Scottie, Collin, and Xander lead an elevated field in Jack’s Tournament at Muirfield Village. Always a difficult course to comp, we look for lead-in form and the guys who play strong at difficult courses that demand accuracy off-the-tee. A 72-player elevated event with a small cut, make sure to get your guys through to the weekend!

Plus4: Recap

Ben Griffin wins at Colonial capping off a great stretch of golf for a guy who’s playing, as of this week, his 19th event in 21 weeks. That’s an insane amount of golf for anybody to play – and it’s paid off with 2 wins in the last 2 months. We’ve highlighted Griffin many times this year with a large focus on a huge bump in ball speed up through last week.

We didn’t have the outright, but Ben was heavily featured in a player pool that otherwise fell on its face! Berger, Mac Hughes, and Mav all MC in an off week. We come off some middling weeks that leave us ripe for a big winner.

Plus4: Muirfield Village

• A “total control” golf course: I’m a guy who does NOT love the Jack Nicklaus golf courses in which the PGA plays. These include PGA National and Valhalla primarily, but my feel is they do not lend to any risk-reward trade-offs that create really exciting holes – that is the key difference in most Pete Dye PGAT designs and Nicklaus designs. I won’t call him a cynical guy, but he creates a course at Muirfield that tests the player’s complete game. Distance is not required, but accuracy, approach and short game are, and we commonly see players having strong years keep it rolling here.
• Long approach: For the Philadelphia Cricket Club, we include Muirfield Village in the comp. Philly showed some teeth, but in a slightly different way. Jack’s track requires long-iron excellence. At 7,455 yards, finishers will need to lean on an accurate driver and good long approach play to fly, and hold, these elevated tracks. Approaches over 200 yards will be very prevalent, and this won’t include those longer uphill approaches that while only 180-190, play a lot like a 200+ approach.

Plus4: Muirfield Village corollary courses

New here? Visit our Plus4 approach page to learn about our process.

1. WENTWORTH
2. OCEAN COURSE AT KIAWAH ISLAND
3. ROYAL TROON
4. PGA NATIONAL RESORT (THE CHAMPION)
5. KEENE TRACE (CHAMPIONS COURSE)
6. EL CARDONAL AT DIAMANTE
7. AUGUSTA NATIONAL
8. CRANS-SUR-SIERRE
9. INNISBROOK RESORT (COPPERHEAD COURSE)
10. BETHPAGE BLACK
11. THE OLD WHITE TPC
12. FIRESTONE (SOUTH)
13. THE RIVIERA
14. QUAIL HOLLOW
15. WHISTLING STRAITS
16. EMIRATES
17. CORALES

Plus4 Picks

Favorite Play:
Lowry: I made reference to Philly Cricket above, where Lowry finished 2nd to Sepp Straka (also in the player pool!). Shane has played well this year at difficult tracks and returns to a midwest course where the strengths of his game are accentuated – this is a great place for Shane to finally break a winless drought. He’s a former runner-up at PGA National (also to Seppy boi!).
Star Anchor:
Morikawa: Collin has had great success here with a very accurate driver, great long-iron play, and above average short-game. He won the (easier) Workday Championship at this course in 2021, has 2 runner-ups in the Memorial, and also won at Concession in 2020… another Jack track. I’d be very shocked in Collin went his full career without sealing the deal here.
Gut Check:
Straka: 5th here last year. A winner on a Jack track at PGA National. In the midst of easily his best year of his career. And at a course that really fits his accurate and long-iron-strong game. If Straka remains on with his irons and maintains some great driver accuracy, he’s liable to find himself in the winner’s circle once again.
Homa: This is nasty work. Homa has been bad all year, but we bet on talent here. I’ve avoided the Homa hurt so far and will call my shot this week. Homa plays great at difficult, non-risk-reward tracks just like this one – this includes 2 top 6s here and a win at Riviera. The last 20 rounds of Homa have been just average, which is a marked improvement from the seriously dreadful golf (he missed 5 cuts in a row prior) in his 20 rounds before that. It goes up from here.
Favorite Sub-$7,000:
Ryan Fox: Fox was $7.9k at the PGA after winning in Myrtle Beach. He proceeded to be very active on the weekend leaderboard before faltering Sunday to finish 28th… and now he’s $6.5k? okay.

One & Done: Cantlay

Plus4 Bets

Open outright bets:
Single bet Shane Lowry.

My odds shown below via the datagolf.com Custom Model tool

Plus4 Player Pool

Very overweight

1. Morikawa, Collin ($9.9k)
2. Schauffele, Xander ($10.9k)
3. Lowry, Shane ($8.7k)
4. Cantlay, Patrick ($9.5k)
5. Straka, Sepp ($8.8k)
6. Henley, Russell ($8.4k)
7. McCarthy, Denny ($7.9k)
8. Homa, Max ($7.5k)
9. Novak, Andrew ($7.1k)
10. Fowler, Rickie ($7k)

Mid-range fillers

1. Scheffler, Scottie ($13.3k)
2. Noren, Alex ($7.4k)
3. Pendrith, Taylor ($7.3k)

Under $7.0k

1. Bezuidenhout, Christiaan ($6.9k)
2. Fox, Ryan ($6.5k)
3. Bridgeman, Jacob ($6.4k)
4. Eckroat, Austin ($6.3k)
5. Highsmith, Joe ($6.1k)

FOMO

1. Finau
2. Noren

As always, GL GL GL.