The PGA Tour will head to Japan this week for the ZOZO Championship, Oct. 24-27 from ACCORDIA GOLF Narashino Country Club.
It has the best field of the fall thus far, including defending champion Collin Morikawa, Xander Schauffele, Sahith Theegala, Justin Thomas and Max Homa.
Unsurprisingly, Schauffele is a favorite among bettors at the BetMGM online sportsbook. As of Wednesday, Schauffele is drawing the most bets (10.2%) and the second-most money (14%). He has the shortest golf odds to win at +450.
Schauffele had a ridiculous 2024 season on the PGA Tour and enters with four straight top 10 finishes worldwide. Overall, he has 20 top 25 finishes in 21 starts, including 15 top 10s.
Specific to this event, his best finish is a T-9, which came back in 2022.
The player bringing in the most money is Hideki Matsuyama (22.6%) on the fourth-most tickets (6.3%). Matsuyama has seen his odds drop from +850 to now +800.
Matsuyama won this event back in 2022, and had a very solid season. The 32-year-old had two wins to go along with seven top 10 finishes. He’s currently ranked seventh in the Official World Golf Rankings.
Matsuyama, Kurt Kitayama (+2500) and Schauffele are BetMGM’s biggest liabilities this week.
Current Handle & Tickets
Handle
- Hideki Matsuyama – 22.6%
- Xander Schauffele – 14%
- Kurt Kitayama – 7.4%
- Collin Morikawa – 6.1%
- Sahith Theegala – 5.8%
Tickets
- Xander Schauffele – 10.2%
- Collin Morikawa – 7.6%
- Kurt Kitayama – 6.4%
- Hideki Matsuyama – 6.3%
- Sahith Theegala – 4.9%
Kitayama is a popular pick coming off a T-9 finish last week at the Shriners Children’s Open and has finished T-29 and T-16 in his previous two appearances at this event.
Morikawa, the defending champion, closed the year very strong and has the second-shortest odds at +700.
