Opinion & Analysis
A Golf Geek’s Dream: Time in the Tour Van
One week ago, I walked up my driveway with a bounce in my stride that I only get at the end of a great day. Watching the sunset from the top of Mount Kilimanjaro was special, but spending the day in a PGA Tour Van at the Valspar Championship was beyond words.
“Honey, I’m home,” I called out to my girlfriend as soon as I walked in the door. “I went to the Valspar and watched a bunch of tour players hitting bullets on the range,” I said. “But then I got to hang out in a tour van and watched Scott build a set with an SST Pure. It was the most amazing thing!”
“Sorry,” she said, looking at me like I was a bit crazy, “but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I tried to explain it in plain English.
“Today, a friend took me into a tour van and introduced me to Scott E. Garrison,” I said. “Scott owns and operates a tour van. His van is basically a tractor trailer truck that’s a pro shop on wheels and steroids. Imagine a science lab crossed with a tailor shop crossed with the best stocked pro shop you could imagine.”
“Let me see if I get this,” she said. “Your great mood is because you spent the day in a tractor trailer truck?”
“Not just any… Scott’s,” I said. “He travels to about 32 tour events per year, usually stays from Monday to Wednesday, repairing, fitting and building clubs for tour players. His van is full of the most unbelievable technology, a lot of which you can’t find anywhere other than a van like his. He has a couple of lie and loft machines, a gripping station, a saw, a belt sander and a machine to get shafts PUREd.”
“A PUREd?” she asked. She looked at me like I was crazy and speaking a foreign language.
“Yes, a PUREd,” I said, barely holding back my excitement. “It’s this machine that analyzes golf shafts and identifies the most stable plane. It’s helped PGA Tour players earn $2 billion around the world.”
“PureD made $2 billion?” she asked. “Sounds like a vitamin or a workout tape.”
“No, it’s better,” I told her. “What you do is load a club shaft into the machine, then the machine spins the shaft around to locate the strongest point in the shaft. When the machine identifies the spot it even marks it! Then, when Scott builds a club, he puts that spot into the 12 o’clock position on the club, which optimizes performance.”
Her interest piqued. “Why is that important?” she asked.
“Because even something as well built and precise as the shafts in golf clubs have individual characteristics that can be used to make how you use them more or less effective. In this case, it allows you to position the club so it can be its strongest, most consistent and most effective when you swing.”
“Wow, now I get it,” she said. “So that machine could be the difference between someone winning or losing on tour?”
“Exactly,” I said. “I also got to watch Scott put together a set for a big deal on the PGA Tour while the guy stood there. The process was pure artistry. First, Scott looked at the desired specs for the player. Then he weighed all the heads, all the grips, PUREd the shafts and then set upon building what was literally a perfect set.”
“A true artist at work,” she said.
“You got it,” I said. “As he moved effortlessly, he spoke of the precision required in his work, teaching me about the nuances of the process, as well as the challenges of working with tour players. Many of these guys can tell even one swing weight.”
“At one point he held up two brands of golf grips: an Iomic and a Golf Pride,” I said. “He pointed to the end of a club and said, ‘See here, Iomic has no butt, but Golf Pride has about a quarter-inch butt. When you build, you better account for the difference.'”
I kept chattering.
“He was moving from machine to machine through the process, snipping a little hear, measuring a little there, then some mixing and a little light banging and VOILA!” I said. “The perfect set; all lengths, swing weights and frequencies spot on!”
I had her attention as she sat sipping her water.
“The process continued,” I said. “A hybrid for another household name player. Then a putter grip and then a loft and lie check.”
Scott told me that many PGA Tour players came into his Tour van every week to check their lies as he measured a golf club using his $6,000 digital loft and lie machine. “And then there are some who come less often,” he said. “Depends on the guy. Some are very particular, others are not.”
I continued recounting the events of the day to her.
“Around 11 a.m., the Pro-Am was about to start,” I said. “The players and everyone other than Scott left the van. As he continued to work I asked, ‘Was that stressful?’ He laughed. Just how he looked at me, it was clear that he loves his work as much as any artist or craftsman who needed to be on his game all the time. He made it all look very easy.”
“And then what?” my girlfriend asked.
“I watched him work silently for a long time,” I said. “It really felt like he was the master sword fitter, arming the greatest Samurai in the land, and I was watching him build the swords that would make the difference between life and death.”
“Come on young Skywalker,” she said laughing. She kissed me and led me into the kitchen for for dinner; I could smell the spaghetti bolognese, my favorite.
“It didn’t just seem like it,“ she said. “He probably was.”
“Yup,” I said. A perfect day, as I kissed her lightly on the cheek, a happy, contented man.
—
Scott has one of the most amazing Instagram pages (@scotteggolf). It is AWESOME and a must follow! He also offers “Tour Experiences,” where you can have him build you a set of clubs. To find out more, you can visit his website at ScottEGGolf.com.
Bob Van Sweden is a full-time club fitter in St. Petersburg, Florida. His website is http://www.golfrepaircenter.com/.
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19th Hole
Vincenzi’s 2024 Valspar Championship betting preview: Elite ballstrikers to thrive at Copperhead
The PGA TOUR will stay in Florida this week for the 2024 Valspar Championship.
The Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Resort is a par 71 measuring 7,340 yards and features Bermudagrass greens overseeded with POA. Infamous for its difficulty, the track will be a tough test for golfers as trouble lurks all over the place. Holes 16, 17 and 18 — also known as the “Snake Pit” — make up one of the toughest three-hole stretches in golf and should lead to a captivating finish on Sunday.
The field is comprised of 156 golfers teeing it up. The field this week is solid and is a major improvement over last year’s field that felt the impact of players skipping due to a handful of “signature events” in a short span of time.
Past Winners at Valspar Championship
- 2023: Taylor Moore (-10)
- 2022: Sam Burns (-17)
- 2021: Sam Burns (-17)
- 2019: Paul Casey (-8)
- 2018: Paul Casey (-10)
- 2017: Adam Hadwin (-14)
- 2016: Charl Schwartzel (-7)
- 2015: Jordan Spieth (-10)
In this article and going forward, I’ll be using the Rabbit Hole by Betsperts Golf data engine to develop my custom model. If you want to build your own model or check out all of the detailed stats, you can sign up using promo code: MATTVIN for 25% off any subscription package (yearly is best value).
Key Stats For Copperhead
1. Strokes Gained: Approach
Strokes Gained: Approach grades out as the most important statistic once again this week. Copperhead really can’t be overpowered and is a second-shot golf course.
Total SG: Approach Over Past 24 Rounds (per round)
- Tony Finau (+.90)
- Nick Taylor (+.81)
- Justin Thomas (+.77)
- Greyson Sigg (+.69)
- Christiaan Bezuidenhout (+.67)
2. Good Drive %
The long hitters can be a bit limited here due to the tree-lined fairways and penal rough. Playing from the fairways will be important, but laying back too far will cause some difficult approaches with firm greens that may not hold shots from long irons.
Golfers who have a good balance of distance and accuracy have the best chance this week.
