Beakbryce

Has anyone actually done the math? Just curious. The Masters is pretty obvious, but the others? Since the Players has 144 players, if you take the top 144 from the other Majors, will they statistically be worse? Any math guys out there that want to report back later in the year? Will this be skewed because the OWGR doesn't properly represent the LIV players? Which goes to LIV golfers diluting the strength of field. Are the LIV player rankings dropping because of an artificial barrier using OWGR, or because they actually suck at playing golf? There are 9 of the top 10 at the Players. I believe the one missing, is Cam Smith who is the defending champion. I reckon all 10 will be at the Majors barring injury.

I understand this argument. Nicklaus has always said the Masters was the easiest Major to win because it was a small field with the player problems you mentioned. For the Opens, I realize that the bottom of the field has qualifiers, but many in the Players field will be in those tournaments trying to qualify for the Opens and won't make it. There are what, 20-25 club pros in the PGA with hardly any making the cut every year. However, some of the chaff is the difference in the size of the field, with 144 at the Players and 156 at the PGA and both Opens. This causes problems when averaging the strength of field. It's not apples to apples, it's apples to oranges.

Is the Players really the strongest field in golf? Pretty much aren't the same players playing this weekend also at the PGA, US Open and British Open? I realize the Masters has less players, but aren't the top players involved? Can any field call itself the toughest when Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau, Joaquin Niemann, and the DEFENDING CHAMPION, Cam Smith are not in the field? I mean most if not all these guys will be in the majors. Not defending LIV, but I can't stand the self-aggrandizing from the Tour over it's flagship tournament. Thoughts?

I went back and looked. If I looked at the correct data, he was 37th in Fedex ranking prior to the tournament, so presumably he was in. I get where you are coming from though. There is a saying in football regarding any given day, right? You play the game because the highest ranked player isn't always the winner. Thank you Rahm for showing this to be oh so true.

A rambling rant: I watched Peter Malnati indicate he has seen the data and it shows that everyone will benefit from the Tour changes so as a Policy Board member he voted for the changes. "Data", garbage in and garbage out. They haven't yet said what the breakdown is for Fedex Cup points in the no cut events. I would be curious to see if a top 50 player plays the Majors, the WGC events, the no cut events and averages 20th place. Would that be enough to get in the top 50 for the next year without ever playing a non designated event? Could you do that for a 20 year career and retire with a boatload of money? This reminds me of what Kisner said about showing up to the Majors, ie, he might not win one but 20th place makes a lot of money. Presumably now, a lot of Fedex Cup points as well. They say one can play ones way in to the top 50. How many points would one need to average in non-designated events to break the top 50? Yesterday on TV they were saying the metrics indicate a 60-80% chum in the top 50 every year. If the designated no cut events receive a lot of Fedex Cup points, then this will be an abject failure as I don't believe the "metrics" are correct. I guarantee that the whole point system will need to be revamped at the end of next year because the churn will not be anywhere near where they predict it will be. Meanwhile, a majority of the top 50 get another free year. Doesn't the "interim" non designated events that will qualify 5 players to get into the next no cut event seem like Monday qualifying, only on a grander scale? I am already tired of hearing the the PGA Tour has no cut events already to justify adding more no cut events. This should have gone the other way, remove all the no cut events for a true meritocracy. Anything else is hypocritical to what the Tour has been saying for the last year. Mr Eamon Lynch yesterday asked people to go out to the Players Thursday and ask if anyone came to watch James Hanh play, presumably because he had the temerity to question the direction the tour is headed in. The derision was evident in his tone. A better suggestion would be to go to the sponsors of the non designated events and ask them if they are hoping that people will show up to see an unlimited number of James Hanh type players, because that in effect is the other 29 events on tour. Rory was also critical of Hanh for not showing up to the PGA Tour meeting yesterday. But why would you show up when the stars have already decreed the direction of the Tour, mostly for their benefit, with "data" suggesting they are right? If you are a sponsor for a non designated event, I would advise you to drop the Tour like a hot potato as your "product" is going to suck. BTW, in this money grab by the Top 50, where is the discussion on what the charities are receiving? Isn't it time to acknowledge Phil Mickelson as THE GUY who is really going to make PGA players rich? Don't like what he said at times, but he is the guy. Looking back, no one else, not even Tiger, has forced the Tour over the last 2 years to become what it is now. Give the Devil his due. PS I am not a LIV guy, anymore than I was an AFL guy way back when. But, maybe all the PGA and LIV players should review the history of the PGA Tour which came in to being because professional golfers wanted their own Tour playing each other and not "Club Pros", so they could control where they played and receive more money. The then PGA Tour argued that they sent a lot of money down through the club pro's to "grow the game". Sound familiar? There are a boatload of other comparisons between what is being said now and what was said then. history of the PGA Tour - Wikipedia You are welcome to check the footnotes if you don't believe Wikipedia. Many of the footnotes at the time are contemporary newspaper articles when the breakaway happened. What was said then by players like Nicklaus and Palmer is exactly what is being said now regarding breaking away and having more control and more money. Pretty much all of our current big sports leagues have seen breakaway or rival groups which eventually consolidated for a bigger and better product. Time will tell.

