I'm frankly surprised we didn't get more letters like this one from David Marbach of Thousand Oaks, CA. We got tons of mail on how pricey some of the Hot List products are, but few commenting on the lack of "winner" in each category:

I was surprised and disappointed to see that the 2008 "Hot List" did not include an editor's choice in each of the club categories, rather ranking the top five, six or seven "gold" club choices alphabetically. This is particularly disappointing for those of us who look to your magazine for expert guidance in selecting the best of the best equipment each year.
In this election year, I was hoping that a great magazine such as Golf Digest would be above pandering to the interests of it's benefactors.

Please bring back the Editor's Choice Hot List clubs -- your in-depth analysis deserves a clear winner and your readers deserve clear guidance.

Glad someone missed it, Dave. I won't argue it one way or another, but will give you our reasoning. Basically, we know that you'll probably narrow your search to 3 or 4 brands and then try those products out. Research tells us that. It also tells us that your comfort with a brand and your budget will help you do the winnowing. So will the products' scores in our various criteria--technology, value, etc. Given the closeness in score of the Gold-level products on the Hot List and the fact that most consumers are looking for a few, not just one, to test, we thought this was better way to go. But we certainly get your point of view on it.

By the way, check into the site next week for a tool that will allow you to assemble your "dream" bag. Not a bad list to send as a suggestion to your Valentine.

--Bob Carney

Lots of you are complaining about the price of equipment on the Golf Digest Hot List. (A number of you cited price in response to the Hot List article, which wondered why more amateurs don't upgrade. We made the point in response that trade-ins, easier than ever, helped bring down the price. Hold on, said Dr. Eric Addinall of Delaware:

As usual I studied this year's 'Hot List' with great interest. I noticed yet again however, the apparent surprise that more ordinary golfers don't change their clubs more regularly.

It occurs to me that one of the principal reasons is that if your clubs are over two years old, the trade-in value is almost negligible. I had a set of such clubs, wanted to buy one of the recommendations from last years list and was offered the princely sum of $40. I had paid around $700 for them 3 years ago. I still have them but hope to change this year if I'm offered anything at all!

This trade-in problem is worse even than for automobiles (and that is bad enough). Coupled with the fact that the mark- up on manufactured golf clubs is probably significantly higher than for cars, there is significant consumer suspicion around the idea that one must change clubs as often as urged by publications such as yours.

We just checked a couple of clubs from the 2006 Hot List, Cleveland CG4 irons and Callaway X-18 irons and the Cleveland?s were over $100 on the PGA Value Guide in the mid range and the Callaways were around $170. If you didn't use the Vale Guide, do.

Mike Johnson of Golf World, one of the Hot List judges, says "Most of us feel their clubs are worth more than they can actually get in trade. And in categories where the technology has seen a boost, the value of older clubs goes down." Check out Mike's trade-in story in the Jan. 18 issue of Golf World.

Leigh Bader, a leading retailer who consults on the Hot List, thinks you can do better than the offer you got. Leigh operates the online trade-in program for the PGA. He advises that you check the locator on PGA.com for stores near you that honor the PGA Value Guide. (He says there are a lots of them, and believes you'll do better than $40 at one of these. "The residual value of used clubs are higher and more available to more people now, more then ever! Something's amiss." That sounds promising. Love to hear back if you do better....

--Bob Carney

(Illustration by William Rieser)

PS: For another of those letters on equipment prices, continue on...

We called it the "growing disconnect between golfers and golf-club technology. "Perhaps it's confusing," we said in the Golf Digest Hot List intro. "Perhaps it's distrust. Perhaps it's just ignorance..." that average golfers don't keep up with the technology that can help them. "If you haven't thought about upgrading your equpment in the last six months, let alone last six years, you have more than a little catching up to do."

Well, we caught it for that. Many letters, some posted here, reminded us that all that new technology is expensive. We hear you. All of you. Tom Holstein, though, had a different take:

You just don't get it.