Good Drive % Over Past 24 Rounds
- Brice Garnett (+91.3%)
- Zach Johnson (+91.1%)
- Sam Ryder (+90.5%)
- Ryan Moore (+90.4%)
- Aaron Rai (+89.7%)
3. Strokes Gained: Ball Striking
Adding ball-striking puts even more of a premium on tee-to-green prowess in the statistical model this week. Golfers who rank highly in ball-striking are in total control of the golf ball which is exceedingly important at Copperhead.
SG: Ball Striking Over Past 24 Rounds:
- Xander Schauffele (+1.32)
- Keith Mitchell (+1.29)
- Tony Finau (+1.24)
- Cameron Young (+1.17)
- Doug Ghim (+.95)
4. Bogey Avoidance
With the conditions likely to be difficult, avoiding bogeys will be crucial this week. In a challenging event like the Valspar, oftentimes the golfer who is best at avoiding mistakes ends up on top.
Gritty golfers who can grind out difficult pars have a much better chance in an event like this than a low-scoring birdie-fest.
Bogey Avoidance Over Past 24 Rounds
- Brice Garnett (+9.0)
- Xander Schauffele (+9.3)
- Austin Cook (+9.7)
- Chesson Hadley (+10.0)
- Greyson Sigg (+10.2)
5. Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions
Conditions will be tough this week at Copperhead. I am looking for golfers who can rise to the occasion if the course plays as difficult as it has in the past.
Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions Over Past 24 rounds
- Xander Schauffele (+1,71)
- Min Woo Lee (+1.39)
- Cameron Young (+1.27)
- Jordan Spieth (+1.08)
- Justin Suh (+.94)
6. Course History
That statistic will tell us which players have played well at Copperhead in the past.
Course History Over Past 24 rounds
- Patrick Cantlay (+3.75)
- Sam Burns (+2.49)
- Davis Riley (+2.33)
- Matt NeSmith (+2.22)
- Jordan Spieth (+2.04)
The Valspar Championship Model Rankings
Below, I’ve compiled overall model rankings using a combination of the five key statistical categories previously discussed — SG: Approach (27%), Good Drive % (15%), SG: BS (20%), Bogeys Avoided (13%), Course History (13%) Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions (12%).
- Xander Schauffele
- Doug Ghim
- Victor Perez
- Greyson Sigg
- Ryan Moore
- Tony Finau
- Justin Thomas
- Sam Ryder
- Sam Burns
- Lucas Glover
2024 Valspar Championship Picks
Justin Thomas +1400 (DraftKings)
Justin Thomas will be disappointed with his finish at last week’s PLAYERS Championship, as the past champion missed the cut despite being in some decent form heading into the event. Despite the missed cut, JT hit the ball really well. In his two rounds, the two-time major champion led the field in Strokes Gained: Approach per round.
Thomas has been up and down this season. He’s missed the cut in two “signature events” but also has finishes of T12 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, T12 at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, T6 at the Pebble Beach AT&T Pro-Am and T3 at the American Express. In his past 24 rounds, he ranks 3rd in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach and 6th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking in the field.
Thomas loves Copperhead. In his last three tries at the course, he’s finished T13, T3 and T10. Thomas would have loved to get a win at a big event early in the season, but avoidable mistakes and a balky putter have cost him dearly. I believe a trip to a course he loves in a field he should be able to capitalize on is the right recipe for JT to right the ship.
Christiaan Bezuidenhout +6000 (FanDuel)
Christiaan Bezuidenhout is playing spectacular golf in the 2024 season. He finished 2nd at the American Express, T20 at Pebble Beach and T24 at the Genesis Invitational before finishing T13 at last week’s PLAYERS Championship.
In his past 24 rounds, the South African ranks 3rd in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach and 26th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking. Bezuidenhout managed to work his way around TPC Sawgrass last week with minimal damage. He only made five bogeys in the entire week, which is a great sign heading into a difficult Copperhead this week.
Bezuidenhout is winless in his PGA Tour career, but certainly has the talent to win on Tour. His recent iron play tells me that this week could be a breakthrough for the 35-year-old who has eyes on the President’s Cup.
Doug Ghim +8000 (FanDuel)
Doug Ghim has finished in the top-16 of his past five starts. Most recently, Ghim finished T16 at The PLAYERS Championship in a loaded field.
In his past 24 rounds, Ghim ranks 8th in Strokes Gained: Approach and 5th in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking. In terms of his fit for Copperhead, the 27-year-old ranks 12th in Bogey Avoidance and 7th in Strokes Gained: Total in Difficult Conditions, making him a great fit for the course.
Ghim has yet to win on Tour, but at one point he was the top ranked Amateur golfer in the world and played in the 2017 Arnold Palmer Cup and 2017 Walker Cup. He then won the Ben Hogan award for the best male college golfer in 2018. He certainly has the talent, and there are signals aplenty that his talent in ready to take him to the winner’s circle on the PGA Tour.
Sepp Straka +8000 (BetRivers)
Sepp Straka is a player who’s shown he has the type of game that can translate to a difficult Florida golf course. The former Presidents Cup participant won the 2022 Honda Classic in tough conditions and should thrive with a similar test at Copperhead.
It’s been a slow 2024 for Straka, but his performance last week at the PLAYERS Championship surely provides some optimism. He gained 5.4 strokes on approach as well as 1.88 strokes off the tee. The tee-to-green game Straka showed on a course with plenty of danger demonstrates that he can stay in control of his golf ball this week.
It’s possible that the strong performance last week was an outlier, but I’m willing to bet on a proven winner in a weaker field at a great number.
Victor Perez +12000 (FanDuel)
Victor Perez is no stranger to success in professional golf. The Frenchman has three DP World Tour wins including a Rolex Series event. He won the 2019 Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, as well as the 2023 Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, which are some big events.
Perez earned his PGA Tour card this season and enters the week playing some fantastic golf. He finished in a tie for 16th in Florida at the Cognizant Classic and then tied for third in his most recent start at the Puerto Rico Open.
In his past 24 rounds in the field, Perez ranks 11th in Strokes Gained: Approach, 1oth in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking, 6th in Good Drive % and 15th in Bogey Avoidance.
Perez comes in as a perfect fit for Copperhead and offers serious value at triple-digit odds.
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Opinion & Analysis
Myrtle Beach, Explored: February in South Carolina
As I gain in experience and age, and familiarity breeds neither contempt nor disdain, I understand why people return to a place. A destination like Myrtle Beach offers a sizable supply and diversity of restaurants, entertainment venues, and shops that are predicated on the tenets of the service industry. Greet your customers with a smile and a kind word, and they will find comfort and assurance. Provide them with a memorable experience and they will suggest your place of business to others.
My first tour of Myrtle Beach took place in the mid-1980s, and consisted of one course: Gator Hole. I don’t remember much from that day, and since Gator Hole closed a decade later, I cannot revisit it to recollect what I’d lost. Since then, I’ve come to the Grand Strand a few times, and been fortunate to never place a course more than once. I’ve seen the Strantz courses to the south and dipped my toe in the North Carolina courses of Calabash. I’ve been to many in the middle, including Dunes, Pine Lakes, Grande Dunes among them.
