Fedex St Jude Championship
Fedex St Jude Championship
Aug 12, 2024Fedex St Jude Championship
It was a strange week at the Wyndham Championship as the impact of Storm Debby, which lead to the opening days play being washed out saw the event playing catch up throughout culminating in a herculean effort to get 36 holes plus in on Sunday.
The event in the end was won by Brit, Aaron Rai who morphed some really strong play of late in to his first PGA Tour title. Midway through the back nine it looked like Max Greyserman was going to bag his maiden title, however a quadruple bogey eight on 14 followed by a four putt double bogey five on 16 completely derailed his challenge and allowed Rai to capitalise.
From our point of view with all of our picks making the cut we had various players at various times looking like they could get in the mix. In the end though after 175/1 pick Justin Suh fell away badly in the final round it was left to Eric Cole to charge through the field on his back nine and bag us a share of some place money.
So with the regular PGA Tour season now all wrapped up it’s time for the Play Off’s.
As per the changes introduced prior to last year’s play-offs we for the second year we have a system whereby instead of the historical way of the top 125 making it to the first event we are down straight away to the top 70. The event is a ‘no cut’ event with all 70 players playing all four rounds.
Next week we will then see the top 50 on display in Colorado before we head to the regular season ending Tour Championship featuring the final top 30.
This year the prize on offer for those who make it through to next weeks BMW Championship is huge as those who make the top 50 will again be guaranteed a spot in all of next seasons Designated Events, which once more will bring with it massive pay days. For those hovering around that 50th spot heading in to this week then there will be just one thing on their mind.
Whereas for many years the scene of the first play-off event was always in the North East this year and for the third year running the drama will take place in Tennessee as we head to Memphis for the Fedex St Jude event.
First played in 1958 the Fedex St Jude Classic has been a staple event of the tour for many years. And TPC Southwind has been the host course since 1989.
In 2018 though it was announced that the traditional Fedex St Jude Classic historically held in June before the US Open would go from the calendar with TPC Southwind instead taking over hosting the WGC, which was previously held at Firestone in Akron, and with the rejigging of the PGA Tour schedule, the event was allocated the post Open week slot.
In 2021 it was all change once more as it was announced that the WGC held late in the summer would be removed from the calendar and that from 2022 the Fedex St Jude Championship would be the first of the three play-off events to be held replacing the Northern Trust.
As you would expect we have a stellar field on display with the big three of Scheffler, Schauffele and McIlroy heading up the market. They are then followed by Collin Morikawa, Ludvig Aberg, Tommy Fleetwood and Patrick Cantlay.
COURSE
TPC Southwind is a Par 70 measuring at 7244 yards.
The fairways feature Zoyzia grass which can also be found at East Lake home of the Tour Championship and Trinity Forest, which briefly held the Byron Nelson.
The greens are Champion Bermuda.
The course was originally designed by Ron Pritchard with consultation from Hubert Green & Fuzzy Zoeller in 1988 and opened for play in 1989.
TPC Southwind is a tough, technical test with fairways and greens being hard to find and water in play on 8 of the 18 holes. On this basis a good short game is normally key here.
Year in year out the course ranks as one, if not the, toughest par 70 on tour.
You will also no doubt see the stat come up on your TV screen over the week that TPC Southwind historically sees more balls in the water than any other course on the PGA Tour. [Although TPC Twin Cities may have taken that honour away this year.]
This means no lead is safe coming down the stretch here.
One man who will certainly testify to this is Robert Garrigus who famously took a seven on the 18th back in 2010 when he held a three shot lead, thus ending up in a play-off which ultimately lead to Lee Westwood being the grateful recipient of the trophy.
HISTORY
In a fairly unique scenario [outside of Major’s such as a US Open at Pebble or the PGA at Quail Hollow three years ago] we have an event on the calendar, where the host course has been pinched from two other regular tour event.
From that point of view we in theory have two angles that we need to look at, historical TPC Southwind form from the previous events, and form from this first Fedex play off event.
In all honesty though I see no real value in focusing on the Northern Trust as not only are we on a different course but we are in a completely different area of the US meaning we cannot even home in on those who perform well in the North East are of the US. I will therefore keep my focus on history at TPC Southwind.