Callaway pre-owned today: X Hot pro driver- $105 GBB 3 wood and 5 wood- $194 total Mavrik 4 hybrid- $120 Mavrik Irons, 5-PW,SW- $424 JAWS Full Toe Raw Black Wedges 54, 58 degree- $198 Odyssey EXO Stroke Lab 2-Ball S Putter- $120

I started with wood woods and tourney irons, so yes, I would say things have changed. For instance, I had a Wilson R90 wedge to go with my PW for short game stuff. Now I have 3 Vokeys and a PW. Long game was 1, 3 woods and 1-PW irons. Now 4 woods and 3 hybrids. Bullseye Putter then and Odyssey Fang or Ping Answer now. So the equipment has changed. But the mind set has never changed. Buy quality clubs and figure out how to hit them. Take advantage of technology to keep the game fun. Swing hard. In a week today's score is a thing of the past so always think about going for it. You will learn more about yourself every time you do it. Just let it go if it doesn't work. I'm retired so this philosophy is predicated on playing a lot. If you keep a handicap and play once a week, being conservative may be more important for you to judge where you are in the game. It's all relative.

Have had an Epic heavenwood for several years. Easy to hit, particularly off downhill lies. I also have a 5 wood shaft in the club. Note: in the GBB Epic line, the 7 wood is not adjustable whereas the heavenwood is.

Daphne all the way. Our families don't have a lot of money so these were cheap gift suggestions. Quail- live in AZ, Buffalo-went to CU, Tiger-everyone should have one, Sea Otter, met my wife in Monterey and the aquarium was our first date. Second photo is my wife's winter cat collection. And yes, there are a full set of cat summer covers.

I think I am about where I am. Mid to high 70's shooter and have been for 35 years. I play all year round and don't really practice although I am about to pull the trigger for a net and launch monitor so I can wack it all day on my porch. That doesn't mean I don't have bad days, weeks, or a month. But when I do I "fake it until I make it". May be delusional but as long as I think I am shooting well, I find that I actually began shooting well. Let me be clear, I don't keep a handicap or play in tournaments where a deluded score would be frowned on. Some would say I am only cheating myself but I say I believe in the power of positive thinking because it works. It is after all only a game. What do you'all think?

Live in Phoenix area. Mornings now with windchill in the low 30's but rarely freezing. If it is near freezing there is usually a frost delay which means we don't get to play until the sun is well up and warm. Wear Lands End mock turtleneck and Eddie Bauer rugby shirts. I have no idea if Eddie Bauer still sells the shirts but they are perfect for cold weather. Mine have to be 20 years old so thank you Eddie Bauer. Both do not restrict a swing. I am 70 and still get to parallel on the backswing. We walk and it warms up to the high 40's to 50's by the end of the round so this is very comfortable for me. I note there is some who won't wear cotton but I am all in. I know it doesn't breathe as well as the new miracle fabrics but if I start to sweat I take a layer off. It has never made me colder and is a renewable resource. I usually wear cargo shorts but have recently added a couple of pairs of Amazon standard cargo pants for when it looks like staying in the 30's for most of the round. I don't know what I would add if we ride because I have a cart cover which can get very warm once the sun is up. So I don't worry about it.

I hope there isn't a lake at the ninth hole! That would be bad.

To funny.

