Equipment

LA Golf Partners buys Matrix Shafts’ assets, launches “LA Golf Shafts”

Published

8 years ago

Mar 19, 2018

Reed Dickens, Founder and Chairman of the newly formed LA Golf Partners, is bringing a concept he once used in a baseball bat company into the world of golf shafts.

Marucci Sports, of which Dickens was the co-founder and former CEO, is the No. 1 bat in Major League Baseball (by a reported 20 percent over its competition), and it’s different because the company partnered with professional players who not only helped with product development, but who actually invested in the company.

Now, Dickens is bringing the same strategy into golf after winning a bid and purchasing assets (inventory, equipment and patents/IP) from Matrix Shafts on March 9th. LA Golf Shafts will partner with professional golfers; the company will build shafts for these pros “from a blank sheet of paper,” meaning they will be fully custom, according to Dickens. Also, those players will become partners with the company. As of now, LA Golf Shafts has not announced exactly which players will become partners.

LA Golf Shafts will also sell aftermarket shafts, with emphasis on the word aftermarket. According to Chief Operating Officer Chris Nolan — who’s the former General Manager of North America for Matrix Golf Shafts — LA Golf Shafts will be made with extreme attention to detail and with a different scaling approach. Therefore, the new shafts will be aftermarket-only, meaning they will not be the “stock” shafts in the golf clubs of OEMs. LA Golf Shafts will also offer the signature shafts of pros to the public, according to Nolan.

So, what’s the connection between baseball bats and golf shafts?

“There’s not just a few parallels, there’s dozens,” says Dickens.

Dickens, who was a baseball player growing up but is also a lifelong golfer and has a handicap in the “low teens,” says when the opportunity arose to buy the assets from Matrix he drew a number of connections between the baseball bat industry and the golf shaft industry. The similarities he noted included materials used, industry size, trade secrets and attention to detail of the products. He also recalls that player-after-player in the majors had issues with baseball bat specs that were off: “Some players kept a scale in their locker to make sure their bat actually weighed [the proper amount].” Now, Dickens says making golf shafts that are fully custom and “absolutely perfect” makes perfect sense given his background. He says that “custom” shafts doesn’t mean engravings or colors, however; he says they’re making prototypes for specific player needs.

Just four days after winning the bid, Dickens and Nolan said they already began making prototypes. While no player-partner for LA Golf Shafts has been announced, they say they’re shooting for Quarter 2 — “as early in Quarter 2 as possible” — to have a product at market.

In terms of pricing, Dickens says LA Golf Shafts will “position as a premium brand.” They will be “aggressive with margins,” and expect to sell “on the high end and above the high end” of what’s currently on the market, possibly “at a few different price points.” Dickens says philosophically that he places a premium on value, meaning he “won’t ask for more money than [the shaft is] worth” and that the company will “spend more money on making these shafts in order to give more to the consumer.”

As for LA Golf Partners, Dickens says the brand new company will continue “looking for good opportunities and looking for the right partners.” Dickens says the company will focus on not just traditional strategies in the golfing space, but will be looking for strategies that are different, possibly partnering with companies not in the golf space.

“I’m on a mission to grow and expand the game of golf,” Dickens says. “[LA Golf Partners will] invest in diverse golf businesses and grow the audience of who plays golf.”

The takeaway here? Dickens and LA Golf Partners have big plans for growing the game of golf, and they’re starting with a shaft company.

Certainly, GolfWRX will be the first to bring you in-hand photos of the new LA Golf Shafts when they release, along with all of the information on materials, tech and specs when we know them.

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Andrew Tursky

He played on the Hawaii Pacific University Men's Golf team and earned a Masters degree in Communications. He also played college golf at Rutgers University, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism.

