2024 Zozo Championship: Top 10 power rankings at Narashino CC
Japan is baseball and baseball is Japan; it is a pillar of Japanese society, engrained through countless backyard and schoolyard games. In 2024, Shohei Ohtani is the manifestation of Japan's pastime -- a representation of a country so dearly proud of its culture.
Japan's dominance on the world baseball stage has never been more pronounced, as displayed by its victory over the United States in the 2023 World Baseball Classic.
The country's impact on the global stage of sports is defined by its stars: Ohtani and tennis star Naomi Osaka. In 2021, another athlete entered the fold -- Hideki Matsuyama, with his quintessential victory at the 2021 Masters. He became the first Japanese man to win a major championship.
In America, he is known as a world-class golfer. In Japan, he is a divine figure, a culmination of Japan's eagerness to invoke its will on the world.
Matsuyama will have an opportunity to shine for his country once again; this time on home soil. The PGA Tour voyages across the Pacific Ocean to Narita, Japan, where Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club -- located on the outskirts of Tokyo -- will host the 2024 Zozo Championship.
The Zozo Championship marks the halfway point of the FedEx Cup Fall; we are officially in the thick of the fall swing. Players will continue to jostle for positioning: only the top 125 players in the standings retain full-time status for the 2025 season. The field for this week's event is the most distinguished of the fall season to date -- Xander Schauffele, Hideki Matsuyama, Justin Thomas, and defending champion Collin Morikawa headline the 78 players competing in Japan.
Players like Schauffele, Thomas, and Morikawa can use this event to work out the kinks of their games and shake off some rust. But let's not diminish the value of what a win would mean this week -- Tour wins are hard to come by. Just ask JT, who has not won since 2022.
The Zozo Championship debuted in 2019, which marked the first official PGA Tour event in Japan.
Narashino Country Club was constructed by the iconic Japanese designer, Kinya Fujita. Fujita traveled to the U.S. at the turn of the 20th century, where he became enamored with American golf course design. He began work on golf courses once he returned home from Japan, with Narashino being one of his final works.
The striking parkland layout will catch your eye with its pristine zoysia fairways contrasted with layers of ancient Japanese trees in the backdrop. It plays as a traditional Japanese layout -- with narrow fairways that make each hole tight from tee to green. Consequently, the course plays as a par-70 and at 7,079 yards. Narashino also has two greens on every hole, which is a staple of Japanese golf courses. The par-four fourth will be the only hole that uses both.
On the surface, 7,079 yards is especially short for a PGA Tour event. However, the yardage is skewed because four of the five par threes are playing at less than 200 yards. There is a litany of long par fours that will test players all week. The layout is demanding, which is shown by low scores over its four-year tenure. The winner is yet to break 20 under par, with Tiger Woods boasting the lowest score at -19 in 2019.
Players must position the ball properly in the fairway off the tee, and in Woods' 2019 win, he was excellent off the tee. The past four winners (Morikawa, Bradley, Matsuyama, and Woods) are all great drivers. But Narashino is a second-shot golf course, so ball striking is the most important statistic this week. The fall events can become a putting contest at times, but there is no hiding at this venue: the best ball-strikers will find themselves at the top of the leaderboard come Sunday.
The PGA Tour desperately needs more events outside of America; its annual event in Japan is a start. Diversity should be a driving theme in PGA Tour board meetings, and global venues offer exactly that.
Let's see who has the advantage in Japan this week.