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can you really tell the difference between the balls you play

SuperStroke
To some extent I can. There are others that are much better and can really notice smaller differences but I can notice what I like and don't like.
 
Played and loved z star today... Durability was awesome and felt great off irons. Little softer than QST. Now what do I do?
 
I can't hear great, but my hands and game are ball sensitive. Little differences seem large to me.
 
Give me a Chrome Soft, TP5, Prov1 and I likely would not tell the difference as they are similar. Give me a pure distance ball and I will notice. Feel and performance around the green willbe noticably different.

Current ball is a TP5.
 
Spin on green and then feel off driver... Hit some rocks and then tour balls. You can feel it.
 
100% I can. Maybe not off the driver, but the closer to the hole I get, the more the difference become apparent.
 
I have an easier time getting a ProV1X or CS in the air than some other balls.

Going to try a Srixon Z-Star next.
 
I have been playing Zstar and ProV this year and score the same with them. I am not certain I can really feel the difference.
 
I generally play colored matte balls by Wilson Staff, OnCore and Callaway. The WS and OnCore are pretty similar. But I think Callaway balls are better around the green. There is a noticeable difference around the green when I game Callaway Truvis.


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I do now, Chrome super soft .
Game changer.

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*Range Rat said:
I've done this recently and the difference is negligible. You may have had a different experience, but for me (been playing since 1977, as a single digit hncp for the last 35) golf balls are largely similar.
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I agree 100% with you......they're round and have dimples;)
 
Anybody being honest knows there's negligible difference.
 
Nope. Not enough to matter. I can tell if it is a different ball shot to shot and I lose one and pull a different ball. But if you had me test balls I wouldn’t know there was really a difference.


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Desmond said:
I have an easier time getting a ProV1X or CS in the air than some other balls.

Going to try a Srixon Z-Star next.
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The spin is awesome on the newest gen with updated SeRM
 
For me, I would likely be able to tell the difference between balls but only as to the cover. Putting and greenside spin would be the two areas where I can easily differentiate among the covers. But among urethane balls I couldn’t tell the difference among the brands unless I looked at the name on the ball.
 
If you are trying to judge differences in distances with the naked eye most of us can't. Our swing isn't that consistent, unless you've been given the nickname Iron Byron. Today's balls are so close that what you are really measuring is differences in your swing.

Short game is where the differences are most easily detected for most of us. Even then, you have to have consistent impact or you'll end up judging your contact swing to swing more than the ball. That's a problem for many of us.

How the ball feels off the putter is probably the easiest thing to detect.

Spin rates on chips, pitches, and approach shots with short irons vary a lot on a crisply hit shot. On fat or thin shots? Not so much. The green you are hitting onto has to be consistent too. You want the green to have the same receptivity. Where I live there is a point coming out of the rainy season when the receptivity of the greens, or spots on a green is highly variable. That is NOT the time of the year to be ball testing.

For longer shots there is a great deal of consistency in how far a ball flies at a given SS with two exceptions: how much backspin and side spin is produced. Some players that struggle with a slice want a ball that reduces side spin. Players who purposely hit draws and cuts hate that characteristic. Players with a slow SS want a ball with more backspin to keep the ball in the air and produce more carry. Players with high SS typically want a ball that produces less backspin, otherwise the ball balloons.

These are all things that can be seen. But you can detect them even more readily if you have a launch monitor.
 
I believe I can for the most part. Mostly feel, but also ball speed off the tee and greenside spin. Gotten pretty decent at distinguishing ones from others through the process of trying to find the right ball for me.
 
Honestly if it were a blind test I would be skeptical of what I could feel. I think I could tell between a distance ball, a soft ball, and maybe a tour ball. But there is crossover in feel for a lot of them.

I know that there are performance differences, but I will not be able to positively identify a ball blind.

So long as I got a Titleist, Bridgestone, or Srixon tour ball I would be happy.
 
