$20 for your old flip-flops: Bomb & Gouge: Golf Digest

$20 for your old flip-flops

Thursday, May 20, 2010 Comments

GOUGE: There’s a guy I know in my neighborhood who cuts his grass while wearing an old pair of golf shoes that I’d guess pre-date the first Bush administration. Looks like the folks at Adidas have a deal for him. He can take his beat-up mowing shoes or his used flip-flops to his favorite golf shop and trade them in for hilariously destructive videos to make its point. Lower is better is the Adidas theory, although at this point there is not much other than anecdotal evidence to suggest that lower in fact produces better golf swings and lower scores, particularly for the crowd that needs to be cashing in $20 shoe coupons.

It’s clear the Adidas concept is the only thing interesting that’s happened in shoes in this decade, probably the only real innovation since Softspikes. Just watch the videos Adidas has put together. While I get others are thicker, what does that really mean? Certainly, Adidas has changed the paradigm (according to its measurements, on average, its shoes are nearly 5 millimeters thinner (the width of two nickels) on the bottom than other leading shoes from Callaway, Ecco, FootJoy and Nike). Still, as chief rival FootJoy, with the largest stable of tour players, has stated to us: “To this day we have never been asked by a tour player to make FJ shoes lower to the ground.” The question is, I suppose, have they not asked because they didn’t know what they were missing?

Still, I would like to see some data suggesting that lowered footwear produces faster learning, better swings and lower scores. For instance, while theoretically a longer-shafted driver will generate more clubhead speed than a standard-length driver, it is not exactly true that a longer-shafted driver will result in more distance for every golfer on the planet, maybe not even for the majority. As to shoes, it’s not clear, for instance, that PGA Tour players wearing Adidas shoes are winning most of the tournaments. I count 4 wins for Adidas shoes this year, significantly less than FootJoy’s 11, but with admittedly a much smaller group of players on its staff. Still, I like the effort. I just wonder if there’s a way we can definitively say lower produces a better golfer. This, I would guess, we may not know for years, perhaps after the Adidas technology has become the industry standard.

BOMB: Well, as I understand it, it boils down to lower provides better stability, thus better balance, thus it helps your swing. Kind of like playing in bare feet but with cleats on the bottom. But I’m not going to focus on the technology here. I know lower is probably better but I just don’t really know what benefit there is to the Adidas GolfLite Slam being 21.78 millimeters at Adidas’ point of measurement and the FootJoySuperLites being 23.14 millimeters Honestly, does 2 millimeters really make a difference in the golf swing?).

However, I highly applaud the trade-in initiative. I’m a big fan of trade ins in golf. Always have been. It just makes such good sense. And this is about as legitimate as it gets. Bring in any pair of shoes -- ANY pair -- and get $20 off. That’s a solid offer and a smart business move. As Adidas’ fancy videos show, golf shoes are indeed equipment. But most golfers still think of them as something they purchase only when their previous ones wear out. Anything that can help get people in upgraded footwear is a plus.

By the way, I’m pretty sure that guy you’re referencing cutting the lawn is you. But don’t part with those worn-out golf shoes. I think that old pair of Converse Chuck Taylors you used to walk around the office in would do just fine -- apparently they’ll accept them, too.