27 Comments

Pingback: Dustin Johnson joins LA Golf as a partner, member of board of directors – GolfWRX
the dude

Aug 28, 2018 at 11:56 am

LA??….time to rethink that name

Reply Report comment
Be Warned

Aug 3, 2018 at 11:41 am

Good luck getting a shaft that’s not a complete forgery. Unless they throw out the entire old inventory, don’t even waste your money. You’ll receive a repainted, random shaft.

Reply Report comment
Tiger whisperer

Mar 22, 2018 at 9:37 am

GolfnRide – it would not take much research to find that composite bats are made out of the same materials that composite shafts are made from. Marucci makes composite bats, so it actually makes a lot of sense.

Reply Report comment
~j~

Mar 21, 2018 at 1:23 pm

Another high end ‘solution’ for one’s swing flaws. Whe I’m sure it’ll he ‘fun’ and ‘cool’ to create ylur own personel shaft, I’m betting the only increases one will see is the dent in gheir wallets.

Walt, you must have 100% driving accuracy and distance like DJ if you’re vested in one of those seven (wet) dreams shafts. Your strokes gained against your other rich friends must be thru the roof ????

Reply Report comment
GolfnRide

Mar 21, 2018 at 12:37 pm

Sounds cool, but am I missing something? Aren’t MLB bats made from wood? I don’t see the crossover “similarities” here.

Reply Report comment
george

Mar 20, 2018 at 4:58 pm

“n terms of pricing, Dickens says LA Golf Shafts will “position as a premium brand.” They will be “aggressive with margins,” and expect to sell “on the high end and above the high end” of what’s currently on the market, possibly “at a few different price points.” …”
———————-
Only the upper 1% and neurotic gearheads will afford to buy these overpriced status shafts to fix their swing faults with money and equipment.

Reply Report comment
Ryan

Mar 20, 2018 at 2:35 pm

I preordered an M3 with a Matrix Black Tie 80 and I’m still waiting. Now I know why. I wonder if I’ll ever get it?

Reply Report comment
- Jack Nash
  
  Mar 21, 2018 at 1:41 pm
  
  Check Ebay. You’ll probably find a ton there.
  
  Reply Report comment
DB

Mar 20, 2018 at 1:08 pm

“spend more money on making these shafts in order to give more to the consumer.”

So the cost to make them will be $20 instead of 10-$15? I’m guessing the prices will be $400+. Also, LA Golf is a terrible name. Most people don’t have good thoughts when they think of LA.

Reply Report comment
- Jack Nash
  
  Mar 21, 2018 at 1:43 pm
  
  Well, if they’re in LA a sanctuary city/State labor will be cheaper. He did say he’d be aggressive on margins which doesn’t necessarily mean tighter.
  
  Reply Report comment
walt

Mar 20, 2018 at 12:14 pm

“n terms of pricing, Dickens says LA Golf Shafts will “position as a premium brand.” They will be “aggressive with margins,” and expect to sell “on the high end and above the high end” of what’s currently on the market, possibly “at a few different price points.” Dickens says philosophically that he places a premium on value, meaning he “won’t ask for more money than [the shaft is] worth” and that the company will “spend more money on making these shafts in order to give more to the consumer.”
Golf shafts only affordable for the top 1%… and gearheads will have to bleed for these shafts.

Reply Report comment
carl spackler

Mar 20, 2018 at 8:23 am

seems like a bad move to drop the matrix name, especially when there are alot of pros using existing matrix shafts now

Reply Report comment
Miuralovechild

Mar 20, 2018 at 1:38 am

LA Gear would be a better name! I’ll stick with no nonsense Oban unless my club fitter tells me different.

Reply Report comment
- Robert Parsons
  
  Mar 20, 2018 at 11:23 am
  
  Wasn’t LA Gear a cheesy clothing company from the 80’s? They did a lot of neon, pastels, & stretchy nylon stuff. Hahaha
  
  Reply Report comment
  - Ernst
    
    Mar 20, 2018 at 8:25 pm
    
    ????yeah it was!
    
