How Tiger inspired Rory McIlroy's driver switch among top equipment stories for 2023

From the return of a decade-old putter to brand-new unreleased drivers, all the way through the bag it was a hectic season for golf equipment. We started 2023 with a signed putter from Tiger Woods selling at auction and ended with him in action. It was a jam-packed year, filled with intriguing storylines, learning moments and just plain cool stuff.

Below are GolfWRX.com’s top 10 equipment stories of the year:

1. A putter that revived multiple careers

Comeback stories are the best in sports. And when they involve golf equipment they get even better. So take the careers of Lucas Glover and Camilo Villegas. Both, once at the top of their games were considered some of the best in golf, battled back from tough times to earn victories again on TOUR in 2023.

Glover, winner of the 2009 U.S. Open, has been a perpetually phenomenal striker of the golf ball. Driving, long iron play, short iron play and even his wedge game, have remained top-tier for PGA TOUR standards throughout his career.

His putting woes, however, have also been constant. Multiple different methods hadn't been able to solve his struggle with the yips, which began around 2013. Switching to the long putter was one of his last options. He finally did it this year, and it paid immediate dividends with a series of high finishes before his back-to-back wins at the Wyndham Championship and FedEx St. Jude Championship.

“I made up my mind that something was going to change,” Glover said. “I was going to try (a long putter) and if that didn’t feel good, then I was going to try left-handed. That’s how far down the road I was. Nothing I did worked. Nothing I practiced worked. My brain was just fried. Ten years of dealing with it and not understanding it, … that I could lose all feeling on a 10-inch putt.”

Glover started testing out an L.A.B. Golf Mezz.1 Max putter at the Memorial Tournament presented by Workday. Adam Scott popularized the putter in 2022.

Glover ordered one with the same measurements and specifications as Scott’s flatstick.

“I took it to Memorial and putted nice. My misses weren’t that crazy, awful, yippy stroke. They were just misses,” Glover said. “And that’s OK. It’s basically a whole new motor skill, because it’s so different. It’s so out there from what I was doing.”

Villegas also took advice from Scott and broke through during the FedExCup Fall with the L.A.B. wand.

“I guess I've got to thank Adam in a way because you're right,” Villegas joked about Scott after the win at the Butterfield Bermuda Championship. “We did a little trip to Quail Hollow before the Presidents Cup, and I was watching Adam putt with a broom. He kept rolling it so good and he kept telling me how confident he was feeling."

Turns out, the scouting trip to Quail Hollow helped Villegas end his nine-year winless drought with a fifth PGA TOUR title.

2. Michael Block’s decade-old 7-iron gets a $50k offer

In the aftermath of Michael Block’s improbable run at the PGA Championship, his decade-old TaylorMade irons became one of the year’s most intriguing equipment stories. Block made a hole-in-one on the 15th hole of the final round at Oak Hill en route to a T15 finish, which earned him a spot in next year’s PGA Championship at Valhalla. And the 46-year-old PGA of America professional did it while playing alongside Rory McIlroy.

Block used a TaylorMade Tour Preferred MC 7-iron from 2014 to make the hole-in-one, which gained so much popularity that Block received a $50,000 offer for the club, as well as interest from numerous museums and galleries.

Block, however, opted instead to continue using the club at the 2023 Charles Schwab Challenge the next week. He had, after all, been playing those irons for 10 years, saying he preferred the familiarity of the clubs over the latest in technology.

It was an awesome equipment story, wrapped up in an even bigger, more awesome sports story.

3. The Jailbird’s the word

The Odyssey Versa Jailbird putter, which is slathered in lead tape and counterbalanced with an elongated SuperStroke grip, was undoubtedly the hottest golf club trend in 2023.

And it’s still going, too.

Much of the credit goes to Rickie Fowler, who started using the putter at The American Express in January after trying out the putter of his caddie, Ricky Romano. Fowler loved the club so much that he decided to get one for himself.

Wyndham Clark then used Fowler’s putter in a casual round and also got one of his own. The putter was a focal point of their pairing in the final group Sunday at the U.S. Open, which Clark went on to win. Keegan Bradley used the same putter to win twice this season, ending a four-year victory drought.

A marketing genius couldn’t have scripted a better campaign for a putter, especially since PGA TOUR players continue to test the putter’s merits, and find success with it.

Read more about the “Year of the Putter” here.

4. Blade irons continue to disappear

Blade irons undoubtedly provide benefits for great ball strikers; they can help the game’s best achieve the ultimate precision in shot-making and trajectory/spin control. Blade irons also represent the peak of traditional craftsmanship, enhanced feel and true artistry in golf equipment.

Cavity-back irons, however, are continuing to rain on the reign of blade irons in the professional ranks.

This season saw numerous players turn from blades to cavity-back technology. Some of the most notable switchers were Rickie Fowler, Chris Kirk, Webb Simpson and Adam Scott.

Mixed sets, which are a combination of blade and cavity-back irons, are also becoming increasingly popular. Top players who employ mixed iron sets include Rory McIlroy, Max Homa and Collin Morikawa.

5. Scottie Scheffler’s 13 clubs

Scheffler led the PGA TOUR in Scoring Average, Strokes Gained: Total, SG: Approach-the-Green, SG: Off-the-Tee, SG: Tee-to-Green and Greens in Regulation for 2023.

Scheffler uses an 8-degree TaylorMade Stealth 2 Plus driver with a stout Fujikura Ventus Black 7X shaft. He also uses a TaylorMade Stealth 2 fairway wood set to 15 degrees and utilizes a duo of Srixon Z-U85 driving irons (3- and 4-iron), each with a healthy helping of lead tape on the back for extra weight.

For his 5-iron through pitching wedge, Scheffler employs the Tiger Woods-co-designed TaylorMade P-7TW blade irons to go along with three Titleist Vokey wedges (his 60-degree is a low bounce T-grind).

Coincidentally, Scheffler doesn’t miss with any of them.

6. Steve Stricker’s longstanding putter

Ryder Cup Vice Captain Steve Stricker used this year’s Zurich Classic of New Orleans to team with Captain Zach Johnson and bond, speak strategy and scout potential team members.

Stricker’s appearance in New Orleans also gave GolfWRX.com an opportunity to see what clubs Stricker has in the bag. As it turned out, Stricker was still using his famous Odyssey White Hot Pro No. 2 putter, which he first started using in the early 2000s.

“I’ve made some big putts with it over my career,” Stricker told GolfWRX. “I’ve tried to go away from it at times, but I always gravitate back to it. … It never goes too far away.”

From early testing, to damage repairs, to big putts, Stricker spoke on the history of his historical putter here.

7. Tiger Woods' distance inspires Rory McIlroy’s driver switch at Riviera

While Tiger Woods had another year interrupted by surgery, 2023 got off to a promising start when he completed four rounds at his Genesis Invitational. He played alongside Rory McIlroy, who was the reigning FedExCup champ, for the first two rounds.

Woods was outdriving McIlroy so badly that it led McIlroy to switch drivers after the first round, into a 9-degree TaylorMade Stealth 2 Plus. McIlroy said he was able to find more optimal spin compared to his former Stealth Plus model and that helped him hit it past the wily Woods, who was hitting low cuts to take advantage of Riviera Country Club’s firm conditions.

“I was sick of Tiger outdriving me,” McIlroy said. “I played the (WM Phoenix Open) and noticed that my spin numbers on my driver were a little low, so then I went to L.A. and I put my driver up a click in loft. But I'm so particular about face angle when it comes to drivers that when I went up a click in loft, obviously I can see a little more face, it looks a little further left to me. And I didn't hit one drive out of the middle of the face the first day at Riv. I needed to go and try something else.”

It should be noted that McIlroy currently leads the PGA TOUR in driving distance, averaging 326.3 yards per drive.

Enough said.

8. Adam Schenk emerges as the coolest gear guy on TOUR

Adam Schenk not only qualified for his first TOUR Championship this year, he also emerged as a favorite of the gearheads.

Schenk is constantly tinkering. He regularly travels with two staff bags full of golf clubs that he rotates in and out of his 14-club tournament setup. He actually switches his clubs from day-to-day based on various factors, including wind direction. He played one round at the John Deere Classic, where he finished T4, without a 4- or 5-iron.

Schenk is a true gear lover who enjoys setting up his equipment based on strategy.

For the love of golf equipment, .

9. Tiger and Rory switch big stick again

All eyes were on Tiger Woods at the end of the year as he returned to PGA TOUR competition at his host event, the Hero World Challenge at Albany Golf Club in the Bahamas. And with the first start since April came a new big stick. The 82-time TOUR winner tested the yet-to-be-released TaylorMade Qi10 LS driver. It hit the USGA Conforming Clubs List in mid-November, with fellow TaylorMade staffers Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood putting the driver into play at the DP World Tour Championship.

Per GolfWRX, the Qi10 LS features a carbonwood sole, a weight port and a T logo alignment mark. The driver comes in three different lofts: 8, 9 and 10.5.

Woods would go on to finish 18th at the Hero but ranked 4th in SG: Off The Tee and averaged 304.90 yds in Driving Distance.

TaylorMade has not announced its 2024 golf equipment line. The timeline of submission to the USGA is consistent with the traditional launch season ahead of a new calendar year.

10. Scottie's switch from Scotty

After a year of putter switches and trying to find the answer on the greens, Scottie Scheffler may have found the solution in his final event.

Entering the Hero World Challenge, Scheffler ranked 162nd in Strokes Gained: Putting (-0.30) in 2023. That all changed when he put the bespoke putter company out of Fortuna, California, "Olson Putters" flatstick in the bag.

Scheffler not only won the Hero World Challenge, but he also ranked sixth in SG: Putting (+0.77). After his well-publicized struggles with the shortest club in the bag this season, that was a marked improvement for Scheffler.

So, who is Logan Olson? What makes his putters any different than what’s already on the market? And, how does a niche putter company end up working closely with the Scheffler? Read more here from Logan Olson, the owner himself, about what the process was like designing a putter for the No. 1 player in the world.