MyGolfSpy's Comprehensive Ball Testing Shows 17.43 Yard Difference Between The Longest And Shortest Performing Golf Balls On The Market

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The gang at MyGolfSpy has undertaken an extensive testing study of all major golf balls on the market and boy is it one Hot List!

The same folks who elevated the Kirkland ball from Costco to cult status still say that’s a nice value, but the Snell MTB-X appears to be the new MyGolfSpy hero of the golf ball world while Callaway’s Chrome Soft ball landed on the list as the shortest flying ball in their testing, 17 yards behind the Snell.

So much for the statement that all of these balls are just about the same these days. Their key conclusions:

  • Driver Distance (115 MPH): The average carry distance between the shortest and the longest ball in our test is 17.43 yards.

  • Driver Distance (85 MPH): The average carry distance between the shortest and the longest ball in our test is 7.6 yards.

  • Wedge Spin: There is an average of 1425 RPM difference from highest spinning to the lowest spinning ball in our test.

If that is not enough to convince you, consider this; at the fastest speed tested, the distance between the longest single ball and the shortest in the test was an astonishing 38.77 yards. For most golfers, that’s a 3+ clubs difference.

The ball that rolled back the ball! Without trying. Intentionally.

A few of their other Tweets that will undoubtedly have the industry buzzing:

They will be discussing their results on May 1 via YouTube:

Jason Day's Ball Speed Drops 13 MPH Using The Original Taylor Made Metal Wood

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Nice bit of data posted here by Golf.com’s Luke Kerr-Dineen of Jason Day on the Quail Hollow range after the Aussie hit the original Taylor Made driver.

Day’s current 2019 PGA Tour ball speed average is 177.2. His clubhead speed average is 118 mph, but in a follow up Tweet posted a screen shot showing a 111 clubhead speed with the much smaller head (275cc?).

No word on how Athleticism and Agronomy are feeling right now after a simple change in driver head size ate into the huge advantages they’ve given today’s players.

Sports Illustrated May Become A Licensing Play For Greg Norman To Give Golf Tips, Among Other Awful Ideas

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That is a bleak assessment of Jean Palmieri’s WWD report on Authentic Brands Group’s pursuit of Sports Illustrated, which will likely die as a print publication and become “primarily a licensing and digital play.”

Even if they tried to resuscitate the brand, this should kill it:

According to sources, the print magazine would continue to be published for at least the next two years as ABG works to capitalize on its content to extend the brand’s reach into a number of sports-related businesses. That could include everything from camps for kids to sports rehabilitation clinics, sources said.

AGB owns 50 brands, 45 percent of which are in the fashion space, and is the world’s fourth-largest licensing company. It has $9.3 billion in annual retail sales. Among its sports-affiliated brands are Greg Norman, Shaquille O’Neal, Muhammad Ali, Prince, Spyder, Volcom, Hind, Above the Rim and Julius Erving.

One source close to the company said a Sports Illustrated site could potentially include golf tips from Norman or basketball strategy ideas from O’Neal. “This would be very different from just making Sports Illustrated jackets,” the source said. “That’s not the business they’re going into.”

While it’s a sad state of affairs, at least think of the comedy in imagining someone on the business side thinking this is a good idea.

May Gray: PGA Would Like Some Sun And Warmth At Bethpage

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You can usually read into Kerry Haigh’s comments when discussing PGA Championship venue issues, and in a press conference today it sounds like things looking good at Bethpage Black. However, it sounds like a more sun and warmth would be helpful to get the course looking ideal for the upcoming PGA.

Here’s Haigh today:

As Seth mentioned, we are extremely excited looking forward to the up coming PGA Championship at Bethpage and as we all know, Bethpage is a wonderful test of golf. We've come through the winter very well from a conditioning standpoint.

Obviously the next two weeks are important in terms of leaves on the trees and grass growing, which is exactly what we knew and anticipated the past two years when we have been monitoring conditioning into this new date.

We're very excited where we are. Andrew Wilson, the superintendent and Mike Hadley, the Black Course superintendent, both are feeling very positive about the overall conditioning. Just need a few warmer days the next 10, 14 days, and I think the golf course will be in just outstanding condition for the 101st PGA Championship.

Obviously we're excited about the date change from a conditioning standpoint in that the grasses will be -- the cool season grasses will and should be a lot healthier. They will be sort of improving, as opposed to in the August date previously, we were sort of more on a hanging-on, keeping-the-grass, the-cool-season-grasses-alive mode. Whereas the spring temperatures are likely obviously to be more temperate and easier, cooler temperatures, which I think everyone will enjoy. But also more likely, and possibly have more chance of wind and probably tougher playing conditions.

