Hullohihello

In determining your bag makeup you should try to match it to your swing speed, ballstriking ability, and tendencies. A basic set would include a Driver, 3W, 5W, 3-PW, GW, SW, Putter. Many people will choose to substitute the 3wood or 5wood for the LW or the long irons for hybrids. You should get a hybrid if you struggle with the long irons and cannot get them airborne very high. However, if you're a high ball hitter, a long iron may work just fine or a lower launching hybrid so it doesn't balloon. Generally, people who have higher swing speeds will keep the lower lofted irons because they have the clubhead speed to hit high long irons while slower swingers will replace the 3, 4, and sometimes 5 hybrid. If your swing speed is average I would recommend a 3 hybrid replacement. Also, I would recommend a GW unlike what some people have said. A GW these days is essential when PW lofts have gotten lower than 46 while the SW is still 54-56 making a huge distance gap making the GW essential.

You have a handicap similar to mine and I believe you could hit the mizuno's if you wanted to. The irons you pick should be on ballstriking ability, not your handicap. An 18 handicap like you could either have a great long game and a poor shot game or a poor long game but a fantastic short game, or someone in the middle. In terms of recommending clubs I personally like the MP-57's alot, however is not that forgiving when your swing is off. I haven't git the MP-52's but in theory they should launch higher and have a larger sweetspot due to the pocket cavity. Other clubs in the players cavity back category worth trying include the Nike VR Splitback and the Titlies AP2. Also, perhaps you could also try the new MX-300.

I'm probably not qualified to give any advice but here's what I have to say. Since you either hit a low left shot or a pop-up slice it makes sense that you are hitting down on the ball like your coach says. Hitting down produces the clean contact required with irons and wedges to create backspin. However, with a driver an ideal attack angle whould be 0 to 5 degrees upwards into the ball in order to maximize launch angle and to decrease spin. Perhaps try checking if your swing plane is too steep since the swing plane of a driver is flatter than a iron or wedge so although the rest of your clubs will work fine, your driver may not. I would suggest finding another coach so you can get a different perspective on your swing than your usual coach possibly finding the solution to your problem. Good luck =)

I've hit the mx-200 and mp-52 on mizuno demo day and they are both at least equally as forgiving as my rac OS2's. The mx-200 had a somewhat better feel and equal forgiveness while the mp-52 had the great forged feel while still having a reasonable amount of forgiveness for a mid-high handicap like me.

I have hit the R7's on the course and personallly I thought it was not as good as I was hoping for it to be. The irons felt really light and I had trouble from keeping the ball from going left on the long irons. The trajectory was mid-high and the feel was good for a cast. They weren't bad by any standard but they didn't really live up to the hype. I think they are not much better than the rac OS2 that I'm playing right now.

A good alternative to buying new Pro V1/x is to either buy them in almost new for about $30 online or getting a ball like the NXT tour or the HX hot bite in the $30 dollar range as well. A method that works for me is I play used balls when praticing on the course and new balls when my score really matters.