2022 ZOZO Championship Preview and Betting Strategies

The 2022 ZOZO Championship will be played at the Accordia Golf Narashino CC in Tokyo, Japan.

Hideki Matsuyama is defending champion of the 2022 ZOZO Championship. Tommy Fleetwood, Tyrrell Hatton, Viktor Hovland, Sungjae Im, Tom Kim, Collin Morikawa, Xander Schauffele and Cameron Young are also in the field.

Narashino Country Club opened in 1965 during the height of the Japanese golf boom. After World War II, Japan turned to golf to rebuild its coffers. Almost 1,300 golf courses were built in Japan between 1958 and 1979.

Narashino CC is a traditional Japanese design. The fairways are very narrow and surrounded by a wall of tall trees. Everything is played directly out in front of the player. This tournament will use the bentgrass greens. They will roll at 11 on the stimpmeter. If the weather is dicey, birdies will be at a premium. It's a short tournament but it's not easily overpowered. it has enough character not to get overrun.

The final round of the ZOZO Championship played about 7,040 yards from the Championship Tees last year. In 2019 it played a little over 7.100 yards. Bad weather in 2021 probably forced the tournament directors to shorten the course.

2022 ZOZO Championship is taking place on July 3. Fairways are zoysia and the greens are bentgrass. TPC Craig Ranch, Kasumigaseki CC and Bellerive Country Club are examples of zoyia/bentgrass combination golf courses seen on the PGA Tour.

2022 ZOZO Championship Preview and Betting Strategies are available. The only stats kept at the two ZZo Championships in Japan are driving accuracy and green in regulation %. 2021 was a much tougher scoring tournament than 2019 due to the remnants of a typhoon disrupting the tournament. The field struggled to hit greens, make birdies and avoid bogeys. Par 3's were able to attack the golf course. They scored at a higher pace than PGA Tour average. Tiger hit 8 drivers on the 13 Par 4 and 5 holes in the final round of the 2019 tournament, which is a good sign.

The weather is going to be chilly and the golf course will be soft this year. The proximity of Tiger's final round gives a rough estimate of where players will hit approach shots from. The tournament starts on Thursday. It will end on Sunday.

Narashino plays longer due to its layout and weather conditions. Good scramblers have a slight edge than the normal PGA Tour setup. The 2019 ZOZO Championship had its share of good scrambler near the top. The 2021 leaderboard had some terrible putters near its top, but the rest of the Top 20 was littered with elite ball strikers. It's not going to be a putting contest. There is a low correlation between a good finish at Narashinos CC and how good of a putter you are. For every Patrick Reed, Ian Poulter, Gary Woodland, Billy Horschel and Sungjae Im there was a Hideki Matsuyama, Corey Conners, Byeong Hun An, Ryan Palmer, and Keegan Bradley.