So with that said, can't say more how excited we are to come to New York and see the best players in the world, the strongest field in golf, play on what is truly a great golf course.

Q. Couple of technical questions. In perfect world, how thick or how high do you anticipate the rough being, and how narrow the fairways?

KERRY HAIGH: Good morning, Doug. The fairway widths we have not adjusted at all since the last events that have been played there.

So they are very similar, the exact same as they were then, other than hole 18. That is the only fairway we sort of recontoured and that was really more to make the shot from the tee, you know, the player has more options now from the tee, whereas it used to be sort of an hour glass fairway is more of a reasonable width fairway throughout the lens.

So a player could still hit a an iron off the tee or a hybrid or a 3-wood, or can now even hit a driver. So that's the only fairway change since I think the '09 Open that I'm aware of.

In terms of the rough, a lot will depend on how well it does grow the next couple of weeks, but our plan is for it to be 3 1/2 to 4 inches long, and again, the anticipation based on what we saw the last two springtimes is that it should be pretty healthy and growing fairly quickly.

The Accuweather forecast does show some warmer options in the coming days. Tournament week suggests we might see some rain.

Players Keep Forgetting The Slow Play Discussion Is About The Fans...

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Since PGA Tour executives and players do not actually pay to attend and watch their product, the slow play discussion has always been a mystery to them. When a player has turned up to watch this year to watch, he was astounded at what he saw.

But as Randall Mell notes in this GolfChannel.com rant, we all grasp that some slow play issues can’t be resolved when caused by distance gains, longer courses and faster greens. But the slow pokes exposed at select times by things like Edoardo Molinari’s tweet, and who everyone on the various tours know take their sweet time, could be addressed for the fans.

McDowell, as usual, is probably right about the overall numbers, but this is more about the viewing experience, about the frustration fans feel watching a professional take three minutes to make a two-second swing with his group a hole behind. That’s what this is all about.

“Until sponsors and TV tell the commissioner you guys play too slow and we’re not putting money up, it’s a waste of time talking about, because it’s not going to change,” Scott said.

He’s right, too. The answer may ultimately lie beyond what a player police force can do, but at least Molinari’s willing to lead a revolt that could lead there.

Spring Ratings: 2019 Heritage Down, Zurich Final Round Draws A 1.1

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Paulsen at Sports Media Watch has this full report on last week’s Heritage Classic ratings, down 16% and 12% over 2018 but up over 2017. He also includes Golf Channel lead-in numbers which were pretty impressive given the erosion of cable numbers in most other sports.

And the SBD overnights from the Zurich Classic put the ratings at a 1.1. for Sunday’s final round, a .9 for Saturday play. Not thrilling but not awful either.

At least the golf outdrew rounds 4-7 of the NFL draft in prime time on ABC. Why anyone beyond family and friends are watching that is beyond me.

Team To Root For Files: Florida Tech Women Make NCAA's After Program Is Dropped

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You just hate reading things like this and hope the young women who want to keep playing college golf find an outlet for their talents, but in the meantime, keep an eye out for Florida Tech in the May 14-18 NCAA DII finals at PGA National, writes Golfweek’s Todd Kelly.

This suggests the Golf Gods may be on their sides, too…

On April 10, Florida Tech won the Women’s Panther Invitational.

It was the final home tournament in program history and the team’s third win in the last four events this season.

Ladies European Tour "Moonlight" Event This Week Is Finishing Under LED Lights

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We won’t get it on Golf Channel this year with several other events on the schedule, but the simulation of the LED lighting package being employed to finish a Ladies European Tour event under the lights looks interesting. Jessica Marksbury with details for Golf.com.

From their Tweet:

Minjee Lee Carves Up Wilshire, Moves To World No. 2

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While 58 of 72 greens is always an admirable number at historic Wilshire CC, but it was Australia’s Minjee Lee’s precision helped her to hold off a charging Sei Young Kim to win the 2019 Hugel Air Premia LA Open. She moves to the Rolex No. 2 spot with her win in Los Angeles.

Following the leading group during the front, I was whining to anyone who might listen that the final round hole locations would stifle excitement. And then Lee would hit a ball six to eight feet when the pin looked inaccessible. Beth Ann Nichols with Lee’s winning story for Golfweek.

And great news from The Forecaddie, Wilshire is on the schedule for years to come, sponsor permitting.

I posted a few shots on Instagram to give you a sense of how special it is to have great players out there testing shots almost identical to how they played 100 years ago. Norman Macbeth and friends would never believe 100 years later how well the course has aged.

