The PGA TOUR will head to Japan this week for just the third time in history to play the ZOZO Championship at Narashino Country Club. The event was played at the course in 2019 but had to move to Las Vegas in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic before returning to Narashino in 2021. 

Narashino Country Club is a par 70 measuring 7,079 yards and features Bentgrass greens. The course has a unique design with five par 3’s and three par 5’s.

The ZOZO Championship is a no-cut event and will feature 78 golfers. The field is very strong this week, with a handful of PGA TOUR stars making the long trip to Japan. Those golfers include Xander Schauffele, Collin Morikawa, Hideki Matsuyama, Tommy Fleetwood, Tom Kim, Rickie Fowler, Viktor Hovland, Cameron Young, Tyrrell Hatton, Corey Conners and Sahith Theegala.

ZOZO Championship Best Bets

Collin Morikawa (+1600, DraftKings):  

Collin Morikawa had a disappointing 2021-2022 season by his lofty standards. He had six top-5 finishes but failed to truly thrust himself into contention on a consistent basis. The two-time major winner should be in store for a better season starting this week in Japan.

Morikawa has already shown he can play well in Japan, having finished in a tie for 4th at the Tokyo Olympics and finished 7th at Narashino Country Club last year. The 25-year-old is half-Japanese and has expressed in the past how special it is to play in front of the Japanese fans who are some of the most passionate golf fans in the world.

Narashino Country Club is the type of track that Morikawa should be able to continue to excel on. It is a difficult driving course, and his driving accuracy should keep him in the tight tree-lined fairways. He ranks 2nd in the field in Good Drives Gained and will be able to strategically plot around the golf course similar to how we saw Tiger Woods tackle the course in 2019.

While still great, Morikawa’s iron play was not quite at the level we’ve come to expect last season. He gained 5.2 strokes on approach at the TOUR Championship in his most recent start and went 2-1 at the Presidents Cup easily taking down Mito Pereira in his Sunday singles match. If his iron play is indeed back to his previous form Morikawa will have a strong chance to start his season off with a victory in Japan.

Mito Pereira (+3500, DraftKings): I was high on Mito’s chances last week at the Shriners Children’s Open and he didn’t disappoint. He finished in a tie for fourth place and led the field in strokes gained approach (+9.1). 

Narashino Country Club should be an excellent fit for what Mito does well. As past winners at the course have shown, it is crucial to be able to gain strokes with irons and put the ball on the correct level of the complex greens. Both Tiger Woods and Hideki Matsuyama excel with their iron play and as we saw last week, Pereira’s irons are in peak form right now.

The Chilean also showed he is comfortable playing in Japan, where he finished in a tie for 4th at the Tokyo Olympics.

We saw Mito miss a handful of short putts after getting in contention last week. If he can find a way to turn those near misses into makes, he can finally breakthrough for his first PGA TOUR victory.