Zozo Championship 2023
Overview
Dates: October 19, 2023 to October 22, 2023
Location: Chiba, Japan
Course: Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club
Course Par: 70
Course Length: 7079
Prize Purse: $11000000
The tour makes its way to Japan for the Zozo Championship as sixteen of the world’s top fifty tee it up alongside a smattering of less familiar players from the Japan Tour. Keegan Bradley defends the title he won in emotional fashion last year; incredibly his first Tour win since 2018. There is a reduced field of 78, with no halfway cut, so is a little different to what we see week-to-week.
Preview
Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club again plays host, for the third consecutive year and fourth time overall, and plays as a fairly short par 70 at just a shade over 7000 yards. Fifteen under has been the winning mark in each of the last two editions, and in 2021/2 only three players reached double digits under par, so it perhaps plays a little tougher than the yardage might suggest. We don’t have shotlink data to draw on, although there are a few clues to be gleaned from previous results. While local players make up roughly 20% of the field, they have rarely troubled the upper reaches of the leaderboard, so it would seem to make sense to focus on the more established names from the PGA Tour. Having only 60 or so plausible contenders makes finding the value seem a less daunting prospect than usual and we’ve found four picks to get involved with.
Outrights
Player | Points | Type | UK Odds | Places | Outright US Odds |
Xander Schauffele | 5 | Each Way | 7/1 | 7 | +700 |
Cameron Champ | 1.5 | Each Way | 60/1 | 8 | +6000 |
Sahith Theegala | 2.5 | Each Way | 22/1 | 8 | +2000 |
Adam Svennson | 2 | Each Way | 40/1 | 6 | +4200 |
Xander Schauffele (5pts each way, 7/1, 7 places) goes off as marginal favourite over Collin Morikawa, and as far as we’re concerned there should be a considerably bigger gap between the two, so we’re very happy to side with the top of the market for the second consecutive week. Available at 9/1 in one place, we feel that 5 or 6/1 should be more like the mark, so anything bigger than that is worth a decent interest. Schauffele has been a full 0.6 strokes per round superior to Morikawa over the last 3 months and 0.7 strokes looking a further 3 months back. Neither has played competitively since the Ryder Cup and although both finished with a disappointing week, and identical 1-3-0 records, it’s worth noting that Xander’s data was notably superior to that of his teammate. With doubts about many of the other market leaders, particularly in relation to recent form, he looks to be by some way the likeliest winner this week and should be played accordingly.
We’ll keep stakes a bit more modest with our other picks, starting with Cameron Champ (1.5pts each way, 60/1, 8 places), who looked to be in top form for most of the Shriners, with only a disappointing third round 74 preventing him from seriously challenging for the title. This followed up a top 10 in the Sanderson Farms and he looks to be trending in general, having put a full half shot on his strokes gained average in the last three months, largely due to improvement on and around the greens. We’re getting a decent price about a guy who has shown he can certainly contend and even win when in top form, so he’s well worth having on our side.
A more obvious pick is Sahith Theegala (2.5pts each way, 22/1, 8 places), whose last outing was a win in the Fortinet, immediately preceded by two top 15s. Now he has his first win under his belt he can be expected to push on this season and he looks likely to add to his win tally sooner rather than later. A solid T5 in this event last season, just three shots behind the winner, adds further confidence that he should be in for a big week here.
Finally, we’ll give another chance to Adam Svensson (2pts each way, 40/1, 6 places), who put in a good showing for us in the Shriners, narrowly missing out on a top 10 finish after a quiet final round. His recent strokes gained data puts him comfortably in the same bracket as several of the players who are half his price in the market and it’s something of a surprise to be able to get involved at the same price as last week in a field half the size having proven himself to be in such good form.
Eric Cole continues to impress and looks likely to go very well again, but looks a shade underpriced in the market on this occasion. It was also tempting to throw a small stake at one of the locals at a big price, most notably either Keita Nakajia, Ryo Hisatune or Taiga Semikawa. We wouldn’t put you off a small interest in any of them, but the modest record of Japan Tour players in this event was enough to persuade us not to include them in the staking plan.