Only three birdies were made at the par-3 18th Sunday, and they all came in the three groups. Lee was the last and most notable:

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That winning feeling with @minjee27 @lpga_la.

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Walk-Up Music And Presidents Cup Testing Grounds Are Not Enough: Zurich Classic Format Needs Tweaking

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While I certainly agree with my colleague Dan Kilbridge’s view that the two-man team format for the Zurich Classic remains a welcomed addition to the schedule and must be protected, the alternate-shot golf is pretty deadly stuff. Particularly on a Sunday when fans want excitement.

He writes:

Watching the teammate dominos fall is a huge part of the Zurich Classic’s appeal in the days and weeks leading up. Dissecting the pairings and eventually their chosen walk-up music might be more intriguing than the actual golf.

International Presidents Cup team captain Ernie Els even introduced the idea of treating it as a chance to prep for the December matches at Royal Melbourne, with international players staying at the same hotel and bonding after-hours. Jason Day and Adam Scott played together for the first time, but that experiment ended early in a missed cut.

When you need excruciatingly painful exercises like walk-up music—executed better this year, slightly—and December Presidents Cup testing grounds, something is amiss.

I’d start by making the foursomes play modified, with each player hitting a tee shot. Or, if the purity is just that important to someone, then back to Thursday-Saturday rounds. To finish on a Sunday with a format that is about making the fewest mistakes instead of what is the most fun to watch, once again announces to fans that the PGA Tour was not thinking of you. Or if they were, they believed you like watching hard-earned pars being made.

And this…

Golf's Latest Embarrassing Association With Saudi Arabia...

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The European Tour’s awful association with the Crown Prince and ensuing cash grab seemed like the worst possible partnership in modern professional sports. Particularly after other sports backed away from events in Saudi Arabia, or if you read about last week’s Saudi government led series of beheadings, including 16 and 17-year-old boys, yet another violation of international law and similar to recent atrocities green lit by the tour’s partner.

Continuing golf’s tone-deaf ways, struggling Ladies European Tour professional Carly Booth briefly launched an endorsement campaign for Saudi Arabia’s “different” place, to which she said she was honored (the posts have since been taken down after a brutal reaction).

Golfweek’s Eamon Lynch scolds Booth but highlights the even greater concern: what kind of representative would subject their player to this kind of endorsement and feel it’s the right move to make?

One can mount a defense for Booth, but it’s unflattering: devotion to her craft leaves little time to study geopolitics and human rights; women golfers, and particularly those in Europe, subsist on vapors so deals aren’t easily rejected, no matter how morally questionable the source.

But no exculpatory defense exists for the fatuous pillocks on her management team, who devised the deal, who displayed a mesmerizing disregard for the risk to her reputation, who presumably helped author the social posts, who thoroughly failed at their most basic function: they left their client looking like both a fool and a jerk.

Too often players are put in odd positions by those taking 10%, but this one takes the cake for bad advice topped off by terrible timing.

Slow Play Wars: Molinari Posts Bad Time And Fines, GMac Says It's Old News

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Edoardo Molinari, former US Amateur champion, European Tour golfer and brother of The Open champion, has taken taken the slow play debate up a few notches while helping us figure out who should not play the Slow Play Masters.

He first posted this after his 5:30 minute round in the Trophy Hussan in Morocco:

Encouraged by his Twitter followers, he posted these “bad times” and the (very few) fines that ensued. These are European Tour times but obviously included the Masters given the names that popped up.

When asked about the effort, Graeme McDowell reiterated what most players and tour officials tend to say about slow play discussions: old news, we play for a lot of money, deal with it.

From Brentley Romine’s GolfChannel.com report:

“It’s not a dead horse, but it’s pretty dead. What do you want to do? We can’t get around there much quicker. Is 20 minutes going to change his life? Listen, I like Edoardo, nice kid, but I think he’s just frustrated.”

McDowell pointed out that he feels like the pace-of-play policy on the European Tour is more stringent than the PGA Tour’s policy, though he said even that is “getting tougher and tougher.”

“Listen, golf courses are long, golf courses are hard, we’re playing for a lot of money, it’s a big business, it is what it is,” McDowell said. “There’s just no way to speed the game up really. You can try these small percentiles, but at the end of the day it’s very hard to get around a 7,600-yard golf course with tucked pins with a three-ball in less than 4:45, 5 hours. You can’t do it.”

He is correct that getting around such a big course at modern speeds is becoming all but impossible, particularly given the back-ups on par-5s and drivable par-4s.

