DraftKings PGA DFS Picks: FedEx St. Jude Championship Cash and GPP Strategy

FEDEX ST. JUDE CHAMPIONSHIP

Purse: $20M
Winner's Share: $3.6M
FedEx Cup Points: 2,000 to the winner
Location: Memphis, Tenn.
Course: TPC Southwind
Yardage: 7,288
Par: 70
2025 champion: Justin Rose

Tournament Preview

The PGA Tour's 2026 regular season is over, and it may have been unlike any other -- certainly unlike any other in recent years. That's because in recent years, one player dominated. That player would be Scottie Scheffler.

But this year, not only has Scheffler not dominated, no one has.

So as the three-event playoffs begin, not only is there is no clear-cut favorite to win the PGA Tour's Player of the Year Award, there aren't even two or three favorites. A case could be made for any of five players to take home the Jack Nicklaus Award for the season's top golfer.

Cameron Young, Matt Fitzpatrick, Chris Gotterup, Wyndham Clark and even Scheffler all can stake a claim to the prestigious honor, and if any one of them would win this week at the FedEx St. Jude Championship, that would surely tip the scales heavily in their favor. It's not impossible for even someone else to win the POY award, such as Rory McIlroy, who won the Masters, though no one else is a part of the conversation right now. Unlike last year, McIlroy at least is in the field, and that made tournament organizers so happy they posted about it.

The usual field of 70 for the start of the playoffs will actually be 69. Daniel Berger is No. 60 in the FedExCup Standings, but he has withdrawn from multiple tournaments -- including this one -- since missing the cut at the Open Championship.

It's safe to say that all five POY candidates will be will play in all three playoff events. After this week, the field will be whittled to 50 players for the BMW Championship, then 30 in the TOUR Championship.

Let's take a look at the qualifications for all five golfers.

• Young: Perhaps the slight front-runner right now, Young has two wins -- THE PLAYERS Championship and the Cadillac Championship Signature Event -- plus a runner-up at the Open Championship, a tie for third at the Masters, five top-5s and eight top-10s
• Fitzpatrick: He has three wins -- the RBC Heritage Signature Event, the Valspar and the Zurich Classic team event -- plus two runners-up, including to Young at THE PLAYERS, with seven top-5s and eight top-10s
• Gotterup: He also has three wins -- the Sony Open, WM Phoenix Open and John Deere Classic, with three top-5s and five top-10s
• Clark: He has two wins -- the U.S. Open and Byron Nelson Classic -- with four top-5s/top-10s.
• Scheffler: This is where things get interesting. He has won just once, the Amex way back in January. But he has five runners-up, including at the Masters and two Signature Events, plus a whopping 11 top-5s/top-10s. Scheffler is actually first in the standings, and by a fairly large margin. 

There is a long way till the Player of the Year vote and announcement -- the players vote after the FedExCup Fall in late November and the winner should be announced in early December -- but these next three events will determine the POY winner.

And, in turn, could go a long way in determining who is the FedExCup Champion.

Justin Rose is the defending FedEx St. Jude champion. Other former winners of this tournament in the field are Hideki Matsuyama in 2024 and Justin Thomas in 2020, when it was known as the WGC-FedEx.

The point system is different from last year, when Rose received 2,000 points for winning. This year, the winner will get 750, which matches what the winner gets in the four majors and THE PLAYERS Championship.

There was significant volatility in the standings the past two years, as golfers try to secure a spot in the top 50 not only to qualify for the BMW Championship but also every Signature Event. Last year, five golfers jumped inside the top 50 at the St. Jude -- notably Rickie Fowler zoomed in and Jordan Spieth stunningly got booted out -- and the year before there was a three-player turnover. But with fewer points being distributed, we may not see the same volatility.

The PGA Tour has a long history with FedEx, and an even longer one with the city of Memphis.

There is no bigger sponsor of the Tour than FedEx, which has been the title sponsor for the playoffs all 20 years now. It has been the title sponsor of the Memphis tour stop since 1986, first as a regular tournament, then as a WGC and now for the fifth year as the first playoff event. (FedEx's current contract with the PGA Tour ends after the 2027 season.)

The Tour has been stopping in Memphis since 1958. The tournament was closely associated with the late entertainer Danny Thomas, and it bore his name from 1970 to 1984. (Thomas founded  the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis in 1962 and his family is still closely associated with it.) Two years later, FedEx came on board. TPC Southwind has been the host course since 1989.

