club review redundancy ?
I got one like to learn a little about the technology and that specific club. I find myself thinking comparisons but I prefer when my authors do not tell me how a club compares unless like the reviewers here I can ask them personally and they might have some clue as to whether or not it is repetitive my game.
I think that’s the thing that sets THP apart for me. I’ve shared enough of my game abilities on here that I can ask some highly educated people and they can give me a comparison that may be applicable to me on the forum but doing that in addition to the information gathered from the product review.
I think that’s the thing that sets THP apart for me. I’ve shared enough of my game abilities on here that I can ask some highly educated people and they can give me a comparison that may be applicable to me on the forum but doing that in addition to the information gathered from the product review.
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I think it’s helpful to see comparisons. I consume the reviews here and they are informative but what really informs me is hearing what others see compared to something else. It’s why I love the forum.
Louis_Posture
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Obviously a dozen players offering testimony of on-course shot experiences is most helpful, but that type of information usually takes months to compile.
For the professional reviews, which are typically emerge within a week or two of the club's release, it can be useful for the reader or listener to learn about the shot tendencies seen by the reviewer, especially when compared to the previous version of the same club model.
And a significant factor to golf shots is the shaft, which for some reason the professional reviewer ignores. For example a new model driver or fairway wood usually has the option of one or two stock shafts. Some commentary about whether the shaft swings-feels especially boardy-rigid or loose, smooth or mechanical-divided etc... would greatly improve the review.
Yes, the effectiveness and consistency of golf swing of a 3 is very different from a 13 handicap, but there are some characteristics (especially for the shaft) that are relevant for all skill level players. For example three prominent YouTube professional reviewers are TXG, Rick Shiels, Mark Crossfield; and while all three of these guys strike their shots with the stock shaft , none of them offers any commentary about the feel or tendencies of that shaft.
There's different kinds of reviews. For example the official reviews here tend to focus on the technology in the club, why it was done and what it's intended to do. A lot of engineers jump between companies and golf is a small world, so i'm sure a lot of the OEMs are doing some stuff that is similar, with weighting, inserts , whatever
I find the ones here more interesting than the Youtube style reviews
Like i used to watch Crossfield sometimes back in the day but after a while it's just 7 minutes of different ways to say a club looks nice and feels nice.
I find the ones here more interesting than the Youtube style reviews
Like i used to watch Crossfield sometimes back in the day but after a while it's just 7 minutes of different ways to say a club looks nice and feels nice.
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- #56
My suggestion is to grab some clubs and start reviewing them. If you've got a way you think YouTube reviews could be done better, get out there and make it happen. More content is better for everybody.
Exactly.
A while back, there was a review on the Cleveland Halo hybrid irons. The folks who review clubs here are good players, but the author stated (I'm paraphrasing) "this wouldn't be a set I would buy for myself, but..." and he went on to comment about how well the club performs the way it was designed to perform. Very objective, very informative and without any snobbiness toward those of us who need a little help. That's when my opinion changed about the value of a club reviews on this site. These writers take the time to review products across the gamut of skill levels and that's pretty cool.
There’s no way to know when something is “new” and hasn’t been in the hands of the masses.
New release info tells you what it is
People buy
People say what they like or don’t
There’s your side by side review
Goggle the club you want followed by “The Hackers Paradise” and you’ll get all the info.
Works like a charm.
New release info tells you what it is
People buy
People say what they like or don’t
There’s your side by side review
Goggle the club you want followed by “The Hackers Paradise” and you’ll get all the info.
Works like a charm.
exactly what i was going to say. there are lots of youtube reviews that compare to previous gens.
Are you looking for club reviews or shaft reviews? Again shaft reviews will be way more personalized than club reviews (IMHO) as they will help or hurt certain swing characteristics. I would never get a club and shaft combo based on what some YouTuber suggests. I will see that more of them are using say a Denali shaft so that may be one I ask about in a fitting.
TXG you can learn a lot from their fitting videos. Ian has so much knowledge and can speak to it better than a lot of polished YouTubers. Shiels and Crossfield read off a script and while they know a lot more about the golf swing than I do, I wouldn't trust their opinion on any golf product. Crossfield for sure has an agenda and he is not so subtle about it.
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- #61
Which is why we have both.