    Reply Report comment
- stueldo
  
  Mar 16, 2019 at 7:10 pm
  
  Like that comment.
  
  Reply Report comment
SImms

Mar 20, 2018 at 1:26 am

Before you believe all this and that about shafts find and read Mr. Adams (original founder of Adams golf) article about golf shafts…..from a guy that made a living competing with the best golf club OEM’s in the world. In a nut shell once you have the right flex, kick point for your swing it matters little how “Premium” the shaft is….

Reply Report comment
walt

Mar 19, 2018 at 11:40 pm

Great, but will your shafts beat out the autoclave cured Seven Dreams $1200 graphite shafts …. or will they be floppy soggy oven-cured shafts filled with excess epoxy plastic?
Autoclave curing sucks out the redundant expoxy and the shaft is predominantly graphite fibers. All of the graphite shafts on the market now are oven-cured and reinforced with exotic metallic of graphite fibers to compensate for the spaghetti performance…. and after 40 years of graphite shafts the engineers still haven’t figured out how to improve performance…. other than Seven Dreams.

Reply Report comment
- F
  
  Mar 20, 2018 at 12:27 am
  
  They haven’t tried to figure anything out. It’s all been figured out already. The question was how any of these companies could make any of these types of things affordable at the recreational golf level. Any rich tech and materials companies in cahoots with the world governments supplying space-age advanced materials can make anything, and have always done so. It was always the questions of costs allayed to the public, was the issue, not the ability to make anything. You wouldn’t have been able to afford anything they had put on to the Space Shuttle 40 years ago at Walmart and Target, or even Apple and Microsoft levels – until now. But there are still materials and tech being developed and used that Joe Public won’t be able to afford, until they can make them readily available and affordable again. Where do you think microchip tech came from. Where do you think graphite and graphene came from. It’s as if each one of us could own the Large Hadron Collider one day. But we won’t be able to.
  
  Reply Report comment
  - walt
    
    Mar 20, 2018 at 12:10 pm
    
    Haven’t you noticed? All the OEM club and shaft makers have given up on the shrinking recreational golfer market and are now catering to the super-rich where price doesn’t matter…. e.g. PXG, Muira, TM, Ping, etc.. They are overpricing their latest and greatest super game improvement clubs so they can survive. Look at the U.S. car companies who only make a profit selling pickup trucks for blue jean crowd personal use. Same with golf clubs.
    
    Reply Report comment
- Aaron
  
  Mar 20, 2018 at 12:44 am
  
  Walt won’t stop telling anyone and everyone about Seven Dreams shafts. Super annoying.
  
  Reply Report comment
  - rebfan73
    
    Mar 20, 2018 at 8:01 am
    
    Agreed
    
    Reply Report comment
  - walt
    
    Mar 20, 2018 at 12:03 pm
    
    Yup… super annoying for the gearheads who are stuck with their floppy soggy inconsistent pizza oven-cured graphite shafts loaded with extra epoxy plastic that makes them play like limp spaghetti and spraying the ball all over the place. Losing pride in yer WITB sticks must really hurt…. boo hoo 🙁
    
    Reply Report comment
- JDS
  
  Mar 20, 2018 at 9:29 am
  
  Nice Ad.
  
  Reply Report comment
- Skippy
  
  Mar 22, 2018 at 1:18 pm
  
  It’s Seven Dreamers.
  
  Reply Report comment
Steve P

Mar 19, 2018 at 11:30 pm

Worst name they could have ever picked for this new company. When I think “LA”, I don’t think of quality golf equipment.

