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Sungjae Im 2023 PGA Championship: Best Bets & Predictions

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The PGA Championship used to bat cleanup as the fourth and final major of the season, but this will be the fifth time that the PGA has been held in May, in between the Masters and the U.S. Open.

Justin Thomas is the defending champion. He shot a final-round 67 at Southern Hills last year and beat Will Zalatoris in a playoff to win the Wanamaker Trophy, the giant piece of hardware awarded annually to the PGA champ. Thomas and Brooks Koepka have combined to win four of the last six PGA Championships, with Collin Morikawa and Phil Mickelson interrupting the Thomas/Koepka reign in 2020 and 2021.

This year’s PGA Championship returns Oak Hill in Pittsford, N.Y., where Jason Dufner finished -10 to win the 2013 PGA, beating runner-up Jim Furyk by two strokes. But the East Course at Oak Hill will look much different than it did at the last PGA here 10 years ago. Course architect Andrew Green presided over a major remodeling intended to make the course more faithful to the original Donald Ross design. The course will once again play at par-70, and after playing at 7,163 yards in 2013, it has been stretched to 7,400 for this year’s event.

Will favorites Jon Rahm and Scottie Scheffler flex their muscles at Oak Hill? Will Thomas and Koepka extend their stretch of PGA dominance? Or will an unexpected winner emerge from the field the way Jimmy Walker did at Baltusrol in 2016? Read on for betting profiles of the top contenders for the 2023 PGA Championship.

Check out our 2023 PGA Championship Betting Guide >>

Sungjae Im 2023 PGA Championship Best Bets

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Sungjae Im Stats to Know

    • Best odds to win: +3600 (FanDuel)
    • World Ranking: 18
    • Best PGA Championship finish: T17 (2021)
    • Last four PGA Championship finishes: T42, MC, MC, T17
    • Last four tournament finishes: T16, T7, 6, T8

Sungjae Im Course History

South Korean native Sungjae Im is set to appear in his fifth career PGA Championship this week at Oak Hill Country Club. He did not participate in last year’s event, meaning his most recent outing in 2021 was his best. That was a T17 at Kiawah Island in South Carolina. Aside from the Masters, Im hasn’t had much success playing in majors. He has missed two cuts at the PGA Championship, and his T17 was the only top-20 performance at the tournament. Perhaps this is the week that Im breaks through and contends for a major championship.

Sungjae Im Recent Form

Im has been playing excellent golf recently, registering three straight top-10 finishes. Most recently, he finished T8 at the Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow earlier this month. The 25-year-old has produced five straight top-20 outings dating back to a T6 at The Players Championship in March. Im continues to rise up the world rankings, where he’s currently the 18th-ranked golfer on the planet. He’s yet to secure a win on the Tour this campaign, but he has eight top-10s to his name.

Sungjae Im Betting Outlook

All things considered, I think the best bet that we can make on Im is for him to place inside the top 20 this weekend. That’ll issue a respectable +130 payout over at DraftKings Sportsbook. Im is just 45th in putting average this season, averaging 1.74 putts per hole. Considering the difficulty of putting at Oak Hill’s East Course, I think that may be what holds him back this weekend. However, there’s no denying that the South Korean is at the top of his game right now. That alone is worth a flier on him to place inside the top 20. As I mentioned above, he’s accomplished that in five consecutive tournaments. Let’s lock him in to do it a sixth straight time in Rochester this weekend.

2023 PGA Championship Golfer Profiles

Check out our previews for each of the top golfers competing at Oak Hill this week:

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