2024 brought a quartet of new courses, including two at the Barefoot Resort. I’d heard about the North Myrtle Beach four-pack of courses that highlight the Barefoot property, including layouts from Pete Dye, Tom Fazio, Davis Love III, and Greg Norman. I had the opportunity to play and shoot the Dye and Fazio tracks, which means that I’ll have to return to see the other two. Sandwiched between them were the TPC-Myrtle Beach course, also from Tom Fazio, and the Pawley’s Plantation trace, by the hand of Jack Nicklaus. I anticipated a bit of the heroic, and bit of the strategic, and plenty of eye candy. None of those architects would ever be considered a minimalist, so there would be plenty of in-play and out-of-play bunkers and mounds to tantalize the senses.
My nephew arrived a few days early, to screen a few more courses. As a result, you the reader will have an extra quarter of mini-reviews, bringing the total of courses in this piece to eight. It was inconceivable that CJR would play four courses that I had never played nor photographed, but that was the case. His words appear at the end of this piece. We hope that you enjoy the tour.
Main Feature: Two Barefoots, a TPC, and Pawley’s Plantation
What Paul “Pete” Dye brought back from his trips to the United Kingdom, hearkened back to what C.B. MacDonal did, some 65 years prior. There is a way of finding bunkers and fairways, and even green sites, that does not require major industrial work. The Dye course at Barefoot Resorts takes you on a journey over the rumpled terrain of distant places. If there’s one element missing, it’s the creased and turbulent fairways, so often found in England and Ireland. The one tenet of playing a Dye course, is to always aim away from temptation, from where your eyes draw you. Find the safe side of the target, and you’ll probably find your ball. It then stands that you will have a shot for your next attempt. Cut the corner, and you might have need to reload. The Barefoot course begins gently, in terms of distance, but challenges with visual deception. After two brief 4s and a 3, the real work begins. The course is exposed enough, to allow the coastal winds to dance along the fairways. Be ready to keep the ball low and take an extra club or two.
If memory serves, TPCMB is my first trek around a TPC-branded course. It had all the trappings of a tour course, from the welcome, through the clubhouse, to the practice facilities and, of course, the course. TPC-Myrtle Beach is a Tom Fazio design, and if you never visit Augusta National, you’ll now have an idea of what it is like. You play Augusta’s 16th hole twice at TPCMB, and you enjoy it both times. Fazio really likes the pond-left, green-angle-around par three hole, and his two iterations of it are memorable.
You’ll also see those Augusta bunkers, the ones with the manicured edges that drop into a modestly-circular form. What distinguishes these sand pits is the manner in which they rise from the surrounding ground. They are unique in that they don’t resemble the geometric bunkering of a Seth Raynor, nor the organic pits found in origin courses. They are built, make no mistake, and recovery from them is manageable for all levels of bunker wizardry.
If you have the opportunity to play the two Tom Fazio courses back to back, you’ll notice a marked difference in styling. Let me digress for a moment, then circle back with an explanation. It was written that the NLE World Woods course designed by Fazio, Pine Barrens, was an homage to Pine Valley, the legendary, New Jersey club where Fazio is both a member and the architect on retainer. The Pine Barrens course was plowed under in 2022, so the homage no longer exists. At least, I didn’t think that it existed, until I played his Barefoot Resort course in North Myrtle Beach.
Pine Valley might be described as an aesthetic of scrub and sand. There are mighty, forced carries to travers, along with sempiternal, sandy lairs to avoid. Barefoot Fazio is quite similar. If you’re not faced with a forced carry, you’ll certainly contend with a fairway border or greenside necklace of sand. When you reach the 13th tee, you’ll face a drive into a fairway, and you might see a distant green, with a notable absence: flagstick. The 13th is the icing on the homage cake, a callout of the 8th hole at Pine Valley. Numero Ocho at the OG has two greens, side by side, and they change the manner in which the hole plays (so they say.) At Barefoot Fazio, the right-side green is a traditional approach, with an unimpeded run of fairway to putting surface. The left-side green (the one that I was fortunate to play) demands a pitch shot over a wasteland. It’s a fitting tribute for the rest of us to play.
Be certain to parrot the starter, Leon’s, advice, and play up a deck of tees. Barefoot Fazio offers five par-three holes, so the fours and fives play that much longer. Remember, too, that you are on vacation. Why not treat yourself to some birdie looks?
The Jack Nicklaus course at Pawley’s Plantation emerged from a period of hibernation in 2024. The greens were torn up and their original contours were restored. Work was overseen by Troy Vincent, a member of the Nicklaus Architecture team. In addition, the putting corridors were reseeded with a hardier, dwarf bermuda that has experienced great success, all along the Grand Strand that is Myrtle Beach.
My visit allowed me to see the inward half first, and I understand why the resort wishes to conclude your day on those holes. The front nine of Pawley’s Plantation works its way through familiar, low country trees and wetlands. The back nine begins in similar fashion, then makes its way east, toward the marsh that separates mainland from Pawley’s Island. Recalling the powerful sun of that Wednesday morning, any round beginning on the second nine would face collateral damage from the warming star. Much better to hit holes 11 to close when the sun is higher in the sky.
The marshland holes (12 through 17) are spectacular in their raw, unprotected nature. The winds off the Atlantic are unrelenting and unforgiving, and the twin, par-three holes will remain in your memory banks for time’s march. In typical Golden Bear fashion, a majority of his putting targets are smallish in nature, reflecting his appreciation for accurate approach shots. Be sure to find the forgiving side of each green, and err to that portion. You’ll be grateful.
Bonus Coverage: Myrtlewood, Beechwood, Arrowhead, and King’s North
Arrowhead (Raymond Floyd and Tom Jackson)
A course built in the middle of a community, water threatens on most every hole. The Cypress 9 provides a few holes forcing a carried drive then challenge you with water surrounding the green. On Waterway, a drivable 2nd hole will tempt most, so make sure the group ahead has cleared the green.
Myrtlewood (Edmund Alt and Arthur Hills) and Beechwood (Gene Hamm)
A middle of the winter New Englander’s paradise. Wide open fairways, zero blind shots and light rough allow for shaking off the rust and plenty of forgiveness. A plethora of dog legs cause one to be cautious with every tee shot. Won’t break the bank nor the scorecard.
King’s North @ Myrtle Beach National (Arnold Palmer)
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19th Hole
Vincenzi’s 2024 Players Championship betting preview: Pete Dye specialists ready to pass tough TPC Sawgrass test
The PGA Tour heads to TPC Sawgrass to play in one of the most prestigious and important events of the season: THE PLAYERS Championship. Often referred to as the fifth major, the importance of a PLAYERS victory to the legacy of a golfer can’t be overlooked.
TPC Sawgrass is a par-72 measuring 7,245 yards and featuring Bermudagrass greens. Golfers must be patient in attacking this Pete Dye course.
With trouble lurking at every turn, the strokes can add up quickly. With a par-5 16th that is a true risk-reward hole and the famous par-3 17th island green, the only safe bet at TPC Sawgrass is a bet on an exciting finish.
THE PLAYERS Championship field is often referred to as the strongest field of the year — and with good reason. There are 144 in the field, including 43 of the world’s top 50 players in the OWGR. Tiger Woods will not be playing in the event.
THE PLAYERS is an exceptionally volatile event that has never seen a back-to-back winner.
