One of the longest-running and most active conversations in all of golf equipment is the subject of blades versus game improvement irons. Over the nearly 20 years I’ve been writing this blog as “The Wedge Guy,” I’ve addressed this in various ways and always stimulated a lively discussion with my readers.
I hope this angle on the conversation will do the same, so all of you please share your thoughts and observations.
In the interest of full disclosure, I have always played some kind of blade-style irons, with only a few detours along the way. But I always come back to my blades, so let me explain why.
I grew up in the 1950s and 60s when blades were all we had. As a teenager with a developing skill set, I became a devotee to those models from the old Ben Hogan Company, and played the “Bounce Sole” model, then several iterations of the Apex line after it was introduced. Those few sets served me well into my 30s, when I became involved in the golf equipment industry. Having Joe Powell Golf as a client, I switched to his pure muscle back model called the “PGI.” They were certainly sweet.
In the late 1980s, I was handling the marketing for Merit Golf, who offered a cavity back forging called the Fusion, which was inspired by the Ben Hogan Edge irons, but offered a more traditional face profile. So, I switched to them.
Playing to a low single digit handicap at the time, I really didn’t see my scores change, but I just wasn’t making as many birdies as I had before. Openly pondering why my golf felt different, a regular golf buddy noted, “You’re not knocking down pins as often as you used to,” and I realized he was right. I was hitting just as many greens as before, maybe one or two more, but I wasn’t getting those kick-in birdies nearly as often. So, I went to the closet and broke out the old Joe Powell PGI irons and had an epic day with three birdies inside five feet and a couple more in the 5-10 range.
Those blades stayed in the bag until I developed my first iron design, the “RL blades” by my first company, Reid Lockhart. By this time, I had seen enough robotic testing prove that the most penalizing mishit with a blade was a toe impact, which mirrored my own experience. So, I sculpted a pure muscle back blade, but added a bit of mass toward the toe to compensate for that deficiency of all such designs.
I played those irons for 20 years, until I created the “FT. WORTH 15” irons for the re-launch of the Ben Hogan brand in 2015. In that design, I further evolved my work to very slightly add a bit of modified perimeter weighting to a pure forged blade, taking inspiration from many of Mr. Hogan’s earlier personal designs in the Apex line of the “old” Ben Hogan Company. Those are still in my bag, going on eight years now.
So, why do I think I can make a solid defense for playing blade irons? Because of their pinpoint distance control, particularly in the short irons — those with lofts of 35 degrees or higher.
I’ll certainly acknowledge that some modern perimeter weighting is very helpful in the lower lofts . . .the mid- and long irons. In those clubs, somewhere on or near the green is totally acceptable, whether you are playing to break 90 or trying to win on the PGA Tour. [Did you know those guys are actually over par as a group outside 9-iron range?] That’s why you see an increasing number of them playing a conservative game-improvement design in those lofts. But also remember that we in the golf club design business deal with poor “hits” only . . . we have no control over the quality of your swing, so the vast majority of bad golf shots are far beyond our influence.
But what I’ve seen in repeated robotic testing and in my own play, when you get to the prime scoring clubs – short irons and wedges – having a solid thickness of mass directly behind the impact point on the face consistently delivers better distance control and spin. In my own designs of the SCOR wedges in 2010, and the Ben Hogan FT.WORTH 15 irons and TK15 wedges, I created a distribution of mass that actually placed a bit more face thickness behind the slight mishit than even in the center, and the distance consistency was remarkable.
I’ve carried that thinking to the Edison Forged wedges by positioning much more mass behind the high face and toe miss than any other wedges on the market. And in robotic testing, they deliver better transfer of energy on those mishits than any other wedge we tested.
So, back to that experience when I switched back to my Joe Powell blades from the Merit cavity back forging, I can sum it up this way.
If your pleasure from your golf is derived more from how good your worst shots turn out, then a game improvement iron is probably the way to go. But if your golf pleasure is more about how good your best shots are, I think there is a very strong case to be made for playing some kind of blade iron design, at least in your scoring clubs.
Alright, fans: sound off!
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Drew
Sep 30, 2022 at 7:22 pm
So your playing vokey wedges, but game improvement irons of a different(non Titleist) brand. How would one incorporate blades into this setup. But some Titleist 8-PW blades or go with blades of the same manufacture as your game improvement irons? I think a part 2 may be needed for this article
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Not Biden
Sep 27, 2022 at 7:14 pm
What is the authors playing background? How often does he shoot under par? I take no advice from somebody who’s not scratch or better.
+3.1 myself.
Try
Sep 23, 2022 at 7:19 pm
Nonsense. Give me the largest game improvement iron you can find and you play your blades and I’ll still beat you
Brian
Sep 26, 2022 at 2:23 pm
Suuuure you will. It’s your story, tell it however you want.
MarkM
Sep 23, 2022 at 1:46 pm
I grew up with blades, as I started playing golf in the 70s. I have gone back and forth between blades and CBs but always seem to return to blades for the same reason you cited – the feeling of hitting that pure shot and knowing it will go the distance you want. Currently playing Honma T//W Rose Proto irons
Dennis
Sep 23, 2022 at 12:08 am
Don‘t you need a certain swing speed to play blades?
Brian
Sep 26, 2022 at 2:22 pm
In the 3 – 6i you do. If you don’t have enough speed, your gaps will bunch up in the mid-long irons.
Dan
Sep 22, 2022 at 10:49 pm
Thanks for An enjoyable read. I briefly had RL blades around 2003 and forgotI had them till I read this.
WYBob
Sep 22, 2022 at 7:56 pm
I agree with you 100%. I am about the same age as you and started playing forged blades in the mid-’60s on tight lies and some tough courses in Texas. As you say, they were the only thing available at the time. A modern GI club just does not fit my eye and I hit them worse than most modern MB irons. My favorite irons are still the Ben Hogan FTX from the early 2000s which was a mixed MB (E-7) and CB (6-3)set designed as an integrated set. I still have them plus several sets of Hogan Apex and a set of Hogan Fort Worth irons that I pull out from time to time to test my ball striking (and honestly for nostalgia purposes). However, as a concession to age, I have built out a combo set of irons that take advantage of current technology in an effort to regain some of the distance lost due to age. The primary difference from the FTX is that my current MBs run 8-PW. Thanks for your insights and affirmation that my current thinking about iron set makeup has some merit. cheers…
Nick
Sep 22, 2022 at 6:02 pm
This is my idea for my set of irons is to have players distance in the 4-7irons and get more blade like irons in 8-W
Karsten Solheim
Sep 22, 2022 at 1:24 pm
I had it figured out in 1982 Terry. Certain folks didn’t like it when I took their market share.
Stosh
Sep 22, 2022 at 12:46 pm
I completely agree with your argument. And during my years of trying and buying new clubs, I have found the a mixed set of clubs – blades in the short irons – gave me not only great consistency but the ability to hit a broader variety of shots with control. I encourage golfers, mid to low handicaps to try this set up.