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2007 Payne Stewart Award – Hal Sutton

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Hal Sutton was awarded the 2007 Payne Stewart Award during the Tour Championship at Eastlake Country Club in Atlanta.

According to the PGA Tour, the Payne Stewart Award has been awarded annually in order to "perpetuate Payne’s memory by honoring a player who reflects Stewart’s respects for the tradions of the game, his commitment to uphold the game’s heritage, of charitable support, and his professional and meticulous presentation of himself and the sport through his dress and conduct."

When I think of Payne Stewart I remember class and lots of it. I remember a guy who stuck with an inferior equipment contract because he made a commitment to said contract, even if it may have hurt is game or his career at times. Most importantly, I remember him sinking that putt. The winning putt on the 18th hole at the venerable Pinehurst No.2 course during the US Open.  He was without his rain jacket sleeves and with his trademark plus fours. Payne made a once in a lifetime putt and then was graciously sincere while consoling runner up Phil Mickelson after having gave him the knockout punch for the win. I always enjoyed Payne Stewart, he was himself and a great role model for all. I can only imagine what it would have been like to be his friend or even enjoyed his golf presence for a bit longer in our world.

According to PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem, "Hal has been a prominent member of the PGA Tour for many years and has always represented himself and the Tour in a most professional manner. Hal selflessly has utilized his success as a golf professional to the benefit of our organization and countless individuals through his leadership and charitable work. It is a sincere honor to present the Payne Stewart Award to Hal this year."

Past Payne Stewart Awardees include Byron Nelson, Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer (2000), Ben Crenshaw (2001), Nick Price (2002), Tom Watson (2003), Jay Haas (2004), Brad Faxon (2005), Gary Player (2006) and now Hall Sutton for 2007.  Hal’s golf pedigree speaks for itself;  the 1983 PGA Championship, two Players’ Championships, four Ryder Cup appearances, Ryder Cup Team Captain, 14 PGA Tour victories all together. Hal’s reach stretches far beyond golf however. Sutton is also responsible for several charities of his own; the Christus Schumpert Sutton Children’s Hospital in Hal’s hometown of Shreveport, Lousiana and he has teamed up with fellow touring pros David Toms and Kelly Gibson to raise aid for Hurricane Katrina and Rita victims.


Anyone who knows anything at all about golf, knows what Payne Stewart stood for. It is quite an honor to be forever associated with Payne by being named a recipient of this prestigious award. Congratulations Hal Sutton, you deserve it.

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  1. Andy Brown

    Nov 15, 2007 at 2:36 am

    It was a tragic end to the career of a golfer who had just found his way back into the limelight winning the U.S. Open in remarkable fashion. Unfortunately fate cut short a life that was destined for much more.

    The Payne Stewart Award is a wonderful way to recognise the life of a great golfer and to keep his memory alive. Just a look at the list of awardees shows what an elite list this is of incredible golfers and even better human beings. It is a recognition of their achievements both on and off the field. To add to his 14 tour titles he has done a lot of charitable work which includes raising money for those affected by Hurricane Katrina and also setting up a charitable hospital for children. There are many people who achieve greatness in their respective fields but even greater are those who harness their fame and power for the greater good. Such people definitely need to be applauded and Hal Sutton definitely deserves the Payne Stewart.

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Equipment

Spotted: Tommy Fleetwood’s TaylorMade Spider Tour X Prototype putter

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Tommy Fleetwood has been attached to his Odyssey White Hot Pro #3 putter for years now. However, this week at the Wells Fargo Championship, we did spot him testing a new putter that is very different, yet somewhat similar, to his current gamer.

This new putter is a TaylorMade Spider Tour X head but with a brand new neck we haven’t seen on a Spider before. A flow neck is attached to the Spider head and gives the putter about a 1/2 shaft offset. This style neck will usually increase the toe hang of the putter and we can guess it gets the putter close to his White Hot Pro #3.

Another interesting design is that lack of TaylorMade’s True Path alignment on the top of the putter. Instead of the large white center stripe, Tommy’s Spider just has a very short white site line milled into it. As with his Odyssey, Tommy seems to be a fan of soft inserts and this Spider prototype looks to have the TPU Pure Roll insert with 45° grooves for immediate topspin and less hopping and skidding.

