lately, I've been searching fruitlessly for the perfect putter. Ive tried, insert, milled, c grooves, inserts with grooves (Itsy bitsy spider), and so on. I have putters at all different price points. Assuming that the main point of buying a putter is to putt better, it got me wondering about the link between price and performance for putters that look pretty similar.
It would be nice to see the following experiment:
Compare the same model up and down the Ping line. For instance, the same Anser from the Karsten 1952, Scottsdale, Redwood, and Milled series. Try putts of different distances across putters and report on the results. This would allow one to figure out what the measurable benefit was of buying a $300 putter versus a $100 putter.
Now try the same exercise with Ping versus equivalent model Scotty Cameron. There are strongly held views about this particular battle. Some argue that Scotties are essentially Ping knockoffs sold at high prices while others argue that Scotties are decidedly better products than the Pings that inspired them.
One could do a similar exercise with the various Odyssey lines.
I think it would be very interesting to have hard data about the extent to which price translates into performance.
Now, admittedly, there are a lot of intangible aspects to putting that this exercise ignores. For instance, the feel of the Ping milled putter really is much nicer than the $99 Karsten. These differences are obviously important, but very subjective. Still, this should still translate into performance. If better feel makes you more confident at putting, then this should still appear ithe exercise I suggest.
Any volunteers to create this data? I have several Pings though not the very high end, so I'll perform this experiment tomorrow with my stuff. I'm sure there are many of you with more complete collections.
It would be nice to see the following experiment:
Compare the same model up and down the Ping line. For instance, the same Anser from the Karsten 1952, Scottsdale, Redwood, and Milled series. Try putts of different distances across putters and report on the results. This would allow one to figure out what the measurable benefit was of buying a $300 putter versus a $100 putter.
Now try the same exercise with Ping versus equivalent model Scotty Cameron. There are strongly held views about this particular battle. Some argue that Scotties are essentially Ping knockoffs sold at high prices while others argue that Scotties are decidedly better products than the Pings that inspired them.
One could do a similar exercise with the various Odyssey lines.
I think it would be very interesting to have hard data about the extent to which price translates into performance.
Now, admittedly, there are a lot of intangible aspects to putting that this exercise ignores. For instance, the feel of the Ping milled putter really is much nicer than the $99 Karsten. These differences are obviously important, but very subjective. Still, this should still translate into performance. If better feel makes you more confident at putting, then this should still appear ithe exercise I suggest.
Any volunteers to create this data? I have several Pings though not the very high end, so I'll perform this experiment tomorrow with my stuff. I'm sure there are many of you with more complete collections.
