Rickie Fowler’s Big Gear Shake-Up & New Mini Driver Craze!

Rickie Fowler has made some big moves! He’s extending his long-term deal with Puma and Cobra for apparel and clubs but is stepping away from his six-year partnership with TaylorMade for gloves and balls.

What’s next for Rickie as he tests out a Titleist Pro V1?

Plus, we dive into the growing trend of mini drivers hitting the golf market.

Are these hybrids between a driver and a 3-wood worth the hype? Let us know if you’d bag one or stick with your current setup!

speaking of all their shirts and sponsorships Ricky Fowler he um has extended his long-term agreement with Puma Cobra uh for apparel and clubs but I will say he did make a little bit of a change he is done with his six-year partnership with Taylor Maid for using their ball and their glove oh yeah where’s he going um he’s a free agent right now where do you think he’s going to go tyus he’s playing a 20 23 title is prov1 and using a cobra glove but he has no agreements in place so that is still yet to be seeing what you know who’s going to be paying them to be whacking their balls and what glove he’ll be wearing to do so I’m surprised Cobra doesn’t have a ball yet you know I don’t I they became a huge brand it’s true I just don’t have any clue what it takes to get into the ball game you know what I mean literally thank you I because it’s got to be a lot like I don’t know like what what what new are you bringing to the table like Taylor Taylor Made like okay we’re do a tp5 totally different five layers the whole thing but like like well we’re just going to do a three-piece ball like stricken like Bridgestone like Titus like do you just join the party and hope your name sells an equivalent ball enough to make some money or do you say no we have a brilliant idea and we want to get in this game I don’t know what it takes to do that but I’d probably hit it question yeah so when when these guys sign these big deals with you know Taylor Callaway or who whoever they’re whatever they’re playing um are are they playing the same club that I go and buy no um it would appear similar but it is in fact a a a different handmade handbuilt customized club that then gets the badge work and everything for whichever club they’re wanting to promote um but even uh Max homo was talking about that in his conversations about his new deal with Cobra and how he is now a full Cobra bad guy Puma clothes he said the clothes were no brand oh no no I’m sorry he’s not cob he’s he’s in the uh Lululemon but he said the um he said the equipment’s great he said it just took a little time he said because there were some tweaks we had to make to the clubs to get them to look right to my eye and a few things that I needed but once we got it it all felt great which I think is a very soft and simple way of saying that he had guys in they grinding and building and making and giving them options and try this no that’s not right take more off here add more there I want this to be more offset I want less of a line at the top for my eye I want center of gravity move down all these things and then here we’re going to walk into like Golf Galaxy and grab a set off those little hangers and unwrap the plastic think we’re playing what Max homo’s playing and and and we’re ultimately not I also up into um like the like the drivers and woods and things like that what’s really interesting is they’ll have all the the say the drivers come from the factory they will go through there and start tolerance testing them because of course there’s tolerances some might weigh a little more some might weigh a little less so these things they are tolerance testing to find the most perfect version of that Club from the factory and setting all of those aside and then weighing them down to the fractions of a gram and then if you like on the Cobra tour truck you open it up every single one of them has a little sticker on it of the exact grams of each head in that drawer and it’s interesting because they’ve all come from the same Factory but yet every number is slightly different on all of them so on top of them doing all this work to customize clubs for these players then everything that comes from the factory they’re also making sure that they get the absolute best 0.01% of that equipment that comes out of fact that process makes me a better golfer because I’m like man I got this thing that is only for me and like me and my friends that want me to succeed and me succeeding also translates into them making more money and having job security would just make me play better there there there 100% is a confidence that comes with a new even if it’s a sing club like put a newwood in the bag that you went you got fit it feels great you tried a few different shafts you did whatever and now it’s like man when I left there I was hitting this so good you were so excited to take that club on the golf course so I couldn’t imagine for these guys it’s not just I went to you know whatever the store and hit a few they like no I have had engineers and Club Builders perfecting