Gear: Scotty Cameron Special Select putters
Price: $399 each
Specs: Milled 303 stainless steel heads with 6061 aluminum, stainless steel and tungsten.
Available: Jan. 24
Scotty Cameron’s official title at Titleist is not head of design or category manager. It’s master putter maker. For years he has focused on trying to make putters with which the game’s elite golfers fall in love, and many have. Some of the game’s best players collect Cameron putters, often those being prototype and customized clubs that aren’t available at retail.
With his latest update to the Select family of putters, Cameron is making the putters sold at retail simpler, cleaner and more like clubs used by the pros.
Each of the seven head models starts as a solid block of 303 stainless steel before a computer-guided milling tool shaves off ribbons of material until the final shape is achieved. In the Newport, Newport 2 and Newport 2.5 blades, the sole was given a soft, tri-sole design, with the toe and heel rising slightly so the center portion can easily rest flat on the ground at address.
The blades also feature thinner toplines and slightly lower face heights, with more material being milled off the back flange areas. That may not seem like a big deal, but Cameron did it to make the retail putters have the same look at address preferred by many pros.
As a result, the overall weight of the heads decreased. In order to maintain the same swing weight, Cameron decided to use tungsten in the heel and toe sole weights of the blade putters. Heavier weights are added to shorter putters, while longer putters get lighter weights.
The four mid-size mallets have extra material in the sole milled out. Removing steel from the center of the sole, then covering the hole with 6061 aircraft-grade aluminum, shifts more of the head’s weight to the heel and toe areas, which creates more stability without increasing the head size.
While the Fastback 1.5 and Squareback 2 are shapes Cameron has offered in the past, the Flowback 5 and Flowback 5.5 are new. They are semi-circular mallets based on the previously released GoLo putters
Cameron has brought back a compact mallet, the Del Mar, with the Special Select line. As with the blades, it has a solid sole.
Unlike the previous Select putters, none of the Special Select putters have an insert or vibration-dampening membrane. Again, this is a nod to the kind of insert-free putters that pros often ask Cameron to make.
Each Special Select putter has a glare-resistant, raw stainless steel finish with a single black alignment line.