This article is part of our DraftKings PGA DFS Picks series.
ZURICH CLASSIC OF NEW ORLEANS
Purse: $9.2M
Winners' Share: $1.329M to each winner
FedEx Cup Points: 400 to each winner
Location: Avondale, La.
Course: TPC Louisiana
Yardage: 7,425
Par: 72
2024 champions: Rory McIlroy - Shane Lowry
Tournament Preview
When we last saw Rory McIlroy, he was collapsing in relief/joy on the 18th green at Augusta National, having just won the Masters to complete the career Grand Slam. This week, he'll be in a far more relaxed setting, about as relaxed as you can get while still playing a professional golf tournament.
In the eighth edition of the Zurich Classic since it was reconfigured into a team event, McIlroy and good buddy Shane Lowry return to defend their title. In all, 79 two-man teams will be at TPC Louisiana (it's normally 80 but guys withdrew).
The New Orleans Tour stop is one of the oldest on Tour, having been around since 1938, when it was named the Crescent City Open. Many of the biggest names in golf have won there. But in a bid to raise sagging interest, the team format was instituted in 2017.
It's a fun diversion for both golfers and fans alike to play or see a different type of golf roughly midway through a grueling eight-month regular season.
It's also pretty cool to see all the different kinds of pairings -- some star-laden, some countrymen, some familial, some college chums and some "The last two kids without a prom date decide to go together."
McIlroy and Lowry are the biggest star pairing -- no disrespect to Lowry, but McIlroy and a bag of used Titleists would've been the biggest star pairing two weeks after the Masters. But Collin Morikawa is also on hand, joining up again with fellow Call of Duty gamer Kurt Kitayama. It was a surprise, though, to see the annual tandem of Patrick Cantlay and Xander Schauffele, the 2022 champs, sitting this one out.
Other players of note in the field include Wyndham Clark (paired with Taylor Moore), Sepp Straka (Brice Garnett), Robert MacIntyre (Thomas Detry), Billy Horschel (Tom Hoge), Akshay Bhatia (Carson Young) and Sahith Theegala (Aaron Rai). Horschel was the 2018 winner with Scott Piercy.
There are three sets of brothers teaming up: Matt Fitzpatrick and Alex Fitzpatrick, twins Nicolai Hojgaard and Rasmus Hojgaard and two more twins, Jeremy Paul and Yannik Paul.
We have Canadians (Adam Hadwin and Nick Taylor), Frenchmen (Mathieu Pavon and Victor Perez), old guys (Luke Donald and Camilo Villegas), older guys (Zach Johnson and Ryan Palmer), bombers (Niklas Norgaard and Jesper Svensson, both top-10 in driving distance) and whatever the opposite of bombers is (Russell Knox and Peter Malnati).
This might be a good time to put a stop to any comparisons between this tournament and LIV Golf events. There is only one title up for grabs in the Zurich, unlike LIV events that all have individual and team champions. And there is a cut, one that is very difficult to make.
Since this is a once-a-year event on the DFS landscape -- this will be just the fifth year that DraftKings is offering games -- let's detail the format and scoring.
The 79 two-man teams will play best-ball (fourball) in the first and third rounds and alternate shot (foursomes) in the second and fourth rounds. The Friday cut will be the top 33 teams and ties. You still pick six guys with a $50,000 salary cap. Each golfer on a team will cost the same DraftKings price and get the same DK points. You may pick only one of the two -- and it makes absolutely no difference which one. Other than that, the scoring is pretty standard.
Getting six guys through to the weekend will be VERY hard. Normally you need six of 65 plus ties. This week it's six of 33 plus ties. Five of six making it through to the weekend can probably win you some cash in many games.
Needless to say, as is the case most of the time in team formats, you have to go super low to win. The winning score has been at least 25-under in five of the seven years the Zurich has been a team event. Nick Hardy and Davis Riley set the record of 30-under two years ago and are back again this year.
