My trusty Vokey SM6 58 M grind had seen better days. I don’t play or practice much these days, but after 4 years in the bag, it was time for retirement. It was still pretty effective from the fairway, but just didn’t have the same grab or consistency from the rough.
The Vokey M grind is one of the most popular lob wedge grinds since it's inception in the mid 2000s. Short for MF'er grind, because it was such a pain to grind when Vokey first started making them for tour pros (Titleist actually says it's short for Most popular...). One has been in my bag almost exclusively since the 2009 Spin Milled. I’m not sure if it has always fit my game, or if my game just adapted to it over time, but that part of my golf game has been strong for some time. I play most of my short shots with a slightly open face, and the heel relief is perfect for that. It also works well on square face shots, most any shot from the rough and with bunker shots. One shot that’s given me trouble with this grind was an open face shot off a tight lie. The leading edge gets too far off the ground for those type shots.
Instead of just ordering the latest Vokey iteration, I decided to take a look at the current wedge offerings at my local golf shop. That’s where I saw the Cleveland RTX Zipcore Tour Rack. While the name might be busy, the club itself looked amazing. Raw finish, with a brushed grey look before the oxidation started. The iconic teardrop 588 style footprint. Aggressive looking face millings. A little more heft than some of the other manufacturers.
After looking at the 3 grinds (Low, Mid and Full) and all the Tour Rack customization options (heel, toe, trailing edge and leading edge offerings), I decided on a 58 low bounce. The stated bounce of 6 was 2 less than the 58M, but Cleveland listed the low grind as the best comparison to the M grind.
Sidenote - I love all the customization options available by manufacturers now. It’s amazing you can have a wedge ground exactly how you want, with whatever paintfill or stamps you desire, topped off with your preferred grip, shaft, loft, length and lie.
I played my first round with the club 4th of July weekend at a public course in Alabama. The first outing wasn’t great. The course wasn’t in very good condition, and I had some less than stellar lies, but I hit a number of shots very fat. Like halfway to the green on a 50 yard pitch fat. I chalked it up to the conditions, and my poor play that particular day.
A few weeks later, one of my best friends asked me to play in the member-guest at my old club. With the chunks lingering in my head, I decided to hit a few more on the range before blindly throwing in the bag. I started warming up by hitting some shorter pitch shots and everything was decent, although I was a little tentative about entering the turf. I started moving out to some longer pitch shots, and mostly good, but occasionally I’d hit it a little heavy. Finally I hit a few fuller shots with it, and the last one felt like I dug a trench long and deep enough to roll an ankle.
So I shelved it. I loved the look and feel of it, but I couldn’t trust it at all. I was a little perplexed about the digging, because all the contact on the face was in the right spot. Instead of the bounce I thought the leading edge might be sharper than what I was used to, but I later bought a Zipcore 50 and have no such issues.
Again, instead of ordering an SM8 58, I decided to continue to branch out. This time I looked at the Callaway Jaws MD5. I always prefer either raw or black finishes with my lob wedge. Callaway released the raw version of the MD5 in May of 2020, well after the initial MD5 release, but for some reason they’re no longer offering raw. The Tour Grey looked good, and they were offering a steep discount on Callaway Golf Preowned, so I pulled the trigger on a 58 X grind.
Back in the pre-children days, I had quite a few lessons from Dan Carraher. He’s known as iteach or iteachgolf on various golf platforms. He has always been a huge proponent of the Vokey V grind. The V grind has a ton of bounce, but the peak of the bounce is in the middle of the sole. The high bounce on the front part of the sole keeps it from digging, but when you open the club, the leading edge stays close to the ground. It sounds perfect for a guy who’s been known to empty a divot mix bottle, but the problem is they’ve never been a mass produced option. They were available a few years back thru Wedgeworks, and I kick myself for not buying one then. There are a handful of retail offerings that are somewhat close and one of those is the Callaway X grind.
The wedge arrived, and looked great. The grey finish was a really nice offering and I liked the shape of the head. The grind appeared to do exactly as it intended and the leading edge stayed pretty close to the ground even in an open position.
With all that said, I never even took it to the course. Before I could, I hit some chips off my living room carpet. I noticed that I either hit it very low on the face or hit it slightly heavy. I couldn’t hit one that felt crisp. So I grabbed my M grind and immediately started hitting nippy little chips.
I began to think back about why I wanted to move on from the M grind, and a major component was a round of golf I played in the spring where the ground was firm and the grass a little sparse. I hit quite a few mediocre short shots where I think I was trying to do a little too much from a tricky lie.
So I ordered a SM8 Raw 58 M grind, and it works great. I really, really love the look of the Zipcore, and if I had an option to test out all their various grinds and custom offerings, I’m sure there’s a combination that would fit me. I don’t know that it would work any better than the Vokey though. I guess the moral of the story is go with what you know, especially if what you know works very well.
