The PGA Tour returns to Trump National Doral (Blue Monster) for the first time since 2016 for the 2026 Cadillac Championship.
Opened in 1962, the Blue Monster has a storied history, hosting the Doral Open for decades before becoming the home of the WGC-Cadillac Championship from 2007 to 2016. While we most recently saw the course in 2025 for LIV Golf Miami — where Marc Leishman won at 6-under par — the last PGA Tour winner here was Adam Scott, who beat out Bubba Watson at 12-under in 2016.
The Blue Monster plays exactly how it sounds: long, water galore, thick Bermuda rough, and grainy green complexes.
To find success at Doral, you must be completely dialed in via the ball striking category. Players need a blend of power and accuracy off the tee, paired with elite performance from both their long and short irons. While scrambling through the thick rough can get tricky, the putting surfaces remain very manageable if you can stick to these grainy green complexes.
When Adam Scott won here in 2016, he gained a whopping 14.79 strokes ball striking: 3.38 SG: OTT and 11.41 SG: APP.
My weight this week will be heavily focused on players with strong recent ball-striking numbers and those who perform well on a select few comp courses: Augusta National, Bay Hill, Riviera, and Torrey Pines.
It’s fascinating when you look at the pedigree of past winners here: Adam Scott (2016), Dustin Johnson (2015), Patrick Reed (2014), Tiger Woods (2013), and Justin Rose (2012). We already know how well Rose plays at Augusta, but the four winners following him are all Masters champions as well. There are some very similar, undeniable correlations with the leaderboard at Riviera, too.
What’s even crazier is the crossover to Torrey Pines (South). Leishman, Reed, Tiger, Rose, and Mickelson have all won at both venues.
To take it a step further, Adam Scott won here and has a runner-up at Torrey; Dustin Johnson won here and has a T3 at Torrey; Ernie Els won here and has a T5 at Torrey; and Bubba Watson has a runner-up here and a win at Torrey.
The correlation is pretty wild.
Given the lack of recent data at Doral, I will be leaning heavily on the comp courses this week.
2026 Cadillac Championship: Our Expert's Pick for Outright Winner
- SG: Approach (L24 Rounds) 21.6%
- SG: Ball Striking (L24 Rounds) 21.6%
- SG: Approach – Difficult to Gain on Approach (L24 Rounds) 21.6%
- SG: Putting – Bermuda (L24 Rounds) 7.135%
- SG: TOT – Bermuda Rough/Fairway (L24 Rounds) 13%
- SG: TOT – Torrey Pines, Bay Hill, Augusta National GC, and Riviera CC (L50 Rounds) 15%
Jake Zach's Top 20 Players
- Collin Morikawa
- Cameron Young
- Jordan Spieth
- Akshay Bhatia
- Justin Rose
- Scottie Scheffler
- Adam Scott
- JJ Spaun
- Hideki Matsuyama
- Pierceson Coody
- Daniel Berger
- Patrick Cantlay
- Sudarshan Yellamaraju
- Kurt Kitayama
- Ryan Gerard
- Chris Gotterup
- Sepp Straka
- Keith Mitchell
- Viktor Hovland
- Jacob Bridgeman
Bet to Win: Collin Morikawa +2000
Collin Morikawa is your winner this week and is my only outright of the week.
Ranked first in my model by a mile, it’s been a bit of a mystery what Morikawa is actually going through physically. When we saw him at the Masters, it looked like he could barely walk after shooting 5-under on the back nine Sunday. But then, in his most recent start at the RBC Heritage, he absolutely flushed it, gaining 8 strokes with his ball striking.
You never truly know what’s happening behind the scenes with an injury, but that performance makes me believe Collin is as close to 100% as he can be. Just look at his last five starts: Win, T7, 5th, T7, T4. If one thing is true, it’s that when Morikawa is consistently gaining 3 to 4+ strokes on approach, he’s likely winning. Over this five-start stretch, he’s averaged 5.3 strokes gained via ball striking.
Morikawa is abusing the model this week. He ranks 1st in both approach categories, 2nd in ball striking, 2nd in Bermuda rough/fairway performance, and 2nd across comp courses. Morikawa has gained 1.82 total strokes at Torrey Pines in his 15 rounds there, ranking third in this field.
Looking at the other comp courses, he ranks 4th in the field in total strokes gained at Augusta National, 5th at Riviera (min. 16 rounds), and 8th at Bay Hill — a place where he’s gone 5th and 2nd over the last two years.
With this and the current ball striking numbers, I have no other choice but to pounce and to pounce heavily. Despite whatever he might be dealing with — which I think has mostly drifted — this is a no-brainer max play for me.