The best-ball record is 59, set by Cantlay-Schauffele on Thursday in 2022; they then shot 60 on Saturday. Jon Rahm-Ryan Palmer set the alternate-shot record of 65 in 2019, and it's been matched by a few teams, including by Hardy-Riley. It's safe to say that strong iron play and quality putting will be imperative this week, so a good team should have at least one of each. Two of each, of course, is better.
TPC Louisiana is a 2004 Pete Dye design, and the tournament was first played there in 2005. It was a big-time birdie-fest even before they instituted the team format. Justin Rose set the "solo" tournament-record at 22-under 266 in 2015. The stock par-72 is not especially long -- except with the par-3s, all of which are over 200 yards. There are four par-4s of 400ish or less. The par-5s tap out at the 585-yard 18th, and all are gettable in two by a long hitter.
The greens are poa overseed, average a medium-size 5,225 square feet and run 12 on the Stimpmeter. There's water on eight holes and 106 bunkers, second most on Tour behind Pebble Beach.
As for the weather, this little nugget comes courtesy of the Golf Course Superintendents fact sheet: "In January the golf course received 11" of snow and was closed for 4 days. New Orleans had not received that much snow since 1895."
It will not snow this week. But it will be hot and humid all week, with high temperatures in the 80s. There's a small chance of rain throughout the tournament but it will be a bit windy, forecast to blow in the double-digit mph all four days.
FedExCup factoid: Not that we concern ourselves too much with FedExCup points, but if you're wondering why it says up top that the winners get 400 points apiece, that's because the winner of a regular tournament normally gets 500 and the runner-up gets 300. Also, there will be no Official World Golf Rankings points doled out this week.
Key Stats to Winning at TPC Louisiana
The most important indicators every week are current form and course history. "Key Stats" follow in importance.
• Strokes Gained: Approach/Greens in regulation
• Strokes Gained: Putting
• Birdie or Better Percentage
• Team Chemistry
Past Champions
2024 - Shane Lowry - Rory McIlroy
2023 - Nick Hardy - Davis Riley
2022 - Patrick Cantlay - Xander Schauffele
2021 - Marc Leishman - Cameron Smith
2020 - No Tournament
2019 - Ryan Palmer - Jon Rahm
2018 - Billy Horschel - Scott Piercy
2017 - Jonas Blixt - Cameron Smith
2016 - Brian Stuard
2015 - Justin Rose
Champion's Profile
We mentioned above how low the scores go, so it's an absolute necessity to get on the green in regulation and make putts. But it's more than just the golf. As we see in the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup, team chemistry is also imperative. Many of the guys on Tour are friends off the course, so it's natural for them to connect this week. But there are some curious pairings of seemingly different guys.
Horschel has won this tournament as both a single (2013) and double (2018), so if there's a horse for this course, he would seem to be the guy. Besides, he's very genial and has had success here with multiple partners.
Golfodds.com puts the over/under on the winning score at 261.5 -- 26.5 under par.
DRAFTKINGS VALUE PICKS
Based on Standard $50K Salary Cap
$10,000 and up
Shane Lowry - Rory McIlroy - $12,400 (Winning odds at the DraftKings Sportsbook: +360)
Don't think for a second that McIlroy won't be prepared, even though it'll be just 10 days after the biggest golfing moment of his life. He would never let his good friend down. They are the defending champions, had a blast year and have been looking forward to returning ever since. As two of three best solo guys in the field, they easily could've been priced in the $13,000s.
Thomas Detry - Robert MacIntyre - $10,300 (+1800)
These guys are the co-No. 3 choice at the DK Sportsbook. And why not, they are Nos. 21 (MacIntyre) and 31 (Detry) in the OWGR. They know each other from their DP World Tour days. They played together last year and tied for eighth. And now both are far more accomplished golfers. MacIntyre is ranked 35th on Tour in SG: Approach and Detry is 35th in SG: Putting.
