Wyndham Clark's caddie John Ellis says PGA Tour players "mess around" with other players' gear "more than you think"
Wyndham Clark's caddie is willing to let everyone in on a little secret. John Ellis had a Q&A with the PGA Tour ahead of Clark's appearance in the BMW Championship this weekend, where he revealed something that might be a bit unexpected.
Every single golfer has their own gear. Many of them have customized clubs specially designed to their liking.
When asked about Clark reportedly trying out Rickie Fowler's putter before putting it to use in a Major championship, a tournament Clark won by a single stroke over Rory McIlroy at the 2023 US Open, Ellis said:
"More than you think. If somebody's doing well with a club or a putter or there's a new driver, everybody's inclined to be like, ‘What do you got going over there?’ So that stuff happens more than you think."
According to Ellis, this is something that happens fairly often. Some golfers clearly believe that some success can be derived from the equipment, so they're willing to try what anyone else has done to see if it works for them.
Wyndham Clark addresses new mindset in playoffs
For a while, Wyndham Clark looked like he was ascending into the upper tier of golfing. He burst onto the scene with his first win at the 2023 Wells Fargo Championship and then his first Major win last year at the 2023 US Open, but things slowed down after that.
These two wins in a short period, including one of the most prestigious tournaments in golf, made it seem like Clark had arrived, before he experienced some setbacks.
Clark said in an interview with SB Nation that earlier this year, he got too worried about the outcome and thus was not focussing on his actual play:
“I’ve gone back to a little bit more of a process. I think I was getting a little too outcome-focused. As I had some early success in the year and was playing amazing golf, I guess just falling short of Scottie a couple of times—I just got too much into winning and trying to break through and win in some of those big events."
He came up short against world number one Scottie Scheffler a few times, such as the 2024 Arnold Palmer Invitational, and that only served to bring a change in his mindset. Clark continued:
"I got away from everything that made me successful, and I feel like recently, I’ve gotten back to the process of focusing on the things that got me here, playing good golf, and I’ve started to play good golf."
He'll have a home tournament this week at the BMW Championship where he will try to win the playoff tournament and possibly even the Tour Championship after that.