19th Hole
Fred Couples on Seattle, being a feel player, and what Phil Mickelson is the best ever at
Fred Couples joined Johnny Wunder for the latest installment of his “Gear Dive” podcast. Couples, as he approaches 60, is an interesting case from an equipment perspective, and he’s seen some major changes in the clubs he’s so fluidly swung across his career.
Particularly interesting is the fact that Couples seems to stick with a club until he wears it out. Look at his current driver (a 2013 TaylorMade SLDR) and 3-wood (a 2008 Callaway FT-i Squareway). Hearing what he has to say about those clubs and his equipment philosophy is darn interesting (and atypical).
That said, we’re pulling a section of the pod for further examination that has more to do with technique than equipment, as Couples had some interesting things to say about growing up as a feel player and learning to hit shots around the green.
Johnny: “You’re the epitome of a ‘feel guy’…growing up in Seattle, growing up in the Pacific Northwest, you have to be a feel player, you have to feel your way around a golf course…can you commentate a little bit on how to get yourself out of trouble…how to scramble? How did growing up in the Pacific Northwest teach how to play well hitting it straight and play well hitting it sideways?”
Fred Couples: “If you look at some of the shots some of us play. If you grow up in Seattle…I played at Jefferson Park…small greens; they called them ‘pop-up greens.’ If you missed the green, you had to have great feel, and you had to have touch to get it up in the air and to stop it fast. There weren’t many times where I took a 7-iron out and played a little bump-and-run; it was all sand wedge.”
“So when I got on the PGA Tour, ever time I used a club from off the green, it was a sand wedge…then as you go to Florida and you’re playing on Bermuda, that’ll make you look bad fluffing chips, so you just learn to play around the United States…”
“You mentioned a guy earlier, Phil Mickelson. People want to know how good he is–he’s probably the best player ever to judge a lie. Whether it was a bad lie, good lie, in the rough. We know he’s tried to hit drivers out of the rough and tried to do things, but more or less, that’s what makes Phil the player that he is…he’s got the feel for every shot, and he tries to pull off every shot. And if we’re anywhere alike, we’re like that…I do judge the ball well out of the rough.”
“Seattle, it certainly made me the player that I am. There’s no doubt in my mind.”
Incredible perspective from Couples–although he did later say rain is his kryptonite, which is somewhat odd for a Seattle boy. Anyway, the rest of Johnny’s talk with Boom Boom is well worth your time.
Check it out below.
19th Hole
‘Don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight’ – LPGA pro offers candid take following rough AIG Women’s Open finish
An opening round of 77 left LPGA pro Jenny Shin with a mountain to climb at last week’s AIG Women’s Open.
However, fighting back with rounds of 69 and 67, Shin found herself six shots off the lead and just outside the top 10 heading into Sunday as she went in search of her first major victory.
Shin, who won the US Girls’ Junior at just 13, couldn’t back those rounds up on Sunday, though, and after playing her opening nine holes of the final round in level par, she then bogeyed three holes coming home to slip down the leaderboard and eventually finish T23.
Taking to X following the final round, Shin offered a frustrated and honest take on how she was feeling, posting: “Don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight. What a crappy way to finish.”
Don’t think I’ll sleep well tonight. What a crappy way to finish
— Jenny Shin (@JennyShin_LPGA) August 3, 2025
Shin has made 11 cuts in 13 starts on the LPGA Tour this season, but has been plagued by frustrating Sunday finishes throughout the year. Shin ranks 102nd on tour this year out of 155 for Round 4 scoring in 2025.
Miyu Yamashita won the 2025 AIG Women’s Open with a composed final round of 70 to win her first major of her career by two strokes.
Cameron Young won the Wyndham Championship on Sunday for his first victory on the PGA Tour.
Young dominated all weekend at TPC Sedgefield, running away from the pack to win by six strokes and put himself in contention for a Ryder Cup pick in September.
Ahead of the event, the 28-year-old switched to a Pro V1x prototype golf ball for the first time, following recent testing sessions with the Titleist Golf Ball R&D team.
Interestingly, Young played a practice round accompanied by Fordie Pitts, Titleist’s Director of Tour Research & Validation, at TPC Schedule early last week with both his usual Pro V1 Left Dot ball and the new Pro V1x prototype.
Per Titleist, by the second hole Young was exclusively hitting shots with the Pro V1x prototype.
“We weren’t sure if he was going to test it this week, but as he was warming up, he asked to hit a couple on the range,” Pitts said. “He was then curious to see some shots out on the course. Performance-wise, he was hitting tight draws everywhere. His misses were staying more in play. He hit some, what he would call ‘11 o’clock shots,’ where again he’s taking a little something off it. He had great control there.”
According to Titleist, the main validation came on Tuesday on the seventh hole of his practice round. The par 3 that played between 184 and 225 yards during the tournament called for a 5-iron from Young, or so he thought. Believing there was “no way” he could get a 6-iron to the flag with his Left Dot, Young struck a 5-iron with the Pro V1x prototype and was stunned to see the ball land right by the hole.
“He then hits this 6-iron [with the Pro V1x prototype] absolutely dead at the flag, and it lands right next to the pin, ending up just past it,” Pitts said. “And his response was, ‘remarkable.’ He couldn’t believe that he got that club there.”
Following nine holes on Tuesday and a further nine on Wednesday, Young asked the Titleist team to put the ProV1x balls in his locker. The rest, as they say, is history.
Rickie Fowler fired an opening round of one-under par on Thursday at the Wyndham Championship, as the Californian looks to make a FedEx Cup playoff push.
Fowler is currently 61st in the standings, so will need a strong couple of weeks to extend his season until the BMW Championship, where only the top 50 in the standings will tee it up.
Heading into the final stretch of the season, Fowler has made an equipment switch of note, changing into new iron shafts, as well as making a switch to his driver shaft.
The 36-year-old revealed this week that he has switched from his usual KBS Tour C-Taper 125-gram steel shafts to the graphite Aerotech SteelFiber 125cw shafts in his Cobra King Tour irons, a change he first put into play at last month’s Travelers Championship.
Speaking on the change to reporters this week, Fowler made note that the graphite shafts offer “something that’s a little easier on the body.”
“I mean, went to the week of Travelers, so been in for, I guess that’s a little over a month now. Something that’s a little easier on the body and seemed to get very similar numbers to where I was at. Yeah, it’s gone well so far.”
Fowler has also made a driver shaft change, switching out his Mitsubishi Diamana WB 73 TX for a UST Mamiya Lin-Q Proto V1 6 TX driver shaft in his Cobra DS-Adapt X, which he first implemented a couple of weeks ago at the John Deere Classic.
However, according to Fowler himself, the testing and potential changes are not done yet.
“Probably do some more testing in some different weight configurations with them once I get some time. Yeah, I feel like we’re always trying to search, one, to get better but are there ways to make things easier, whether that’s physically, mentally, whatever it may be. So yeah, I thought they were good enough to obviously put into play and looking forward to doing some more testing.”
Fowler gets his second round at TPC Sedgefield underway at 7.23 a.m ET on Friday.
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