Past Winners at TPC Sawgrass
- 2023: Scottie Scheffler (-17)
- 2022: Cameron Smith (-13)
- 2021: Justin Thomas (-14)
- 2019: Rory McIlroy (-16)
- 2018: Webb Simpson (-18)
- 2017: Si-Woo Kim (-10)
- 2016: Jason Day (-15)
- 2015: Rickie Fowler (-12)In this article and going forward, I’ll be using the Rabbit Hole by Betsperts Golf data engine to develop my custom model. If you want to build your own model or check out all of the detailed stats, you can sign up using promo code: MATTVIN for 25% off any subscription package (yearly is best value).
5 Key Stats for TPC Sawgrass
Let’s take a look at five metrics key for TPC Sawgrass to determine which golfers boast top marks in each category over their last 24 rounds.
1. Strokes Gained: Approach
Strokes Gained: Approach has historically been far and away the most important and predictive stat at THE PLAYERS Championship. With water everywhere, golfers can’t afford to be wild with their iron shots. Not only is it essential to avoid the water, but it will also be as important to go after pins and make birdies because scores can get relatively low.
Total SG: Approach Over Past 24 Rounds
- Tom Hoge (+1.37)
- Scottie Scheffler (+1.20)
- Tony Finau (+0.99)
- Jake Knapp (+0.83)
- Shane Lowry (+0.80)
2. Total Driving
This statistic is perfect for TPC Sawgrass. Historically, driving distance hasn’t been a major factor, but since the date switch to March, it’s a bit more significant. During this time of year, the ball won’t carry quite as far, and the runout is also shorter.
Driving accuracy is also crucial due to all of the trouble golfers can get into off of the tee. Therefore, players who are gaining on the field with Total Driving will put themselves in an ideal spot this week.
Total Driving Over Past 24 Rounds
- Rory McIlroy (22)
- Akshay Bhatia (25)
- Keith Mitchell (25)
- Adam Hadwin (34)
- Sam Burns (+39)
3. Strokes Gained: Total at Pete Dye Designs
TPC Sawgrass may be Pete Dye’s most famous design, and for good reason. The course features Dye’s typical shaved runoff areas and tricky green complexes. Pete Dye specialists love TPC Sawgrass and should have a major advantage this week.
SG: Total (Pete Dye) per round over past 36 rounds:
- Patrick Cantlay (+2.02)
- Scottie Scheffler (+1.90)
- Min Woo Lee (+1.77)
- Sungjae Im (+1.72)
- Brian Harman (+1.62)
4. Strokes Gained: Ball Striking
Prototypical ball-strikers have dominated TPC Sawgrass. With past winners like Sergio Garcia, Henrik Stenson, Webb Simpson, Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas, it’s evident that golfers must be striking it pure to contend at THE PLAYERS.
SG: Ball Striking Over Past 24 Rounds
- Scottie Scheffler (+2.02)
- Tony Finau (+1.51)
- Tom Hoge (+1.48)
- Keith Mitchell (+1.38)
- Will Zalatoris (+1.18)
5. Par 5 Average
Par-5 average is extremely important at TPC Sawgrass. With all four of the Par-5s under 575 yards, and three of them under 540 yards, a good amount of the scoring needs to come from these holes collectively.
Par 5 Average Over Past 24 Rounds
- Scottie Schefler (+4.31)
- Erik Van Rooyen (+4.35)
- Doug Ghim (+4.34)
- Wyndham Clark (+4.34)
- Matt Fitzpatrick (+4.31)
6. Strokes Gained: Florida
We’ve used this statistic over the past few weeks, and I’d like to incorporate some players who do well in Florida into this week’s model as well.
Strokes Gained: Florida over past 30 rounds:
- Scottie Schefler (+2.43)
- Erik Van Rooyen (+1.78)
- Doug Ghim (+1.78)
- Wyndham Clark (+1.73)
- Matt Fitzpatrick (+1.69)
7. Strokes Gained: Total on Courses with High Water Danger
With water everywhere at TPC Sawgrass, the blow-up potential is high. It can’t hurt to factor in some players who’ve avoided the “eject” button most often in the past.
Strokes Gained: Total on Courses with High Water Danger over past 30 rounds:
- Scottie Schefler (+2.08)
- Rory McIlroy (+1.82)
- Tony Finau (+1.62)
- Patrick Cantlay (+1.51)
- Will Zalatoris (+1.49)
THE PLAYERS Championship Model Rankings
Below, I’ve compiled overall model rankings using a combination of the five key statistical categories previously discussed — SG: Approach (25%), Total Driving (20%), SG: Total Pete Dye (14%), SG: Ball-striking (15%) SG: Par 5 (8%), SG: Florida (10%) and SG: High Water (8%).
- Scottie Scheffler
- Shane Lowry
- Tony Finau
- Corey Conners
- Keith Mitchell
- Justin Thomas
- Will Zalatoris
- Xander Schauffele
- Cameron Young
- Doug Ghim
- Sam Burns
- Chris Kirk
- Collin Morikawa
- Si Woo Kim
- Wyndham Clark
2024 THE PLAYERS Championship Picks
(All odds at the time of writing)
Patrick Cantlay +2500 (DraftKings):
Patrick Cantlay is winless since the 2022 BMW Championship but is undoubtedly one of the most talented players on the PGA Tour. Since the win at Wilmington Country Club, the 31-year-old has twelve top-10 finishes on Tour and is starting to round into form for the 2024 season.
Cantlay has done well in the most recent “signature” events this season, finishing 4th at Riviera for the Genesis Invitational and 12th at Bay Hill for the Arnold Palmer Invitational. The former Tour Championship winner resides in Jupiter, Florida and has played some good golf in the state, including finishing in a tie for 4th at the 2023 Arnold Palmer Invitational. His history at TPC Sawgrass has been up and down, but his best career start at The PLAYERS came last year when he finished in a tie for 19th.
Cantlay absolutely loves Pete Dye designed courses and ranks 1st in the field in Strokes Gained: Total on Dye tracks in his past 36 rounds. In recent years, he’s been excellent at both the RBC Heritage and the Travelers Championship. TPC Sawgrass is a place where players will have to be dialed in with their irons and distance off the tee won’t be quite as important. In his past 24, rounds, Cantlay ranks in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach.
Despite being winless in recent years, I still believe Cantlay is capable of winning big tournaments. As one of the only United States players to bring their best game to Marco Simone for the Ryder Cup, I have conviction that the former top amateur in the world can deliver when stakes are high.
Will Zalatoris +3000 (FanDuel):
In order to win at TPC Sawgrass, players will need to be in total control of their golf ball. At the moment, Will Zalatoris is hitting it as well as almost anyone and finally has the putter cooperating with his new switch to the broomstick style.
Zalatoris is coming off back-to-back starts where he absolutely striped the ball. He finished 2nd at the Genesis Invitational and 4th at the Arnold Palmer Invitational where his statistics were eye opening. For the week at Bay Hill, Zal gained 5.0 strokes on approach and 5.44 strokes off the tee.
Throughout the early part of his career, Zalatoris has established himself by playing his best golf in the strongest fields with the most difficult conditions. A tough test will allow him to separate himself this week and breakthrough for a PLAYERS Championship victory.
