The TRUTH About Irons (What Big Brands Won’t Tell You)

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Golfers have such a hard time knowing the truth about irons and fall victim to marketing claims. In this video, I’ll teach you how to look past those claims and learn more about how drivers ACTUALLY work.

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This took me over a decade to learn, and I’m going to teach it to you in less time than it takes to watch an episode of Seinfeld. So many golfers are making the game harder for themselves by playing the wrong irons. In this video, I’m going to teach you how to look past the marketing claims and become a smarter consumer by learning about club fitting and what makes irons perform differently from one another. Hi, my name is John Sherman. I’m the author of the best-selling book, The Four Foundations of Golf, co-host of the Sweet Spot podcast, PGA Tour Coach, and most importantly, I’m a golfer just like you. Everyone refers to their wedges and their putter as their scoring clubs. But the truth of the matter is is that golfers of all levels separate from one another with their iron play. So, that means if you get your equipment dialed in properly, you can hit more greens and lower your handicap significantly. I promise you that is not clickbait hype. that is real. For the past decade, I’ve been fortunate to learn from one of the best club fitters in the industry, Woody Lashen from Pete’s Golf. And I’m going to share a ton of the knowledge that he’s shared with me over the years. Before I get into topics like the differences between game improvement and players irons, there’s one crucial element that golfers overlook, and it’s making them hit more offline shots. I want to talk about lie angle first. Lie angle is how the sole of the club enters the turf at impact. Ideally, you should contact the ground evenly. Here’s the simple version. For a right-handed golfer, if the toe is up at impact, the ball is going to go left. And if the heel is up at impact, it’s going to go more right. And as loft increases, lie angle has more influence on shot direction. But as you go through your iron set, if your lie angle is off, it’s going to be harder to hit your shots on target. For example, the toe of my club used to be very upright and it was exaggerating my hooks and making more of a left miss on the golf course. But when Woody from Pete’s Golf flattened them about 2 to 3°, it helped tighten my curvature and hit my shots straighter. Years later, my club head delivery changed and we just had to do the exact opposite because my heel was way in the air at impact, which was causing more of a right miss. Y angle also will affect your ability to find the center of the club face which is arguably the most important skills for hitting greens and yes lowering your scores. So this is a really big deals and a lot of golfers have no idea what’s going on in their iron set. So even if you’re not going to purchase a new set of clubs, this is something that you should get checked out every few years because it might be a very lowhanging fruit on how to hit straighter shots. And this is a recurring theme with all equipment. You don’t want to make golf harder for yourself by playing the wrong specs. Now, lie angle is really critical, but it’s definitely not the end of the story because the truth is a lot of golfers are playing the wrong iron head altogether. And what the club companies are telling you about blades, forge irons, or loftjacking isn’t the full picture. When most golfers think about irons, their first question is, “What head should I play? Can I play blades or a players iron? or should I swallow my pride and get some game improvement clubs? Now, here’s the truth that Woody shared with me over the years. Game improvement irons are built to help. They’ve got wide soles, deep cavities, and sometimes hollowed out bodies. All of that pushes the center of gravity lower on the club face. And center of gravity is arguably the most important part of your irons. It’s going to affect how the ball launches, the spin rate, and ultimately the distance and trajectory of all of your shots on the course. Something that I always try and remind golfers is that static loft on a club is just a starting point. You could take three different irons with the same exact loft and they could all fly at different trajectories and distances based on where the center of gravity is. Now, becoming a better iron player is mostly about distance and trajectory control. So, personally, I’m not interested in a seven iron that can add 15 yards of distance. I want the seven iron that gives me the tightest dispersion between my m hits and my good strikes. That’s how you hit more greens and make more easy pars when you can hit more of your shots to pin high of your intended yardage. Now, a lower center of gravity does the following. You’re going to get more forgiveness, especially when you miss it low on the club face. And the side effect is that it launches the ball higher, which a lot of golfers need help with. That’s why game improvement irons are stamped with stronger lofts. You’ll hear a lot of golfers complain about loftjacking, but in reality, it’s a design trade-off. The stronger loft keeps the ball from ballooning because the center of gravity is so low on the club face. Without that pairing, the ball would just fly too high and then fall out of the sky. So, if you’re someone who needs help with getting the ball up in the air and keeping your m hits playable, game improvement irons are a really smart choice. And they’re not all created equally. So, you’ve got to test them, of course. Now, the trade-off is that you might run into gapping issues at the bottom of the bag, which you’ll have to sort out with your wedges, in particular, a gap wedge. Now, I want to quickly tell you about the sponsor of this video, Factor. Eating clean is really important to my wife and I, but it’s hard to do with a busy schedule and our kids. So, instead of ordering a quick cheat meal when