If we take a look at recent winners of this event the most striking thing, which I have noted in previous years is that 15 of the previous 17 winners in Memphis were players who either hailed from or are based in the Southern or Eastern states in the US. These are Lucas Glover, Will Zalatoris, Abraham Ancer, Justin Thomas, Brooks Koepka, Daniel Berger [x2], Dustin Johnson [x2], Harris English, Harrison Frazer, Brian Gay, Ben Crane and Justin Leonard. The two exceptions were Fabien Gomez from Argentina and Lee Westwood.
Furthermore four of those winners, Zalatoris, Ancer, Frazar, Crane, Gay & Leonard all either hail from/are based in/attended college in Texas.
In simple terms guys from the Southern/Eastern area of the US are more at home in the hot sticky conditions that we see here, and of course on the Bermuda Greens, than the West Coast guys are.
From a correlating course point of view not unsurprisingly based on the above one of the Texas events, the Charles Schwab Challenge held on another par 70 track at Colonial CC leaps off the page at us. To expand further two time TPC Southwind Champion Daniel Berger has triumphed there, the2022 winner at Colonial Sam Burns lost out to Ancer here in 2021 in a play off while another former champion here Harris English has a runner up finish to his name at Colonial.
With regards to the recent form of the winners of the first play-off event coming in to the event a pattern had developed over recent years, which can be seen from the table below.
From 2013-2017 all the winners had been in strong form coming in to the week leading to a conclusion that we should look for a marquee player with good momentum coming in. In 2018 Bryson Dechambeau somewhat bucked this trend and took the trophy on the back of some fairly mediocre form, however the four subsequent winners Zalatoris, Finau, Reed and Johnson brought solid if unspectacular recent form in to the event.
Meanwhile last years champion Lucas Glover rode the hot hand of his win at the Wyndham the previous week straight in to another victory here to post back to back wins.
With the slight exception of Glover then [although it shouldn’t be forgotten that Lucas is a former US Open Champion!] What we can clearly see though from this list is once we get in to the play offs we are invariably looking for a bigger marquee name and we are unlikely to see a shock three figure odds champion here.
Three Previous Starts – most Recent First
2023 L Glover 1 MC 5
2022 W Zalatoris 21 20 28
2021 T Finau 34 28 15
2020 D Johnson 12 WD MC
2019 P Reed 22 12 10
2018 B Dechambeau MC 30 51
2017 D Johnson 13 17 18
2016 P Reed 22 11 13
2015 J Day 1 12 1
2014 Hunter Mahan 7 15 MC
2013 A Scott 5 14 3
2012 N Watney 31 MC 19
That said there is one thing that has struck me over the past two years since the schedule changed and that is that both winners here, Glover and Zalatoris played the Wyndham the week before whereas a lot of bigger names had been off since the Open Championship. It may be then that some of the marquee names were caught slightly cold here as they eased their way back in after a break.
This year of course several of the biggest names including Scheffler and Schauffele of course were in action just two weeks ago at the Olympics so we have another dynamic in play.
The winning score posted by both Glover last year and Zalatoris in 2022 was 15- under while the past two WGC editions here have seen totals of 13- under and 16- under posted.
WEATHER FORECAST
Not unsurprisingly for Memphis August we have a week of hot temperatures in store with the potential for it to hit 100 on Thursday and at least the low to mid 90s the order across all four days. In addition, not unpredictably for this time of year while the forecast looks good as a whole, storms are showing as a possibility for Sunday.
Wind could be a factor with gusts of 15-20mph + in the forecast over the week.
As I always say though this could all change!
PICKS
I have gone with four players this week as follows;
SUNGJAE IM – 35/1 – 1.5pts E/W – 1/5 odds 1st 8. - FINISHED 40th
With some big names not having played since the Open and others having just returned from the Olympic experience I am keen to focus as a whole on players who teed it up last week at the Wyndham, an event lets not forget, which the winner of this has played for the last two years, since this tournament became the first Play Off event.
I will start then by giving another chance to Sungjae Im who we lead off with last week.
It was a strange week in North Carolina for Sungjae as he mixed plenty of good stuff with plenty of bad. Eighteen birdies across the week and a final total of 6- under tells the story.
A disappointing week then for him no doubt but it may just be that having not teed it up since the Open it was a case of blowing off some rust, particularly with his iron play, after taking a break. Instead then I am keen to focus on the superb run of form the Korean had been in prior to that, which had seen him finish no worse than 12th in eight of his previous ten starts, a run, which sees him now in the top ten of the Fedex Cup standings.