*Range Rat said:
Anybody being honest knows there's negligible difference.
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Just tried to make light of the fact that I see that there is a difference, mostly from feel. If I was to take the names off the balls, picking out the difference in feel would be obvious especially on the putting green. Now when you get to premium balls, under the same scenario I think it would be difficult.
 
*Range Rat said:
I've done this recently and the difference is negligible. You may have had a different experience, but for me (been playing since 1977, as a single digit hncp for the last 35) golf balls are largely similar.
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Interesting. I currently am gaming two balls. The Chrome Soft TT and the Q Star Tour. It’s weird that I like them both so much because they are noticeably different. I’m pretty sure anyone and everyone could feel how much softer the QST is off driver.
 
Absolutely. I like the feel of the Duo, Supersoft, or Soft Feel better off the tee, a wedge, or a putter than I do a ProV1 or Chrome Soft X. But, I can spin a Chrome Soft a lot more with a wedge than I can a Supersoft, as expected.
 
I find a lot of almost new, hit-once golf balls because I live on a course. I’ve got a shoebox full of ProVs, TP5s, Tour Bs, Duos, Velocities, etc that I enjoy trying out for putting and chipping around the green behind my house. Differentiating between hard/soft/clicky/thunky balls isn’t that difficult. Off the tee, even a HH like myself should be able to tell the difference between an AVX and a Supersoft just on feel and shot shape. But does it really matter for scores? Probably not as much as you would think. A scratch golfer would still be scratch playing Noodles. That said, I definitely enjoy playing with Supersofts and the new e6 much more. The ball gets up high and goes more straight for me than when I play with a ProV1. My score seems about the same regardless, but hitting some balls is simply more fun.
 
I can tell the difference, yes. I didn't used to though, and said for a while that unless I could I wasn't going to worry about it. I have gone back and forth between playing one ball or the other and just playing whatever I found in the rough while looking for my last shot. I noticed over the years that I found an awful lot of fresh Pro-V1's while searching. I took that to mean that if it hadn't helped the last guy find the fairway it wasn't going to help me. In recent years however I've taken to picking one ball and sticking with it for the season. My theory being that at least I would have some consistency. That's when I started to notice differences between balls. I'd lose a sleeve and switch to whatever I had. Since I only save the good ones I find I do notice the Pro-V1 has a very pronounced difference off my mid and short irons. I did one of those demo days ball fittings once and the guy remarked that my spin rate was very high off my wedges. I'm not sure what that means or how to change it but the Pro-V seriously balloons on my short irons. I lose about a full club distance. I guess that could be a good thing if I was trying to drop and stop. Right now I'm locked in on the Vice Pro. Played a 5 dozen order last year and just got another 7 dozen delivered last week. So looks like I'm kind of set there.
 
OtterMan said:
I can tell the difference, yes. I didn't used to though, and said for a while that unless I could I wasn't going to worry about it. I have gone back and forth between playing one ball or the other and just playing whatever I found in the rough while looking for my last shot. I noticed over the years that I found an awful lot of fresh Pro-V1's while searching. I took that to mean that if it hadn't helped the last guy find the fairway it wasn't going to help me. In recent years however I've taken to picking one ball and sticking with it for the season. My theory being that at least I would have some consistency. That's when I started to notice differences between balls. I'd lose a sleeve and switch to whatever I had. Since I only save the good ones I find I do notice the Pro-V1 has a very pronounced difference off my mid and short irons. I did one of those demo days ball fittings once and the guy remarked that my spin rate was very high off my wedges. I'm not sure what that means or how to change it but the Pro-V seriously balloons on my short irons. I lose about a full club distance. I guess that could be a good thing if I was trying to drop and stop. Right now I'm locked in on the Vice Pro. Played a 5 dozen order last year and just got another 7 dozen delivered last week. So looks like I'm kind of set there.
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Crazy how many pro-v1s are always abandoned or lost. I wonder if those people can feel the difference and that's why they choose PROV 1 or because marketing tells them to.
 
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