The PGA TOUR heads to the Big Easy this week as the field splits up into 74 two-man teams for the Zurich Classic of New Orleans. This is the only team event on the official PGA TOUR schedule, and it’s a fun tournament to see the partner interactions and support as the players team up for the week. DraftKings is also ready to tee off with some big GPP contests with large top prizes. My top three pivot plays for this week’s GPP contests are Ryan Gerard/Sudarshan Yellamaraju ($9,500), Mac Meissner/Matt McCarty ($8,700), and A.J. Ewart/Casey Jarvis ($7,400).

Let’s define what we’re searching for in this post, to be sure we’re all aiming at the same flagstick. A fantasy golf pivot play is a golfer with low expected ownership in tournament formats but high upside. These picks go against the grain and typically come with more risk compared to popular options with similar salaries. In large-field tournaments, it’s important to differentiate your lineup with low-ownership plays like these, even though they are NOT the safest options.

These are “grip it and rip it,” boom-or-bust style options that could go off or flame out. Getting players at low ownership is critical for success in GPP tournament-style events with many entries, so making yours stand out is critical. Be sure to check out my companion post to this one that highlights my picks for cash lineups if you’re looking for safer options that raise the floor.

Let’s break down why I like each of my top three pivot plays this week!

Set your DraftKings fantasy golf lineups here: PGA TOUR $400K Sand Trap [$100K to 1st]

Ryan Gerard/Sudarshan Yellamaraju ($9,500)

The top of the salary structure is full of strong options that should be very popular. Gerard and Yellamaraju are one of the tandems with the lowest projected ownership in that top tier, but they come with enough upside to be strong pivot plays from popular plays like Matt Fitzpatrick/Alex Fitzpatrick ($10,500), Brooks Koepka/Shane Lowry ($10,000), and Michael Thorbjornsen/Karl Vilips ($9,400). Remember, for DFS contests this week, you can only have one player from a team in your roster, and that player earns the fantasy points for the entire team.

Gerard finished T12 at this event last season, when he teamed up with Danny Walker. This year, he’ll team up with Yellamaraju, who comes in riding an impressive run of results for his tournament debut.

The 24-year-old Yellamaraju has five top-25 finishes, including two top-10 finishes, in his 10 events this season. He finished T52 last week at the RBC, but before that, he stacked up three straight top-15 finishes at THE PLAYERS Championship, the Texas Children’s Houston Open, and the Valero Texas Open.

Over the last 20 rounds, Yellamaraju ranks in the top five in the field in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green, Strokes Gained: Approach, and Total Strokes Gained.

Gerard is also in the top 10 in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach over that time span and is third in Total Strokes Gained over the last six months. He had three straight runner-up finishes on the DP World Tour and PGA TOUR as the calendar turned to 2026, and he seems to be trending towards that form again after a T38 at Augusta and a T33 at Harbour Town the last two weeks.

This duo has the shotmaking to set up plenty of par-breakers in this low-scoring championship, and if either or both of their putters get going, this new team could claim the title this year.

Mac Meissner/Matt McCarty ($8,700)

In the mid-range of the salary structure, Wyndham Clark/Taylor Moore ($8,900) and Hayden Springer/Alex Smalley ($8,500) seem to be getting most of the hype and attention, but the team of Mac Meissner and Matt McCarty should be a fun one to watch with plenty of upside as a pivot play.

Meissner is looking for his first PGA TOUR win, while McCarty claimed his at the Black Desert Championship in the fall of 2024. This season, McCarty finished runner-up at The American Express before missing some cuts in Florida, but he posted impressive T24 and T12 finishes the last two weeks in Augusta and Harbour Town. Over the last six months, he ranks 10th in the field in Total Strokes Gained, with his highest ranking coming from his work on the greens.

He brings a complementary skillset for Meissner, who is a strong shot-maker, but sometimes struggles with his flat stick. Meissner missed three straight cuts in Florida, but he did much better in Texas with a T28 at the Texas Children’s Houston Open and a T30 at the Valero Texas Open.

Their games should fit together well and could vault them into contention this week if the synergy as a team clicks.

A.J. Ewart/Casey Jarvis ($7,400)

Another pairing of young players with lots of potential stands out in the $7,000s. Last year’s winners, Ben Griffin and Andrew Novak, were each claiming their first title at this event and went on to put together great seasons. One young tandem in this price range looking to follow that blueprint to success is the international team of Casey Jarvis and A.J. Ewart.

Jarvis doesn’t have a lot of PGA TOUR experience, but the 22-year-old from South Africa has been a breakthrough star over the past few months on the DP World Tour. In February of this year, he claimed back-to-back wins at the Magical Kenya Open and the Investec South African Open Championship. The week after his two victories, he finished runner-up at the Joburg Open and then tacked on a T13 at the Hero Indian Open.

Jarvis played pretty well but missed the cut at the first major championship of the season, and now he’ll look to build some solid stateside momentum by teaming up with Ewart, as they look to each improve their status moving forward.

Ewart had success last year on the PGA TOUR Americas, posting seven top-25 finishes. The 26-year-old from Canada earned his full-time spot on the PGA TOUR by medaling at PGA TOUR Q-School presented by Korn Ferry last December.

So far in his rookie season, Ewart has made the cut in seven of his 10 tournaments, highlighted by a pair of top-25 finishes at the Cognizant Classic (T13) and the Valspar Championship (T11).

Both these players are rising stars with bright futures, but they are high-risk since this is their first time in this format, on this course, and working together. They have complementary skillsets, with Ewart the better putter and Jarvis the better driver, according to their Strokes Gained numbers.