Reply Report comment

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Whats in the Bag

Christiaan Maas WITB 2026 (June)

Published

12 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

GolfWRX Staff

Driver: TaylorMade Qi4D LS (8 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus TR Blue 6 X

3-wood: TaylorMade Qi10 (15 degrees)
Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 9 TX

Irons: TaylorMade P770 (3), TaylorMade P7CB (4), TaylorMade P7TW (5-PW)
Shafts: Fujikura Ventus Black HB 10 X, True Temper Dynamic Gold X100

Wedges: TaylorMade Prototype (50-SB09), TaylorMade MG5 (56-HB12, 60-LV07)
Shafts: True Temper Dynamic Gold S400

Putter: TaylorMade TP Juno

Ball: Titleist Pro V1x

Grips: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Cord

Check out more in-hand photos of Christiaan Maas’ clubs here.

Equipment

TaylorMade MySpider Tour and Tour X: More customizable build options now available

Published

12 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

Alistair Cameron

TaylorMade Golf’s MySpider program underwent a substantial overhaul over the last month. Firstly, the company launched the option to customize the Spider ZT model, and now the program has returned with the MySpider Tour and MySpider Tour X.

The revamped page now gives golfers complete control over every visual and functional detail of their putter on the popular Tour and Tour X head, with every cosmetic idea thought of. In MySpider Tour, golfers can choose from four head finishes, 16 paint fill colors, nine Surlyn face insert colors, three aluminum insert options, six sightline configurations, and four hosel options — L-neck, small slant, double bend, center shaft. Six sightline options are available in MySpider Tour, including the optically engineered True Path alignment system. MySpider Tour X gives builders the option of four head finishes, four hosel configurations, and five sightline options, also including True Path alignment.

One of the more interesting features of the new MySpider program is the availability of three distinct face insert options. Along with the usual Surlyn Pure Roll insert trusted by Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy, which can be customized from nine colors, golfers can now also select firmer options. Two are offered with the black aluminum Pure Roll insert, slightly firmer than the traditional insert, or for the firmest feel, golfers can choose from two colors of milled aluminum inserts.

Another fun addition to the MySpider Tour is the ability to use the “Tommy Sightline.” The custom alignment aid design, which was first drawn onto Tommy Fleetwood’s putter by PGA Tour Rep James Holley, is based on the milled sightline on his Spider ZT head. There are five shorter lines on the left and right of a longer central line serving as the traditional short line alignment aid.

See below for the full specifications sheet for MySpider Tour and Tour X:

MySpider Tour

MySpider Tour X

Equipment

Then and now: Comparing Rory McIlroy’s current setup to his record-breaking 2019 Canadian Open victory

Published

15 hours ago

Jun 11, 2026

Alistair Cameron

In Rory McIlroy’s first appearance at the 2019 RBC Canadian Open, he crushed the record books to earn his 16th PGA Tour title in dominating fashion, winning by seven shots over Shane Lowry and Webb Simpson.

McIlroy’s score of 22-under-par 258 is the lowest 72-hole score to date at the Canadian Open, and his closing 61 is also the best final-round score in the history of one of golf’s oldest tournaments. Finally, with his win in 2019, McIlroy became only the sixth player to win the career Triple Crown, adding to his victories at the U.S. Open in 2011 and The Open Championship in 2014, joining Tommy Armour, Walter Hagen, Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino and Tiger Woods in a coveted list.

So, with that, why not compare his current setup to the clubs he used to break all the records?

Driver

2019: TaylorMade M5 (9 degrees), Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 70 TX
2026: TaylorMade Qi4D (9 degrees @8), Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 7X (45 5/8 inches)

McIroy led the Tour in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee in 2019; he’s doing the same in 2026. Between now and then, McIlroy has switched from the Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 70 TX (a shaft with slightly more feeling in the tip) to the original Fujikura Ventus Black 7X, having just made the change to the heavier version from playing the 60X.

What’s interesting about McIlroy’s 2019 setup is that the weighting on his driver is actually set in the high-draw setting, using the T-Track weighting system, whereas in the Qi4D, he’s currently using a heavily rear-weighted setup. (Two 13-gram weights in the rear and only two 4-gram front weights.)