we’re short on time and can’t cook, we fill in with Factor’s fresh ready-made meals that are never frozen. We’re simply throwing them in the microwave for 2 minutes and we are good to go. Now, Factor just introduced their healthiest menu yet. It is massive. They’ve doubled it to over 80 rotating weekly meals to choose from. So, whatever type of diet you’re on, whether it’s high protein or low carb, you can choose between a ton of different cuisines. And to be honest, they all taste great. I’ve tried many of them at this point. Now, I’m doing my best to work out and eat clean. And when we don’t have time to cook, these meals are our savior because they’re so quick. So, if you want to hit your wellness goals, we have a special offer for our YouTube channel. Head to factor75.com or click the link in the description below and use promo code practical FB50 to get 50% off plus free breakfast for the year. That’s practical FB50 atfactor75.com to get 50% off plus free breakfast for one year. Now, let’s get back to the irons. So, players irons and blades are the other end of the spectrum from game improvement irons. They’re going to have higher center of gravity, smaller head profiles, and a lot less forgiveness. These are designed for golfers who are already striking the center of the face. Now, historically, blades had the center of gravity pushed towards the heel of the club, but modern designs have moved it more towards the center, which makes them more stable. Then you’ve got the middle category, which are players distance irons, and these have become really popular over the last decade. They look sleeker, are more like a player’s iron, and they hide some forgiveness and distance inside of them. Think of these as a compromise for golfers who want a classic look, but still need some help when they mishit it. Don’t be afraid to use irons like these. Jordan Spe was one of the best iron players in the world during his epic run in 2015 and 2016, but he also used Titleless AP2 irons, which had a ton of forgiveness built in them compared to pure blade irons that some other Tour players were using at that time. Now, I consider myself a very good iron player. It’s one of the main reasons I’ve stayed close to a plus handicap for a decade, and I use these types of irons as well. Now, let’s bust a few myths Woody talked about in our podcast episode, which I’ll share in the link in the description if you really want to go in depth on this topic. First off, forged irons do not automatically mean soft or better. You can have a forged iron that feels harsh, and you can have a cast iron that feels buttery. Tour pros can use cast irons. High handicappers can use forged irons. There is no rule. Now, the second myth, workability. The old idea was that blades were more workable than other irons. Now, in theory, a higher MOI iron resist twisting and wants to return to square, which could make shaping shots a bit harder, but Woody has told me many times that’s mostly a myth. He works with a two-time National Club Pro champion who plays very forgiving irons. I’ve played with this guy, he’s incredible, and he can still hit every shot in the book. draws, fades, and he gets the benefit of forgiveness when he misses the center of the club face. So, for 99% of golfers, consistency is far more important than this illusion of workability. Now, a quick note on blended sets. You’ll see a lot of golfers playing one type of head in long irons and another head in their short irons. Woody said this can work for really skilled players, but he prefers match sets for most golfers. That’s because when you mix, you’re introducing different centers of gravity. A sixiron with one CG and a seveniron with a totally different CG can make consistency harder. And finally, here’s something that is rarely discussed. Turf interaction. Now, not all soles are created equal with irons. If you’re a picker who barely takes a divot, you’ll benefit from a bit of a sharper leading edge and less bounce in your irons. But if you’re more of a digger taking beaver pelt divots, you’ll need a rounder sole with more bounce so you don’t bury the club as much. So, to wrap this up, when it comes to iron heads, do not get stuck on labels, brand names, or myths. It’s not about whether it’s forged, or whether it’s a blade, or whether the loft is jacked. It’s really about whether the head gives you the right launch, spin, forgiveness, and turf interaction for your golf swing. That’s how you find irons that actually can help you score better. That is the goal. You mostly want to control your distance and trajectory, hit more greens, and make more stress-free pars. Don’t make golf harder for yourself by playing an iron that might seem cooler but is completely wrong for you. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tested irons that I really wanted to love, but they were just wrong for my game and they would have cost me strokes on the course because I would have had really bad distance control. And lastly, when you do get the right iron head, it could easily last 7 to 10 years before you need to make a change because of better technology or the club eventually wears out for better ball strikers. Now, before we move on to shafts, let me quickly talk about set makeup and how your irons should fit into the rest of your bag. Now, every golfer is going to reach a point where longer irons stop adding distance or they’re just too hard to launch into the air. That’s when it might make sense to swap in a hybrid or a fairway wood for consistency. So, I personally use a hybrid because I’m getting more distance and more height and there’s more forgiveness built into the club versus a normal threeiron. Now, at the bottom of the bag, you want to do your best to avoid huge distance gaps based on your pitching wedge distance and your next wedge. For a lot of players, this is why you need a gap wedge. And I will do a separate video on fairway woods and wedges down the line. All right, now let’s move on to what can really make irons feel and perform