The Five: Stars with ties to Japan at ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP

The ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP in Japan will feature plenty of players with local ties, starting with Hideki Matsuyama, the most successful golfer ever from the Land of the Rising Sun.

He’ll tee off Thursday with Rickie Fowler, another guy with ties to Japan – his maternal grandfather, Yutaka “Taka” Tanaka got him started in the game – and defending champion Keegan Bradley, whose victory a year ago at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP kick-started a comeback season.

“Hideki's a rock star over here and I'm looking forward to it,” Fowler said. “He's someone I admire as a person, as a player, enjoy being around him as well as his caddie. It will be an exciting atmosphere, for sure, for both myself and Keegan to see the show of Hideki in Japan.”

Here are the five players with ties to Japan who should get the biggest galleries at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP.

Hideki Matsuyama

Runner-up to Tiger Woods at the 2019 ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP, the tournament’s first year, Matsuyama won it by five in 2021. That was the year he became the first from Japan to win a men’s major at the Masters Tournament, an accomplishment for which he received the Prime Minister’s Award.

This season has been a dud by Matsuyama’s standards. Battling injuries, he managed just two top-10s and missed the TOUR Championship, snapping a streak of nine straight trips to East Lake that was the longest among active players. After some time off he’s hoping to come back strong at one of his happy places on TOUR in Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club.

“It has been two months since I played in a tournament,” Matsuyama said. “The first month I really took it easy; it's been a long time since I took that much time off, but the last month I've been working hard getting my game back in shape and I feel good about heading into this week.”

Whether or not his body is in shape will be something to keep an eye on, as he withdrew with a back injury after an opening-round 71 in his last start at the BMW Championship in August.

Rickie Fowler

Fowler is so close to his grandfather that he has “Tanaka” tattooed in Japanese on his left biceps. They were fishing buddies when Rickie was a boy in Southern California, and regulars at the Murrieta Valley Driving Range, where Fowler was set up with his first and perhaps most formative instructor, Barry McDonnell. (Fowler recently bought the driving range.)

Although it wasn’t something he talked about, as a boy, Taka was taken with his family to a WWII internment camp in Wyoming. He would eventually settle in Murrieta with his wife, Jeannie. They had a daughter, Lynn, who would marry Rod Fowler.

All four of them have attended numerous golf tournaments.

“What I really like is to see how he treats all the little ones who run up to him wearing orange with the big caps,” Taka said of Rickie in a 2016 Golf Digest story.

Fowler relishes coming back to Japan, where he tied for second at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP last year. That kick-started a comeback season in which he would win the Rocket Mortgage Classic, breaking a four-plus-year win drought, and a return to the TOUR Championship.

“I've really enjoyed the last few years being here,” he said Wednesday. “Last few years on the golf course have been a little tough for me, so very appreciative of ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP and Travis (Steiner), the tournament director, to extend those invites where I've been able to come over.

“Luckily I didn't need one this year,” he continued, “but still, like I said, I love to be here.”

Collin Morikawa

Morikawa’s family on his father’s side left Japan for Maui, where his grandparents ran The Morikawa Restaurant. They had long since sold it, but the structure was one of many in Lahaina that burned to the ground in the recent Maui fires. Morikawa pledged to help, donating $1,000 per birdie through the FedExCup Playoffs, and inspiring others to do the same.

A self-described epicurean, Morikawa always takes time out to visit the best Japanese restaurants on the road, especially in Los Angeles. So it was a treat when he and his wife went earlier this week to one of the most famous sushi restaurants in the world, Sukiyabashi Jiro, in Tokyo.

“Man, I almost don't want to have sushi again because it was that special,” Morikawa said from the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP, where he’ll be trying to win for the first time since the 2021 Open Championship. “Chef Jiro was actually making the sushi for us, which made it even that much more special.”

As for his famine in the win department, he’s more than ready to break it.

“At the end of the day I want to win,” he said. “… Here's one last chance for the season to kind of come off and finish off on a high note. I know what my goal is, and I know what I want to do and accomplish this week is really just stand up and find a way to win.”

Xander Schauffele

Like Morikawa, Schauffele is still chasing a victory this season and has, in a sense, come home.

Japan is where Schauffele won the gold medal at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, which was especially poignant because his mother is Taiwanese but grew up in Japan.

“Yeah, coming to Japan is pretty simple for me,” said Schauffele, whom the Los Angeles Times once called a one-man United Nations. (His father is French-German.)

“I have family here and to be able to sort of split the workload and seeing my grandparents is really cool, I wouldn't pass that up for anything,” he continued. “…For the most part, it's been nice. I was able to see my grandparents on Sunday when I came in and spent some time with them Monday morning and then back to work. I'm sure I'll see them again as the week goes on.”

It hasn’t always been roses and gold for Schauffele in Japan. He made his professional debut in Yamanashi, Japan, in 2018, and had trouble keeping the ball in play.

“Yeah, I shot a pair of 76s or 77s, missed the cut by a landslide,” he said. “I remember it was more of a traditional Japanese course and Yamanashi's OB stakes going down both sides of the fairway, which was very intimidating being a young pro.”

Winning Olympic gold in Tokyo rendered that failure moot.

“It kind of gets better as time goes on,” he said. “I can hear people in Japanese saying, ‘Oh, there's a gold medalist’ when I walk by, so it's pretty cool.”

Aguri Awasaki

The least known player of these five, Awasaki may nevertheless be the hottest.

While Fowler, Morikawa and Schauffele, who made up a fourth of the U.S. Ryder Cup Team, are coming off a deflating 16.5-11.5 loss in Rome, Awasaki is presumably still on a high after winning the Japan Open last weekend. That the runner-up was 18-time Japan Golf Tour winner Ryo Ishikawa gave the win even more resonance.

At the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP, Awasaki even got to play a practice round with Matsuyama.

“Yeah, I follow all of the Japanese players, especially Iwasaki,” Matsuyama said. “I know he's had a tough year in Europe, and I've been following him.

“Then on Sunday, to be able to watch him win the Japan Open was quite a thrill,” he added. “I think I was more nervous watching him than he was.”