A look at Im’s record at TPC Southwind shows us a sixth place here last year, while he notched a 12th place here the previous year posting a 63 along the way. Further more we can take encouragement from three top 15 visits in his past five starts at the correlating Colonial CC, while his maiden PGA Trophy came on another par 70 layout at the Honda.
There is no doubt that Sungjae doesn’t win as often as he should do and he will be keen to add to his two tour titles to date and land a bigger profile event. I’ll chance then that he can put last weeks scrappy effort behind him and return to his recent great form and deliver a big performance.
BILLY HORSCHEL – 35/1 – 1.5pts E/W – 1/5 odds 1st 8 - FINISHED 10th
Next up I will side with Billy Horschel.
It is common knowledge that Horschel is a momentum player who when he gets on a run is capable of stringing a bunch of big results together.
The most memorable instance of this of course was when Billy finished 2 1 1 in the final three Play Off events in 2014 to bag the Fedex Cup trophy however there have been numerous other examples over the years where he has ridden the hot hand to victory.
Allowing for this then Billy has to be very much on our radar at the moment as he backed up his recent superb runner up effort at the Open with a seventh place at the Wyndham last week where he ranked 11th in approach play, 14th in putting and second in good old fashioned GIR.
Looking at Billy’s course history and he has been a regular visitor to TPC Southwind over the years bagging numerous top tens along the way, while lets not forget he has a win on the par 70 layout at East Lake that features the comparable Zoyzia grass.
Finally as a native of Florida Horschel ticks that box of hailing from the South East of the US as many winners have here.
Having missed out on the Play Off’s last year Billy will have a point to prove this time around and ticking a heck of a lot of boxes as he does I am very keen on his chances this week.
ERIC COLE – 90/1 - 1pt E/W – 1/5 odds 1st 8 - FINISHED 18th
Next up I will go back to the well with Eric Cole who’s back nine Sunday charge at the Wyndham helped bring us some small reward last week.
As I noted last week it’s been a tough sophomore season for Eric as a whole, however after a poor spring and early summer he sprung back in to life more recently to post back to back top tens at the Rocket Mortgage and John Deere before having a solid fortnight in the UK. Add that to his seventh place at the Wyndham where he ranked 10th in approach play and Cole is clearly producing some really good stuff at the moment.
Cole arrives here this week in 54th place in the Fedex standings so there is a slight concern that his week could get overshadowed by focusing on just doing enough to crack that top 50 and all that it offers for the second year running. That said though he doesn’t strike me as the type of character who would rest on finishing mid pack if he produces a good first couple of days.
Cole’s closest brush with victory came on a par 70 at the Honda last year and that ties nicely with former Honda winner Straka who came close to victory here. Meanwhile Cole also finished runner up on a par 70 at the ZOZO last year.
Another who resides in Florida Eric will I’m sure be comfortable in this weeks hot sticky conditions and on the Bermuda greens of course, and I can see him producing another big week on a par 70 test at juicy each way odds.
AUSTIN ECKROAT – 100/1 - 1pt E/W – 1/5 odds 1st 8 - FINISHED 18th
Finally I will wrap up by taking a chance on Austin Eckroat to shine on his debut here.
Eckroat continues to flourish in what has become his breakout season on the PGA Tour with his latest strong showing coming at the Wyndham last week where he finished sixth.
A look at Austin’s stats at Sedgefield CC give cause for great optimism, he ranked first in Driving Accuracy, fourth in strokes gained off the tee, 32nd in approach and notably tenth in putting on a return to Bermuda greens, which he also triumphed on at PGA National earlier this year.
Talking of that win at PGA National and that gives us a nice link to strong form on a correlating par 70, which if you then add in a 16th at Colonial and a 12th at Waialae both last year, to go with his tenth at the 2023 US Open gives us a clear pattern of stronger form on par 70 tests, which obviously is what we face this week.
A native of Oklahoma this weeks temperatures will hold no fear to Eckroat, while if the wind does pick up again he is more than capable of handling the challenge.
At 41st in the Fedex standings Austin’s place in to top 50 is secure so he can freewheel this week and I am happy to roll the dice at big odds.