I openly admit that one of my favourite golf reviewers of old used to use that trick with his titles....but I found it to be an attention getter, and believe that these clubs deserve all the attention they can get. Are they thick on the top line?--Yes! Are they slightly over-priced?...Yes!.. Do they hit the ball well?...Yes! Are they a vast improvenment over many of Calloway's recent offerings?....Yes!

Alright now Bernie...we've heard you bad-mouth a ton of Callaway's stuff lately. Why try and pull a fast one here? Well there are several reasons. Not the least of which is the gigantic leap forward in quality control that the newly acquired Hogan Division brings to this line of clubs. Let's take a good long look at a very good offering.

HISTORY

Callaway Golf hit the scene back in the nineties, and was a very progressive company at the time. They brought forth the Big Bertha Drivers, Big Bertha Irons, X-14 Irons, Hawkeye Tungsten Titanium Irons, and many offerings that were not only ahead of their time, but well crafted. Yes, I said crafted. They were not the slap 'em together over-priced mediocre offerings of several years ago--they were top-notch quality from stem to stern.

Sadly, as other manufacturers either caught up, or fell by the wayside, people began to grow weary of $500.00 Drivers, and $1200.00 sets of irons that were no longer offering the gigantic technological advantages that Callaway's had become known for. Soon, they made a huge mistake, and began to cut corners. People such as myself not only became disillusioned--we grew darned vocal about it. The Top Flite/Strata/Hogan Acquisition seems to be turning things around. These clubs are a fine example of that turnaround.

BUZZWORDS and TECHNOLOGY

Lots of buzzwords get tossed about these days, both old and new. Some of them are viable, and achieve the wonderful things they tout, while others are simply a new twist on an old fix. Callaway loves to toss about the buzzwords of all varieties, and these irons are no exception. Fortunately for Callaway, they practically invented a lot of these buzzwords through technological innovation, and there is some real teeth to the marketing behind them.

Perimeter Weighting

Extreme Perimeter Weighting can be back-dated to the Ping Eye 2's of several club generations ago. None-the less it is one the first attempts at adding forgivensess, and has become part and parcel of every clubmaker's Buzzword vocabulary ever since. It doesn't really "enlarge the sweetspot" as so many claim, but it does provide a much larger "safe-hitting zone" on the club face, and helps mitigate the lost distances suffered on a miss-hit. This club has it--as advertised, and it works well. These clubs have a gigantic "safe hitting zone" on the face. The "Sweetspot" is also fairly large.

S2H2

The shortened hosel is a Callaway trademark. It's an old buzz word, but an effective one. A shorter hosel makes it easier for the club to get through rough w/out the club head twisting. Less club head twisting means more of that newer buzzword everyone's talking about--MOI. A higher moment of inertia, or less club head twisting, became a very popular buzzword w/the advent of the new block-headed drivers. In irons it's usually been done w/tunsten weights on the toe, in the sole, or in the middle of the cavity. (Witness the irons made by KZG, Yonex, and others.) The shortened hosel is Callaway's own method, and it works exceptionally well when hitting their irons from the rough. The Extreme notch weighting system shifts the weight horizontally across the back in order to make squaring up the long irons an easier proposition. n conjunction w/the shorter hosel, you get an even higher MOI.

Lower Center of Gravity

We should all know by now that a lower center of gravity creates a higher launch. The early Big Bertha irons were legendary for the ease w/which they got the ball up in the air. The X-20 is no exception. Despite the fact that their top-line is not as clunky as the Bertha's, nor is the sole anywhere near as bulbous, they've achieved the same results w/a couple of newer buzzwords. The "Progressive Wall Reduction System" and the Extreme Notch Weighting" have given these babies a 6% increase in lowering the center of gravity over the old X-18's--which themselves had a truly low center of gravity. The notch weighting also figures into the perimeter weighting and forgiveness factors, as does the "Progressive Wall Reduction System."(Basically the longer the iron-the lower the center of gravity.--nice touch.)

Variable Face Technology

This is a great Callaway innovation as well. It's a buzzword that actually means something. Basically the thickness of the face varies across the different areas in order to ensure less loss of distance on an off-center hit. Though I personally did not find it to work as well as it used to on the old VFT Hawkeye Series that Callaway put out many moons ago, I found that it did work better than on the old X-18's. The truly sweet shots were well rewarded w/distance, and the off center shots were minimally penalized. VFT works, and works well.

SHAFTS and SUCH

When Callaway started to cut corners a few years ago, it was their shafts that suffered the worst treatment. Their old RCH Line lost all credibility w/clubmakers and repairmen. You could literally pick up the same shaft on a different set of the same model club that had the same flex rating stamped on it (I.E. "Regular Flex Big Bertha 5 Iron") and measure out a full 10CPM's worth of difference. 10CPM's is a full flex to many shaft makers--and it looked like Callaway just didn't care at all. Hogan Quality control has obviously taken over these days. Shafts are not only matching up in CPM's, but clubheads are no longer flying off at the driving ranges, and balance between shaft and club head has returned. The Graphite shafts feel wonderful, and even though the steel shafts are those darned "Uniflex" models--they too conduct a strong sense of feel and balance.

OVERALL

These clubs aren't actually very workable--but that's what the X-20 Tours are for. These are game-improvement irons to the nth degree w/out all the clunkiness attached. They are safe to hit from alomost any lie. The long and mid irons are very easy to hit, and the ball goes long and straight. The short irons are a shade clunky to be considered "Lasers", but again--these are game-improvement clubs. They do launch the ball on a rather high trajectory, and it doesn't take much effort or an overly steep swing-path to achieve this. High and straight is a good thing in short irons for most of us. These are Callaway's best iron in a long time.



Recommended: Yes