differently, the shaft. Now, in my last video on drivers, I mentioned how Woody Lashen often starts with picking the driver head first in a fitting. But in iron fittings, him and his team will often start with the shaft. Here’s why. The shaft has more control over how consistently you can strike the center of the club face. And if the shaft isn’t right in terms of the weight profile, and the flex, then even if the head design is good, you won’t be able to deliver it consistently. Now, Woody said that the head still influences ball flight the most. But in irons, shaft fitting is usually the priority to get repeatability. So, let me give you a quick crash course on iron shafts to make you a smarter consumer. Let’s start with weight. Iron shafts can range anywhere from about 40 g in ultra light graphite up to about 135 or even 140 g in heavy steel. Now, every 7 to 10 g is going to make a difference. Now, golfers think weight is about strength. It’s not. It’s really about your tempo and your swing length. Two golfers can both swing a 7iron 90 mph. One of these golfers can have a smooth flowing move that can handle a lighter shaft. The other golfer can rip it back short and fast and need something heavier to stay in control. If the shaft is too light, it’ll feel like you’re swinging air and you’ll struggle to hit the center of the face. If it’s too heavy, then it feels like you’re dragging a sledgehammer and you’ve got the same exact problem. Get it right and you’re suddenly finding the center of the club face more consistently. Next up is profile. That’s where the shaft bends near the grip in the middle or closer to the tip of the club. This is why two shafts that both say stiff can weigh the same and feel completely different to you. One of them might feel smooth and lively where the other one might feel like a broomstick. Shaft profile is less about changing your ball flight and more about giving you a feel that lets you repeat your swing. The wrong profile usually shows up as inconsistency. shots that are going left, shots that are going right, and nothing feels quite right. Now, let’s move on to flex. Here’s the dirty little secret that I try and remind all golfers. There are no standards with flex. One company’s stiff might be another company’s regular. And flex isn’t just about swing speed. It’s how you load the shaft, particularly in the transition of your swing. Two golfers can swing at exactly the same speed and need completely different flexes depending on their swing tempo and how much load they’re applying in transition. So when someone says, “I play stiff shafts,” that statement really means nothing unless you know how they deliver the club and how that specific shaft performs. Bottom line, if you get the wrong flex and profile, it can make the club feel horrible and you’ll hit less shots on target. Now, what about graphite versus steel shafts? Graphite shafts can obviously be made much lighter down to the 40 to 60 g range. So, they’re a great option if you need to save weight. They also are going to give you more options in terms of bend profiles at these lighter weights. Now, steel shafts tend to live in the 85 to 135 g range. And because only a small handful of companies actually make them, quality control is going to be more consistent. Now, that doesn’t mean graphite shafts are bad. It just means there’s more variation from brand to brand. Now, there are more fitting options than ever with graphite. I actually played with some really heavy iron shafts and was recently able to match the same weight to graphite. I made this change to reduce the amount of vibration going through the club to give my elbows a bit of a break. But honestly, I would have never known that the shafts were graphite if you didn’t tell me. Now, another thing that comes up when people get fit is getting a stock or aftermarket shaft. Aftermarket shafts usually have higher tolerances, higher quality materials, and more consistency from one shaft to the next. In other words, if you happen to break one of them and ordered a replacement, you’ll likely get the same exact feeling shaft. But that doesn’t mean a stock shaft won’t perform for you. Woody Lashen has fit plenty of golfers into stock options that are perfect for their swing. So spending $400 on a shaft upgrade doesn’t always guarantee better results. It only matters if it’s the right fit for your swing. So, here’s the bottom line. Don’t get caught up on what’s printed on the shaft or what you see tour players using. The best shaft is the one that matches your tempo, lets you feel the club head, and helps you hit the center of the face more often. That’s the real cheat code for iron shafts that can make a huge difference in your variability from shot to shot on the golf course. So, I know I’ve gone over a ton of information in this video, and I don’t want everyone to rush out and go buy new irons. You might not need them, but maybe you just need a lie angle adjustment. And it is possible you might not have access to a great fitter or it’s not within your budget. Not everyone has to do this. But either way, if you’re a golfer who does care about equipment and is in the market for new clubs, you should have a basic understanding of how all of this works. So, you’re a smarter consumer. If you do get fit and you get it done properly, your irons should easily last for 5 to 10 years. I just switched sets for the first time in 8 years. And if you want to do a much deeper dive on this topic, I’ll include the link to the podcast episode with Woody to get even more information. And I’ll also link to Pete’s Golf in the description below. If you’re in the New York metro area or willing to travel, Woody and his team are the absolute best. And we’ve had tons of golfers around the world who listen to our podcast who visit them all the time. They are truly legends and they won’t fit you into something you do not need. And if you want to learn more about club fitting, you can check out my other video where I share with you everything the OEMs don’t want you to