this thing for me so when I show up at the Zozo World Championship or whatever you know it’s like you just feel pre- dialed when you gave me your clubs to like the eight iron and the six iron to like use as I whatever cuz mine flew off because I played too much golf no I played too much Golf and they just flew off but um like the weight of those are so bottom heavy and like my clubs feel like nothing and like all the weights and the the grip I feel like that’s the only just difference that I had to like make but they’re great clubs and I hit them way longer and you could just feel the pop cuz my clubs are dying like Lally in Hospice in the bag going like could we just could you please help me um it’s not like one it’s like all it’s like a scene from a war where they’re just like do the Humane thing just do the Humane thing Grandma’s old enough she’s got to go so so keep going down this road the like what what does tiger play uh tiger is a full tailor made bag okay so let’s say tiger for with a title’s ball right for whatever reason uh you know he he loses sponsorship with Taylor B and he moves to Callaway yeah is Callaway going could Callaway take the tailor made club and scratch off the that’s what I think happens honestly um I think without doing that they essentially probably do that they are literally measuring all the tolerances the weights like I mean the materials and everything and building him something that is so custom and so specific what I get curious of when we look at like the Tiger Woods Edition irons that Taylor Made put out are those really for real a a a replica of what they had made for tiger or is it hey what are we going to call this one hey well we pay him a ton let’s just throw his name on it and we’ll sell a bunch more that I I would really be curious to know like no I’m hitting like the tiger Club if you grabbed it out of my bag’ be like logo well actually there’s no such thing as the tww logo well I mean whatever when it existed on those new clubs is it the Sunday red logo or is it just the tiger brand with nothing well no he’s still a tailor made sponsored golfer for his clubs understood monster has his bag but how do they decipher like what do they put on that club that goes because every time I bought a Nike Club I’ve had the Tiger Woods ones with the logo I think that’s all built into and baked into his Club contract he has an apparel contract you know that he’s obviously partnered with he’s got a club sub contract a ball contract and so I think you know for example like there are the the Bridgestone Tiger Woods Edition balls that to me is it’s just baked into the contract more you know like we’re going to pay you x amount of dollars we can use you in ads and marketing you’ve got to come out for seven days to film commercials we’re going to sell boxes with your face on it and we’re going to print your name of the ball you know I would imagine it’s similar to the the club thing it’s like we’re going to pay you this much money you’re going to hit these clubs we’ll make sure we build them until you love them and then we’re going to have an entire line with your initials on them but what I want to know is that line with the initials on them are they replicas of the ones that Tiger Woods uses I don’t know how do you find that out I don’t know I when I was touching his shoes last week I could have checked do they make pro model like sets kind of like you know baseball they have uh pro model yeah like well you get your blades and then you get your really stiff shafts and then you know cust them to you no no no no I’m saying like when you you could go to the store and literally adverti as Cobra Puma or Cobra uh tour Edition Ricky Fowler oh well maybe not the name but like they have tour Edition things cuz like the rocket balls driver there was a tour Edition that was like just way better than the regular one and it looked better and it was I had four of them but they all break because the face will implode out and make a crack above it every time blown out clubs yeah and they made like the best noise that like but but yes they do yes they do uh as far as the ball goes do I mean I feel like that would be the EAS yeah there’s like tore balls scr no but I mean like if you switch from a a Callaway ball to a to a tailor made ball what interesting so John ROM uh before going to live golf he was a gigantic face for Callaway and when he was going to Callaway what he talked about he said for me the most important thing was knowing I could hit that ball I he said this he goes I knew they would build me a club that worked I had to know I could play that ball and once I tested the ball and the ball matched my game then I knew everything else would work out they could do what which is really interesting to think about that it wasn’t like here come hit our clubs he’s like no no I know you can build me clubs that’ll work that’s what you guys do but the ball you’re not making me a custom John ROM ball like I’m going to be hitting obviously probably the nicest freshest cleanest ones from the