Background: I learned to play golf at MCAS El Toro CA. I was an RF4 pilot. I started golfing when I was 29. This happened in 1984. The 12th hole ran parallel to the runway. It was a par 5 which occasionally was reachable in 2. I am out there the day before the airshow, watching all the airplanes and the Blue Angels. Great place to watch the show and get in some golf. I was playing by myself. I hit a good drive and then a 1 iron and watched the ball roll in the hole. I'm walking to the green looking around to see if anyone saw the shot. When I got to the green there was a guy with a big ass video camera shooting the air show. I asked him if he happened to record my shots. He said he did! Cool, I asked him if I could buy the recording. He said no, he was filming stock footage of the airshow for one of the local TV stations and the film belonged to them. He gave me a contact number, but by the time I got connected to that person, the footage of my shots had been deleted and she stated they wouldn't have given it to me anyway. Fun times. As an aside, it was more than 20 years later before I got a hole in one.

Red Gremlin. I had it at college. I was in ROTC. One of my non-ROTC buddies soaped it one night, drawing a big peace symbol on the hood. I don't know what kind of soap he used or what kind of cheap assed paint was on the car but washing, waxing, smoothing with compound, no matter what I did that symbol could be seen in some lights. Fun times.

depends on pin position. Short or middle pin, take more club. Choking down works for me. Back of the green pin, take the shorter club and swing normal. You never know what you might get with a flushed shot. My reasoning, middle of the green is almost never bad. another thought: I think it's been proven that most amateurs don't really hit what they think is their target yardage with any approach club with any degree of regularity. If they hit their 7 iron 165 yards once, it will go that far forever. NOT! So to my way of thinking opting for a longer club is usually the better way to go. Commitment is everything whatever you pick.

For me it depends on what tee I am playing. It's not one club. Lately, if I play a longer tee than I hit mostly woods and 4 hybrid and not to many irons. If I move up a tee, than a lot of irons and not so many woods. It's kind of a stark contrast. I generally play three courses and it's the same way on all three. Good times.

I get you. I think maybe not so much reliance on what the club is, ie PW or SW, or GW, but more on the actual degree of loft of each club. That gives you the best chance of finding clubs for every yardage. You indicated in another post you choke down on your SW to vary the yardage. By gapping with degree of loft and not what the club designation is, you can have a grip it and rip it yardage, and choke down for the yardage in between clubs. Please try to not think SW,GW,PW and more along the lines of needing a 54, 50, 46, 42 etc lofted set. if you can find a fitter that will set you up that way your yardages will smooth themselves out. If not, then look at specialty wedges, say something like Vokey wedges, that you can gap right down to the more traditional set of irons. Say the PW in the set you want to buy is at 44, you can buy a 48, 52, 56, which is what you were hinting at in your original post. BTW, what do you hit less than 80? I am guessing that there are a number of partial shots around the green that an additional wedge can help cover.

This may take some work. Not sure what your makeup is now but am assuming from what you wrote that it is driver, 3 wood, 3 hybrid, the 2 wedges, putter, which leaves 8 irons. I think you need to base your gaps on what you eventually want the completed set to look like. Start at the green. What yardage do you want your highest lofted full swing wedge to cover? Say a 58 or 60 that you hit 80-100 yards. Then gap back through your irons with a 4 to 5 degree spread. Do you choke up to hit shots that fall between yardages for each club or do you adjust your length or speed to take care of the gaps? Depending how good you feel about intermediate yardage between full swings with each club will guide you on whether you want 4 or 5 degree spread. That is the low end. By the same token, on the long end, if the PW is stronger loft, the 4 and 5 iron will be stronger loft. For instance, the Apex 21 and the JPX921 forged 4 iron is 21 degrees. Maybe get rid of the 3 hybrid which should be close to the 4 iron. Or buy 5- PW, get rid of the 3 wood and 3 hybrid and get a strong 4 wood and 4 hybrid. The clubs on the higher end is what you want to look at getting rid of to solidify the gaps between irons. If you have driver, 4 wood, 4 hybrid, and a putter, that leaves 10 clubs. Typical 4 hybrids these days are around 20 degrees so pretty much equal to your X2 3 hybrid at 19 degrees and much easier to hit. If you have a 58 or 60 as your highest lofted club, that leaves 38-40 degrees or around 4 degrees between irons. This would be a very tight setup and easy to use. 58,54,50,46,42,38,34,30,26,22. or 60,56,52,48,44,40,36,32,28,24 A lot of sets have their PW at 42, so you would need 4 wedges if you start with a 58. With the set that you are looking at with a 44 degree wedge and you start with a 60, you would need 4 wedges. Hopefully the other irons in that set are around 4 degree gapping. In any case, the gaps you come up with have to be tighter on the shorter clubs than the longer ones as they generally are your scoring clubs. My suggestion is to be tight on the scoring end and then see what combo you want between the driver and the lowest numbered iron. This might be the 4 wood and 4 hybrid or a 3 and 5 wood. Even a 5 wood at 18 degrees would still leave around 40 degrees of difference between that and the 58 wedge. Those 10 clubs can be irons or hybrids depending on your skill with medium to long irons.

