In part one of my annual rankings, I talked a bit about my process and went through 25 names to consider toward the back end of fantasy drafts.
I will continue that quest to rank the top 150, with 25 more names to ponder for upcoming season-long leagues.
125. Brice Garnett
Baseline Ranking: 121
1-Year Starts: 27
Notes: He’s finished top 125 in the FedEx in four of the last five seasons. Last season was a bit of a “down year” but he has a proven track record of piling up a handful of top 25s each season. I would expect a bounce-back year from the Missouri Western State product.
124. Paul Haley II
Baseline Ranking: 119
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: The sharpshooter snagged six top 10s in each of the last two Korn Ferry seasons. The concern is the lack of firepower off the tee (averaged 280 yards on his 40 measured drives this fall). He went 3-for-18 on his first try at the PGA TOUR (2013) so there is some concern that his style of play just doesn’t translate well to most PGA TOUR venues. There will definitely be a handful of courses played where he has podium finish upside though.
123. Samuel Stevens
Baseline Ranking: 122
1-Year Starts: 30
Notes: The 26-year-old ranked 35th in driving distance on the Korn Ferry circuit last season and 3rd in GIR. That resulted in 4.28 birdies per round (25th). He didn’t impress in the fall but his two cuts made came on the courses that catered more to bigger hitters. He snagged 11 top 25s in 23 starts last season and I expect him to find some more of those when play resumes in 2023, likely on courses that allow him to unleash the driver more than a lot of fall courses.
122. C.T. Pan
Baseline Ranking: 124
1-Year Starts: 22
Notes: He remains a steady fantasy option, posting a 17-for-24 record last season. He’s 100-for-164 in his PGA TOUR career with five of those doubling as a podium finish. Pan doesn’t pipe it off the tee but he’s one of the best from fairway to pin. You have to be in order to post those kinds of consistency numbers while averaging less than 300 yards off the tee.
121. Ryan Armour
Baseline Ranking: 108
1-Year Starts: 22
Notes: The 46-year-old lost his status but played well under pressure at the Korn Ferry Tour Finals to find his way back to the big stage. We know what he’s capable of at this stage of his career. He’s one of the straightest shooters but also one of the shorter off the tee.
120. Matti Schmid
Baseline Ranking: 144
1-Year Starts: 28
Notes: The youngster has four top 10s since July, across three different tours (2 DP World Tour, 1 PGA TOUR, 1 KFT). Right now he’s mostly a masher but has pop weeks in other areas. If he develops some more consistency in those other areas then there is a lot of upside for the German.
119. Joseph Bramlett
Baseline Ranking: 120
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: His underlying baseline metrics are better than his 2022 results. This big hitter can demolish the par 5s while he often struggles with the putter at times, to put it kindly. He doesn’t have a single podium finish on the PGA TOUR (yet) but I’m expecting his ball-striking skills to eventually lead to some big finishes. All it will take will be a hot round or two with the putter, or even an average week with the putter at times would do the trick.
118. Lucas Glover
Baseline Ranking: 107
1-Year Starts: 26
Notes: He’s finished top 50 in the FedExCup race in three of the last four seasons, so we can’t overlook that. At the same time, he ended 2022 by posting finishes outside of the top 35 in 13 of his last 14 events played. He’s getting up there in age (43) so that does alarm me with a decline of form starts to hit.
117. Vincent Norrman
Baseline Ranking: 142
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: The youngster has two career top 10s in 10 DP World Tour starts. He’s on the big stage now and could prove to be a viable hole-by-hole scorer for fantasy gamers. During the fall he ranked 44th in Par 5 Scoring Average and 27th in Eagle Rate. I would consider him a boom-or-bust option at this stage of his career but I’d prefer to take a chance on his upside rather than lean on some “known commodities” with no scoring skills.
116. James Hahn
Baseline Ranking: 114
1-Year Starts: 23
Notes: He remains a streaky option with a 12-for-25 record two seasons ago and 13-for-26 record last year. What he lacks in consistency, he makes up for with big-finish upside. He’s posted eight top 10s over that two-season stretch and he has five career podiums.
115. Adam Schenk
Baseline Ranking: 113
1-Year Starts: 30
Notes: He’s eclipsed 30 starts in three of the last four season’s played and racked up seven starts in the fall. If your league values quantity over quality then he gets a serious bump. When you factor in both, he’s still a valuable asset as he’s piled up top 25s in 30 of his 155 career starts.
114. Michael Thompson
Baseline Ranking: 102
1-Year Starts: 23
Notes: Fitting the mold of many in this range, Thompson relies on precision, not power. He’s piped more fairways per round than the field in 16 of his last 19 starts, to give you an idea. That’s not going to put him on the radar many weeks but he gets a boost anytime the TOUR heads to a course that rewards accuracy or short game. He’s piled up 21 top 10s in 286 career starts but just five of those have doubled as podiums. So, he brings upside to the table but not a ton of win equity.
113. Matt Wallace
Baseline Ranking: 112
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: He still spreads his time across the globe but posted a career-high last season in terms of PGA TOUR starts (21). His game is still sporadic, ranking 172nd in strokes gained tee-to-green and 103rd in putting. Despite the ho-hum stats, he still brings big-finish upside to the table as he’s bagged four top 5s in 74 PGA TOUR starts.
