Pin or no Pin?

[powerfade]

  Steaksauce said:

I read the exact opposite for Pelz.

Correct re Pelz.

I'll leave it in most of the time, unless I'm only chipping from a few feet off with a reasonably flat roll to the hole, then out it comes.

[iWALK18]

Pelz says leave it in! I never take it out.

[Oregon Golf Ho]

Pin in. I love the sound the ball makes when it hits the pin and then drops hard into the hole.
Love that sound and I feel the pin gives me a feeling that it will stop my ball if I happen to hit the
shot to hard

[michaeljames92]

if you take the pin out and the ball goes too fast and pops out of the hole then having a pin in is better as it at least gives you a chance

[chingali]

I just about always leave the pin in unless I'm chipping from under about 15 feet. I have always felt that leaving the pin in gives me a better sense of depth perception and hence it helps me to more accurately judge distance. I also have the flagstick attended when putting from outside about 40 feet most of the time for exactly the same reason.

And no there is nothing wrong with my eyesight and yes I am a pretty decent chipper and lag putter in case you were wondering!

[Three Putt]

Ahhhhh....depends on how old the holes are at the course. If they wobble a bit with the wind...

leave them in if the wind is at yee back....
pull em' if the wind is at yee face....

[Avid Golfer]

What I believe (and I believe Dave Pelz explained a couple of times) is that you should base leaving the pin in or taking it out on the situation you are presented. If you are chipping uphill the back of the cup can be used as a backboard and hitting the back of the cup is softer than the pin and will have a little give to absorb a shot that has a little too much speed and still drop in the hole. Also with the pin out of the hole on an uphill put you have the entire cup to catch, but with the pin in you have the stick blocking part of the hole your ball could otherwise hit. The pin is a lot firmer than the ground that is the back of the cup, and if you hit the firm pin going too fast the ball has a higher chance of kicking away from the hole.

On a downhill chip if you catch the pin the ball could rebound to the high side of the cup and then roll downhill to the cup again, but if the pin is out on the downhill chip if the ball is moving too quickly it might have so much momentum that it could be propelled over the cup without catching anything to rebound off.

In summary if the chip is uphill I'll take the pin out, if it is downhill I'll leave it in, if it is side hill then I'll go with instinct and feel ;).

[connor35]

I'm a believer in the "The pin never helped a good shot" theory.

That said, I hit plenty of bad shots so I'll only leave the pin in when I think a good shot is improbable (e.g., tough lie to a downhill pin).

[RC_GRAFXS]

I very very rarely leave the pin in. I feel I should be confident enough in my chipping abilty that I shouldn't need a backstop which usually keeps you from making chips instead of helping slow your out of controll ship shot down. Most of the time the pin just gets in the way when chipping from green side. There re two expcetions to when i don't take the pin out: I do leave the pin in when hitting from green side bunkers and I leave the pin in when I have a terrible lie in the rough.


What's In my bag:
Driver: Taylor Mader R7 425CC with 65 REAX (Co-designed by Fujikura) Mid Tip Stiff Flex
3-wood: Admas Tight Lies Tour Model 15* with Proforce V2 stiff flex Made by UST
Irons: Mizzuno GRADS MP (3-PW) S300 shafts (soon to be Project X Rifle shafts)
Wedges: 52 (standard bounce), 56* (standard bounce) & 58* (low bounce) CG12 black pearl
Putter: 34" Odyssey White Steel 2 Ball SRT Putter

[Jack_2251]

I find that even when my ball hits the cup hard it still drops in more often then when it hits the flag dead center at the same speed, so TAKE IT OUT!