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Balancing act

Wilson Golf would have you believe many of today's balls are unevenly weighted. Could this mean it is the ball's fault you're missing all those putts?

By BOB HARIG, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published April 4, 2002

Any golfer worth his polyester will tell you a straight putt on a flat surface from 5 feet is no gimme. Plenty of human deficiencies can cause the ball to stay out of the hole.

But what if it's the ball's fault?

Wilson Golf believes that is the case, in many instances, even with the most expensive golf balls.

Buy a dozen golf balls, Wilson products included, and there is a good chance at least one and perhaps more of those balls has a heavy and light side that result in an unbalanced ball.

Hence, the Staff True, the first "perfectly balanced" ball, which Wilson unveiled for $39 a dozen at the PGA Merchandise Show in Orlando in January while causing quite a buzz in the industry.

"As a consumer, can you afford to ignore this issue?" said Luke Reese, vice president and general manager for Wilson Golf. "Consumers who don't worry about it aren't going to know. 'Maybe it was the ball.' That will be the most powerful measurement out there. They'll say, 'Why risk it? Let's try a balanced ball.' "

The idea of an unbalanced golf ball is not new. Putting guru Dave Pelz has talked about it for years and writes about it in his book, The Putting Bible. Fifty years ago, players such as Ben Hogan and Byron Nelson would test the balance of their golf balls in salt water. Arnold Palmer recalled placing golf balls through a ring to make sure they were round.

Despite the incredible strides made in the manufacturing of golf balls, it still remains difficult to center the core of a golf ball, Reese said. And if the core is not centered, you get a heavy and a light side. The reason? The core weighs more than the material that makes up the cover. Wilson came up with a way to balance the two by adding weight to the cover.

"Now, it's a perfectly balanced ball that rolls and putts truer," said Reese, who also said the added weight to the cover makes it a good distance ball. "It's amazing, absolutely shocking. This is a subject that's been around since the 1940s. Back then, players would get a ball and if it putted well, they would keep it until it wore out. It's unbelievable that they didn't find a way to solve this."

At the PGA Merchandise Show, Wilson used a robotic putter to demonstrate how poorly an unbalanced ball works. It will veer to the heavy side on putts. Accuracy also is affected on drives and iron shots.

Wilson even came up with a definition for what is bad. Taking a 10-foot putt on a flat surface, if the ball missed the hole twice out of six times, it was considered an unbalanced ball. Reese said one out of every four balls it tested was unbalanced.

The company did not test golf balls that retail for less than $20 per dozen, meaning it was only looking at the high-end market. Including its own golf balls, the best balls on the market -- balls used by tour players -- were missing 1 out of 12 times. That would be a ball such as the Titleist Pro V1. Stratas, for example, were unbalanced 5 out of 12 times.

John Holst, a local Wilson rep who lives in Brandon, has a handy demonstration. He "spins" golf balls in a mixture of epsom salt and water, then marks them with a pen. Every time he spins the balls, those that are unbalanced will always come up in the same spot. If it stops randomly, it is a balanced ball.

"We open a lot of eyes with this every time," Holst said. "The response has been unbelievable."

But not as stunning as, say, Titleist's Pro V1 was last year. Golf stores could not keep the premium ball on their shelves.

"People are more interested in the distance aspect than they are the ball going in the hole," said Terry Decker, the head pro at St. Petersburg Country Club who is part of Wilson's staff of club professionals. "It's sort of like people would be better players if they worked on their short games instead of hitting balls.

"The idea behind this ball is really solid. But that's how golf is. People are looking for performance instead of having a ball that rolls true."

Decker said, however, he could not see using a different ball.

"Now I don't have to worry about that aspect, 'Did I miss that putt or was it the ball?' " he said. "Knowing that, I won't play another ball."

Naturally, rival golf ball companies are downplaying Wilson's claims. They contend some golf balls become unbalanced after being hit several times. Wilson already has even been taken to court by Spalding, whose Strata ball performs poorly in the balance testing.

But Wilson found a believer in Ben Crenshaw, long considered one of the game's best putters. When he saw the testing, Crenshaw was stunned.

"The ball putts incredibly true," said Crenshaw, who attended the PGA Show launch. "When I hit a putt, or a chip, it tracks very well. I feel like it will go exactly where I hit it."

Reese is the first to admit it is unlikely a tour player such as Tiger Woods or David Duval would ever get an unbalanced golf ball. They get balls that are specially produced and inspected for them.

But for the average guy? There's a good chance a few unbalanced golf balls will show up in every batch he buys.

Amazingly, with all of the talk about technology and improving golf balls, this issue got lost.

"I think no one knew how to fix it," Reese said. "I think we just focused on making balls longer. It wasn't an issue that excited them. We immediately went out and tested our balls in salt water and realized they weren't very good. Suddenly, once we tested them, we realized if we're not making very good balls, it must be the case with others. We found a lot of bad balls out there."

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