News
Steven Bowditch arrested for extreme DUI early Friday morning
Golfer Steven Bowditch was arrested Friday morning in Scottsdale, Arizona, on suspicion of “extreme DUI,” according to The Arizona Republic.
The 33-year-old was in the area as a participant in the Waste Management Phoenix Open and was taken into custody at 1:10 a.m. by the Scottsdale police with blood-alcohol content exceeding 0.2 percent.
Photo: Scottsdale Police Department
A civilian driver called the police after seeing a white truck “swerving all over the road,” the Arizona Republic reported. The truck, which Bowditch was found to be operating, didn’t move through two green light signals. Police needed to wake Bowditch, who was behind the wheel.
He was booked into Scottsdale City Jail, Golfweek reports, and was bonded out later that day.
Life is about choices. Last night I made a very poor one. I’m very sorry to those I have disappointed. I must and will, do better.
— bowdo (@bowdo83) February 4, 2017
Bowditch took to Twitter to apologize, and also issued a statement on Friday following the arrest:
“I would like to apologize to my family, friends and supporters, as well as the PGA Tour and Waste Management Phoenix Open for the incident reported today. As I intend to fully cooperate with the authorities.”
Despite being arrested Friday morning, Bowditch made his 12:25 p.m. second-round tee time at TPC Scottsdale. He shot 74 on Friday following a Thursday 74, and has missed the cut.
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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 timing of Lowry’s putter changeup was curious: Was he just using a Spider putter because he was paired with McIlroy, who’s been using a Spider Tour X head throughout 2024? Was Lowry just being festive because it’s the Zurich Classic, and he wanted to match his teammate? Did McIlroy let Lowry try his putter, and he liked it so much he actually switched into it?
Well, as it turns out, McIlroy’s only influence was inspiring Lowry to make more putts.
When asked if McIlroy had an influence on the putter switch, Lowry had this to say: “No, it’s actually a different putter than what he uses. Maybe there was more pressure there because I needed to hole some more putts if we wanted to win,” he said with a laugh.
To Lowry’s point, McIlroy plays the Tour X model, whereas Lowry switched into the Tour Z model, which has a sleeker shape in comparison, and the two sole weights of the club are more towards the face.
Lowry’s Spider Tour Z has a white True Path Alignment channel on the crown of his putter, which is reminiscent of Lowry’s former 2-ball designs, thus helping to provide a comfort factor despite the departure from his norm. Instead of a double-bend hosel, which Lowry used in his 2-ball putters, his new Spider Tour Z is designed with a short slant neck.
“I’ve been struggling on the greens, and I just needed something with a fresh look,” Lowry told GolfWRX.com on Wednesday at the 2024 Wells Fargo Championship. “It has a different neck on it, as well, so it moves a bit differently, but it’s similar. It has a white line on the back of it [like my 2-ball], and it’s a mallet style. So it’s not too drastic of a change.
“I just picked it up on the putting green and I liked the look of it, so I was like, ‘Let’s give it a go.’”
Read the rest of the piece over at PGATour.com.
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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.
- Check out the rest of our photos from the 2024 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.
…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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jc
Mar 1, 2017 at 4:31 pm
he was also charge with extreme eyebrows!!!! go see a barber.
russell platt
Feb 8, 2017 at 6:17 pm
Her is a great guy and who doesn’t have their share of problems.I thought the legal limit was .2 for Aussies?
Barry
Feb 6, 2017 at 7:52 pm
He’s been playing terrible, can’t blame him for drinking! But don’t drive you idiot
Guia
Feb 6, 2017 at 7:02 pm
Give the guy a break. We don’t know if him being intoxicated is a regular thing, or just a one time occurrence. If it is a regular thing I hope he seeks help and over comes it. If it is not, well **it happens.
cgasucks
Feb 7, 2017 at 8:01 am
If he wants to be drink his sorrows away, that’s fine but don’t drive drunk and potentially kill an innocent human in the process..
Dave R
Feb 6, 2017 at 12:20 pm
Good luck to you.
Jim
Feb 6, 2017 at 10:52 am
….74 after that night? Man, get it together bro…there’s talent in there….
setter02
Feb 9, 2017 at 10:17 am
Was going to say the same thing, that’s an impressive feat after a less than impressive evening.
