If you want to find the right irons for you, you have to ask yourself some key questions.
Callaway
If you’ve been following along with equipment news, you know this week was a huge week for the iron market.
Just to polish up the scorecard, Titleist launched T-Series, which consisted of T100, T150, T250, T250* and T350. Ping launched I240 and Callaway dropped X-Forged, X-Forged Max and Ti-Fusion 250. Yes, all of this happened in the span of four days, and for someone who does this for a living, it was an onslaught of work to test, understand and figure out where it all fell into place. Because that’s the question at the end of the day, of everything out there, what is the iron I (you, us, we) need to play? How can we sort through all the information regarding ball speed, launch, spin, turf interaction, yada yada yada?
I was in the same pickle until I asked myself some really honest questions. If you watch the top half of the video I did on the T-Series, you’ll get an inside look at what I’m personally trying to accomplish with my game. You can watch the video below, but in a nutshell, it’s quite simple. How can I take my iron game from a liability to an asset again?
So, how do we do this? If everything out there is good, how do I know what is good for me?
I arrived at my answer with a simple list of questions, and it helped me break down the irons that hit the market this week.
What do I need? Forgiveness and versatility in a 5-iron and 6-iron. Having recently ditched my 4-iron for a 4-hybrid, it not only saved me shots but also added probably three extra clubs to my bag. Where a normal four iron had a 215-yard carry in it, the mishits went 200, and I couldn’t stretch much past 220 if I really stepped on it. With a 4-hybrid, I have a chippy or mishit 205 and 230 if I really wanna smash it. That’s high, low, fades, draws, skinny, or knuckling. The same rules need to apply to my 5 and 6 irons. No, I don’t need the wide yardage gaps, but I do need the high floor on a mis-hit. That’s non-negotiable.
What do I want? This will always come down to optics. My have-tos from a look perspective are offset, short blade length and bounce. Offset for me is key because if there isn’t enough, my misses get unruly, and I find myself fighting a right-to-right shot all day. Short blade length helps the head’s closure rate and ensures the face squares up, again mitigating that right miss that I hate. Bounce is huge, especially with the shorter clubs, so I can be aggressive through the turf without fear of the club getting slow, which can affect everything if you aren’t paying attention.
What will I give up to play better? For gearheads, this is always the big question. Am I willing to sacrifice curb appeal to play better golf? At 48 years old and with my game in decline at the moment, the answer is undoubtedly yes. I’d play a bag of shovels to start playing great golf again. That’s why when I went through the OEM visits to test all the new stuff, I was actually quite happy that my ball striking was at its worst. If I could find quality when I’m hitting it that bad, that’s an iron that should have my attention.
Let’s take a peek at what we tried of the new launches. Unfortunately, I didn’t try the new Ping I240 just yet, but Kris McCormack went in deep here with all the info.
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Unmatched precision meets unrivaled feel with T100 Irons. Fully forged with more aggressive grooves in the mid/short irons, T100 offers pure player’s feel with improved consistency in variable conditions. Now with higher long-iron launch for optimal trajectory control in every club.
Forged Player’s Design
Masterfully forged into a pure player’s design that offers precision control and buttery feel.
Superior Flight and Stability
Split High-Density Tungsten produces optimal CG with remarkable stability for precise shotmaking.
Consistent Speed & Spin
New VFT technology and progressive groove design for consistent spin and speed across the face in variable conditions.
Elevated Long-Iron Launch
Lower CG and a new muscle channel help improve peak height and carry.
I’ll bullet point this with my own game in mind to keep it simple and leave the super game improvement irons for later.
Titleist
T-100: 7-PW they perform like the other iron that is near and dear to my heart, the Callaway Apex TCB. T-100 has “enough” offset, very manageable blade length for me and they get through the turf perfectly. What was really an eye-opener was how good these things were out of the rough. As Jack Hirsh mentioned in his write-up on T-Series, the spin retention out of the rough is simply astonishing. I retained at least 1000RPMs of spin out of the rough vs my old irons, which is insane. That’s a serious value add.
