Keegan Bradley begins defense of Zozo Championship

Several notable names made the trip abroad for the PGA Tour's one-week Asian swing as the Zozo Championship tees off Thursday in Chiba, Japan.

This year, the tournament serves as the fourth of seven events of the new FedEx Cup Fall series, in which players outside the top 50 of the FedEx Cup playoffs are fighting to retain their tour cards.

But stars like Xander Schauffele, Collin Morikawa, Rickie Fowler and defending champion Keegan Bradley have also traveled to Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club to play for prize money, world ranking points and to appreciate the change of scenery.

"I love playing in Japan, and winning a tournament for me outside the United States is a big deal," Bradley said. "So I'm very happy to be back and excited to get back out there."

Bradley broke out of a four-year winless slump when he captured last year's Zozo title, beating Fowler and Andrew Putnam by a single stroke.

He went on to win again during the summer at the Travelers Championship and rose to No. 16 in the Official World Golf Ranking.

"I'm very proud of the year that I had," Bradley said. "Before the Zozo last year I had made some significant changes in my diet and a certain way I was going about playing golf in my career. It was a risk that I took and it paid off. This tournament coming back here brings back a lot of great memories."

The home-crowd favorite will be Hideki Matsuyama, who won the 2021 Zozo Championship six months after becoming the first Japanese man to win a major at the Masters.

Matsuyama had a pedestrian 2022-23 season by his standards and will rely on some home cooking at his first tournament in two months.

"Compared to two years ago, the rough is a lot longer and deeper this year," Matsuyama said of the course. "In order to play well and to score well here, you're going to have to keep the tee shots on the fairway."

South Koreans Sungjae Im and Si Woo Kim are in the field two weeks after winning a team gold medal at the Asian Games, which helped them bypass mandatory military service for their country.

The field also includes many of Japan's top golfers who do not normally play on the PGA Tour. Takumi Kanaya and Keita Nakajima, ranked Nos. 125 and 126 in the OWGR, are both former No. 1 amateurs in the world who have a combined nine professional victories worldwide.

Fowler, Schauffele and Morikawa are competing for the first time since coming out on the losing end of the Ryder Cup in Rome.

"It was unfortunate we had -- myself and a couple other guys that weren't feeling very well, so I'm happy to be in a healthy spot and excited to play some better golf than I did in Rome," Fowler said. "They're always really fun weeks, special weeks to be a part of. They just happen to be a lot more fun when you're on the winning side."

Players who finish the FedEx Cup Fall at Nos. 51-60 in points will qualify for two signature events this winter, the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and the Genesis Invitational. Beau Hossler and Ben Griffin, currently Nos. 51 and 52, are in the field in Japan.