The golf equipment industry has changed!

I started PROBE GOLF, my golf equipment company, in my garage on the Lake Shastina Golf Resort's fifteen hole during the winter of 1986-87. The space shuttle had just exploded during launch the day my first golf components showed up at my house.

I had studied the differences between all of the iron shafts on the market at the time, and learned why PING "custom fit" iron sets really fit no one because they used the same shaft for every customer. Changing the Lie, Length, and Grip size means nothing if the shaft's flex and flex point (low, medium or high) is not properly addressed.

I made myself a custom fit set of Probe irons, and dropped from a 6-handicap to a "+2" handicap. I won that year's Lake Shastina Men's Amateur by shooting 70-70-140, four under par. The three guys who finished 2nd, 3rd, and 4th all played PING irons. Over drinks the afternoon I won, all three ordered custom fit sets of Probe irons from me. The next year one of them came back and won the same tournament by six strokes!

I had played golf for 22 years, and had never had a hole-in-one. After making my first set of Probe irons for myself, I holed a 5-iron on #8, 195 yards over a lake. A month later I holed a 2-iron on #11, at 222 yards. The shaft I chose for my set made all the difference in my scoring. No other golf equipment manufacturer was custom fitting shafts in those days.

By 1991, I learned that the most important two clubs in the golf bag were the driver and the putter. The driver sets up every par-4 and par 5 hole. If you drive it long and straight, the rest of the hole can be attacked, for a birdie or better. But drive it crooked, and you end up scrambling for a bogie or worse.

That's what I have been talking about with Phil Mickelson for the last two weeks. He has removed his ability to play a better driver than his Callaway driver, all for endorsement money paid to him by Callaway. When I learned the details of his contract, and learned what kind of man manages Phil, I no longer remained as a fan of Phil Mickelson. I want to respect the golfers for whom I cheer, and Phil would be the best golfer in the world, better than Tiger, if Phil would put performance ahead of endorsement money.

The same holds true of his putter, the Odyssey (Callaway-owned) blade he uses. A heel-shafted putter is the worst kind of putter for a tour player to use. It is the farthest thing imaginable from a center-shafted, face-balanced putter.

I mentioned over a week ago what happened when I got the idea of helping Phil make more short, fast, breaking putts by showing him how to improve his chances of doing so by using my Probe 20/20 putter. When I tried to contact Phil online with that "noble" goal, I ran into his lawyer, who threatened me if I so much as tried to say, "Hi." to Phil.

When I worked the Senior PGA Tour from 1991 through 1993, I introduced the seniors to my superior Probe driver. I figured the Senior Tour players would be more likely to use what worked for them, and won more tournaments for them, than simply play certain equipment for endorsement money. I was right, up to a point. In two years we had 23 victories by seniors who were using the Probe driver! And we did not pay any of them to play it.

The best example I want to mention to make my point was Chi Chi Rodriguez, who played the Probe driver starting in February of 1991. He won four tournament in three months, and was the leading money winner on the Senior Tour by June of 1991. Then his agent demanded we pay him $150,000 to continue using the Probe for the rest of the year, or he was going to change to Callaway's Big Bertha, at the "suggestion" of his attorney. I faxed his attorney and wished Chi Chi well with his new Bertha. He changed, and did not win another tournament for 15 months, and dropped to eleventh on the money list for 1991.

But the story does not end there. In September of 1992, Chi Chi learned that Arnold Palmer had changed to using the Probe 20/20 putter, and called my office in Yreka, CA, and asked if he could try the putter. We sent him one just before he flew to the Ko Olina tournament in Hawaii, and he WON THE TOURNAMENT, his fist win since quitting my driver!

What is your opinion of tour players who would put endorsement money ahead of performance and victories on the professional tour? I have very little respect for them. But that is what the golf equipment industry has become; prostituting tour stars to fool the public into thinking their golf equipment is the best.

Please let me know your opinion of this major change in advertising in the golf industry. I would really like to know.