The TaylorMade M5 driver he played in during his Canadian Open win was the company’s first head that they claimed to design to initially exceed the USGA’s COR limit, and then injected with tuning resin to bring it back in bounds.

Fairway woods

2019: TaylorMade M6 3-wood (15 degrees), Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 80 TX; TaylorMade M5 5-wood (19 degrees), Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei CK Pro White 90 TX
2026: TaylorMade Qi4D 3-wood (15 degrees), Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 8X; TaylorMade Qi4D 5-wood (18 degrees), Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 9X

The TaylorMade M6 fairway wood that McIlroy was using during the 2019 season is still in the bag of some of the best golfers on Tour in 2026. Just check out Justin Rose’s winning setup from the Farmers Insurance Open earlier this year. This year, though, McIlroy has still been searching for his top-end-of-the-bag setup, having played both the new Qi4D and the Qi10, which he won the Masters with.

The same shaft swap can be seen in the fairway woods as the driver, along with slightly less loft on the 5-wood.

Irons

2019: TaylorMade P750 (4) Buy here, TaylorMade P730 (5-9), Shafts: Project X 7.0
2026: TaylorMade P760 (4), TaylorMade Rors Proto (5-9), Shafts: Project X 7.0

The biggest difference between McIlroy’s custom set and the stock P730s is the groove design. While the P730s were constructed with 14 MX-9 grooves on their milled faces, McIlroy’s proto heads instead use the higher-spinning, 16-groove layout of the TW2 grooves. Other big differences between the sets are that McIlroy’s 7- and 8-irons have thinner toplines, are 1 degree stronger in loft, and are 1/4 inch longer than the original P730 builds.

With McIlroy’s 4-iron, the switch from P750 to P760 sees a transition to a two-piece construction with Speed Foam in it, which allows McIlroy to launch the ball slightly higher, with more workability.

Wedges

2019: TaylorMade Milled Grind (48-09SB), TaylorMade MG Hi-Toe (52-09SB, 56-09SB, 60-LB09), Shafts: Project X Rifle 6.5
2026: TaylorMade MG5 (46-09SB, 50-09SB, 54-11SB, 60-08LB @61), Shafts: Project X 6.5 (46-54), Project X 6.5 Wedge (60)

Between 2019 and 2026, McIlroy’s focus on his short game has been much more apparent. It was the reason why he switched back to the TP5 golf ball, to help with launch, spin and control with his wedges leading up to his career Grand Slam victory in 2025. The most apparent changes to McIlroy’s wedge setup are his lofts and bounce. He’s slowly delofted his pitching to a sand wedge, but has increased the loft on the lob wedge, bending his current 60-degree to 61. With that, adding more loft to his lob wedge also slightly increases the bounce and leading-edge sit point, so, as a result, he plays a lower-bounce lob wedge compared to 2019. The MG5 wedges are also softer than the first Milled Grind option from 2019. McIlroy also no longer plays the full-face grooves found on the Hi-Toe.

Putter

2019: TaylorMade Spider X
2026: TaylorMade Spider Tour X

Notice anything similar. Yes, the copper finish on Rory McIlroy’s Spider X putter in 2019 is a slightly more reflective finish than the recently released torched PVD finish. McIlroy was using the True Path alignment system, but now uses only a single white sightline.

Ball

2019: 2019 TaylorMade TP5 (#22)
2026: 2025 TaylorMade TP5 (RORS)

As mentioned above, McIlroy had transitioned from the TP5 to TP5x golf ball since his victory in Canada in 2019, but now is black with the same style of golf ball as his victory at Hamilton Golf & Country Club.

Grips

2019: Golf Pride Tour Velvet Cord
2026: Golf Pride MCC

Interesting, McIlroy actually used Golf Pride’s Tour Velvet Cord grips during his victory in 2019 (it was during a 2+ year switch to the corded TV) as opposed to his usual MCC grips, which he has played for most of his career.