Shane Lowry +4000 (DraftKings):
History has shown us that players need to be in good form to win the PLAYERS Championship and it’s hard to find anyone not named Scottie Scheffler who’s in better form that Shane Lowry at the moment. He finished T4 at the Cognizant Classic followed by a solo third place finish at the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
The fact that the Irishman contended at Bay Hill is a great sign considering he’s really struggled there throughout his career. He will now head to a different style of course in Florida where he’s had a good deal of success. He finished 8th at TPC Sawgrass in 2021 and 13th in 2022.
Lowry ranks 6th in the field in approach in his past 24 rounds, 7th in Strokes Gained: Total at Pete Dye designed courses in his last 30 rounds, 8th in par 5 scoring this season, and 4th in Strokes Gained: Total in Florida over his past 36 rounds.
Lowry is a player who’s capable of winning big events. He’s a major champion and won another premier event at Wentworth as well as a WGC at Firestone. He’s also a form player, when he wins it’s typically when he’s contended in recent starts. He’s been terrific thus far in Florida and he should get into contention once again this week.
Brian Harman +8000 (DraftKings):
(Note: Since writing this Harman’s odds have plummeted to 50-1. I would not advise betting the 50).
Brian Harman showed us last season that if the course isn’t extremely long, he has the accuracy both off the tee and with his irons to compete with anyone in the world. Last week at Bay Hill and was third in the field in Strokes Gained: Approach, gaining 5.54 strokes on the field in the category.
In addition to the strong iron play, Harman also gained strokes off the tee in three of four rounds. He’s also had success at Pete Dye tracks recently. He finished 2nd at last year’s Travelers Championship and 7th at the RBC Heritage.
It would be a magnificent feat for Harman to win both the Open Championship and PLAYERS in a short time frame, but the reality is the PGA Tour isn’t quite as strong as it once was. Harman is a player who shows up for the biggest events and his odds seem way too long for his recent track record.
Tony Finau +6500 (FanDuel):
A few weeks ago, at the Genesis Invitational, I bet Hideki Matsuyama because I believed it to be a “bet the number” play at 80-1. I feel similarly about Finau this week. While he’s not having the season many people expected of him, he is playing better than these odds would indicate.
This season, Tony has a tied for 6th place finish at Torrey Pines, a tied for 19th at Riviera and tied for 13th at the Mexico Open. He’s also hitting the ball extremely well. In the field in his past 24 rounds, he ranks 3rd in Strokes Gained: Approach, 3rd in Strokes Gained: Ball Striking, 6th in Par 5 average and 15th in Total Driving.
Finau’s problem has been with the putter, which has been undeniably horrific. However, this week he will see a putting surface similar to the POA at TPC Scottsdale and PGA West, which he’s had a great deal of success on. It’s worth taking a stab at this price to see if he can have a mediocre week with the flat stick.
Sungjae Im +9000 (FanDuel):
It’s been a lackluster eighteen months for Sungjae, who once appeared to be a certain star. While his ceiling is absolutely still there, it’s been a while since we’ve seen Im play the type of golf expected of a player with his talent.
Despite the obvious concerns, the South Korean showed glimpses of a return to form last week at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. He tied for 18th place and gained strokes off the tee, on approach, around the green and with the putter. When at his best, Im is a perfect course fit for TPC Sawgrass. He has remarkable precision off the tee, can get dialed in with his irons on shorter courses and can get up and down with the best players on Tour.
This number has gotten to the point where I feel comfortable taking a shot on it.
Billy Horschel +20000 (FanDuel):
Billy Horschel is a great fit on paper for TPC Sawgrass. He can get dialed in with his irons and his lack of distance off the tee won’t be a major detriment at the course. “Bermuda Billy” does his best work putting on Bermudagrass greens and he appears to be rounding into form just in time to compete at The PLAYERS.
In his most recent start, Billy finished in a tie for 9th at the Cognizant Classic and hit the ball extremely well. The former Florida Gator gained 3.32 strokes on approach and 2.04 strokes off the tee. If Horschel brings that type of ball striking to TPC Sawgrass, he has the type of putter who can win a golf tournament.
Horschel has been great on Pete Dye designed courses, with four of his seven career PGA Tour wins coming on Dye tracks.
In a season that has seen multiple long shots win big events, the 37-year-old is worth a stab considering his knack for playing in Florida and winning big events.
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Fyearoldgolfer
Mar 16, 2017 at 9:41 pm
People spouting off with out doing the basic research of checking google. SSTPuring
Was developed by engineers interested in making a golf club better and matched
to the end user. I didn’t use it 20 years ago because of the expense, but now every
set of iron shafts I buy are pured. I now also get wood shafts pured to be aligned
in the hosel setup I will use the most in my adjustables, and aligned in my glue in heads
that still out perform whatever current club heads offered now. I see some noticeable
Improvements every 3 – 5 years, and only buy that head if it outperforms all my current
backups. 15 drivers that need to be culled down to 5. 36 fairway clubs, 7 hybrids,
15 sets of irons, I’ve lost count of wedges 60 or 70, 8 – 10 putters, plus another
4 for sentimental reasons. 8 driver shafts for adjustable heads, only 2 fairway shafts
for adjustable heads, more coming out of some of the unneeded drivers. Played this game
more than 47 years, I can feel a one swing weight difference club to club, my club fitter
tested me all the time without telling me what he was doing, I thought I could only
tell if it was 2 or more swing weights, but he taught me better. Go find your old set of irons
and have them fitted. Sure your own is not a current pw/8 iron, but I would bet you the cost of the new shafts that you play them better, and now your upper end iron is a 4 or 3 iron
that outperforms your new off the rack hybrid.
Iliketomoveitmoveit
Mar 16, 2017 at 10:33 am
I thought the article was pretty cool but still left out a lot of details on what really goes on in these vans from stop to stop. I for one would love to hear more about the back-end operations that make these tour events so successful year after year – from the tour van guys, the caddies, the volunteers, photographers, clubhouse chefs, and more! I think it’s a very overlooked aspect of golf operations that people don’t either seem to care about or even know what impact they have on making an event a success. I say more of these kind of articles/insights – the golf fans want to know!!
Tom
Mar 16, 2017 at 1:10 pm
+1… I agree
People's Champ
Mar 16, 2017 at 10:28 am
Great read and obvious the hackers don’t get it. You can’t win them all Brendan. Keep it up.
Hooker T. Washington
Mar 16, 2017 at 9:45 am
I love how everyone’s objective on here is always to find ways to bash the articles and/or the writers. Brendan, I want to say that I thoroughly enjoyed reading this, and the conversation/story style it was written in was somewhat refreshing compared to your typical articles.
To all of you who are speaking so negatively on shaft PUREing, it definitely does make a difference…maybe only a minute one in some circumstances, such as steel iron shafts, but noticeably in graphite shafts. Granted, you will only see or feel this difference if you are swinging very consistently day in and day out. I don’t know if they still offer them when you have the process done, but I had received a full page printout with graphs and explanations of the PUREing process when I had a bi-matrix driver shaft PUREd years ago…the shaft was stabilized by 94% compared to the usual logo-down install position…and yes I saw a significant increase in consistency!
