PGA Tour quietly testing golf ball rollback: What do players think?

Posted by author March 7, 2025 Golf

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ORLANDO – The PGA of America isn’t the only governing body that may be in opposition to the USGA and R&A’s plan for a golf ball rollback.

The PGA Tour quietly has been doing its own research and is preparing to present its findings to the ruling bodies. On Tuesday, Tour leadership briefed the 16-member Player Advisory Council on the findings. Maverick McNealy, a PAC member since last June who is running for chairman, said, “It was as united as I’ve ever seen the PAC.”

McNealy declined to specify whether that was for or against the rollback but Brian Harman, another member of the PAC, gave a pretty good clue.

“I think it’s a bad idea. I can’t get on board,” he told Golfweek at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. “There are so many more steps we can take to mitigate distance with golf course setup, driver set up before you force companies to R&D a bunch of things.”

Harman said that he participated in one of several tests the Tour has conducted with members of all different swing types and speeds and representing all of the tours it operates.

“I hit it a lot shorter,” Harman said. “The farther you hit it, the less you are affected by the first version of the golf ball. It’s the first version but that was the finding.”

Asked why he participated in the testing, Harman said, “Out of a general care for the future of the game. I’ve been through a lot of this stuff in my career. It was the grooves and then it was the putter and now it’s the ball. Sometimes things are just good. Just because a guy that looks like (Houston Astros infielder) Jose Altuve is able to hit home runs doesn’t mean you make the ballparks bigger. Instead of trying to grab low-hanging fruit, there needs to be a more nuanced conversation about the future of the game, what that looks like, and what you want that challenge to be. I’m afraid this golf ball rollback will have the opposite effect of what they want. I think you will have even less skill in the game because it will be even more important to hit the ball far. Guys will train harder to hit it far. When you take distance out, it becomes more important to hit it far.”

A Tour official confirmed that the Tour has been doing its own testing as part of a board directive following the USGA/R&A joint announcement of the new rule in December 2023, which is scheduled to go into effect at the elite level in 2028. But the Tour declined to speak on the record for this story, noting that it is still in the process of discussing its findings with the governing bodies.

The Tour’s study is to determine if the golf ball rollback will significantly affect its players and to better understand what a reduced-distance ball will mean.

Ben Griffin participated in the same test session as Harman at Retreat Golf Course in St. Simons Island, Georgia, and recalled that about 10 players participated, including Keith Mitchell, Patton Kizzire and Davis Thompson. The prototype reduced-distance balls were white and unmarked except for tiny numbers so the testers could identify each ball. Players were asked to hit drivers, 7-irons and wedges on a hole at the course, and rate each shot. The Tour used TrackMan for data capture to compare the reduced-flight golf ball to their current gamer ball.

“They wanted feedback on what we felt that was different in the golf balls,” Griffin said. “Let’s just say it was pretty easy to notice which balls were part of the roll back. It definitely comes out of the air faster. But it still didn’t curve as much because I think the technology of the clubs is so much better. It will affect low-ball hitters the most. Tony Finau and Rory McIlroy won’t experience as big a difference compared to someone like Brian Harman who relies on more roll.”

Count former U.S. Open champion Lucas Glover as firmly in the camp of those opposed to the roll back.

“It’s not a way to grow the game to have people hit it shorter. It’s stupid and reactive like everything else. The (USGA and R&A) never get ahead of anything and then they need to do something drastic on the back end to make up for it,” he said. “They are breaking the world record in the 100 meter, they don’t make it 110. Guys are shooting three-pointers better, they don’t move the line back. They haven’t made the goal posts narrower when field goal kickers got better.”

If the Tour were to join the PGA in coming out against the rollback, the governing bodies will face an existential question: How can they continue down the road of a rollback if the people they are making the rules for do not follow it? It’s quite the conundrum.

“This might be the time that the Tour and PGA of America say, ‘We’re out,’ ” Glover added. “It would be nice if somebody took a stand for us for a change. Maybe this could be the opportunity for the Tour to do that.”