Golf is a traditional country club sport like sailing in the Summer and skiing in the Winter. The goal is to do your person best against the natural conditions of the course, the mountain, and the wind.

Down deep inside, most "boomers" and "X ers" compete against their younger selves. Beyond a certain limit", they do not want to "cheat" by using an extreme "game improvement club" on "designer steroids" any more than they want to "buy" the love of a trophy mate. They would still rather earn it, up to a certain age. That is why Jack Nicklaus stopped using the over-sized "Response" putter after he won his last major in 1986. He wanted to know that it was the man, not the equipment.

This limit was probably reached about 10 years ago when drivers became grapefruit sized and the "COR" of titanium faces made the rebound effect greater than traditional persimmon and metal woods....

Club championships and amateur tournaments are different than weekend golf....The tournament goal is to beat your opponent, and you must use the best custom fit and technologically designed clubs to stay competitive.

Every year a group of us that competed for our college teams get together for a reunion at a destination golf resort. We each bring 2 sets of clubs. One set is from the 1980's, and one set is from today.

Sometimes we play with a 9 club limit to focus on shotmaking. Other times we play all old clubs or all new clubs. There is generally a three to five shot difference. The goal is to test our current personal skills against each other, and what we used to be. We want to make certain that it is the golfer, not the equipment that makes the difference.

--Bob Carney

A reader asks, "Will the editor post the testing results of all other clubs and balls that did not get a gold or silver rating in the 2008 Hot List?"

Golf Digest Equipment Editor Mike Stachura responds:

Just as we don't post the results for courses that do not make the grade in our ranking of the 100 Greatest Courses, we don't post results for products that are not elevated to Gold or Silver status on the Hot List. The Hot List is about singling out the most significant products, which is different than the idea of assigning a grade to every single product introduced in the last year. That said, we do have a scoring system and we can put our results in some kind of perspective. For instance among our 240 finalists (listed on our website), not one of these products received a final score of less than 70.56, and the average for those finishing last among finalists was 82.23.

What does that mean? Bottom line: The difference between making the list and not making the list is small, but in our minds, significant. Only products that demonstrated consistent excellence across multiple criteria ended up on the list. The list isn't about good products. There are loads of those. It's about exceptionally great products, and those are relatively few, less than 25 percent of the total of 552 products that made the Hot List.

--Bob Carney

Dave Defendis of Rochester, New York, loves the Hot List. He's just not buying the fact that golfers replace their equipment as often as we say they should.

Each year when Golf Digest's equipment issue arrives, I probably rip open its cellophane wrapping with the same anticipation that Ralphie opened up his "official Red Ryder carbine action, two hundred range model air rifle" on Chrsitmas morning in the movie A Christmas Story. And as I read through it, I probably have the same wide eyed look he had as he peered into the window of Higbee's Department Store to look at the "Red Ryder".

While I do like "digging the newest equipment", this "boomer" certainly has not replaced the clubs in his bag as often as your article indicates I probably should. One of the reasons could be that my discretionary spending account has been a bit low. Another reason could be that my kids keep presenting me with grandchildren. I always seem to be adding dollars to somebody's college account. And hey, whose grandchild doesn't look good in a new outfit. Or maybe it's because I believe that if I don't have "a real swing", the equipment can only help so much. My money might be better spent on some lessons before I buy some equipment. I guess me and people like me are a golf company's worse nightmare.

Dave, no man with grandchildren asking him what he wants for Christmas is a golf company's worst nightmare. Red Ryder is coming.

--Bob Carney

Ed Lane of St. Louis has a very good question about this year's Hot List:

I usually put a lot of weight into your club rankings, which is why when I knew it was time to replace my relic 3- and 5-wood TaylorMade Burner fairway woods (I'm talking about the bronze looking ones), I decided to go with your 2007 Editor's Choice Fairway Wood, the Callaway Big Bertha.