The sole is interesting as well in that the rear weights don’t look to be interchangeable and are recessed deep into the ports. This setup could be used to push the CG forward in the putter for a more blade-like feel during the stroke, like TaylorMade did with the Spider X Proto Scottie Scheffler tested out.

Tommy’s putter is finished off with an older Super Stroke Mid Slim 2.0 grip in blue and white. The Mid Slim was designed to fit in between the Ultra Slim 1.0 and the Slim 3.0 that was a popular grip on tour.

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Rickie Fowler’s new putter: Standard-length Odyssey Jailbird 380 in custom orange

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Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from a piece our Andrew Tursky originally wrote for PGATour.com’s Equipment Report. Head over there for the full article. 

…The Jailbird craze hasn’t really slowed down in 2024, either. According to Odyssey rep Joe Toulon, there are about 18-20 Jailbird putter users on the PGA TOUR.

Most recently, Akshay Bhatia won the 2024 Valero Texas Open using a broomstick-style Odyssey Jailbird 380 putter and Webb Simpson is switching into a replica of that putter at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship.

Now, Fowler, who essentially started the whole Jailbird craze, is making a significant change to his putter setup.

Fowler, who has had a couple weeks off since the 2024 RBC Heritage, started experimenting with a new, custom-orange Jailbird 380 head that’s equipped with a standard 35-inch putter build, rather than his previous 38-inch counter-balanced setup.

According to Fowler, while he still likes the look and forgiveness of his Jailbird putter head, he’s looking to re-incorporate more feel into his hands during the putting stroke.

He told GolfWRX.com on Tuesday at the Wells Fargo Championship that the 38-inch counterbalanced setup “served its purpose” by helping him to neutralize his hands during the stroke, but now it’s time to try the standard-length putter with a standard-size SuperStroke Pistol Tour grip to help with his feel and speed control.

Although Fowler was also spotted testing standard-length mallets from L.A.B. Golf and Axis1 on Tuesday, he confirmed that the custom Odyssey Jailbird 380 is the putter he’ll use this week at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship.

Head over to PGATour.com for the full article. 

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Details on Justin Thomas’ driver switch at the Wells Fargo Championship

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Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from a piece our Andrew Tursky originally wrote for PGATour.com’s Equipment Report. Head over there for the full article. 

So, with a couple of weeks off following his latest start at the 2024 RBC Heritage, Thomas sought to re-address his driver setup with the remote help of Titleist Tour fitting expert J.J. Van Wezenbeeck. About two weeks ago, Thomas and Van Wezenbeeck reviewed his recent driver stats, and discussed via phone call some possible driver and shaft combinations for him to try.

After receiving Van Wezenbeeck’s personalized shipment of product options while at home, Thomas found significant performance improvements with Titleist’s TSR2 head, equipped with Thomas’ familiar Mitsubishi Diamana ZF 60 TX shaft.

Compared to Thomas’ longtime TSR3 model, the TSR2 has a larger footprint and offers slightly higher spin and launch characteristics.

According to Van Wezenbeeck, Thomas has picked up about 2-3 mph of ball speed, to go along with 1.5 degrees higher launch and more predictable mishits.

“I’d say I’d been driving it fine, not driving it great, so I just wanted to, honestly, just test or try some stuff,” Thomas said on Tuesday in an interview with GolfWRX.com at Quail Hollow Club. “I had used that style of head a couple years ago (Thomas used a TSi2 driver around 2021); I know it’s supposed to have a little more spin. Obviously, yeah, I’d love to hit it further, but if I can get a little more spin and have my mishits be a little more consistent, I felt like obviously that’d be better for my driving…

“This (TSR2) has been great. I’ve really, really driven it well the week I’ve used it. Just hitting it more solid, I don’t know if it’s the look of it or what it is, but just a little bit more consistent with the spin numbers. Less knuckle-ball curves. It has been fast. Maybe just a little faster than what I was using. Maybe it could be something with the bigger head, maybe mentally it looks more forgiving.”

Head over to PGATour.com for the full article. 

 

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