$9,000-$9,900
Tom Hoge - Billy Horschel - $9,400 (+2500)
Horschel plays well here almost every year, no matter the partner. He didn't last year, though it was the week after he had a big win in the Dominican Republic. So we'll give him a pass because that was a huge moment in his career. Now Horschel teams with yet another new partner, Hoge, who has had a couple of good results here, including T13 two years ago. Hoge is ranked 14th on Tour in SG: Approach and they both are just outside the top-50 in SG: Putting.
Nico Echavarria - Max Greyserman - $9,000 (+4000)
We're not sure of the connection here, one guy from Colombia and the other from New Jersey. But there surely is a connection, as they shared fourth place last year. They are each better individually than a year ago, both now ranked top-50 OWGR. Echavarria is ranked first on Tour in SG: Putting.
$8,000-$8,900
Adam Hadwin - Nick Taylor - $8,600 (+3500)
These two Canucks are good pals. They've played together here multiple times, tying for 10th last year and were solo runners-up in 2023. This time around, Taylor has been playing pretty well, but Hadwin has been way off his game. Playing alongside Taylor might be just be what he needs to lighten up and play like he's done in the past.
Alex Fitzpatrick - Matt Fitzpatrick - $8,100 (+5000)
There's no guarantee that brothers will play well just because they are brothers. It actually could lead to more pressure, not wanting to disappoint one of the closest people to you in the world. But that's not the case here. The Fitzpatricks have played the Zurich twice together, tying for 19th in 2023 and improving to T11 last year. Matt has been having a very down year. Meeting up with brother Alex may be the best thing for him right now.
$7,000-$7,900
Rico Hoey - Sam Ryder - $7,900 (+4500)
Hoey hits the ball a ton off the tee and is ranked 25th on Tour in SG: Approach. Ryder is also a very good iron player who's also ranked third in SG: Putting. How is Hoey's putting, you ask? Well, he is ranked second ... to last (182nd). Both guys missed the cut last year. Ryder tied for third in 2022 alongside Doc Redman.
Ryan Gerard - Danny Walker - $7,500 (+5000)
Gerard has had a great season, with a T9 and T2 on the Texas Swing before a respectable T27 last week at the RBC Heritage. Walker had one brief moment of glory when he tied for sixth at THE PLAYERS. Gerard is ranked 28th on Tour in SG: Approach, Walker is 44th. Gerard is also ranked 15th in SG: Putting.
Pierceson Coody - Jackson Suber - $7,400 (+9000)
Coody teamed with his twin brother, Parker Coody, last year but they missed the cut. This will be Suber's Zurich debut. What we have here, hopefully, is one great iron player and one great putter. Suber is ranked ninth on Tour in SG: Approach. Coody ranked 13th on Tour last year in SG: Putting. He finished last year in the 126-150 category, so he's been splitting time with the Korn Ferry Tour this year. He has played five PGA Tour events, making his past three cuts, including last week at Puntacana.
$6,000-$6,900
Ben Silverman - Sami Valimaki - $6,900 (+8000)
Valimaki might be playing better right now than anyone else in the $6000s, and some guys priced even higher. He finished fourth at Houston, T12 at the Valero and T18 in last week's signature event at Harbour Town. If that's not enough, how does this sound: He's ranked eighth on Tour in SG: Approach and 14th in Putting. Okay, yeah, there is another guy. Um, Silverman has been really bad, missing eight of 10 cuts this season. He's not putting well this year, or doing anything well, but he ranked eighth in SG: Putting last year.
Charley Hoffman - Nick Watney - $6,200 (+15000)
Hoffman and Watney are the only tandem to have played together all seven editions of the Zurich team tournament. And they've been outstanding, even well into their 40s. Last year, they tied for 11th, despite Watney having very few starts leading up to the tournament. Hoffman has two top-10s this season, including last week at Puntacana. This is clearly a case of the whole being greater than the sum of the parts. The oddsmakers think so too: Last year, Hoffman-Watney was 300-1 and now they're listed at half of that.
Agree with these recommendations? Give them a spin with various combinations of other golfers in RotoWire's PGA DFS Lineup Optimizer.
