Tommy Fleetwood has long stood as the consensus “best player without a win on the PGA Tour,” and the English star once again finds himself in position to finally get that breakthrough win after two rounds at the 2025 FedEx St. Jude Championship. Fleetwood followed his opening-round 63 with another strong performance on Friday, posting a 64 to reach 13 under and open up a four-shot lead over Collin Morikawa, Akshay Bhatia and Justin Rose.

Rose still has two holes to play in his second round as play was suspended late Friday amid dangerous weather in the area. He will come back at 8:30 a.m. ET with others who failed to complete their rounds, all attempting to inch closer to the lead. No matter how those final second-round holes play, Fleetwood will enter the third round in Memphis, Tennessee, as the 36-hole leader.

After his effort Friday, Fleetwood was asked whether this would finally be his time to find the winner’s circle, especially given Cameron Young broke his own drought last week. Fleetwood was happy to give himself another chance but made clear there’s a lot of golf left to play. 

“Well, we’ll see. I’m happy to put myself in with a chance over the weekend,” Fleetwood said. “I think this is exactly where you want to be and keep testing yourself. And, yeah, it hasn’t happened for me yet out on the PGA Tour, but I would much rather be up there and not quite get it done than not there at all. And who knows, maybe this week is the week and we’ll see and we’ll crack on from there. But, you know, look forward to tomorrow first.”

Fleetwood has taken the lead thanks to some all-world ball-striking; he’s leading the field in driving accuracy (24 of 28 fairways), greens in regulation (29 of 36) and strokes gained on approach (5.991). He’s rolled the ball well — 10th in strokes gained putting — which has always been a question for him, and the challenge on the weekend will be avoiding the trap of getting too tentative both with his irons and his putter. 

The last time we saw Fleetwood held a late lead, he lost it in gutting fashion at the Travelers Championship as Keegan Bradley beat him with a birdie on the 18th as Fleetwood made a bogey. This week, Fleetwood will have to stare down some of the biggest names in the sport to get his first win. Morikawa is playing the best golf we’ve seen from him since the start of the season, and Scottie Scheffler lurks menacingly at 7 under, six back but certainly in striking distance. 

Scheffler posted a 66 on Friday, even as he grew frustrated with bad lies in the Bermuda grass rough at TPC Southwind, to climb into the top 10 and stay within reach of Fleetwood and the lead. 

The leader

1. Tommy Fleetwood (-13): It’ll be a white-knuckle ride all weekend for Fleetwood fans, as they know better than anyone how fragile a lead is with Fleetwood at the top. That said, the Englishman has looked phenomenal so far this week, and he seems to be in fantastic form. His putting is the most encouraging part of his game so far, as we see the ball-striking pretty regularly, but the new greens in Memphis appear to be agreeing with him. How the weather impacts the course remains to be seen, but another round in the mid-60s on Saturday might be enough to create even more cushion on the field. Given his history, Fleetwood needs as big a lead as he can manage should the nerves come rolling through Sunday.

Contenders 

T2. Collin Morikawa, Akshay Bhatia, Justin Rose (-9)
T5. Kurt Kitayama, Andrew Novak (-8)
T7. Scottie Scheffler, Bud Cauley, Jacob Bridgeman, Maverick McNealy (-7)
T11. Ludvig Åberg, Si Woo Kim, J.J. Spaun (-6)

If Fleetwood can stay on track and continue posting rounds under par, it’ll be tough for anyone outside of this group to make a real charge in Memphis. Should he comes back to the field, it would open the tournament up considerably.

Rose, Bridgeman and McNealy will be back early Saturday to finish their second rounds, so they still can move up (or down) this leaderboard before the third round begins. Bhatia couldn’t back up his opening 62 with another low round, but he has made a habit of hanging around leaderboards early in the week. He will need to shake off a brutal final round last week to realize he can contend down the stretch, but Bhatia just needs to give himself a chance to follow through at TPC Southwind. 

From a FedEx Cup perspective, the big winners so far this week are Kitayama and Cauley, as they are in position to move from outside the top 50 into the field next week at the BMW Championship if they can stay where they are on the leaderboard through the weekend. 

FedEx Cup standings bubble watch

Speaking of that race for the top 50, which earns not only a spot in next week’s second playoff event but also all eight signature events on the 2026 calendar, there are some big names that’ll be sweating it out all weekend. While Kitayama and Cauley have moved solidly into the top 40 with their play, Min Woo Lee and Jake Knapp are the two that have dropped out. Below you can see the current projected standings for the top 50 bubble, as well as where those players started the week. 

46th: Wyndham Clark (49th)47th: Tom Hoge (40th)48th: Xander Schauffele (42nd)49th: Aldrich Potgieter (43rd)50th: Jordan Spieth (48th)51st: J.T. Poston (51st)52nd: Chris Kirk (61st)53rd: Jake Knapp (47th)54th: Jhonattan Vegas (56th)55th: Min Woo Lee (50th)

Clark has improved his status by getting to T14 right now at 5 under, but everyone else just inside the coveted 50th spot is battling right now: Hoge at T67 (+7), Schauffele at T48 (E), Potgieter at T61 (+3) and Spieth at T39 (-1). They’ll want to get it in gear for the weekend because they’re all in danger of getting jumped by a hot round by those on the outside looking in. Poston is T39 (-1) and Kirk is T14 (-5) with the latter standing as the biggest threat right now to pick up major points and shake up the top 50. 

2025 FedEx St. Jude Championship updated odds, picksTommy Fleetwood (11/10)Scottie Scheffler (9/2)Collin Morikawa (9-1)Akshay Bhatia (14-1)Justin Rose (18-1)
Maverick McNealy (18-1)Kurt Kitayama (25-1)

It’s tough to side with Fleetwood at such a significant number given his history. Scheffler is in the thick of it, and at 9/2, he’s got better odds than what he held at the start of the week, so I wouldn’t fault anyone that wanted to take a chance on him tracking down Fleetwood. Of the other chasers, Morikawa at 9-1 and McNealy 18-1 are the two with the best value. Morikawa’s looked solid and much more like himself so far, while McNealy’s playing well and still has a chance to climb the leaderboard further in the second round.