same Factory as everybody else can I hit that ball because it’s not going to be hey we make John ROM’s ball like a little thicker or something and add like five extra dimples well they like you know you could just be like throw me a ball and make this but obviously this intellectual property theft and you would get sued if they ever found out how they would find out whatever but I I think the process of making golf balls are probably there’s some kind of craziness that like Cobra doesn’t want to take a you know there just another building they got to build then like I want to go to where they make the Prov ones and see the process like I want to see the forms and the molds and the stamps and all like I would love to see like raw Plastics turn into a proov one okay I think that’ be so cool talking about the Prov I don’t know if I mentioned this before but somebody very credible in golf about the Prov that taught me everything in golf when I was coming up um if you want to hit the ball longer you have to put the Prov logo like this facing where you want it cuz the ball is made to go longer that way now if you want the off feel on the green going into a part three or something you have to put the logo vertical like this and hit that part of the ball now he told me that I believe him I don’t know look it up if anybody says in the comments if I’m right cool but that’s what I’ve heard and that’s how I play it I just put my ball in epon salt so I could get the balance you just found out what golf was like a year ago though so you’re all good hey you know what and quickly he realized the salty balls was the only way but Ricky father speaking of a all right go ahead and then I got I got one more thing but go ahead rich I was going to say G guess where the provy ones are manufactured uh Massachusetts uh China there’s actually two different plants in Massachusetts for it thank you there’s one in New Bedford and there’s one in Fair Haven and I want to go to both that’s kind of crazy that you know that thank you thank you very much um Ricky fer was out seen testing a new Cobra mini driver there is a trend going on right now of Club manufactur ures making Mini Drivers um no Gary it’s not that mini driver that I bought off of Tik Tock shop oh which I’m excited about we’re gonna go hit that today um Rich have you seen this what is that in your hand it is a mini driver um and it’s well this isn’t the mini driver I’m talking about this is a training aid the one that Gary’s holding and it is a a micro driver that is really ultimately help it’s supposed to help you practice hitting the center of the face you don’t have this gigantic driver face to like smack it off the toe you’re going to miss the whole thing uh so this thing is sort of like a training aid and I want to take it out with Gary and see if we could actually hit this thing and then maybe do like a long drive contest but um the mini driver that a lot of these club companies are working on is sort of a hybrid in between a regular driver and a three-wood and it lands somewhere in the middle and I don’t know maybe it’s a two onewood amazing driver which one the Paradigm AI smoke yeah Max fast I like that smoke but I find it interesting because a lot of club companies are coming out and doing this now and like let’s see we’ve got Titus has got the gt280 mini driver pxg has something they’re calling the secret weapon uh Cobra’s doing the Cobra King mini driver Taylor Maid has the burner mini and Callaway is doing the Paradigm AI smoke TI 340 mini driver I’m sure all the club companies are going to be doing it I just I didn’t know that I didn’t know we needed that like it’s to get that in betweeners like it seems like everyone’s either piping there a lot of other people are doing driver off deck seems like so like this is a club that you could do that with I feel like um freezer tarps brought a revolution to zins and the the dod King brought the driver off the deck you know and I feel like these two guys in the internet world have made big waves so I would be really curious to know the dod King how much effect he’s had on I thought I like his I liked his [ __ ] you know it’s like a skit Co you know the guy’s a very nice guy because our buddy Jake talked to him yeah um yeah but I I I thought he was fun says here the smaller Club heads between 280 and 340cc provide added control and confidence off the tea versatile for tight Fairways windy conditions or uh players who struggle with driver uh with Driver club heads I don’t know why you struggle with that combines driver likee distance with accuracy of a three-wood I feel like it’s a huge placebo effect to that just is like this new mini driver I have to try it I hit it once I hit it good great let’s keep going I here’s the thing I I’ve never swung one so I’ve never held one in my hand I want to I’m like curious to see what it’s all about but I’m trying to figure out okay then what are you taking out of your bag I’m like I don’t want to get rid of my 3-wood I love my three like six more clothes probably in my bed oh my God