Jim
Feb 6, 2017 at 10:48 am
He’s taking this head on. Good for him. Don’t know the man; wouldn’t if he bit me, but it really is a “Thank you, God” moment as a possible tragedy was averted….
on a medical note….while .2 is a pretty solid number, passing out @ .2 is far from AA Fueler status. He can fix this with a little support and self honesty….I wish him well
next M/C? Don’t go hang out in the Wasted Management gallery….
ChunkieChip
Feb 5, 2017 at 3:18 pm
What a haunting photo! If her were alive, would love to see Vincent van Gogh paint this guys mug. Oh my bad, Vince was a highly influential painter that grabbed the 20th century art scene by the ears…….errrr ear.
S Hitter
Feb 5, 2017 at 3:32 am
Wow. Absolutely hilarious.
GolfBum
Feb 5, 2017 at 12:54 am
You can`t change the past, but you can change the future. Hope to see better things in the future. Some notables made mistakes and came back stronger.
Best of luck mate.
Stylin'
Feb 4, 2017 at 11:45 pm
Man, he’s got a sweet head of lettuce. Baldies are jealous the world over!
Bob
Feb 5, 2017 at 8:43 pm
You must be balding. Cause guys don’t pay attention to that kind of stuff. Spieth is that you?
Double Mocha Man
Feb 6, 2017 at 5:14 pm
He has more hair on his eyebrows than most men have on the top of their heads.
Dr Troy
Feb 4, 2017 at 10:09 pm
Sad to see him do something this stupid. He’s a really cool guy but I know for a fact he loves the sauce. Being around the Cartersville CC tour pros from time to time, you see up close and personal how much some of them can pound the booze. Several others that I wont mention on here also…To echo one of the other comments, AZ does NOT fool around and it wouldnt surprise me that he gets 30 days. I hope not, but his BAC was so damn high.
Chuck
Feb 4, 2017 at 10:02 pm
How many people looked at this story and their first reaction was, “Hey, he’s still using the 2016 M2. I wonder what loft? And is that a Project X HZRDUS? Which one?”
Jason
Feb 5, 2017 at 12:47 am
Funny you mentioned that, it’s exactly what I thought! However, while I don’t condone DUI, at least he owned it. It would have been easy for him to go silent. He stepped up and admitted to his mistake. Makes me root for him even more.
Bert
Feb 4, 2017 at 7:51 pm
Mistakes are made and booze makes them worse. Nothing good comes from booze; been there and done it.
cgasucks
Feb 4, 2017 at 6:13 pm
Ok so Botwditch is friggin depressed and hit rock bottom and is drinking himself away. That’s fine, but that doesn’t give him the right to drive intoxicated and hurt or kill and innocent human being.
Rich
Feb 5, 2017 at 12:48 am
Thankfully that didn’t happen. Good people do stupid things sometimes. But I guess you’re perfect, right?
cgasucks
Feb 6, 2017 at 8:21 am
Of course! Don’t be stupid.
Mark Walgren
Feb 4, 2017 at 3:17 pm
Awesome! party like a rockstar! At least nobody was hurt. Just gotta be careful next time and not show just how intoxicated you are!
cgasucks
Feb 4, 2017 at 6:14 pm
I bet MADD would love to have a few words with you…
BooBunkie
Feb 4, 2017 at 2:54 pm
Unfortunate?! I’ll say! It’s unfortunate this idiot didn’t kill anybody!! Clown! Ok, here goes. If this had happened to Eldrick…..OMG!! Breaking News!!! Eldrick hammered, Eldrick hammered, Eldrick hammered!!!! 2-3-4 times the legal limit of adult beverages consumed during the week of a tourney! Missed cuts, broken family, busted back, ankle, achilles, immoral behavior, da da da da da da da., and on and on and on ALL DAY AND NIGHT.
Meh, Bowdy plays second round, missed the cut, meh no biggie. I love selective reporting of news stories. Ok, y’alls turn…..BRING IT ON!!!
Steve
Feb 5, 2017 at 10:51 pm
Do you know what unfortunate means? Why would you want him to kill somebody?
gwillis7
Feb 4, 2017 at 2:46 pm
unfortunate this happened, c’mon Bowditch!
B Moore
Feb 4, 2017 at 12:51 pm
Human like all of us…. good to see him taking this face on. Your in our prayers Steve, better days ahead!