Of course, there could be remedies to this…

If It Makes You Feel Better, Tiger Will Still Be Teeing Up Way More Than Hogan Did

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Only once in his career has Tiger Woods gone from major to major without a known injury or death in the family. That makes his decision to pass up next week’s Quail Hollow PGA Tour stop a bit jarring since he’s now going straight from his Masters win to the next major. This year, it’s the first-ever May PGA Championship. 

No one expects him to add the PGA’s preceding AT&T Byron Nelson for a litany of obvious reasons, meaning he will turn up at Bethpage having gone 31 days between competitive rounds.  

“The Masters took a lot out of him,” agent Mark Steinberg told ESPN.com’s Bob Harig. “He’s still digesting and appreciating what happened.”

Since Tiger has generally played better fresh than in the middle of an extensive run, he’s signaling more than ever that majors are all that matters. This should not be a surprise, nor should it be criticized. He is an all-time great looking to become the all-time greatest, and while the 82-win plateau is a fantastic accomplishment getting a heavy push from the PGA Tour’s marketing arm, 18 is the number he’s looking to surpass.

Tiger is enough of a historian to know that Ben Hogan reached a point after his accident to realize the limitations of his body, mind and desire.

In the first year back from the accident, Hogan played nine times with two starts after winning the U.S. Open that meant nothing: the Palm Beach Round Robin and the Motor City Open.

After 1950 when he pushed himself and was a little unlucky—Hogan had to return to Riviera for an 18-hole playoff a week after the event was scheduled—he cut back significantly. Hogan’s starts after 1950 were severely curtailed to protect his mind and body.

He played four times in 1951, three times in 1952 and eight times in 1953, though two of those starts were the Seminole and Palmetto Pro-Am’s.

Hogan returned to four-start seasons in 1954 and again in 1955, then played even more sporatic schedules after that. 

While Woods’s win at the 2018 Tour Championship gave him the confidence to savor most of the off-season and devote his early 2019 to protecting energy levels, he has not forgotten that last year’s grueling playoff run caused him to lose weight and push his body too hard. He signaled with his pass on Quail Hollow that he won’t be making that mistake again.

Tiger will not be cutting back to Hogan levels but if he keeps winning majors, he will keep passing on PGA Tour events.

The PGA Tour’s new condensed schedule requires such an approach for a player at his age, with his track record of playing well off a break. His bank account also allows him to not care about “chasing points” or grinding at Quail Hollow, a course he once liked but but seems to have less affinity for after multiple renovations and tedious walks to new back tees.  

Just as Hogan limited his exposure to stress, Woods is managing his 2019 at the expense of regular PGA Tour events with majors in mind. History says he’s making the right move.

Has The Official World Golf Ranking Outlived Its Usefulness?

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Rex Hoggard examines the PGA Tour’s increasingly hostile view of the Official World Golf Ranking and suggests the best way to fix the ranking is to stop using it.

The PGA Championship uses its own points list, a one-year ranking based on official earnings, along with a variety of other criteria. Not included in the qualification for the year’s second major is a player’s position in the world ranking, although officials do historically dovetail special exemptions to those inside the top 100 to assure no one slips through the cracks.

The point remains valid, however. There are now endless ways to identify competitive merit without becoming mired in the world ranking weeds.

Perhaps the game’s best minds can conjure a solution to the current ranking problems, but if we’re being objective the entire analysis is starting to feel like an exercise in diminishing returns. Organizations like the PGA of America and R&A don’t need the world ranking to identify the best players any longer.

The point is a strong one assuming that any replacement in use to fill a field does attempt to weave in the entire planet. Or else we’ll just end up with a new ranking again.

Organizers Begin To Consider Moving The ANA Away From The ANWA, Even If It Means Coachella Conflict

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The new Augusta National Women’s Amateur understandably got way more attention than the LPGA’s first major of the year and while the inaugural year must be taken into account, there is a good chance the chance that attention will continue to lean hard toward the “ANWA”.

It’s unfortunate that organizing reps at IMG are suggesting a move is a 50-50 prospect for this reason and not for the reason the ANA needs to move: it’s on the eve of the Masters.

From Larry Bohannan’s Desert Sun report, quoting IMG’s Chris Garrett:

“If I am a tournament sponsor and I am ANA and looking at coverage that was given to ANWA by Golf Channel and certain media outlets, I can understand their concerns that we are golf’s first major and they are feeling overshadowed by an event in its first year,” Garrett said.

ANA has sponsored the major since 2015 and raised the purse to $3 million this year. The airline signed a three-year extension this year through 2022.

Garrett admits that a date change might not be possible as early as 2020 because of all the moving parts involved in the LPGA schedule and TV contracts.

While moving up seems logical, a move to April after the Masters sounds more attractive to golf fans who are always going to be distracted by the Masters.