGA Models to help you make the best choices. These models use stats and simulations to highlight different players’ strengths and weaknesses. A few critical new stats for GPP play are Perfect% and SimLeverage, which are further explained here.
Usually, I rely on the Stroked Gained Model, which is very predictive of results. I also tend to lean into players that gain shots on approach since week-to-week putting performance can be highly volatile, even for the best players on the PGA TOUR.
As you dig into the numbers, you can enjoy the many tools that FantasyLabs offers, including the Lineup Optimizer, which effortlessly creates up to 300 lineups. Alternatively, you can use the Lineup Builder if you prefer a more hands-on approach.
Check out my top picks in each price range listed below.
Editors note: SimLeverage and Perfect% numbers may change after this piece is published. Be sure to check the PGA Models for any updates to the sims.
High-Priced PGA DFS Picks
Collin Morikawa $10,800
Collin Morikawa is the second-most expensive player in the field behind just Xander Schauffele, and he’s also in the second-most optimal lineups in our sims. He is projected to have an ownership of just under 20%, which is high for normal-sized fields but only the fifth-highest in this week’s limited field. As a result, he brings almost 5% of SimLeverage, which is the seventh-highest of any player in the field and the most SimLeverage for any player priced over $9K.
Vegas gives Morikawa the second-best odds to win this week and the second-best odds to finish in the top 10. Getting him at under 20% ownership will be a good way to gain some leverage against the other chalky options at the top of the player pool.
While he’s still looking for his first win since the 2021 Open Championship, Morikawa has posted some strong results in his most recent tournaments. After losing in a playoff to Rickie Fowler at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, Morikawa made a nice run in the FedExCup Playoffs. He finished in the top 25 in the St. Jude Championship, BMW Championship, and the TOUR Championship, surging all the way to a fifth-place finish at East Lake.
His iron play and SG: Approach have remained outstanding, and his putter may be starting to come around a little bit. For Morikawa, it’s always about how much his putting holds him back.
Morikawa hasn’t played any PGA TOUR event since the Ryder Cup, when he went 1-3 in the U.S. loss to Europe. He should feel very comfortable at this venue, though, since he has had good results here in the past, including a top-10 in 2021.
Morikawa is a strong statistical fit for the course, as the stats preview laid out. Getting him at relatively low ownership compared to the other pay-up plays is a good place to start your GPP builds this week.
Cameron Davis $9,500
With almost the same ownership projection as Morikawa at just under 20%, Cameron Davis is another very strong top-tier option to consider. Davis has been a regular in my picks over the past several months and has almost always been a strong play, although he hasn’t had a victory just yet.
He comes in with great form after exceeding salary-based expectations in seven of his past 10 events. He already notched two top 10s in the FedExCup Fall, finishing third at the Fortinet Championship and tied for seventh last week at the Shriners. He also had three straight top 10s in July and August to surge into the FedExCup Playoffs, where he advanced to the BMW Championship.
Last year in his ZOZO debut, Davis finished 29th, but that was before he got into his current groove. Like Morikawa, he excels with accuracy and approach, but his putter can sometimes let him down. Either one of the two stars can win this event if he can get his flagstick to cooperate. As a result, they both offer good upside and leverage, given their projected ownership.
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Mid-Priced PGA DFS Picks
Nocolai Hojgaard $8,700
Of all the players under $9K, Nicolai Hojgaard has the highest ceiling projection. He also has the second-highest Perfect% and matches five Pro Trends.
The 22-year-old from Demark had a strong summer on the PGA TOUR, with top 25s at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, Genesis Scottish Open, The Open Championship, and the Wyndham Championship. He was on the winning Ryder Cup team and then played the Shriners last week, where he made the cut and finished T56. He also played three DP World Tour events over the summer, producing a pair of top-five finishes at the Czech Masters and the Omega European Masters. Overall, he has exceeded salary-based expectations in seven of his last 10 DFS events.
Hojgaard is making his debut at this event, but his game obviously travels well and can work on multiple layouts and courses. With so much of the ownership projection concentrated at the top of the salary structure, Hojgaard is projected for just over 10% ownership, which is just the 20th-highest in the field. As a result, his SimLeverage is the second-highest in the whole field.
Vincent Norrman $8,400
I had Vincent Norrman as one of my picks last week for the Shriners Children’s Open, but the 25-year-old from Sweden missed the cut and didn’t match up with salary-based expectations. I’m still riding with him again this week, though, as he looks to bounce back with a trip to Japan.
This week, he brings the highest SimLeverage in the whole field since he is in the most optimal lineups in our sims of any player under $9K. His ownership projection is extremely low, though, checking in at just 9%. He has the second-highest median, ceiling, and floor projections of all the players under $9K, ranking only behind Hojgaard.