So to all the naysayers…go put some work in on your swing or seek out a PGA professional for help improving your game…then go try a driver with a PUREd shaft
Jim
Mar 16, 2017 at 10:41 am
We don’t build ANYTHING without PURing . No one second guesses us. It’s built into our pricing. Every one of our (hundreds) of demo shafts are PURED and PROFILED. We can replicate the exact feel and performance of the club you used for your fitting because of this.
Puring is for real. It absolutely works. For those who doubt or simply don’t understand, here’s the best analogy:
Remember that set of irons – or maybe your current set where you could just KILL (say) the 4iron, but the 5 or 7 never quite worked or felt as good – as buttery as thar ONE perfect feeling club….
the perfect one had the shaft installed on the optimal plane – simply by chance – because of where the silk screened logo got rolled on….the other ‘evil’ iron – the one that felt ‘harsh’ or couldn’t draw the ball with – whatever – THAT shaft was put in with it’s SEAM on a detrimental axis…
Keep spending $48 a dozen on overpriced BS balls and stick your head in the sand on puring….it’s YOUR loss
carl spackler
Mar 16, 2017 at 9:03 am
Look at the seg golf website. The only reason he has a truck is for advertising purposes, so it makes sense that this article is just another advertisement. I’m just disappointed there are not more pictures of him making the shaka sign. Hang ten bro!
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 16, 2017 at 3:45 am
I have tried both Pured and non-Pured on the same equipment and found there is no difference. In fact, my handicap is now lower with an un-Pured set of clubs. If you get a kick out of paying lots of money to have an extra sticker on the shaft of your club, then knock yourself out.
Stevegp
Mar 16, 2017 at 12:33 am
Golf is indeed highly mental. I’m curious about the benefits of Pureing shafts. There are some true believers and I respect that. However, many disagree to its worth and value. Like them, I would like to see some facts and proof of the benefits it provides. Sometimes it is difficult separating facts from marketing spin.
The dude
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:02 pm
Fairytale story at best
CCTxGolf
Mar 15, 2017 at 9:46 pm
“Wow, now I get it,” she said.
Very bizarre way to write this article. Sort of a weak advertisement not trying to be an advertisement actually.
Bert
Mar 15, 2017 at 9:18 pm
I’ve identified the spine on graphite shafts, but are you saying KBS steel shafts are so out of round they need to be Pured? Is this process the same as identifying the spine? Seems like these high quality steel shafts would be perfect no matter how aligned in the club head.
Bert
Mar 15, 2017 at 9:20 pm
Or is it frequency matching?
Jim
Mar 16, 2017 at 11:13 am
Once you ‘find the spine’ – all steel shafts have one – even &500 graphite shafts have one….where do you put it? Prior to SST we would manually test each shaft for Freq, have to ‘spine’ it, then dry fit the head to FLO (Flat Line Oscillate) it, then Freq it again…
A set of our clubs come with the factory shaft logos pointed all over the place…it looks like someone just glued them together and didn’t bother to ‘line em up’ for a “nice display”. Nothing could be further from the truth. It’s way more work to build the best, most exacting products….
In house SST system saves time and guarantees every one of your 280-400 per club irons we build you feels perfect…
NO One buying top shelf shafts or custom clubs ever says “don’t” PURE it…
“I tried both Pured and not Pured clubs” – yeah, right…
Bert
Mar 16, 2017 at 7:55 pm
Thanks Jim, I’d like to learn more about the process.
Jim
Mar 17, 2017 at 12:19 am
I went to one of the very first intro seminars and workshops. John Kennedy @ Westchester CC hosted it and it was awesome. Go to their website. It’s all true. Every steel shaft has an internal weld. It produces a ‘spine’ Graphite shafts have several manufacturing process’ but most common is layers rolled on…each sheet has a start and a stop so sometimes they ‘gather’ more to one side than the other, thus producing a ‘ridge’ or stronger side…
Logos are silk screened on or decals applied as the shafts roll down a work surface, so have only a roulette chance of being in concert with this strong side.
IF this spine ends up at say 3 or 4 oclock, it would make the club harder to ‘turn over’ smoothly and produce a gentle draw…if it’s installed @ 4 or 5, draws easily become a larger sweeping hook. Put in at 4,5,6, the shaft feels ‘harsher’ and transmits more vibration. Some ot these may also produce more or less droop at high speed, thus making a single lie angle change number not as accurate with all irons (our high end fittings adjust each clubs lie angle individually as sometimes folks release longer flatter lying clubs different from more upright ones – the ‘human factor’)…
anyway, it works. And the machine was time consuming and manual. There was a high probability of operator error as one had to rotate a large lathe chuck smoothly and stop accurately on cue. There was no way this could be adopted to mass production.
the machine itself was 25k PLUS royalties! No “garage club builder” has one – or is gonna get one.
we waited for 2 years until they made us a ‘better offer’ and did the spining by hand, then freq’d it on 4 planes by hand to make sure we had it right, then dry fit the head and ‘bounced it’ up and down slighty turning the face so that the club would eventually bob up and down on a single plane – “Flat Line Oscillating”….
We got one of the first new fully automated machines (no more painstaking precision – or possible operator error, and we can do ten shafts in the time it took to do 3 before.
We also purchased a dozen asst shafts from Golfsmith ($10 up charge when everyone was charging 30 or 35 for a raw shaft) and 7 of them were totally off from when we retested them, SO, it’s quite probable anyone – not the trolls – who legitimately had it done and was unhappy simply had shafts that were not properly done…
What sold me – one of our regular ‘haunters’ had a Kmart Adams driver with the std Adams $10 graphite shaft and said he wanted to try it….I took his club and hit it a dozen times – all over the place. After we pured it, he and I BOTH hit it remarkably better. The hook became a draw and toe side hits on high speed video showed less than half of the torque that was opening the face which produced better gear-effect. It stopped several ‘toe-pushes’ from becoming further right toe-push-slices’…
BOTTOM LINE. It’s 100% legit
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 17, 2017 at 3:01 am
Jim, my friend, why would I lie. Im saying I pured my old set of irons (perfectly flo-ed them. Are there different ways to perfectly flat line?????) and now use a set of the same irons that have been reconditioned and the shafts have not been flo-ed/ pured. So yes I have tried both. Maybe if I was a robot I might have felt a difference. Cheers.
Jim
Mar 17, 2017 at 11:37 am
I’m telling you flat out….Your shafts were NOT done properly. Period.
After we got our first machine it took me maybe 30 or 40 attempts to really ‘get it’. My partner and I would check each others shafts we had done…It was a significant investment in time to get it dead on. We bought 10 shafts from Golfsmith to check their work (we needed some for stock anyway, and it was only a $10 up charge)
Only 3 came out dead on when we retested them….and a couple of em hadn’t even been prepped for PURING properly.
The shaft had to be prepped…any mfr stickers removed (pain in the butt – they never just ‘peel off’) and the butt had to be cut PERFECTLY square and the shaft seated by hand in the chuck. The operatot had to roll the chuck smoothly and consitently ‘hand over hand’ and stop perfectly on cue, then roll the opposite direction.
I’M CERTAIN yours were not done properly.
