The Loop

Flat brims are losing the war against normal hats, but they're gaining ground on visors

HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. -- You may not realize it, but there's a war raging on the PGA Tour. It's between people who like flat brims, people who don't like flat brims, and people who don't really care about flat brims or the war.

On second thought, the word "war" might be a bit much, but since Rickie Fowler and his flat brim burst onto the scene, the ground is definitely shifting.

For reasons unknown even to us, we decided to conduct an audit of what everybody in the RBC Heritage field wore on Friday to help give us gauge the current state of affairs. Of the 131 players in who teed it up on Friday, here's how the headwear demographic breaks down:

103 (78 percent) normal hats____18 (14 percent) visors____8 (6 percent) flat brims____2 (~1 percent) no hat____1 (~1 percent) miscellaneous hats__

__First things first: you're probably wondering what a "miscellaneous hat" is. I classified a miscellaneous hat as any piece of headwear that isn't a flat brim, visor or normal hat. A straw hat, for example, or this thing:

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