PGA Championship 2024: Phil Mickelson putting with goggles on ahead of a major might be the most Phil Mickelson move ever
Most players will tell you that on major championship weeks, they like to keep it simple. If you’re tinkering with your equipment or “searching” for a swing on the range the week of, you might as well book your flight home for Friday. Both defending PGA Champion Brooks Koepka and reigning Masters winner Scottie Scheffler certainly subscribe to this theory, which is a large part of why they are so successful on these weeks.
As for Phil Mickelson, well, he’s not like most players. Whether it be putting two drivers into play at the 2006 Masters (he won), adding a 64-degree wedge to his bag at the 2006 U.S. Open (he should have won) or going completely driverless at both the 2013 U.S. Open and Open Championship (should have won, did win), the man has never been afraid to take a trip to TinkerTown, USA on a major week. The fact he’s had so much success in doing so is further proof he’s a unicorn.
Yet even for Lefty, rolling putts on the practice green while wearing gigantic goggles on the eve of the 2024 PGA Championship is a new one:
Considering his results on LIV this year, which include one top-10 finish in seven starts, it certainly can’t hurt?
Unfortunately, we have no stats from LIV, but we can confidently say Mickelson’s putting is the area of his game he’s currently the most fixated on. He first tested the LAB putter in the video clip above back in February and has kept it in play ever since. Here he was just two weeks ago grinding away with the LAB DF3:
Given the fact Mickelson has been a bladesman for much of his career, this is a stark change for him on the greens. Golf being such a trendy sport, there’s no doubt Mickelson saw the LAB putter reignite the career of Lucas Glover and help the likes of notoriously bad putters like Adam Scott, Will Zalatoris and Byeong Hun An and thought it could help him as well. Watch, before you know it, everybody else will be rocking those goggles on the practice green, too.
