Gear: TaylorMade MG4 wedges
Price: $179.99 each with True Temper Dynamic Gold Tour Issue 115 Wedge shaft and Lamkin Crossline 360 grip.
Specs: Cast 8620 carbon steel with a raw-steel hitting area and seven different milled sole grinds. Even lofts from 46 degrees to 60 degrees.
Available: NOW
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Who It’s For: Golfers who want more shortgame spin, especially in wet conditions, along with several sole grind options.
The Skinny: TaylorMade designed a new surface-roughening pattern to the raw steel face of the MG4 wedges to help golfers create more spin, especially in wet conditions. That spin, combined with more sole grind options, should create more shortgame versatility for golfers.
The Deep Dive: While TaylorMade’s driver designers work hard to create low-spinning options to help golfers hit straighter, longer tee shots, wedge makers constantly seek ways to increase spin. Around the greens, the more spin players can generate on chips, pitch shots and approach shots, the more control they have over the golf ball. With the release of the new MG4 wedges (Milled Grind 4), TaylorMade feels that it has the highest-spinning, most versatile family of wedges yet, which should lead to more short-game options for golfers.
Each MG4 wedge ships with a sticker that covers the hitting area. It is designed to be peeled off after you buy the club because, while the chromed back and hosel are exposed, the raw steel hitting area will start to rust with exposure to air and moisture.
The MG3 wedges that TaylorMade released two years ago featured Raised Micro-Ribs between each of the main grooves. Those are gone, replaced in the MG4 with a new surface-roughening pattern that TaylorMade calls Spin Tread. TaylorMade uses a laser to etch the design at a 45-degree angle to the central grooves, and if you rub your thumb back and forth over the hitting area, you can feel how scratchy the hitting area is compared to the smooth chrome areas of the head.
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However, the Spin Trend design’s most significant advantage is revealed in wet conditions. The laser-etched pattern allows water to get off the face more effectively, so on shots you play from fairways that are damp with morning dew and from wet rough, the MG4 is designed to help you generate more spin. Compared to the MG3 wedge it replaces, TaylorMade’s research showed the MG4 creates a nearly-identical spin rate on 56-degree pitch shots but almost 1,000 rpm more spin in wet conditions with a slightly lower launch angle. That means the ball slides up the face less in wet conditions and retains more spin, which should translate to more control and consistency.
TaylorMade’s research also showed engineers that the Spin Trend helped increase spin durability compared to the Raised Micro-Ribs in the MG3.
To enhance feel, TaylorMade thickened the back flange, the lower portion of the head directly behind the hitting area and removed mass from high in the toe. The tweaks are subtle, but staff players like Collin Morikawa and Rory McIlroy said the impact feels softer, deeper and more solid when compared with MG3.
Finally, TaylorMade is still milling the sole of each MG4 wedge to increase the manufacturing consistency from club to club, but now the brand is offering several more sole-grind options.
TaylorMade is still offering its standard four sole grind options, along with three new sole grinds:
- Low Bounce: 56-60 degrees of loft with 8 degrees of bounce
- Standard Bounce: 46-60 degrees of loft and 9-11 degrees of bounce
- High Bounce: 54-60 degrees of loft with 12-14 degrees of bounce
- Tiger Woods Grind: 56 and 60 degrees of loft with 11-12 degrees of bounce
- (NEW) Standard Bounce C-Grind: The new SBC comes as a 58- and 60-degree lob wedge with 9 degrees of bounce. It is designed with extra bounce and curvature (camber) in the middle, with heel, toe and trailing-edge relief.
- (NEW) Low-Bounce V Grind: Available as a 58- and 60-degree lob wedge, the LBV has 7 degrees of bounce and is ideally suited to players with a shallow attack angle and who play in firm conditions. Scottie Scheffler and Tommy Fleetwood have tested this model, and it requires precision.
- (NEW) High-Bounce W Grind: The HBW comes as a 58- and 60-degree lob wedge with 13 degrees of bounce. It has the widest sole of any MG4 wedge, making it the most forgiving choice in soft conditions, greenside bunkers and deep rough.
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Here are several close-up looks at the new TaylorMade MG4 wedges.