Imo, comparisons have very little place in a formal review, @Canadan broke this down well last night, the review educates and then on the forum the other stuff can take place. Yes, we will do comparisons time to time when it’s within the same line, but going back and across companies just takes away from the product at hand and telling its story.
Louis_Posture
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My point is that a professional club review should include commentary about the stock shaft (s). Again, new clubs typically are offered with one or two stock shaft options. That shaft is a major factor to the performance of the club, yet information about it is mostly ignored by both the OEM and professional reviewers.
It's fine to suggest that "shafts are personal" or that a player should get fit to the shaft that works best for their swing. But the reality is that probably 95% of clubs are sold and played with whichever is the stock shaft offered by the OEM.
@Louis_Posture as an avid reader and consumer of club release videos and articles, club reviews, club comparisons and club tests I have to say that you have hit the nail on the head.
A release article to me is really nothing more than a rehashed company press release, especially so if the author hasn’t hit the clubs in question prior to publication. Then in the club review there is a significant amount of regurgitating the talking points that the Manufacturers have provided in their marketing. Which then gets communicated repeatedly by the different outlets.
Ironically as the barrier to entry in becoming a club reviewer gets further and further reduced to anyone calling themselves an “influencer” and capable of making a phone camera video and posting it on social media it is becoming suprisingly rare to get an authentic reaction of the reviewer/club tester to get at some of the intangibles of the club and their impression of it in hand and in play.
I certainly understand that none of these folks want to “bite the hand that feeds them” and it is quite awkward to “call someone’s baby ugly” especially when you’ve developed a personal relationship with people from the company whose products you are reviewing.
The Ping G425 club reviews are a great example of people “tactfully” trying to dance around the fact that the driver was obnoxiously loud and to some including me “off putting”. Then when the Ping G430 reviews came out there was lots of praise for the improvement in sound after the fact.
On the THP forum and in other peer networks you get a much broader spectrum of reactions to different products. There is no doubt a lot of fanboying from brand loyalists and also some sh** talking from the haters, but there are enough people willing to give their unfiltered thoughts that the new club was or wasn’t a better performer than the previous model, or performed the same but looked and sounded different or was more or less forgiving than the last version.
Increasingly I’ve come to the conclusion that despite all the claims of whether something should be a good fit and work for me or not there is no substitute for just trying the club or shaft or whatever, preferably over multiple rounds of golf, because you just don’t know if it is going to work for you or not until you do.
Also have come to the conclusion that when you do find a particular piece of equipment that really works for you be very reluctant to make any changes to it and keep it in the bag as long as it still performs well for you despite the temptation to get something new and shiny just because.
I’ve started to learn when playing in competitive events that the guys with the newest clubs aren’t usually the ones that beat you. Very often it‘s the guy with the well worn bag and clubs that all have a dime sized wear mark on the face that are going to be tough. He may have a few newer clubs, like wedges, but usually there is a whole bunch of trusty clubs in the bag of varying vintage, some surprisingly old, that do exactly what he wants them to do and go to the yardages he needs.
I’m trying to be more like that guy, but I recognize it is hard to resist the new shiny.
A release article to me is really nothing more than a rehashed company press release, especially so if the author hasn’t hit the clubs in question prior to publication. Then in the club review there is a significant amount of regurgitating the talking points that the Manufacturers have provided in their marketing. Which then gets communicated repeatedly by the different outlets.
Ironically as the barrier to entry in becoming a club reviewer gets further and further reduced to anyone calling themselves an “influencer” and capable of making a phone camera video and posting it on social media it is becoming suprisingly rare to get an authentic reaction of the reviewer/club tester to get at some of the intangibles of the club and their impression of it in hand and in play.
I certainly understand that none of these folks want to “bite the hand that feeds them” and it is quite awkward to “call someone’s baby ugly” especially when you’ve developed a personal relationship with people from the company whose products you are reviewing.
The Ping G425 club reviews are a great example of people “tactfully” trying to dance around the fact that the driver was obnoxiously loud and to some including me “off putting”. Then when the Ping G430 reviews came out there was lots of praise for the improvement in sound after the fact.