112. Matthias Schwab
Baseline Ranking: 111
1-Year Starts: 25
Notes: He ended last season gaining strokes tee-to-green as well as putting. That resulted in a steady 15-for-23 record and three of those turned into top-10 finishes. The problem is how he ended 2022, posting finishes outside of the top 50 in 11 of his last 12 starts. You would think he has too much talent to not turn it around, but stranger things have happened.
111. Luke List
Baseline Ranking: 101
1-Year Starts: 25
Notes: He broke his maiden in 2022 (Farmers Insurance Open) but found just one top 25 in his next 24 starts. He dealt with some injuries but the putter remains the big issue. He was 48th in strokes gained tee-to-green this fall but just 213th in putting (-1.115 SGP per Round). He was 25th in eagle rate last season so definitely give him a bump if your league heavily weighs big birds. Otherwise, he’s going to be frustrating to watch on the greens.
110. Justin Lower
Baseline Ranking: 99
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: He has eight career top 25s on the PGA TOUR and five of those have come since July. He rode a hot putter all summer but is also very sharp with the short irons. His game is better suited for shorter, easier tracks which doesn’t bode well for his earning potential in big events but he could certainly chop together a big chunk of money if he maintains the level of play that we saw this summer.
109. Ben Griffin
Baseline Ranking: 106
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: What impressed me most about Griffin was his scoring ability this fall. He piled up 118 birdies (6th most) while also ranking 25th in birdies per round. On the flip side, he was just 206th in driving accuracy so there will likely be weeks where he drives his way out of contention but we’ve seen enough upside already to make him worth a shot in season-long, especially in scoring formats that reward birdies and eagles.
108. Trey Mullinax
Baseline Ranking: 118
1-Year Starts: 25
Notes: He won the Barbasol Championship in July and didn’t slow down with two more top 5s before the year ended. That 10-event stretch accounts for three of his five career-best finishes on the PGA TOUR. Confidence is often contagious and he’ll certainly have a full tank of confidence to start the 2023 schedule.
107. Dylan Frittelli
Baseline Ranking: 104
1-Year Starts: 28
Notes: He’s established himself as a volume golfer, posting 28 starts in two straight seasons. He leaned heavily on his short game last season (top 90 around the green and putting) but he had a stronger ball-striking reputation on the Euro Tour. He has three career top 5s on the PGA TOUR with one being his win at the John Deere Classic and the other two being top 5s in majors. The latter fits his profile more of crushing tough courses. He’s eclipsed 15-under just three times on the PGA TOUR circuit.
106. Patton Kizzire
Baseline Ranking: 103
1-Year Starts: 25
Notes: His driver can be sporadic at times but his results are usually steady. Kizzire has a 116-for-195 career record on the PGA TOUR level (roughly 60% is a very strong number when you consider it’s not heavily padded with WGC and other no-cut events). He’s finished top 100 FedExCup in four of his seven seasons.
105. Doug Ghim
Baseline Ranking: 116
1-Year Starts: 25
Notes: The Texas alum was looking like a great breakout candidate at this time last year but he regressed with just four top 25s in 29 events played (nine top 25s in 27 starts the season before that). Finishing 178th in putting last season certainly didn’t help his case. This looks like a short-term stumbling block to me and I expect him to work out the kinks in 2023, returning good value for anyone that drafts him in triple digits.
104. Kevin Yu
Baseline Ranking: 137
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: He was a star at Arizona State and it didn’t take him long to lock up status on the big stage. He brings a rare combination of elite distance and elite accuracy to the table. He’ll need to tidy up the rest of his game but the sky is really the limit when you have an elite driving talent like this.
103. Davis Thompson
Baseline Ranking: 129
1-Year Starts: 26
Notes: He has the pedigree. According to Data Golf, he was playing close to the level of a PGA TOUR pro while at Georgia. We know the transition to pro life isn’t the easiest but Thompson won on the Korn Ferry Tour last season and snagged a pair of top 15s this fall on the PGA TOUR stage.
102. Brandon Wu
Baseline Ranking: 123
1-Year Starts: 27
Notes: The Stanford standout can really take it low, making him a very strong hole-by-hole fantasy scorer. Last season he ranked just 184th in par 3 scoring but 58th in par 4 and 24th in par 5 scoring. It’s kind of odd to see his par-3 scoring so low since steady iron play is a part of his game (19th in GIR). I guess you could say he underperformed on the par 3s and if that flips around he’ll start contending on a regular basis.
101. Seonghyeon Kim
Baseline Ranking: 97
1-Year Starts: 29
Notes: The 24-year-old popped when I looked at one-year data on the Korn Ferry Tour and he lived up to that potential early in his rookie season. He found himself in the hunt in each of his first three starts en route to a pair of top 15s. He ranked 37th in Par 4 Birdies or Better Percentage this fall which is a great sign for gamers drafting him in leagues that use hole-by-hole scoring.
Stay tuned for part three which will dissect another chunk of golfers to consider for your 2023 fantasy golf drafts.