T-150: Pretty easy here, I get everything I love about T-100 with a “little more” forgiveness and ball speed. Nothing crazy but enough to get some looks at the 5 and 6-iron spots.
T-250: In a very surprising development, you can almost compare these apples to apples to the T-150, with slightly higher launch and ball speed retention being the thing. So in my case, these also could make a really fun option at the top of the set.
Callaway
X-Forged: Two years ago, these would have been a no-brainer for me 4-PW. Total no-brainer. They are soft, the turf interaction is pristine, forgiving enough and the bag appeal is off the charts. They might be the best-looking Callaway irons I’ve ever seen. But as we sit today, I could only do these 8-PW. Why? Since they are a one-piece forging, there isn’t enough “help” on center hit strikes to raise that floor that I keep bringing up. As someone who typically hits it thin when the wheels fall off, I need all the help I can get. Just being honest, on my good days I’m hitting anything well, but on the bad days I can’t afford to give up the performance I could get from a multi-material construction. That’s where technology kicks in, even with players’ irons.
X-Forged Max: NOW WE’RE TALKING!
Of everything we’ve discussed, this set I could play 4-PW right now and get better. But it’s not that simple. To play a full set of these, I would concede a thing or two with the short irons. And no, it’s not hitting them too far, it’s launch. Since I started playing golf, I was always taught to keep my short irons down with spin. That’s the only way I know how to play golf. What I found with X-Forged Max is that although the window is perfectly high 4 through 7, 8-PW, it takes a bit more work to drive them down. Could I make it work? Yes. But it would take some finessing with lofts, lies and maybe shafts. Yes, in this case, I would consider having a split set of shafts to get what I want. This might look like Dynamic Gold Mid S400 4-7 and Nippon 120S (low launching and spinny) in 8-PW. Wild take, I know. Make no mistake, these irons are so much fun, I’m thinking about it. But there is one other option.
Ai-150: Like X-Forged Max, the Ai-150 speaks to players like me in so many ways. The feel, look, turf interaction is all there, and get this, the short irons fly low and spinny just like I like ’em to. However, I like the slightly larger footprint of the X-Forged Max in 4-7 iron. So here we go again, what do we do? Combo em? Yes. As far as Callaway testing is concerned, the best combo set-up for me under the new Callaway umbrella is 4-7 X-Forged Max and 8-PW Ai-150. Now that’s a fun set.
Forged Precision, Pure Feel
Crafted from a single piece of 1020 Carbon steel, X Forged Max Irons deliver the soft feel and crisp sound preferred by better players—along with a mid-compact profile that blends workability, feedback, and just the right amount of forgiveness.
Clean Looks, Mid-Compact Shape
X Forged Max features a more player-friendly cavity back and offset, mid-compact profile, and a refined topline—crafted to appeal to the eye of the better player looking for workability and forgiveness.
Tri-Level Sole Design
X Forged Max Irons feature a tri-level sole with beveled leading and trailing edge, promoting smooth turf interaction and precise ball control through impact.
As I mentioned in this week’s Fully Equipped Podcast, there is no best anymore. Every company has bangers these days. So the trick to wading through all the new gear chatter is to ask yourself the questions that I did. When I approached it that way, I was able to focus on the platforms that actually made sense for me and only admire the ones that I think are awesome, but won’t help me.
I did finally pick my gamers, and I did it trying to keep myself as honest as humanly possible. What most excites me is that I was able to raise my floor in a few ways. I’ll get into all that when my WITB video hits.
It’s a very fun time to be looking around for new sticks. You literally can’t make a bad choice. If you choose wisely. That’s the trick here, looking at everything through the lens of raising your floor. Hard not to get better doing that.
Johnny currently serves as the Director of Equipment at Golf.com, contributing to platforms like Fully Equipped Golf. Prior to this role, he was the Content Marketing Manager at Callaway Golf, where he led “Callaway Golf’s World of Wunder,” a platform dedicated to in-depth golf equipment content. Before joining Callaway, he was the Director of Original Content and host of “The Gear Dive” podcast at GolfWRX.com. Beyond his professional endeavors, Johnny is an avid golfer with a deep passion for the game, having played since his youth in Seattle, Washington.