On the THP forum and in other peer networks you get a much broader spectrum of reactions to different products. There is no doubt a lot of fanboying from brand loyalists and also some sh** talking from the haters, but there are enough people willing to give their unfiltered thoughts that the new club was or wasn’t a better performer than the previous model, or performed the same but looked and sounded different or was more or less forgiving than the last version.
Increasingly I’ve come to the conclusion that despite all the claims of whether something should be a good fit and work for me or not there is no substitute for just trying the club or shaft or whatever, preferably over multiple rounds of golf, because you just don’t know if it is going to work for you or not until you do.
Also have come to the conclusion that when you do find a particular piece of equipment that really works for you be very reluctant to make any changes to it and keep it in the bag as long as it still performs well for you despite the temptation to get something new and shiny just because.
I’ve started to learn when playing in competitive events that the guys with the newest clubs aren’t usually the ones that beat you. Very often it‘s the guy with the well worn bag and clubs that all have a dime sized wear mark on the face that are going to be tough. He may have a few newer clubs, like wedges, but usually there is a whole bunch of trusty clubs in the bag of varying vintage, some surprisingly old, that do exactly what he wants them to do and go to the yardages he needs.
I’m trying to be more like that guy, but I recognize it is hard to resist the new shiny.
What i also like here is there is usually a good paragraph or two explaining what Callaway/TMAG or whomever was intending to do by placing a weight port here, or another design feature there. If i recall there was one that had results of millions of shots, that showed where the most common misses are from amateurs with drivers, and how that helped shape the product etc. I think it was for the Smoke AI
Stuff like that i find very interesting too.
i've been doing ball reviews here for THP as a panelist. And i try to add as much value as i can ---But i always also point out that i am very low launch and low spin, so what works for me needs to be looked at in that context. You're always gonna run into this too when you talk performance.
Why do they not all use the same shaft year after year or even product to product? The OEMs test and select a shaft/head combo that would benefit most players that just picked it up off the shelf. There are fine tunes for some players that will use upcharge shafts but the OEMs are not out there just picking some random shaft to throw into the club.
There are a ton of articles and YouTube videos that talk about the stock shafts that are offered.
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- #66
So if I play a new driver and absolutely hate it, you don’t think that’s not going to bring a bias? You don’t think that may skew a number or two if it’s a terrible fit for me?
Reviews are hard. I do not envy our staff writers one bit.
I've given a lot of though to comparison type reviews, how would that even work? It's literally not possible. Trying to compare 1 club to 50 just doesnt even make sense.
Every time someone posts a video comparing this years driver compared to one from 10 or 20 years ago there are always holes that are poked in the final conclusion the tester shows. Not enough shots, not the same shaft, that shaft wasn't available in 2004, so on and so forth. There is no winning at all....agreed.
No winning at all.
Louis_Posture
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Yes, no doubt reviews are hard to do. For the launch of the product I believe OEM's could help the cause by providing more information such as results from player testing , club head size, how and why the stock shaft was selected etc... For example, Mizuno web site has an "iron comparison" table which provides heel-to-toe length and face height numbers. This is very helpful to anyone curious about how a new Mizuno iron model compares to a previous version. As far as I know Mizuno is the only company which provides these numbers, but it's information other brands could easily offer.
Sometimes you have to actually hit the damn things yourself and see what works for YOU. We get a front row seat to what’s new by people with relentless enthusiasm for golf equipment, yet it’s not enough. 
I’m still waiting for a review and comparison between Ping i3 Blades and i230’s. I mean, what kinda place is this????
I’m still waiting for a review and comparison between Ping i3 Blades and i230’s. I mean, what kinda place is this????
I do comparison reviews for myself when choosing clubs I want to play. I compare that one club to my gamer and others models I am looking at.
We all do. I was more speaking to attempting to publish that kind of information to appease the masses.
It would be interesting to see a robot test all of the drivers at like 95mph, 100mph ,105mph and 110mph or something. Put the same shaft in all the heads (could be different shaft for the different SS, but same across the heads)
And then take readings on center contact, heel and toe contact
I'd definitely find that interesting. But im guessing if some Youtuber tried to put that together, they would be quietly killed. I don't think any of the companies want people doing that but that's just my opinion
Golf.com does robot testing at 95 mph across 9 points on the face https://golf.com/tag/robotest/?catfilter=39