Norrman has already had a great 2023 with a pair of victories at the Barbasol Championship in July and the Horizon Irish Open in September on the DP World Tour. Last week’s letdown snapped a streak of eight straight DFS events in which he exceeded salary-based expectations with an average Plus/Minus of 28.9 DraftKings points over that span.
I think he’ll get back to form this week on an international course that should play to his strengths. He brings a very high ceiling for a player with this salary and projected ownership.
Value PGA DFS Picks
J.J. Spaun $7,900
Looking lower on the salary structure, no player under $8K brings a higher ceiling projection than J.J. Spaun, who is in the second-most optimal lineups of the players in this price bracket. His ownership projection of 12% is a little higher than ideal, but that’s because he comes in with quite a bit of momentum from his strong recent results.
Spaun made the cut in each of his FedExCup Fall events, finishing T11 at the Fortinet and T46 at the Shriners Children’s Open last week. He exceeded salary-based expectations in six straight events coming into last week in Las Vegas with three top-25 finishes. He also finished T25 at this event last season.
Spaun is one of the best approach players in this field, and his game should be a solid fit for the demands of Narashino.
He posted 2.6 SG: Approach last week and can outperform expectations if he continues his momentum.
Sam Stevens $7,100
In the lower $7,000s, everyone seems to be gravitating towards Cameron Champ after he posted a pair of top 20s over the past two weeks. I get it, for sure, but Champ’s ownership has inflated to just under 13%, which is the highest of all players priced under $8,200. A strong pivot play with a better ceiling, median and floor projections and an almost identical Perfect% is Sam Stevens. Stevens’ ownership projected is under 5%, and his 3.3% SimLeverage indicates he is being under-owned, especially compared to Champ.
Last week, Stevens made the cut but finished an unremarkable T46. However, when you look closer, he posted three rounds of 68 or better, and just Saturday’s 75 held him back. He turned things back around with his best 18 of the week with a 65 on Sunday, and he will look to carry over that momentum to Japan this week.
Stevens missed the cut at the Sanderson Farms Championship earlier this fall, but prior to that, he had exceeded salary-based expectations in four of his previous five tournaments, highlighted by a top 10 at the 3M Open.
The 27-year-old is putting the finishing touches on a strong rookie year on the PGA TOUR in which he made 20 of 33 cuts and posted five top 25s, highlighted by a solo runner-up at the Valero Texas Open. He’s already secured his card for next year but is continuing to build momentum and grow his game. While he may not have the apparent upside of Champ, he is a great source of leverage and definitely has the chance to outperform the other players in this price range. Our projections and sims give him a good chance of going off this week.
Sleeper PGA DFS Picks
Brandon Wu $6,900
Due to the no-cut nature of this event, there is plenty of ownership still expected for the 31 players with salaries under $7K. While K.H. Lee does make sense coming off a strong finish last week, his ownership has inflated to almost 11%, so it looks like another place to grab some leverage by pivoting to another strong play with the same price but lower projected ownership. Just under $7K, I like Brandon Wu as a pivot play. He brings the third-highest ceiling projection of the players under $7K and has an ownership projection of just over 5%.
Wu also has the highest Perfect% of any player under $7K, so he does very well in our sims, even out-performing Lee. As a result, he also has the second-highest SimLeverage of any player under $7K.
Wu has been trending up by exceeding salary-based expectations in his last four events. He didn’t play in Vegas last week but did return from a two-month break after making the FedExCup Playoffs with a made cut at the Sanderson Farms Championship two weeks ago.
So far this season, Wu has six top 25s and three top 10s, most recently climbing into the top 10 at the RBC Canadian Open in June. Wu has played this event before, finishing in the top 30 in his debut last season. His approach game and typically strong showings on international courses make him one of my top sleepers for this week.
Satoshi Kodaira $6,200
If you choose to go extremely cheap in one of your roster spots to stuff more star power in as elite plays, Satoshi Kodaira is a long shot worth exploring. He doesn’t have the length to contend on some tracks, but his accuracy and approach game should serve him well on this layout.
Kodaira will be playing in his native country, so there’s no question that the event will mean a lot to him, and he has a strong career track record at this event, including a T16 last season.
His recent form has been up and down, but he did make the cut and crack the top 30 at the Fortinet Championship in his first start in the FedExCup Fall. He missed the cut at the Sanderson two weeks ago, though, which should keep him well off the radar.
As a boom-or-bust play, Kodaira brings enough upside to be my favorite flier from under $6,500. He brings the second-highest SimLeverage and the second-highest Pts/Sal from the players in that price range, along with the highest Perfect%.
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