Southwind is a long par-70 with narrow fairways that average a mere 25 yards and are bracketed by three inches of Bermuda rough. There are 11 doglegs that curb distance and, to a degree, scoring. There are only two par-5s. Southwind features eight par-4s of 450ish-plus yards and the Bermudagrass greens average a small 4,500 square feet. Hitting from farther back in the fairway than usual -- or from the rough -- into small greens makes getting on the green in regulation a challenge. That doesn't even take into account the 11 water hazards affecting 11 holes. Nowhere is there more danger than at No. 18, a 453-yard dogleg left with water almost the entire way.

The course did undergo some modifications two years ago, resulting in a slight increase in distance of about 50 yards. The greens were overhauled and slightly expanded to allow for more hole locations, but just by an average of 200 square feet per hole. The changes didn't affect scoring or course difficulty, as it normally is midrange in relations to other courses on Tour and was so again last year.

After an easy start to Southwind on Nos. 1 to 4, the course gets harder in a hurry. The hardest hole on the course is often the 485-yard 5th, as it was last year. It was followed in difficulty by the 205-yard 14th, 465-yard 10th and the aforementioned 18th.

As for the weather, in a word, as always, sweltering. Maybe even more than usual. Temperatures will be in the upper-90s and could crack triple-digits on the weekend. The winds will be on the light side and, even though they could really use some rain to cool things down, there's hardly any in the forecast.

Fun Memphis golf factoids: The first 59 in PGA Tour history was shot in Memphis. Al Geiberger did it at par-72 Cordova Country Club in the second round of the 1977 tournament then known as the Danny Thomas Memphis Classic. Geiberger won the tourney by three strokes ahead of former Memphis winner Gary Player. Also in 1977, get this: Former President Gerald Ford hit an incredible shot during the pro-am ... no, he didn't plunk a spectator in the head as he was wont to do -- he made a hole-in-one!

Key Stats to Winning at TPC Southwind

The most important indicators every week are current form and course history. "Key Stats" follow in importance.

• Driving Accuracy
• Ball Striking (Total Driving + Greens in Regulation)
• Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green
• Strokes Gained: Approach/Greens in Regulation
• Par 4 Efficiency 450-500 yards

Past Champions

FedEx St. Jude Championship
2025 - Justin Rose
2024 - Hideki Matsuyama
2023 - Lucas Glover
2022 - Will Zalatoris

WGC-FedEx
2021 - Abraham Ancer
2020 - Justin Thomas
2019 - Brooks Koepka

St. Jude Classic
2018 - Dustin Johnson
2017 - Daniel Berger
2016 - Daniel Berger

Champion's Profile

Rose and J.J. Spaun tied at 16-under last year before Rose won in a playoff. Scheffler and Tommy Fleetwood were one shot back, and no one else was within five.

All four guys finished in the top-14 in SG: Off-the-Tee, the top-13 in SG: Approach and the top-7 in greens in regulation.

Ball striking, ball striking, ball striking.

Specifically, Rose ranked 14th in OTT, eighth in Approach, 27th in Around-the-Green and seventh in Putting, while Spaun ranked sixth in OTT, second in Approach, third in ARG and 45th in Putting.

You don't have to putt amazingly to win this week, but being 45th out of the 69 golfers in the field cost Spaun the tournament.

Two years ago, Matsuyama won at 17-under, Xander Schauffele and Viktor Hovland were at 15-under and Scheffler at 14-under. All four of them finished in the top eight in the field in greens in regulation.

Matsuyama also ranked first in SG: Putting. He normally is a terrible putter, and so were the two winners before him -- Glover and Zalatoris. So what gives? One possibility that we always consider is that smaller greens help the poorer putters. That's why putting is not a key stat this week; not that it's not important, it's just that smaller greens can level the playing field and make who will putt well and who will putt poorly harder to quantify.

The winning score has been between 15-under and 17-under in all four years that the St. Jude has been a playoff event, and those are the only tournaments that we will consider in our picks below.

Zalatoris and Glover won at 15-under in 2022 and 2023, respectively. 

The over/under on the winning score per Circa Sports is 263.5 -- 16.5 under par -- right in line with recent years.

DRAFTKINGS VALUE PICKS

Based on Standard $50K Salary Cap

$10,000 and up

Scottie Scheffler - $13,500 (Winning odds at the DraftKings Sportsbook: +455) 
Even though Scheffler is the only one among the five POY candidates detailed above without multiple wins, a lot of people think he's had the best season. It's hard to argue with that -- did you see how far ahead of No. 2 Fitzpatrick he is in the FedExCup Standings? That's what a win, five runners-up and five other top-5s will do for you. Speaking of top-5s, Scheffler finished third here last year and fourth the year before, and he ranks second on Tour in ball striking. (Quicky Quiz: Do you know who ranks first?) With a very manageable price in the mid-$13,000s and in a no-cut field, Scheffler can be a part of a winning lineup, even if he doesn't win.

