2026-05-12 The PGA Championship

The PGA Championship

Your weekly guide to fantasy golf on the PGA TOUR

⛳ This week on the PGA TOUR

Tournament: PGA Championship
Date: May 14–17, 2026
Venue: Aronimink Golf Club — Newtown Square, PA
Purse: $19,000,000+ (winner $3.42 million)
Cut Rule: Top 70 players and ties after 36 holes
Course Details: This week’s host is a 1928 Donald Ross design widely considered his masterpiece, a classic parkland layout just west of Philadelphia that’s playing as a par 70 at roughly 7,400 yards for the championship. Ross famously said of this place, “I intended to make this my masterpiece, but not until today did I realize that I built better than I knew”. The bunkering is the defining feature. A Gil Hanse / Jim Wagner restoration that launched in 2016 took the bunker count from 74 to 176, replacing modernized greenside bunkers with smaller, intricate clusters in Ross’s original style. Add in his famously crowned, contoured greens with severe runoff areas, and missing in the wrong spot leaves players nowhere to go.
New This Year: More than 100 yards have been added through new tee boxes, fairways have been pinched in at the landing zones to roughly 32 yards wide, and the rough has been grown out to around 3.5–4 inches. A new forward tee on the short par-4 13th will allow players to make it driveable on certain days, bringing the out-of-bounds left of the green dangerously into play. Expect that to be one of the most-watched holes of the week.
Weather: Forecast looks generally favorable for Aronimink, with highs climbing from the low 60s on Thursday into the upper 70s by Saturday and only a 20% chance of rain through each of the four competitive rounds. Cool, breezy conditions early in the week could keep the greens firm and approach play tricky before warmer weekend temperatures soften the test.

The PGA Championship — the year’s second major and one of golf’s four crown jewels, contested for the storied Wanamaker Trophy since 1916 — returns this week for its 108th playing, with a layout, a region, and a moment that all feel uniquely special. This is the first PGA Championship held in the Philadelphia area in over 60 years, and it coincides with the United States semiquincentennial — the 250th anniversary of America’s founding in 1776 in Philadelphia. The PGA Championship is widely regarded as having the strongest field of any major, and this year is no exception: 156 players, including virtually everyone inside the top 100 of the Official World Golf Ranking. Defending champion and World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler arrives as the betting favorite, with Rory McIlroy chasing the third leg of a potential calendar Grand Slam after his Masters win, Cameron Young coming in hot off a Players Championship victory and a T3 at Augusta, and red-hot Matt Fitzpatrick riding three wins in his last five starts. Ludvig Åberg, Tommy Fleetwood, Keegan Bradley, Brooks Koepka, and Akshay Bhatia round out a deep contender list — though the headlines this week also include who’s not here: Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson have both opted out for personal reasons. With a classic Donald Ross test waiting and the strongest field in golf assembled outside Philadelphia, this one has all the makings of a memorable major.

Past Champions:

2025 — Scottie Scheffler (-11) at Quail Hollow Club
2024 — Xander Schauffele (-21) at Valhalla Golf Club
2023 — Brooks Koepka (-9) at Oak Hill Country Club
2022 — Justin Thomas (-5, at Southern Hills Country Club
2021 — Phil Mickelson (-6) at Ocean Course at Kiawah Island

Worth noting: Xander Schauffele’s -21 in 2024 was a remarkable score, while the others all fell in the -5 to -11 range — closer to what you can expect at this week’s classic, demanding Donald Ross test.

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🏌️ Players to Watch (and a Few to Fade)

The PGA Championship’s strongest-field-in-golf reputation means depth is everywhere this week, but a Donald Ross classic with narrow fairways, demanding approaches, and complex green contours will reward a specific kind of player — precision iron strikers with a complete game over pure bombers. With fairways pinched to roughly 32 yards wide and rough grown out to 3.5–4 inches, this is not a week where you can spray it off the tee and recover with wedges — driving accuracy and the ability to control trajectory into firm, contoured greens will be at a premium. The smart roster build leans toward elite iron players, strong scramblers, and steady putters on bentgrass, while fading one-dimensional bombers and players whose recent form has been carried by short-game heroics. Adding intrigue: this course last hosted a Tour event at the 2018 BMW Championship, giving us a small but useful data set on who has solved Aronimink before.

