The eight best bets to win this year’s U.S. Open (2024)

Here are some recent trends:

As you can probably tell, Clark wasn’t one of my choices entering last year’s U.S. Open (he previously had never finished better than 75th at a major championship), but he came out of relative nowhere to nip McIlroy by a stroke. Hey, it happens, and two years ago this system identified winner Matt Fitzpatrick. Here’s hoping we can get back on track.

While there hasn’t been a sure thing in golf since Tiger Woods’s imperial era, Scheffler is getting pretty close to it. He has five wins this year, and all five came in elite-field events played on difficult courses (Masters, Players Championship, Arnold Palmer, Heritage and Memorial). The last golfer with at least five wins including a major entering the U.S. Open? Arnold Palmer in 1962.

Over his past eight tournaments, Scheffler has finished no worse than eighth. But more importantly, Scheffler’s game is a great fit for Pinehurst No. 2, which features turtleback greens that are exceedingly difficult to hold because there’s no rough to stop a ball from rolling away. The world’s top-ranked golfer is fourth this season on the PGA Tour in scrambling and is 14th in strokes gained around the green, key assets at Pinehurst.

Trend match: Scheffler matches five of six trends listed above; he wouldn’t be a first-time major champion. And while it’s no fun betting chalk — Scheffler is the biggest U.S. Open favorite since Woods was +200 in 2009 — it’s easy to think he gets it done this weekend (as long as he can avoid getting arrested).

Hitting it long and straight is an avenue to success at the U.S. Open, where anything that misses the fairway can lead to calamity. And that’s Schauffele in a nutshell: The world’s second-ranked player is fifth in the PGA Tour’s total driving metric, which combines distance and accuracy, and seventh in strokes gained off the tee. And were it not for Scheffler’s superlatives this year, everyone would be talking about Schauffele’s run of elite play, with his major breakthrough at the PGA Championship and 12 other top-10 finishes. Plus, in seven U.S. Open appearances he has six top-10s, with the other finish a tie for 14th. (He’s the only player to finish in the U.S. Open’s top 15 each of the past seven years.) Back-to-back majors? I wouldn’t rule it out.

Trend match: Like Scheffler, Schauffele matches five of six trends, with the only strike against him (such as it is) being the fact that he has won a major championship.

Morikawa leads the PGA Tour in driving accuracy, and his irons have been firing since an early-season lull: He ranked fourth in strokes gained approach at the Masters (Morikawa tied for third, his best finish there) and also gained more than a stroke per round with his irons at the PGA Championship (he finished fourth), where he also ranked second in strokes gained around the green. Morikawa also is coming off a Memorial in which he nearly tracked down Scheffler on Sunday before settling for second place, his approach shots again sterling. His past three U.S. Open appearances have resulted in 14th-, fifth- and fourth-place finishes.

Trend match: Morikawa falls into the same group as Scheffler and Schauffele, meeting all of our trends except for first-time major champion. Morikawa won the PGA Championship in 2020 and the British Open in 2021.

DeChambeau is one of four golfers who have finished in the top 10 at both majors this season (Scheffler, Morikawa and Schauffele are the others), and his performance on the LIV Golf circuit has been encouraging, with four top-10s. He’s also a proven commodity on difficult courses, as evidenced by his 2020 U.S. Open win at Winged Foot, where he won by six strokes and was the only golfer to finish under par. DeChambeau’s length off the tee should be an asset on one of the longest courses anyone’s going to see this season, and if he can keep it on the fairway, watch out.

Trend match: DeChambeau is a match on four of six trends, though one of his misses should be taken with a grain of salt. LIV golfers do not accrue OWGR points, so DeChambeau has slipped to No. 38.

Fleetwood not only is near the top of the list of players who have yet to win a major championship, but he’s probably also the best golfer who has never won on American soil. (The world No. 13 has seven DP World Tour wins, however.) But you have to like his chances this week considering his accuracy off the tee (he’s third in that category in PGA Tour play) and around the green (he ranks 17th in strokes gained around the green). Fleetwood has finished in the top 10 in three of the past four majors — he tied for third at this year’s Masters — so he has been knocking on the door.

Trend match: Fleetwood fits five of the six trends, only missing out on a top-15 finish in one of his past two starts. (He was 21st and 20th.)

Fitzpatrick is just two years removed from his U.S. Open win at the Country Club, and there are signs he might be in position for another title. He gained strokes in every category last weekend on his way to a tie for fifth at the Memorial, his best result since a fifth-place finish at the Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass in March. And there might be something of a Pinehurst-Sawgrass connection: Of the 11 golfers to finish in the top 10 the previous time Pinehurst hosted the U.S. Open in 2014, five also have a Players Championship win on their résumé, including 2014 U.S. Open winner Martin Kaymer. Four others from that 2014 list have multiple top-10s at the Players as well. Fitzpatrick has two Players Championship top-10s over the past four years, and he ranks ninth on the PGA Tour in total driving.

Trend match: Fitzpatrick meets just three of the six trends, but we’re willing to look past that for a guy who has proved he can win in the toughest of circ*mstances.

Matsuyama’s U.S. Open track record is nearly as good as Schauffele’s. In 11 attempts, he has three top-10s and only one missed cut (he tied for 35th the previous time Pinehurst hosted the tournament in 2014). He’s also coming off a tie for eighth at the Memorial, where he gained strokes in every category and ranked second in strokes gained putting for the event. Matsuyama leads the PGA Tour in strokes gained around the green, and if he can fix an occasionally wonky driver, the Japanese star could be worth a look.

Trend match: The 2021 Masters champion is a match on four of six trends. His first two major championships this year resulted in a tie for 38th and a tie for 35th.

The thing that traditionally held Bradley back was his putting, but he has gained strokes on the greens in four straight starts. He’s also one of just eight golfers who have finished in the top 25 at both majors this season, and he has tied for second at two other tournaments (one of them the Charles Schwab in late May). The PGA Tour veteran has just two U.S. Open top-10s in his career, but one of them came in 2014, when he tied for fourth at Pinehurst No. 2. Bradley ranks 12th on the PGA Tour in total driving, and his overall ball striking has been impressive of late.

Trend match: Like Fitzpatrick, Bradley meets just three of six trends, but I like where his game is at.

As of Wednesday morning, here were the odds to win the U.S. Open of the leading contenders, according to DraftKings Sportsbook: