Month: May 2015

Volume Four Hundred Thirty-Four

Too much rain, too little Rory and two Senior PGA Championships.

Hittin' the LinksThere was so much rain at the first of the back-to-back Dallas-Ft. Worth area events that the PGA TOUR instituted preferred lies through the green. Players were able to lift, clean, and place the ball everywhere but hazards. Naturally scores went low. John Huh tied the second-lowest back nine in tournament history with a 29. Jason Bohn did the same on the front. These guys are really good when they get to tee up every shot.

Across the pond, the European Tour’s top event was bereft of the game’s top player on the weekend. A week after he looked unbeatable at Quail Hollow, Rory McIlroy couldn’t find the fairway (or the green or his putter) and failed to make the cut. When his timing is off with the driver, McIlroy doesn’t have a plan B to go to.

In French Lick, Indiana, they held a Senior PGA Championship and a U.S. Open broke out (for the first three days anyway). Precision was the name of the game, and, this just in, Colin Montgomerie is a great iron player.

Let’s hit the links.

Continue reading “Volume Four Hundred Thirty-Four”

Volume Four Hundred Thirty-Three

This is why we can never have nice rivalries.

Hittin' the LinksThis just in… Rory McIlroy is good.

In fact, when Rory McIlroy is on (as he was during a course-record setting third round at Quail Hollow), he does a pretty good Tiger Woods circa 2000 imitation. He is playing a different game than the rest of the field. Luckily for the other players, unlike how Woods used to do McIlroy does not win with his B-game (at least not yet).

It would be great to have a real rivalry, like Palmer-Nicklaus-Player, but for that to happen the rivals need to be at relatively the same level. Jordan Speith’s Masters win and Rickie Fowler taking the Players were both impressive wins. And those guys are among the elite on TOUR. But if McIlroy played every week like he played this one, everybody else would be playing for second, a distant one.

Let’s hit the links.

Continue reading “Volume Four Hundred Thirty-Three”

Callaway Updates Wedge Line-Up

Callaway updates its popular wedge line with a little help from Mickelson.

Bag DropYears back, Callaway Golf had a hit with their X Forged wedges featuring the original Mack Daddy Grooves. Those grooves were wide and deep and chewed through golf balls. Then the rules changed and the company had to go back to the drawing board. After a few different models, the company and Roger Cleveland created the Mack Daddy 2 wedges. These wedges have proved to be popular ones, which is evident as they are still the companies current wedge despite being released two years ago. That isn’t to say that things have remained completely stagnant though; as time has passed more options have been made available. At first it was just a couple more loft/bounce options with different grinds. Last year, the company released the Tour Grind version. This year, the change is a bit bigger. The company’s newest version of the Mack Daddy wedge is the PM grid, and it will be available starting May 15th.

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Is Rickie Fowler Overrated?

Rickie Fowler has been an up-and-coming star for a few years now, but it seems his fellow touring professionals think he isn’t that good. Let’s take a deeper look at Dirt Bike Rickie.

Thrash TalkThe term overrated is overused. It has become a common terms used by sports talking heads when they feel that someone has been given credit they don’t deserve. I am not saying that some teams or players have not been given more credit than they’ve earned, but we overuse the term.

Rickie Fowler was recently rated as one of the PGA Tour’s most overrated players. He answered his fellow anonymous touring professionals by winning The Player’s Championship. Even putting this most recent win aside, voting him the most overrated golfer was misguided at best. I honestly don’t know if they watch the same tour that I do. How could they rank a guy with the highest finish in all of the majors last year overrated. I simply don’t get it.

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Mizuno MP-15 Irons Review

Mizuno releases the MP-15 irons, blending the MP-59 and the MP-64 they are targeting low handicappers and giving them forgiveness without sacrifice.

MP-15When you talk with most golfers and you ask them who has the best irons, Mizuno will come up at some point in the conversation. Mizuno has consistently delivered great irons for decades. The MP line of irons from Mizuno is traditionally dedicated to “player” irons. My regular set of irons before doing this review is the MP-4 which was reviewed here. There are days when the MP-4s tend to be on the demanding side for a golfer of my caliber. So when the opportunity came to review the MP-15 I was extremely excited to give them a whirl.

The MP-15 are designed for the golfer like me. A golfer who is looking for just a little bit more forgiveness than the MP-4 but remaining loyal to the forged iron and the feel that they provide. The recommended handicap range for golfers using the MP-14 is zero to eight which I fit in nicely. In addition to the classic look that Mizuno typically provides the designers threw in some very cool bells and whistles to help your ballstriking. With that lets get into the review.

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Volume Four Hundred Thirty-Two

It’s a major minor,and don’t call Rickie “overrated”

Hittin' the LinksWhat a finish! Even without the three-hole aggregate score playoff and one hole of sudden death, the last few hours of the Players Championship was easily the most entertaining golf of the last several years.

It featured a charge from deep in the pack, some near-miss specialists trying for redemption, and rookies defying the odds. No less than seven players had very good chances of getting to 12-under to get into the playoff, or even of reaching 13-under, which could have been good enough for the win in regulation.

Let’s hit the links.

Continue reading “Volume Four Hundred Thirty-Two”

Volume Four Hundred Thirty-One

Match play, pioneers lost, and a journalist suspended

Hittin' the LinksI love match play. The way that each hole is a new life in the competition. How it’s the basically the only scenario in golf when you are competing head to head with another person rather than solely against the course and the elements.

But TV and match play is a tough fit. Here’s the thing, during the early rounds it’s difficult to follow the match ups closely because the network is flipping between groups. We want to see the action but it detracts from the viewers ability to stay current with the status in each match and hence the drama. Once the bracket gets narrowed down, we get a final that is god-awful to watch when one player gets up by more than two holes. I’m not sure what the solution is, other than a multi-cast so that you could follow any group you wanted. But that is not going to happen, at least not on network television.

Golf could use a new way to showcase match play (and stroke play for that matter). But the PGA TOUR is trying to stick to (and protect) traditional media, so adamantly that they just suspended the media credentials of a journalist for using social media to “broadcast” a practice round. At a time when golf is contracting in this country, it seems somewhat short sighted to censor an innovative journalist so harshly over her coverage of (again) a practice round.

That’s it for the op-ed portion. Let’s hit the links.

Continue reading “Volume Four Hundred Thirty-One”