Adams Golf doesn’t really have much of identity right now. They’ve stopped airing the “number one hybrid on the Champions Tour” commercials (or maybe I’ve stopped watching Golf Channel at 2 AM?), and they don’t really have a repetitive nomenclature. They’re not revered for their huge revenues like Nike or TaylorMade, and they don’t have the rich history of Titleist or Mizuno.
I could complain about the naming of Adams’ clubs from now until Tiger Woods passes Jack’s record, but to dwell on that would be doing to complete disservice to the irons that Adams has been putting out recently. Clubs like the Idea Pro Black MB, the Idea Black CB2, and the Idea MB2 have been laying the groundwork for Adams’ venture into the crossover realm of player’s clubs and GI clubs. They’ve entered the world in between, where clubs can be forged from 8620 carbon steel yet still have the offset needed to get the ball into the air.
The name of the game in the category that these clubs reside is simple: you can hit these clubs. Your swing looks worse than that of President Obama? You can hit these. (And if the President is reading this, a lefty set is available.) Hovering around a 10 handicap? You can hit these. Nearing scratch golf? You can hit these golf clubs. Read on to let me convince you.
Short of only the TaylorMade Rocketballz, this year’s Adams Fast 12 fairway woods are some of the most hyped in the business. They have feature after feature designed specifically to give golfers the most distance, not only on-center strikes but on off-center hits as well. It remains to be seen if their sale to TaylorMade-Adidas helps or hurts the company, but in recent years Adams has been putting out some of the best woods in golf, and this year seems to be no different.
Alert the media golf fans, Jason Dufner had a bad round. I kid, but it did seem for the last month that Mr. Dufner could do no wrong. Heck, even Zach Johnson tried to give the tournament back to him on 18 by not returning his ball mark back to its original position. Good thing Peter Kostis caught it before Zach signed his scorecard. Either way, congratulations to Zach Johnson and welcome to another Hittin’ the Links.
Slow play is slowly killing golf. Recently LPGA golfer Morgan Pressel was penalized in a match play event for slow play. Just the headline by itself is very refreshing. The LPGA has a clear rule for slow play and enforced it. Well played. Sadly there is a bit more to this story and I am not sure the rule was properly enforced.
2012 is going to be a big, big year for Cobra. For a company that looked like it may be falling by the wayside, some major changes have taken places. Earlier we saw the company partner up with Puma and along with that came the signing of two of the game’s brightest stars, Rickie Fowler and Lexi Thompson, to endorsement deals. Along with the new star golfers are the new AMP series of clubs, and while the bright orange color may be a little unique, there is something for players at every level.
Butch Harmon is one of the biggest names in golf. He has been Golf Digest’s top-ranked golf coach every year since 2003, and he is the mastermind behind Tiger’s early career swing. He has coached some of the biggest names in golf, including Greg Norman, Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els, Adam Scott, and Natalie Gulbis.
PING’s successful line of G-series irons has focused on maximum forgiveness for all players, but it’s i-series has been geared specifically to players who are looking for a middle ground between the G-series and the blade-like S-series. The i20 irons attempts to satisfy that audience by utilizing a series of designs that make the long irons forgiving and high-launching while blending in more-penetrating mid and short irons offering control for precise shot making. PGA Tour player Mark Wilson won the 2012 Bob Hope Humana Classic the first week he had the new PING i20 irons in the bag. Not a bad introduction for PING’s latest i-series offering. The i20 is for players as good as Mark Wilson all the way to your average mid-handicapper. Following in the tradition of previous models the i20 is a cast golf club with a progressive set design that delivers for a lot of forgiveness with a ton of playability.
PING’s 2009 i15 driver was aimed at players ranging from low single digit handicaps to players at the tour level and ran into some design issues. The CoG (center of gravity) was fade biased, and the bulge was too pronounced making it too hard to control even for most tour players. There was a small following of players that loved it because it was lower spinning and since the CoG was closer to the face, the ball came off hot. PING learned from this endeavor when engineering the new PING i20 driver. PING has also been able to broaden the handicap range for the i20 making the i20 a forgiving “players” driver. The newest i-series driver is still targeting players looking for a lower launching, lower spinning driver but with the needed forgiveness that the i15 was lacking.