ZOZO Championship
Tom Kim repeated last weekend as champion of the Shriners Children’s Open courtesy of excellent irons and wedge play (third in field for Strokes Gained: Approach) and a hot putter (fourth in field for Strokes Gained: Putting) to win at 20 under, one stroke ahead of Adam Hadwin. Eric Cole was our closest contender shooting a final-round 62 and finishing T-3 along with Alex Noren, J.T. Poston and Taylor Pendrith. At T-7, Chesson Hadley, Joel Dahmen, Beau Hossler, KH Lee, Cam Davis and Monday qualifier Isaiah Salinda rounded out the top 10.
This week, the PGA Tour heads to Japan for the ZOZO Championship. Xander Schauffele (+750) has two top-10s on this golf course and was the Olympic gold medalist at Kasumigaseki at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. Collin Morikawa (12-1) finished seventh here in 2021.
Sungjae Im (14-1) finished third here in 2019 and was also runner-up in the Genesis Championship on the Korean Tour. However, his best recent performance was three weeks ago when he and Si Woo Kim led the South Korean team to a gold medal at the Asian Games, which exempts them from mandatory military service in their native homeland.
Hideki Matsuyama (16-1) was the champion of this event in 2021 and finished runner-up in 2019.
Rickie Fowler (16-1) was runner-up at last year’s ZOZO to Keegan Bradley (22-1).
Min Woo Lee (20-1) won last weekend in the SJM Macao Open on the Asian Tour.
In all, 16 of the OWGR Top 50 players are in this field making for likely the best PGA Tour field during this fall schedule.
The Event
The ZOZO Championship began in 2019 as the first PGA Tour event ever sanctioned in Japan (co-sanctioned with the Japan Golf Tour). It is held at Narashino Country Club in Inzai, Chiba, Japan, which is about 90 minutes outside of Tokyo. Because of the co-sanctioning with the Japan Golf Tour, there is a sizable contingent of Japanese players in the field.
This week’s no-cut field features 78 players, and here is how the field is comprised:
