This ingenious bunker tool is absolutely mesmerizing to watch in action

From metal putter grips to a juiced golf ball for juniors, it’s hard to stand out on the PGA Merchandise Show floor. It’s a seemingly endless sea of products that promise to “change the game.” That sentiment doesn’t hold for most of what I came across in the Orlando Convention Center, but there was one product that stood above the rest: the Bunker Wizard.

I never imagined a booth featuring a new bunker “rake” would make people stop in their tracks. But watching Jim Sorenson, president and CEO of Bunker Wizard, make a mess in a horseshoes-pit-sized sandbox and clean it up in two smooth rolls was mesmerizing to watch. I must have stuck around to take in the presentation over a dozen times. I couldn’t get enough of this oddly satisfying feat.

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“Rakes were designed for leaves, not sand” the Bunker Wizard touts, promising to help you “say goodbye to unwanted rake lines.”

While there’s a rake feature on the Bunker Wizard, its stainless steel wires are its secret sauce. It feels (and looks) like you’re whisking the sand, rather than raking it. Because it simultaneously rakes, flips and smooths the sand, golfers are left with perfect playing conditions for bunker escapes.

A golf ball sits beautifully on top of the sand in a Bunker Wizard-cleaned trap, putting even the worst sand player’s nerves at ease. It’s the closest thing you can find to teeing a ball up in a bunker. Highly-skilled golfers will be salivating at the spin-friendly lies the Bunker Wizard leaves behind.

Don’t let the whisk-like wires fool you, the Bunker Rake can withstand wear and tear just as well as metal and hard-plastic rakes commonly found bunker side.

“You could throw the Bunker Wizard 20 feet in the air — which we have all wanted to do at one point or another after a bad shot — and it would come through just fine,” Sorenson says. “It’s built to clean up sand traps better than traditional rakes and it’s more durable than traditional rakes.”

The only thing I wanted to do more than watch the Bunker Wizard in action was to hit a shot after watching the Bunker Wizard in action. I might just start aiming for bunkers on courses that have them in stock (now that’s a game-changing quality if I’ve ever heard one).

As far as this writer is concerned, breaking out the Bunker Wizard after being told “nice out” might soon become golf’s guiltiest pleasure.