Tommy Fleetwood - $10,200 (+2000)
We have not seen Fleetwood since his T4 at the Open Championship, his seventh top-10 and 12th top-25 of the season. It was at this time a year ago that he began his ascent to winning the TOUR Championship and becoming the FedExCup Champion. He tied for third at Southwind last year for the second time in three years. Fleetwood ranks 12th on Tour in driving accuracy, fifth in SG: Tee-to-Green and third in SG: Around-the-Green.

$9,000-$9,900

Matt Fitzpatrick - $9,900 (+2250)
Fitzpatrick also has been idle since the Open Championship, but unlike Fleetwood's top-5, Fitzpatrick had a horrible missed cut. He finished second, third and fourth in his four starts before the Open. That simply continued a career-best season that has featured three wins (if you want to discount one because it's the Zurich, you do you). Fitzpatrick is ranked third on Tour in ball striking, first in SG: Approach and second in SG: Around-the-Green. He tied for 32nd here last year, but in prior visits rang up fourth-, fifth- and sixth-place showings.

Hideki Matsuyama - $9,000 (+2900)
We know this course is a good for Matsuyama -- he won here two year ago and was runner-up in 2021. The thing is, unlike back then, Matsuyama's driver has been a hot mess for much of the season. But it has been getting better as the season has progressed, and last week he ranked 26th in the Wyndham field in driving accuracy on a course where it's important to hit the fairway, as it is this week. Otherwise, Matsuyama is ranked 28th in SG: Approach, sixth in Around-the-Green and 64th in Putting, which for him is fantastic.

$8,000-$8,900

Si Woo Kim - $8,700 (+3300)
Kim has three tournaments left in his finest season on Tour (yes, we know he could play in the fall season, but play along with us here). He's racked up 10 top-10s in 21 starts, buoyed largely by his iron play -- he's ranked third on Tour in SG: Approach. He's also ranked 28th in ball striking. If there's one bad thing about formulating ball-striking leaders, it penalizes short hitters. Kim is a short hitter. He tied for 14th here last year and for 16th three years ago.

Viktor Hovland - $8,400 (+3700)
Hovland is a bit of a gamble. His best is among the very best on Tour. The thing, it hasn't showed up a hell of a lot this season. It did when he took down Scheffler in a playoff to win the Travelers. It didn't when he missed the cut in the final three majors. But when Hovland is on, Southwind is a near-perfect fit for his game, like when he finished runner-up to Matsuyama two years ago.

$7,000-$7,900

Tom Kim - $7,900 (+5100)
Kim undoubtedly will be a popular play. He finished top-5 in three of his past six starts, including last week's T5 at the Wyndham. He is ranked 27th on Tour in ball striking, sixth in SG: Approach and 14th in SG: Around-the-Green, basically a blueprint for how to succeed at Southwind. Kim finished 24th here three years ago and 13th in 2022, a time when he is game was peaking -- like now.

Rickie Fowler - $7,500 (+6800)
Last year, Fowler had the pressure of needing a high finish to advance to the BMW Championship -- and he did it, tying for sixth. This year, he's in 28th place, firmly secure into next week. He has five top-10s and 10 top-25s in 2026, compiling a season a lot of people didn't think he had in him at age 37. Fowler ranks 34th on Tour in both ball striking and SG: Putting.

$6,000-$6,900

Jordan Smith - $6,600 (+9200)
Fun fact: Smith leads the PGA Tour in ball striking. You can imagine where that leaves his chipping and putting, but we can't say enough what a ball-strikers track Southwind is. The veteran Englishman sits 64th in the standings and needs at least a two-way tie for ninth to advance to next week. Considering Smith has only one top-10 all season, that's a big ask. But he does have eight top-25s, including in some loaded events and also last week at the Wyndham (T14).

Bud Cauley - $6,500 (+10500)
Cauley begins the week in 34th place in the standings, meaning he already knows he'll advance to the BMW Championship next week. That takes a lot of pressure off, and allows him to play free and easy this week. With a win at the Canadian Open and eight top-25s, including some in majors and Signature Events, Cauley's career has come full circle. His return from a devastating auto accident a decade ago has been remarkable. He played Southwind last year for the first time in nine years and tied for 14th.

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