Here are the names worth circling on your roster sheet:

Scottie Scheffler — The defending champion and World No. 1 is the tournament favorite for good reason. His combination of elite ball-striking and steady-everything game profiles perfectly for this test. Penciling him in anywhere below the top 10 feels brave.
Rory McIlroy — Coming off a Masters win and chasing the third leg of a calendar Grand Slam, Rory finished T5 here at the 2018 BMW Championship. One rival caddie called Aronimink “absolutely perfect” for his game. The biggest question is whether the putter cooperates.
Cameron Young — Won The Players and finished T3 at the Masters. Currently the hottest player on statistical trend tables and the strongest bet to win among players without a major. A Jersey-area kid playing close to home — major breakout candidate.
Matt Fitzpatrick — Three wins in his last five starts with career-best ball-striking numbers and improving putting. A precision player on a precision course is a classic fantasy fit.
Keegan Bradley — The 2018 BMW Championship winner at this very course. Has only missed the cut twice in 15 PGA Championship starts with six top-25 finishes, including a T8 last year at Quail Hollow. Course history plus form trending up after a strong Masters finish.
Justin Rose — Lost in a playoff to Bradley here in 2018 and also won the 2010 AT&T National at this course. Nobody in the field has played better golf at Aronimink. At 45, he won’t be the popular pick, but the form-plus-fit combo is real.
Ludvig Åberg — Sits second behind Cameron Young on statistical trend tables. Elite iron player with major-championship temperament. The kind of name you can confidently put high in your lineup.
Xander Schauffele — The 2024 PGA champion is always a major-week consideration even when form is uneven. A safe play for cuts and points.
Bryson DeChambeau — A complicated case. Aronimink doesn’t suit his bomb-and-gouge style as well as recent major venues, but he’s been close at every major recently. Worth a flier, not a building block.
Tommy Fleetwood — Five top-10s in his last nine starts, including a T5 at the Truist last week. The reigning FedEx Cup champion is playing himself into major-week consideration.

Potential Fades:

Jon Rahm — Still in the field and always dangerous, but LIV reps have been struggling at majors of late and his Masters showing was uninspiring. The competitive reps on a weaker LIV schedule simply don’t sharpen a player for the pressure and depth of a major Sunday the way the PGA Tour grind does. Risk/reward play.
Jordan Spieth — A name that always tempts, but the driving accuracy issues that have plagued him for years will be exposed by Aronimink’s narrow corridors and penal rough. The short-game magic that used to bail him out has also been less reliable lately, which makes the math even harder this week. Pass unless you need a name-brand differentiator.
Max Homa — Form has been spotty. Big name with name-brand pull in pools, but the data doesn’t support a high finish. His ball-striking metrics have slipped well off where they were during his peak run, and this isn’t the week to bet on a turnaround at a precision-demanding venue.
Dustin Johnson — Past his peak and on LIV. A faded brand pick that’s unlikely to deliver this week. He hasn’t seriously contended at a major in years, and a tree-lined Donald Ross design with narrow fairways doesn’t fit the wide-open bomber’s paradise his game has historically thrived on.
Hideki Matsuyama — Iron play is always elite, but his putting can erase that edge quickly. A coin flip at majors lately. Bentgrass greens with subtle Ross contours could be especially unforgiving for a streaky putter, and you’d hate to roster him only to watch a hot ball-striking week go unrewarded.

🧐 Did You Know?

Ross gave each of Aronimink’s 18 holes an Indigenous name, connecting the routing to the land’s deeper past. The club itself takes its name from a chief of the Lenape, the Indigenous people who inhabited this region long before golf arrived — legend holds that the chief once resided in a farmhouse that later served as the club’s original clubhouse.
When Gary Player won the 1962 PGA Championship at Aronimink — the only previous men’s PGA contested here — he collected a winner’s check of $13,000, the largest purse in the tournament’s history at that point. The first-place prize in 2026 will exceed $3 million, which means the caddie on the winning bag stands to make some 20 times more than what Player pulled in.
The Gil Hanse and Jim Wagner restoration that returned this course to its original Donald Ross vision wasn’t guided by drawings alone — club officials watched 8mm films and aerial photos and discovered the course Ross built wasn’t the same course he had originally drawn, prompting Hanse — who lives nearby in Malvern — to restore the layout to exactly the way it was originally built, ultimately taking the bunker count from 74 to 176.
The Philadelphia region is a golf architecture capital. Metro Philadelphia rivals Long Island, Eastern Scotland and Greater London for concentration of great golf courses — sharing top-100 billing with Pine Valley, Merion, and Philadelphia Cricket Club’s Wissahickon Course. This major isn’t just at a great course — it’s in arguably the most historically significant golf region in America

🤔 Fantasy Strategy

The PGA Championship’s combination of strongest-field-in-golf depth and an unfamiliar major venue with no recent course form to lean on creates one of the more wide-open major weeks of the year. With Scottie Scheffler at a 17% win probability and no other player topping 9%, the math actually favors thinking beyond the top of the board.

The fundamental angle this week is to lean into approach play and fade pure bombers. Aronimink rewards iron precision and trajectory control over driver length, so players gaining strokes on approach in recent starts should be weighted heavily, while driving distance leaders without elite ball-striking should be downgraded a tier. Bentgrass putting matters too — familiarity with northeast bentgrass is a real edge here, so players who’ve thrived recently at Quail Hollow, Memorial, Travelers, or RBC Heritage profile especially well. And don’t sleep on cut survival: the top 70 and ties advances, slightly more generous than a typical Tour event, which makes reliable weekend-makers more valuable than they look on paper.

