Inside Rickie Fowler’s recent putter switch

Rickie Fowler may still be trying to dig his games out of the depths, but he’s playing in a major championship this week.

A T8 finish in last year’s PGA Championship got Fowler into this week’s field. He arrives at Southern Hills ranked 125th in the FedExCup and 146th in the world ranking.

New gear is part of Fowler’s process to re-finding the game that led to five PGA TOUR wins, including the 2015 PLAYERS, and made him a top-five player in the world.

The Oklahoma State alum arrives at Southern Hills with one top 10 this season, a T3 at the CJ CUP @ SUMMIT in the fall. He’s missed six of 13 cuts this season, but is coming off a solid T21 at the recent Wells Fargo Championship. He made a number of significant equipment changes before that week.

Fowler led the PGA TOUR in Strokes Gained: Putting five years ago but has gone through a slew of putter changes in recent years. He recently utilized Cobra’s new 3D printing process to find his latest flatstick. The putter is similar to Cobra’s King Stingray 20 retail putter, but it doesn’t have the same winged shape in the rear of the putter. That change is something Fowler personally requested.

“With the Stingray, the one that’s (available at retail) has some wings on it, so we made one without those just to condense it a little bit. … I don’t like having too much weight in the rear,” Fowler told GolfWRX two weeks ago at the Wells Fargo. “A lot of mallets, you get weight in the back, where I feel like I’m kind of dragging a lot of times. If it’s not a face balanced putter, the face will swing open and I feel like it kind of stays there. So that was the reasoning for taking those off.

“There is a touch of toe hang on it, just to where there is a little bit of swing. The guys at Cobra were able to make that up. … They’re 3D printed, so that’s what’s nice. … We’re able to make little tweaks instead of having to make a completely new head. They can put that data in and print it up.”

Additionally, Fowler switched back into iron shafts that he played for years earlier in his career. Fowler had been using Mitsubishi’s MMT iron shafts over the last two years to help lower spin, but he switched back into his old KBS Tour C-Taper 125 S+ shafts before the Wells Fargo Championship for a familiar feel and slightly more spin.

(With my swing) being back in a better delivery spot, I was almost too low on the spin spectrum,” Fowler told GolfWRX.com. “The C-Tapers help get me back to where I want spin to be at. I can manipulate loft and stuff like that to get spin where I want and all that. … The MMTs did what I wanted originally. As things continued to get better, I was looking to add a little bit of spin.”

GolfWRX caught up with Fowler on Monday to take a look at everything he has in his bag this week at Southern Hills. Here’s a closer look.

Driver: Cobra LTDx LS (9 degrees)
Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana White Board 70X prototype

3-wood: Cobra RadSpeed Big Tour (14.5 degrees, with 12.5 degrees of actual loft)
Shaft: Aldila Synergy Blue 75TX

5-wood: Cobra LTDx LS (17.5 degrees, with 16.5 degrees of actual loft)
Shaft: Aldila Synergy prototype

Irons: Cobra King Forged MB (4-PW)
Shafts: KBS Tour C-Taper 125 S+

Wedges: Cobra King prototype (52 and 56 degrees), Titleist Vokey 2022 WedgeWorks Proto (60 degrees)
Shafts: KBS Tour 610 Wedge (52 and 56), True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100 (60)

Putter: Cobra King Stingray 20 prototype

Golf Ball: TaylorMade TP5x Pix