Also, much to MY surprise and dismay, PURED shafts DON’T FLO! …yeah, I was bummed….”cause I know all the work we did manually to find and orient the strong side and then ‘tweek it a little’ from there to get the Flat Line bounce did absolutely produce better feeling and more accurate clubs…I loved the feel as did our customers, making us a Top 25 Custom Shop – before we finally came to a deal w/SST…
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 17, 2017 at 9:49 pm
Your last paragraph is exactly what I did. Bare original shaft, spine only as a reference, strongest bend toward target, then fine tune flo with head on. I even rigged up a slip pulley so each Twang of the shaft would be consistent. If this is the wrong way, so be it. Perhaps my lower handicap and better play is more mental in the fact that the reconditioned set looks and feels like a 100% brand new set (which I also did the work myself) and I get satisfaction out of that, who knows? Cheers.
Jim
Mar 19, 2017 at 12:11 am
Sounds like you took the time and did it right! I think the issue we have here is terminology.
You weren’t wrong, you were mislead.
PURING is the SST proprietary term for what their machine does. It was hijacked years ago by folks – some out of ignorance, some out of malice, and some who never actually seriously checked out what it was.
A lot of us builders who were all kind of seperately working on this in it’s infancy and spent their time sweat and money figuring out the process (you and I both used) felt ‘challenged’ when this new, very expensive machine came out – as if all the stuff we were doing to make the best clubs we could – when so many other builders/repair guys – and OEMS didn’t bother taking the extra time to do all those extra steps…..
Problem was we were flying blind. We built (same type everything) clubs with the spine in at 9:00, 12:00 etc, but ultimately we were guessing, so we’d hit em over and over and have several of our ‘better stick’ regulars try them and we ended up with the spine up @ 12:00 as it seemed to provide the best ‘feel’ as folks reported, and seemed less likely to hook as opposed to the 9:00 position which ‘seemed’ to feel more harsh, and ‘turn over’ more than 12… again, all soley based on human feedback at the time…we used the Cheetah (pre trackman) on a full length outdoor range 10 years ago for this as it had become standard with our builds….We were well aware of SST, but it was still pretty expensive. Fortunately, they wanted IN to our shop, and after almost 18 months of back n forth and haggling, they made us a better offer…
Prior to getting the unit it’s successes were getting good press, and we never told anyone we ‘pured’ our shafts, we did absolutely promote how we ‘tuned them’ and promoted the manual FLO process with a video we’d run in house, or take the customer into the shop and demonstrate the process first hand.
Whatever you read, or were told about what/how to do what you did (love the slip release!) Simply never should have lead you (and A LOT OF OTHER FOLKS) to believe it was PURING a shaft…
the machine – designed by total NASA engineer types – takes the guess work out, cuts the time and it absolutely works….
If a new driver shaft is in your future, seek a well regarded cat in your area and have them do it for you. I promise you won’t be sorry
Regards & happy motoring. J
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 19, 2017 at 1:44 am
All good mate, sounds like I was doing similar stuff to what you were doing 20 years ago, lol. I failed to mention I also did this process on my old Fairway woods (910 Titleist with Aldila Rip A shafts) but never my Driver (913 D2 Aldila Rip A). I now have 913 fairways with untouched shafts and the same driver. Funnily enough, I have just this minute done a google search of SST Puring near me, Im in Wollongong south of Sydney NSW Australia, and only found 2 places in Queensland (1000+ Klm away) that does it.
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 19, 2017 at 2:46 am
All good mate, sounds like I was doing similar stuff to what you were doing 20 years ago, LOL. Happy golfing, cheers.
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 20, 2017 at 2:43 am
Arghh! Silly double post. I thought the first one didn’t post so I shortened it and they both posted. Doh!
Jim
Mar 17, 2017 at 3:32 pm
FLO / SPINING IS NOT SSTPURING….Folks have been alluding that – mostly silly articles or threads – sometimes worse; the mildy competent club builder. The guy @ big box repait counter who discounts the SST machine – as he will never touch one, the small shop guy or hobbiest – some of which no doubt read some of our work from years ago when we first started “profiling” shafts and figured out one side WAS stronger than the other….We had to see the proof SST PURING was for real, and it is. I can’t defend it enough here.
We balked at the price, and it was an expensive service….It is NOT related to all the manual work and time we spent to “tune” the shaft for the head (high MOI shaped drivers vs pear shaped heads)….that’s where it became – as good as we were – kinda ‘flying blind’ vs the machine….
When clubs are spined – first step to manually FLOing them, what side goes where? We all debated that back n forth – a case can be made for all 4 compass points, and the process, when done right did produce more stable & consistent clubs, but the biggest thing with irons was feel…
The SST machine simply does it better and absolutely provides both quantifiable & kinesthetic improvement….
tbere’s no doubt in my mind, your clubs were not done properly….
Peace
andy
Mar 15, 2017 at 8:53 pm
i wish there was a standard for buttcaps would make life so much easier.
Dave R
Mar 15, 2017 at 8:03 pm
Great article would like more of these very interesting about shafts.
Aaron
Mar 15, 2017 at 4:57 pm
How does Scott E. Garrison make money? Selling ads on his trailer? Invoicing players for his work? It makes sense when OEM staff players visit their respective brand’s trailer each week, but if Scott isn’t affiliated with any one brand, how is it worth his time?
MrBluster
Mar 15, 2017 at 2:33 pm
Forgetting all the “my dog’s bigger than your dog” chatter- At the Tour vans at all levels, do the players pay for any work that is done or is it all free. Do they tip the operators? How about the equipment available on the ranges and putting greens?
Sekim
Mar 15, 2017 at 2:33 pm
Bob “the guy asking the questions” is actually a well versed club-fitter in St Pete. I’ve been going to his shop for years and it’s a bit funny the way the article worded things. Bob knows all of that already. The tour van access is cool nonetheless…
Ummmm
Mar 15, 2017 at 2:46 pm
That’s because this is a fluff piece designed to get you to spend money on SST puring and hopefully from him.
charles lee
Mar 15, 2017 at 1:46 pm
For OEM manufactures to have all irons pured and perfectly built for tour players would force OEM manufactures to increase to price of clubs. Besides most Joes would never feel the difference. Pros are looking, holding, and swinging the golf clubs almost a 3rd of third of their lifetime. It makes a difference to them.
Blake
Mar 15, 2017 at 1:43 pm
More tour van content please
Artie Jenkins
Mar 15, 2017 at 1:39 pm
Good article and from someone who plays PURE’d clubs I can say they are great. I’m not awesome but I can break par once a week. I think the bad comments are from people who haven’t been fit properly and are showing their ignorance. Poor suckers. Bring your wallet to Jupiter and we’ll play!
Chris C
Mar 15, 2017 at 12:13 pm
The problem with this article is that it makes more than insinuations that Pure-ing makes a difference.
Major OEMs have top engineers, testing facilities, and golf experts, that develop and test new materials and technologies in hopes that they can find something demonstrably better, that still confines to the rules set by the usga and R&A.
Some technologies were milestones and have stuck around through time, i.e. Larger clubheads, titanium and then carbon and multi materials, face thickness innovation and every company is using a version of those technologies. Those milestones are few and far between.
