In the world of golf, the FedEx playoffs get underway in two weeks’ time, but the 70 players taking part in it haven’t been determined yet. A good performance this week at the Wyndham Championship could make a huge difference as to whether certain players qualify for it.
This is a tournament that has seen six of the last eight winners come from the USA. But going further back, winners since 2006 also came from Sweden, India, Spain, Colombia, South Korea and England. Back in 2015, David Love III won it as a 51-year-old, a real rarity on the PGA Tour.
Why It’s Important
This event is the last one of the PGA Tour regular season, before the money-spinning FedEx Cup Playoffs.
Only the Top 70 in the PGA rankings get to contest it. There are a few players who will be desperate to make a good result this week so that their name is in the draw for the opening event.
High-profile players such as Keegan Bradley and Brooks Koepka are just outside the Top 70. Both are available at odds of 41.0 to triumph this week.
One name to keep an eye on is Jackson Kuivan. The 21-year-old only turned pro a few weeks ago, and in just his third pro start, he won the 3M Open, beating World Number 1 Scottie Scheffler no less, on the back nine.
Despite only playing four tournaments this season in total, Kuivan is ranked exactly 70, so a good finish here will see him qualify for the FedEx Playoffs in his debut season. He’s the 21.0 second-favourite to win this week.
Best Bet: Back Hideki Matsuyama for a Top 10 Finish
As explained below, you certainly don’t need to be a big-hitter here at the Sedgefield Country Club, but what you do need is accuracy and a hot putter.
So step forward Hideki Matsuyama, the 34-year-old Japanese who won the US Masters in 2021, has finished in the Top 10 in the other three Majors and has 11 PGA Tour wins to his name.
He almost won the Phoenix Open back in February, eventually losing in a playoff, then had a handful of Top 20 finishes and, better still, finished third and fifth in his last two events, so arrives here in excellent form.
He’s one of the best putters on the Tour on his day at a course that requires great skill and patience with the short stick; odds of 3.5 on what would be a third consecutive Top 10 finish look pretty fair.
Any Other Favourites?
Last year's champ Cam Young goes off as the 11.0 favourite; Koivun is 21.0 as already mentioned, while Hideki Matsuyama (23.0), Patrick Cantlay (23.0), Justin Thomas (29.0), Ryan Gerard (29.0) and Ben Griffin (34.0) are others expected to contend.
The course here in North Carolina was designed by Donald Ross and rewards accuracy over power off the tee, while the week’s best putters are expected to be among the leading contenders on tricky greens.
It’s not a long course by any means compared to the average on the PGA Tour, but as we’ve just seen above, very different types of players have won here in the past.
Those include some huge outsiders, so it’s not always easy to come up with a typical profile for the eventual winner. All of which should make for some fascinating viewing over the four rounds.
A History of Big-Priced Winners
Whereas it’s true that most golf tournaments tend to provide winners at high prices - big fields with lots of players who are all capable of winning a tournament on their day seem to do that - this tournament has produced more winners at big odds than most.
Last year Cameron Young won at odds of 100.0 before he shot up the rankings over the last 12 months or so, while Englishman Aaron Rai won at odds of 40.0 two years ago and Lucas Glover at 90.0 back in 2023. The year before that it was Tom Kim at 36.0, and in 2021 it was Kevin Kisner at 60.0.
But all that was nothing compared to Jim Herman winning it at pre-event odds of 1000.0 back in 2020. It’s hardly surprising that he went off at that price, having only won three PGA Tour events in total across a career spanning 15 years on the Tour.
Going much further back, this event was first staged in 1938, making it one of the oldest golf tournaments. Previous winners included some of the biggest names in golf like Sam Snead, Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, Gary Player and Seve Ballesteros.
