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GolfWRX Morning 9: Pete B to NBC | Open ratings soar | Molinari’s magic wand

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In case you missed it, or you prefer to read on site rather than in your email, we’re including it here. Check out today’s Morning 9 below.

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By Ben Alberstadt ([email protected])

 

July 25, 2018

Good Wednesday morning, golf fans. .
1. Pete B to NBC
The PGA of America chief is the incoming president of NBC Sports Group.
AP Report…”Pete Bevacqua, who was behind the move of the PGA Championship to May and who oversaw a restructure of the U.S. Ryder Cup team, is leaving after six years to become president of NBC Sports Group.”
  • “NBC announced Tuesday that Bevacqua has been hired for a new role. He will oversee areas such as programming, marketing, digital properties, regional networks and all the golf business under the NBC umbrella, which includes Golf Channel.”
  • “Bevacqua plans to leave the PGA of America on Aug. 13, a day after the PGA Championship at Bellerive in St. Louis. In a letter to the PGA’s 29,000 members, President Paul Levy said John Easterbrook would serve as interim CEO. Easterbrook is the chief membership officer for the PGA of America.”
Certainly the most interesting question…What will this mean for Golf Channel and NBC’s golf coverage?

 

2. Molinari’s magic wand
E. Michael Johnson has the details on Molinari’s Bettinardi 
  • “How Molinari came to use the blade putter, however, is an interesting story. Molinari first tried a production-model BB39 mid mallet then, wanting a higher moment of inertia, switched to a production-model BB56 mallet. He liked that putter so much he even posted on his Instagram account about it.”

     

  • “Then, with feedback from his putting coach, Phil Kenyon, Bettinardi’s tour department as well as company owner Bob Bettinardi, he switched into his current putter, which had a heavier swingweight as well as a single sight dot alignment aid. To get to the proper swingweight, Bob had to mill the head to precisely 372 grams, which he did.”
3. Open ratings are in

NBC Sports and Golf Channel announced that the 2018 British Open earned a 5.0 overnight rating.

  • Who knew the Italian had so many fans? Of course, Tiger Woods being in contention could have had something to do with that figure, too. The last time The Open earned a 5.0 rating was 2006: the last time Tiger won the tournament.
  • The Open hasn’t surpassed a 5.0 rating since 2000, the year Woods won at St Andrews.
  • 1-1:30 p.m. ET was the highest-rated stretch (6.74). Not surprisingly, that was the time period during which Woods seized the lead.
4. Shack’s 5 things
Geoff Shackelford rounds up 5 key takeaways from Carnoustie.  
  • Tiger Woods is rounding into his old self
  • Europe is/was thrilled with the Molinari W
  • 11 years is too long to wait to return to Carnoustie
  • Major season is changing
  • The PGA Championship has a tough act to follow
5. Ranting about the Tiger
Randall Mell in his “Randall’s Rant” states, essentially,Tiger needs to remember he’s Tiger.  
  • “Here’s hoping Woods relearns….Yes, as a journalist, you aren’t supposed to root for players, but you know how we root for stories. And I’m not alone rooting for Woods to deliver one of the best stories in the history of all sport, to play his way through McIlroy, Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth, Jason Day, Justin Thomas, Jon Rahm and others to make a run at catching Jack Nicklaus and the Golden Bear’s 18 majors.”
  • “Hey, whether Woods actually catches and passes Nicklaus to complete the story, that’s up to Woods and the golf gods in charge of lucky bounces, but I’m craving the chance to see Woods make a run at Nicklaus.”
  • “It seems as if it’s all about how much Woods remembers now, or how much he has forgotten.”
Check out the full rant.  

 

6. Toe hang 101
A critical and oft-overlooked element of putter fitting. Peter Schmitt does a deep dive.  
  • “We have to assume the putter’s length, lie angle, loft, offset, static weight, swing weight, grip size, grip shape, etc. are already suited to the golfer. We also have to assume the putter fits the golfer’s eye, feels right, and inspires confidence. Assuming those have all been configured correctly, let’s address what toe hang can do for a golfer.”
  • “Let’s go back to our previous discussion about more toe hang encouraging more torqueing of the putter face. Ultimately, you need to ask yourself what you want to feel when swinging the putter, as toe hang will contribute a lot to how the golfer feels where the face of the putter is. A golfer who prefers a lot of toe hang will complain that he or she has no idea where the face is when swinging a face balanced putter. On the contrary, a golfer who prefers a face balanced putter will feel like he or she has to fight with the putter in order to square the face of a heel-shafted blade.”
  • “As a general rule, more toe hang will either encourage or better suit a stronger arc in the putting stroke. One of the more classic examples of this arrangement would be Ben Crenshaw’s fluid, swinging-a-door putting stroke matched to the iconic heel-shafted blade putter he so famously wielded over the years.”

 

7. Team Trump resort upgrades
The Trump Organization plans to spend nearly $200 million on of one its golf resorts in Scotland.
  • Bill Speros writes…”The money will be used to build homes, hotel suits and various sporting and commercial facilities at the Trump resort in Balmedie, near Aberdeen.”
  • ‘”Initial interest to our plans have been incredible and, subject to detailed planning approval, we are aiming to break ground next year,” said Eric Trump, who is running the Trump Organization during Donald Trump’s presidency. The “timing was right,” he added.”
  • “Local officials Tuesday received a formal application to build 500 homes, 50 hotel cottages, sports, leisure and equestrian facilities, along with retail and commercial space. An initial application for a new development was previously approved.”
8. DeLaet back on the shelf
Unfortunate stuff for the oft-bearded Canadian.   
  • Golfweek’s Kevin Casey writes…”Graham DeLaet hasn’t competed in a PGA Tour event since October. And the wait for his return will now be quite a bit longer.”
  • “The Canadian used the beginning of Canadian Open week to announce he’ll continue to be out of commission for quite some time.”
  • “DeLaet revealed Tuesday on Twitter that stem cell injection treatment from late last year has not aided his recovery from back issues and he will thus undergo back surgery, which will put him out 6-12 months.”
9. Place your bets
RBC Canadian Open odds, c/o Bovada 

 

  • Dustin Johnson +650
  • Brooks Koepka +1100
  • Tommy Fleetwood +1600
  • Tony Finau +1600
  • Bubba Watson +2000
  • Charley Hoffman +2500
  • Matt Kuchar +2500
  • Sergio Garcia +2500
  • Joaquin Niemann +2800
  • Billy Horschel +3300
  • Brandt Snedeker +3300
  • Kevin Kisner +3300

 

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GolfWRX Editor-in-Chief

4 Comments

4 Comments

  1. commoner

    Jul 30, 2018 at 1:47 pm

    Pete, ol’buddy, didn’t know you were around. So long. Take some of the party favors with you.

  2. Geohogan

    Jul 25, 2018 at 11:01 am

    Here is hoping that Graham Delaet figures out that its his restricted lower body that is the cause of his back problems.
    Would hate to see someone with so much talent lose it all to life long back injuries when it could be resolved with swing change.

  3. DB

    Jul 25, 2018 at 8:53 am

    So what are the specs on Molinari’s putter? All this talk about getting the right swingweight – what was it? Just curious, seems odd to keep talking about it and then never say what it was.

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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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Equipment

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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Equipment

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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