And then there were three events left on this year's PGA Tour calendar. The first stop in the FedExCup Playoffs is Memphis for the 2024 FedEx St. Jude Championship. This is a course that routinely awards the sharpest ball-strikers in the game.
Let's get into our full FedEx St. Jude preview before revealing our staff's favorite picks for the week.
2024 FedEx St. Jude Championship Best Bets
Favorite We’re Backing
Matt Gannon: Collin Morikawa +1400
Tony Sartori: Scottie Scheffler +350
Greg Waddell: Scottie Scheffler +350
Spencer Aguiar: Ludvig Aberg +2500
Best Long Shot
Matt Gannon: Si Woo Kim +7500
Tony Sartori: Cameron Young +5000
Greg Waddell: Sepp Straka +6000
Spencer Aguiar: Sahith Theegala +6000
Player To Fade
Matt Gannon: Tommy Fleetwood
Tony Sartori: Rory McIlroy
Greg Waddell: Tom Kim
Spencer Aguiar: Tony Finau
2024 FedEx St. Jude Championship Betting Strategy
Matt Gannon: TPC Southwind is a true ball-striker's paradise. There are not many tracks in which a player can win while losing strikes on the putting surfaces, but that was the case when Justin Thomas won here a few years ago.
This is not your everyday TPC Course at which you simply need to hit the fairway and heat up with the wedges. If you want to succeed this week, you need to be a stern ball-striker who can gain upwards of 8-10 strokes off the tee + approach.
When searching for players, key in on those stats this week.
Tony Sartori: TPC Southwind hosts the FedEx St. Jude Championship once again this season, which it has done each of the past two years.
TPC Southwind is a par-70, 7,243-yard track designed by Ron Prichard. The recipe for success at this venue is quite simple: hit your greens and avoid the hazards.
Last season, three of the top five finishers here ranked ninth or higher among the field in greens in regulation percentage, the only statistic or metric in which such a trend occurred. Furthermore, 24.1% of approach shots come from the 150-175-yard range, the largest distribution (by a wide margin) of any of the 25-yard range groupings.
Greg Waddell: The best of the best are teeing it up at TPC Southwind, and this is not the week to go crazy digging for long shots. It’s a top-heavy event, and it would be a surprise if the St. Jude produced back-to-back long-shot winners after Lucas Glover won last year at 60-1.
Look for players with a good course history who gain strokes due to accuracy off the tee and a strong approach game. Good recent form doesn’t hurt either.
Spencer Aguiar: TPC Southwind is an extremely straightforward par-70 property that will accentuate ball striking. We have seen that come to fruition nine times over the past 12 years when looking into the winner of the event being the one who has led the field in Strokes Gained Tee-To-Green.
Narrow Zoysia fairways help to enhance that metric since thick Bermuda rough creates a secondary penalty beyond just the 11 holes that feature water. That Zoysia conversation is one of the most notable pieces here since you get this stark contrast of balls in the fairway that will sit up for second shots versus thick Bermuda rough that can be sticky to hit out of with your irons, especially with all the water that enters the mix.
2024 FedEx St. Jude Championship Picks
Matt Gannon: Rory McIlroy Top 10 (-120)
I really do believe it's Rory's week. He's coming off his second-best approach week of 2024 and has loved playing here. Seven trips to this course include three T7 or better finishes and two weeks of +9.00 or more strokes gained in ball striking. Plus, it's the FedEx Cup, which we know he lives for.
I mentioned above how important ball striking is on a course like this and if McIlroy has proven to be able to do it here plus come in with great ball striking form, that means he is a lock for a top-10 finish. This field has only 70 players which increases his percentage for a top ten tremendously.
I love when we get an under-the-radar McIlroy, and that's the case this week.
Tony Sartori: Alex Noren Top 10 +500 (DraftKings)
Alex Noren is one of my favorite high-floor candidates in this field. I’m not sure he possesses the juice to take down the likes of Scottie Scheffler and Xander Schauffele on a Sunday, but there's a high probability that he at least remains somewhat near that portion of the leaderboard.
Noren has made the weekend in 19 of his past 22 tournaments, posting five top-10 finishes in that stretch. By napkin math, that makes +500 an inherently intriguing number right off the bat, let alone in a smaller 70-man field.
Additionally, Noren finished T12 here in 2019 and is playing a much stronger brand of golf currently than he was then. It makes sense that he has had success at this course, given that he is above the Tour average in greens in regulation percentage from 150-175 yards.
Greg Waddell: Sepp Straka Top 10 (+450, FanDuel)
Straka is looking for a strong finish to a tremendous season as one of the most criminally undervalued players every week on the PGA Tour.
Straka finished second at this event just two years ago and has a history of success on Bermuda greens. He has four T10 finishes this season and ranks first on the entire Tour in Accuracy. On a course with plenty of water hazards, Straka is as safe a bet as any.
At +450 to finish in the top 10, Straka is worth our attention before things get going on Thursday.
Spencer Aguiar: Corey Conners -110 over Tony Finau (bet365)
We're playing many of the same hits this week that we did at the Wyndham Championship in our attempt to attack profiles of golfers who saw a negative trajectory in my model for positional golf courses, Expected Bermuda Putting and the new outlook that we added this week of TPC courses.
That means names like Robert Macintyre and Justin Rose will continue to be options I'm considering taking on because of their negative profiles on similar golf courses. There are many ways to go about that route if trying to fade any of those options, although I will bet a little more on upside totals this week for this article since we don't have a cut.
Corey Conners landed as one of my favorite outright candidates who didn't make my card this week. My model ranked the Canadian fourth for Greens In Regulation, fifth for Expected Proximity and first for Projected Par-Four Scoring.
Add that to a profile of Finau, who has been mostly subpar throughout his career at par-70 tracks, and you get a price that entered too low in the market. You don't have to look any further than Conners moving as a favorite against most opponents and Finau becoming an underdog.