Now, Because of how close we are to the limits of technology within the rules, Companies spend many, many millions of dollars and grasp at straws when needed to find anything that they can legally claim is better so they can market that claim and sell more clubs, even if it barely makes a difference to ball flight. The fact that no major OEMs embrace this as a technology that they can even claim makes a difference, should tell anyone with any common sense that Pure-ing makes absolutely no difference to your ball flight.
Will it hurt the golfer, no. And if it makes you more confident to spend money to “Pure” you’re shafts go ahead. But if you need to “Pure” your shafts to have more confidence, you might as well send me a check for whatever half the cost of “Pure-ing” is and I’ll just text you once a week telling you how awesome you are at golf. You’ll get more of your money’s worth…
Joey5Picks
Mar 15, 2017 at 4:16 pm
Manufacturers add a 1/4″ to the shaft, lower the loft 2 degrees and claim their clubs are the longest. People don’t care about Puring, they care about distance.
Chris C
Mar 15, 2017 at 6:38 pm
You’re absolutely right people do care about that more in the market, and for what it’s worth strengthening the loft and increasing shaft length does change ball flight and that’s something they can quantify and sell, unlike pure-ing.
Jim
Mar 16, 2017 at 11:30 am
Sorry….you couldn’t be more wrong. 20 years of PURING and the robot tests to prove it works. Has shaft manufacturing improved in that 20 years? YES! Dramatically too!
Every steel shaft still has a welded seam creating a ‘spine’ even woven ‘asymmetrical’ graphite shafts had a spine – it was on the mandrel they were woven around….
How can anyone ‘accept’ Frequency analysis / matching and not Puring?
WE ROBOT TESTED factory issue irons with small increments of off-center / off plane strikes then took the club apart, pured it and retested it and the results are quantifiable better….PERIOD…It’s a fact the shitworks. PERIOD…. AND, it’s like $ 10 a club now….a fraction of what it was even 10 years ago.
HONESTLY….IF YOU just got a set of APEX with 110gr Tour Recoil shafts and love ’em, you’re good! Why mess with them…..I HAVEN’T TAKEN MINE APART just to PURE them…..BUT if you’re reshafting clubs, or building custom from scratch, frankly, you’d be an idiot not to do it
Jim
Mar 17, 2017 at 12:29 am
….IT IS ILLEGAL to Manufacture a shaft with a spine deliberately to improve performance. It is NOT Illegal to FIND the spine and install it in a certain way….those crazy rules again…
Jim
Mar 17, 2017 at 9:02 pm
….sorry…one more bit to that….It would be illegal to install a shaft that was spined into the club in a position that would affect – or assit in producing a certain ball flight. Say someone wanted to help promote a draw or a fade, the shaft could be installed in a position that would absolutely contribute to that…
adjustable heads / movable weights aside, according to the rules, the shaft can’t be made or installed to help….who’d know? – kinda like wearing a wedge inside your shoe to invert your ankle and help prevent the foot from rolling – also illegal…as is ‘planing down the sole of a shoe to promote same….
lotsa equipment rules no one ever hears about….STPURING is legal, as it’s simply finding the most solid stable plane in the shaft – which is neutral for influencing ball flight – other than to reduce dispersion from imperfections in the shaft.
the consistent feel is just a bonus
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 18, 2017 at 6:25 am
Hi Jimmy, me again. I found the the most solid (strongest) and stable (perfect flo) in my shafts but apparently I didn’t do it properly. LOL. I really need that extra sticker on the shaft, hey.
Jim
Mar 19, 2017 at 12:48 am
…Hey Man they’re like the weights for balancing tires absolutely KEY components….lol
Funny, but for the first few years (flo or SST) the biggest beef people had was the shaft logos were all over the place…a couple folks reeeaally bummed out! “I need that for alignment” (?)… we never got into the trend that started a few years ago where dudes were “too cool” to have any logo visible – even asking for the grip to be installed upside down….If people want the stickers, we’ll give them to them. We don’t put em on anymore as part of the build…
too funny! 🙂
Jeffrey Purtell
Mar 20, 2017 at 2:50 am
All good, I slipped that one in there as a bit of cheek. lol. When I did my 910 fairways with the aldila shafts the graphics were all over the place with the factory A1 setting. Now my 913’s are untouched straight up graphics.
Chuck S.
Mar 15, 2017 at 11:40 am
This OPINION piece is nothing more than a dressed up ad for PURE Shaft Technology. If this tech is so great then why don’t all the other OEM trucks have them as well? Also, the style in which this is written is totally bogus. Who talks like that? Especially to their girlfriend…
The dude
Mar 15, 2017 at 9:58 pm
Spot on….
Daniel
Mar 15, 2017 at 11:01 am
The Pros all Pure their shafts because guys are willing to do it for them for free, then claim it was that process that helped them win however much money they won that week. The pros probably don’t even know the difference, and just say “sure” when one of these guys asks them if they want their shafts Pured. Then that same guy goes and tells all his retail clients “(Insert big name) has all of his shafts Pured, you are missing out if you don’t”
The difference is the retail buyer pays $30 per club and gets no value.
John O
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:57 am
Been wondering why my scores are still around 100. Need my shafts pure’d.
Miramar
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:48 am
The bonsai tree in the background is much more real than the PUREd shafts…
GolfnRide
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:41 am
An awkward, uncomfortable read…
Pete S
Mar 15, 2017 at 11:32 am
There’s a 0% chance that conversation went that way.
ken
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:38 am
Wow..The curmudgeon is strong in you three people.
Get this straight…You WISH you could be building clubs for the best players in the world.
Hell you’d all be happy just to be the guy that removed the grips prior to regripping the shafts.
Matt Abramson
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:07 am
Why did you have to write the article in story form? And then, to write the plot as you did, in such a weird fantastical form involving a women you claim to be you girlfriend? Confusing and awkward. When trying to scam people on a bogus technology, the use of logos (an appeal to logic/reason) is much more effective than the use of pathos. Trying to appeal to the emotions of the reader is very ineffective, ESPECIALLY when you write it the way you did – in fictional story form.
PapaBear
Mar 16, 2017 at 9:02 am
I loved it!
Chris
Mar 15, 2017 at 9:40 am
Lol. Pure-ing is still a thing? Making a living off of nonsense. Must be nice.
cc ryder
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:46 am
pure-ing is real and I feel as if it helped my game and tournament play.
Ummmm
Mar 15, 2017 at 9:35 am
lol@pured
The scam is still alive!
cc ryder
Mar 15, 2017 at 10:47 am
Scam? LOL… troll I say. Pured shafts work. Work for me and for many of the best in the world.
McPickens
Mar 15, 2017 at 1:17 pm
the technology and science is sound, the actual benefit or increase in performance is what is questionable and any gains are likely in your mind
Ummmm
Mar 15, 2017 at 2:42 pm
It took you two posts saying the same thing?
There is literally 0 scientific proof it helps. It was invented by garage club makers as a means to help revenue and be yet another thing those evil oem and big box stores don’t do.
It’s a scam pure and simple.
If you think it helped, since golf is very mental, great. But it didn’t actually do anything for you. This isn’t 1965 and shaft quality and consistency is such that it’s not something that is the concern these snake oil people want you think it is.
Jim
Mar 17, 2017 at 1:30 pm
You know nothing of which you speak.
spoken like a true troll