I just want to hit the ball pure. The rest takes care of itself. Alternatively, just like to beat the crap out of my buddies. Longer drives, better approaches, better putting and chipping. Lacking that, if I am playing less than stellar, my goal is to mind think them into shanking everything! C'mon man, just being honest.

I have pretty much been a Callaway buyer since I discovered Callaway preowned. Prior to that I owned Ping Eye 2 for 13 years. Right now I have mostly Callaway through the bag except for Vokey wedges. I think anyone can fit themselves in to Callaway adjustable woods and hybrids. The ease of changing shafts, changing loft, and the sliding weight is hard to improve upon. If I do my bit, the irons are good. Not butter mind you, I have swung better feeling clubs, but they just work which is all I need. I have tried Ping clubs off and on. For me, other than the Eye 2, they don't work. I hated the shaft that was supposed to fit every swing. I know they have gotten away from that but looking down, for me, at any of their clubs is a turnoff. For me. My wife was fit by Ping and used a set of Pings for about 6 years. She loved them. I have slowly replaced those with Callaway woods and hybrids and new Cobra hybrid irons. Now she is complaining that her handicap is coming down. Jeepers! I still wonder how a re-imagined modern Eye 2 head with today's shafts would work. I tried TM when they came out with the bubble shaft. Hated it. I was sent a free 7 iron to demo a couple of years later. The shaft head combo didn't work for me. I have tried various other TM clubs from friends but they just never felt right. Tried the new Stealth at a fitting event, observed no improvement over what I was hitting and they felt weird to me. TM and I just can't find a happy medium with their clubs. The TP5 ball is okay, for me less length off the driver but longer off the irons so a wash. I was working at a golf course in Idaho in 98 or 99, in the club pro program, when a Titleist rep showed up with new irons. I guess they were DCI? Anyway, loved them. Butter, am I right? Still remember the unlimited joy at hitting that 6 iron. I was working as a assistant pro but the rep would only provide a discount to people that had already completed the program. I am one of those people that doesn't pay retail for anything. If I go looking for new irons, Titleist is on my list. Titleist as a company is top notch. I was at a local event in 2019 and hit a couple of Mizuno clubs. There was only one rep and he was talking to some guy who claimed to be a 2 handicap and was spraying the ball all over the place. I was hitting lasers. Loved the clubs. The rep wouldn't give me the time of day. So see ya. Boy, Bob Parsons on this thread is pretty polarizing. I am a retired Marine so love him. If I go looking for new clubs, they are on my list. I live in the Phoenix area and they have a fitting center. If I look at new clubs, I am going there for sure. I play mostly at a military course. Plenty of buddies have availed themselves of the military discount available through PXG and love their clubs. I live in a golf retirement community. I can't wait for reps to again show up with lots of clubs to demo. They stopped during Covid. Now they come by sometimes but you have to schedule a "fitting". They expect you to buy that day. Not for me. I just want to swing them, you know? See what's out there. Find that same wonderlust as that Titleist 6 iron.

Thank you

Should have read the rules more closely. Veteran and hole in 1 please. Thank you

I used to play a lot of competitive golf because I wanted to be a club pro and give lessons. When that didn't prove to be economically feasible and my wife indicated that I should "tone it down a bit" I stopped cold turkey. I now play in a group that allows just about everything including auto 2 putts most of the time. In other words, I play for fun and a nice walk. I live in a senior golf community. Imagine my surprise when my unit had a putting contest and I won! I hadn't made that many putts all year. So I reckon some competitive golf couldn't hurt. Not going to make it a regular thing though.

Good morning I am a retired Marine so may I have the "veteran badge" please. May I also suggest that individual service badges would be cool, ie, "USMC Veteran". I have also "Broken 70" and had a "Hole in One". Would it be possible to add those? Thank you Don Beck