However, I noticed your 2008 Hot List only gave the Callaway Big Bertha fairway wood a Silver rating. How is it that one year prior, you gave the same club not only a Gold rating, but an Editor's Choice rating, but this year a disappointing Silver rating? The analysis does not come across as very consistent or reliable. Curiously...

Mike Johnson, Golf World Equipment Editor and one of the Hot List judges, replies:

The name is the Hot List, not the Best List. A slight difference, to be sure, but fact is that the Hot List is more forward looking than looking at products in retrospect. Your Callaway Big Bertha fairway wood will hit the ball every bit as well as last year, but each of the Gold Medal winners in fairway woods this year did not appear on the Hot List last year. In short, the Big Bertha was up against very stiff competition from clubs offering fitting systems, more than one option in head designs or other technological improvements along with, in some instances, more buzz, including from its own sister Callaway X and Callaway FT fairway woods. It may not come across as such, but the difference between Gold and Silver is slight and the Bertha had the highest score among those clubs in the Silver category (which you could likely ascertain from the ratings of each of the five criteria). It may not appear consistent, but it?s important to remember that just because a club earned a gold medal last year that it will earn one the following year. The landscape changes from year to year, meaning a fluctuation in the scores of products from the previous year is highly likely.

--Bob Carney

Our suggestion in the February Hot List package that amateurs aren't upgrading equipment fast enough brought frank and candid (as they say in diplomatic circles) responses from several of you.

New Jerseyan Dominic Carapelli was one:

In talking about why so many amateur golfers do not keep up with the newest clubs, your theories are: 1) Confusion, 2) Distrust, and 3) Ignorance.  While I admit they all can be factors, the majority of "average golfers" can't afford to go out and buy the newest stuff every year, or every two years for that matter.  I love golf very much and I am a pretty decent player (12.8 index), but even I, let alone my girlfriend can't justify spending between $300-$500 every two or three years for a driver, $700-$1000 for irons, $150-250 per fairway wood, $80-$130 per wedge, and a $100-$300 putter.  Then add the cost of the $20-$50 a dozen balls, ever-inflating greens fees, shoes, gloves, clothes, etc., you're talking thousands of dollars over 2 or 3 years and that's if you play the same "out-dated" set. 

I love your magazine and will continue to read it every month, but I feel those statements are in very poor taste.  I make a decent salary and have a nice home but also like to get out and play golf at least once a week.  If I were to make sure every club in my bag was always custom-fitted, and had the newest clubs, I'd never be able to actually play....I'd only chip balls in my back yard.

I'm somewhat upset over the very subtle but definite insinuation in the Hot List article, pg 113 of February's magazine, that quote, "Too many average golfers must not believe golf equipment is getting any better. That helps explain why you would so often find outdated, overworn and ill-fitted clubs in nearly every bag." I can assure that I, and I believe most average golfers, are very aware of what new golf technology can do for our games. However, there's no way I can justify (especially to my wife) why I just spent a year's grocery money on a new set of clubs that I may use 25 to 50 times a year! On top of that there's no way I can justify the cost of these new clubs. I know the manufactures will claim that the cost helps with the research and development of new, even better, equipment, which for the record I'll never be able to afford. But when I look at the materials going into the making of, say, a new driver there's no way you can justify the price of $400.00 to $500.00. So I'll continue to use the clubs that I either purchased at a web site specializing in used clubs or that were greatly reduced as part of a closeout/reduction sale, and if that offends any one the next time they look in my bag, tough, but at least there's food on the table. Thanks for listening to my rant....

Thanks, gentlemen. You're right--and you're not ranting. The prices are daunting and we are not suggesting that you go broke playing golf. As a man who watched his wife pay $300 for a Ping G-10 "Christmas present", I feel your pain--well, our pain.

On the other hand, as you suggest, there are ways to alleviate the suffering. Trade-ins, used clubs, online auctions or just buying the second-to-last generation are all ways to add technology without a mortgage. Less than 10 per cent of us use trade-in credits. So there are options. But you're right. We occasionally lose touch. Thanks for bringing us back.

--Bob Carney