When it comes to roster construction, resist the urge to over-stack the chalk. With such a deep field and an unfamiliar venue, building around two top-tier names and filling the rest of your roster with mid-tier value plays gives you the best ceiling — pool winners this week will be the entries that hit on a sleeper or two. One last edge to watch: with cool morning temps early in the week and the chance of wind picking up, the Thursday AM / Friday PM draw could be the best of it, so a late-Thursday name with a strong Friday-morning slot may carry hidden value.

Sleepers to Consider:

J.J. Spaun — Hard to call a reigning U.S. Open champion a true sleeper, but he’s flying under the radar this week. Ninth on the PGA Tour in strokes gained approach this year, and approach play is the most important stat at Aronimink. He’s already proven he can win a major in Pennsylvania (Oakmont last year).
Harry Hall — One of the best course fits for Aronimink according to the stat sheets, coming off a T8 at the Truist where he gained +1.24 strokes per round with his irons — his best approach performance since last April’s Valero Texas Open. If the iron play carries over, he’s a top-20 threat at huge value.
Aaron Rai — One of the most accurate drivers on Tour, which is the single best skill to bring to Aronimink’s pinched 32-yard-wide fairways. Quietly consistent at majors and won’t go over-owned in pools.
Corey Conners — Elite ball-striker with a long history of strokes-gained-approach excellence. The putter is the only thing that’s ever held him back, and even an average week with the flat stick on Ross greens could push him into contention.
Sepp Straka — Has been a steady major-week performer with multiple top-15s at recent PGAs. His combination of accuracy and approach play maps neatly onto what the course demands.
Sam Burns — Was a fixture in Player of the Year conversations not long ago and the talent hasn’t gone anywhere. Bentgrass-friendly putter who can heat up at any moment — perfect leverage play.
Davis Riley — Has shown major-week flashes and quietly profiles as a strong fit for this kind of precision test. A name nobody will be picking, which makes him exactly the kind of swing you need.

⭐️ Pro Tip: When in doubt, follow the irons — the player with the hottest approach numbers over the last month is more likely to lift the Wanamaker than the one with the longest drives.

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❎ One-and-Done Corner

The PGA Championship week for Golf One and Done pools is here, and it sits at a real crossroads for pool players. We’ve made it through the first half of the year — a run that included a string of high-profile events and the Masters — and now arrive at the second major of the season, with the full complement of PGA Tour players eligible to compete alongside LIV and DP World Tour players who join the field, giving pool players more options to choose from than at almost any other event on the calendar. While the PGA Championship has recently trailed both the Masters and the U.S. Open in total purse, the 156-player field and top-70-and-ties cut still make it a high-leverage opportunity — there’s room for a contrarian pick to deliver a massive payday even if the chalk plays as expected at the top.

The official purse has not been announced yet, but last year’s total purse was $19,000,000, with $3,420,000 going to the first-place winner. Any increase this year would push it closer to the typical Signature Event prize money, and maybe just above recent events like the Truist and Cadillac Championships, but with a much larger field and a cut.

The smart play this week is to target a precision iron player with a complete game over a one-dimensional bomber — the kind of golfer who fits the profile of every past winner here. As longtime head professional Jeff Kiddie put it, players who have won at Aronimink — Gary Player, Justin Rose, Keegan Bradley — were never the longest, but long enough, with elite iron play and streaky putting. The single most important statistical category this week is Strokes Gained: Approach, and for good reason: with fairways pinched to roughly 32 yards wide and rough grown to 3.5–4 inches, many tee shots will leave 150–200 yard approaches into firm, contoured Ross greens where simply hitting the putting surface isn’t enough — players have to find the correct quadrant to have a realistic birdie look. That makes this a poor week to burn a top bomber like Bryson DeChambeau and a great week to deploy a player whose recent approach numbers are trending up — names like Scottie Scheffler, Cameron Young, Ludvig Åberg, or Matt Fitzpatrick all fit the bill. If you’re saving those bigger names for U.S. Open or Open Championship weeks, J.J. Spaun (9th on Tour in SG: Approach) and Tommy Fleetwood (riding five top-10s in his last nine starts) are the kind of complete-game, hot-iron plays that can deliver a strong week without spending a marquee bullet.

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💰 Select Betting Odds

Top Favorites
Scottie Scheffler +480
Rory McIlroy +850
Cameron Young +1200
Matt Fitzpatrick +2200
Ludvig Åberg +2200

Middle Tier
Tommy Fleetwood +2500
Justin Thomas +4000
Min Woo Lee +4500
Justin Rose +5000
Russell Henley +5500

Long Shots
Sam Burns +6000
J.J. Spaun +6000
Jake Knapp +8000
Sepp Straka +8000
Akshay Bhatia +10000

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