The PGA TOUR is in Ohio this week for another Signature Event as the top players in the world visit “Jack’s Place” at Muirfield Village for this year’s edition of the Memorial Tournament presented by Workday. The event has a unique format and history and should provide a great stage for a fun fantasy golf weekend.
Since it’s a limited field of just 72 golfers, you’ll have to work a little harder to make your lineup stand out in GPP contests. If you’re looking to find some fantasy golf pivot plays with lower ownership, check out these three options: Justin Thomas ($10,100), Sungjae Im ($8,100) and Ryan Fox ($6,500). Each of those three players should have relatively lower ownership as pivot plays, but they also the potential to outperform expectations at their price point.
To make sure we’re all aiming at the same green, a “fantasy golf pivot play” is a golfer with lower ownership but similar upside to more popular options available around the same DFS salary. Often, golfers with lower ownership bring extra risk factors, but they can be worth that added risk since their lower ownership improves your chance of finishing near the top of tournaments. Even though they’re NOT the safest plays in their price range, they have enough potential upside to be worth the sweat. Be sure to check out my picks for cash lineups if you’re looking for safer options that raise the floor of your lineup.
Let’s break down why I like each of my top three pivot plays this week.
Set your DraftKings fantasy golf lineups here: PGA TOUR $800K Summer Sand Trap [$200K to 1st]
Justin Thomas ($10,100)
As the class of the field, Scottie Scheffler ($13,700) is getting plenty of attention and will have very high ownership the top of the salary structure. Xander Schauffele ($10,900) is also getting lots of hype along with Collin Morikawa ($9,900), who finished second last year and Patrick Cantlay ($9,500), who has won this event twice. Right in the middle of those options, Thomas will be one of the best fantasy golf pivot plays this week.
Even though he hasn’t been quite as much of a mainstay on the leaderboards as Scheffler, he has posted an outstanding season so far. He broke through for a win at the RBC Heritage in a Signature Event like this one just over a month ago, and since then, he added a runner-up finish at another Signature Event, the Truist Championship.
In his career, Thomas has teed it up at this event 10 times. He has three top-25 finishes and four missed cuts, with his best finish a top-five back in 2017. In 2020, he also played the Workday Charity Open on this track and finished runner-up to Morikawa in a playoff.
He missed the cut in his last tournament, the PGA Championship, but that was his first missed cut in 12 events with six top-10 finishes and three runner-up finishes to go with his victory over that span.
Thomas ranks second in the field in Total Strokes Gained and seventh in Strokes Gained: Approach over the last 36 rounds. He has also been gaining strokes on and around the green to post his good finishes all season long. He’s a huge savings from Scheffler and his lower ownership makes him a strong GPP leverage option from the top tier of players just behind Scheffler.
Sungjae Im ($8,100)
Im has had an up-and-down season but has had a few big weeks that show he could be finding his way through his funk. Sepp Straka ($8,800), Shane Lowry ($8,700) and even Keegan Bradley ($8,000) are getting much more attention, but Im has a good enough history at this even to outperform his expectations if he puts together a good week.
Like Thomas, Im missed the cut at Quail Hollow, but he posted three top-25 finishes in his previous four tournaments, including a T5 at the Masters, a T11 at the RBC Heritage and a T23 at the Truist. Over the last 20 rounds, Im ranks third in the field in Strokes Gained: Around the Green, 16th in Total Strokes Gained, and 25th in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green.
In his career at Muirfield Village Golf Club, he has four made cuts at the Memorial with two top-10 finishes in the last three seasons, including a T8 last season. He’s boom-or-bust, but that makes him perfect for GPP lineups as one of the week’s top fantasy golf pivot plays.
Ryan Fox ($6,500)
At the low end of the salary structure, Akshay Bhatia ($7,300), Eric Cole ($6,600), Bud Cauley ($6,800) and Justin Rose ($6,900) are shaping up to be popular plays, but I think Fox makes one of the best fantasy golf pivot plays under $7,000.
Just a few weeks ago, Fox got his first PGA TOUR win with a dramatic chip-in victory in a playoff at the ONEflight Myrtle Beach Classic. He defeated Mackenzie Hughes and Harry Higgs in that playoff to claim his first PGA TOUR triumph but he already had 17 professional wins, including four on the DP World Tour. The victory claimed him a spot in the PGA Championship, and he finished T28 after making the cut at Quail Hollow.
After taking a week off, he will return to the Memorial for the third time in his career. He missed the cut in his debut in 2019, but he made the cut and finished T30 two years ago. He could have even finished higher on the leaderboard that week if it wasn’t for a Round 1 77.
Over the last 24 rounds, Fox ranks in the top 10 in the field in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee and Strokes Gained: Ballstriking, while ranking in the top-25 in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green and Strokes Gained: Approach.
He comes back to Muirfield Village Golf Club with strong form and enough experience to be a solid play at this salary. If he makes the cut, he’ll likely end up being a good value, and if the bounces go his way like they did in Myrtle Beach, he could be in contention once again on Sunday.
