Hideki Matsuyama leads Sentry after Scotty Cameron putter switch

01/04/2025 10:00 AM

The 2021 Masters champion Hideki Matsuyama has a reputation on tour for being a fiddler with putters – but it's also well-known that he doesn't like to change the one he puts in his bag too often.

But when he does make that transition he has a habit of making it pay big-style.

In the first two rounds of the PGA Tour's 2025 season opener in Hawaii the Japanese star has thrashed a pair of 65s to hit the top of The Sentry leaderboard on 16-under 130 and he revealed after his second lap that he has a new putter in the bag.

Sound familiar?

Back in August, at the FedEx St Jude Championship, Matsuyama took half a dozen Scotty Cameron putters with him to TPC Southwind and, after trying them all out in practice, he decided to put a Scotty Cameron by Titleist Craftsman tour prototype based on the Circa 62 model in play.

"It's behaving very well," he said ahead of the final round and he proved it.

He'd spent the season languishing outside the top 100 for Strokes Gained Putting and then promptly topped that category on his way to winning his second PGA Tour title of the year.

This week he is back playing similar games.

He's got a new Scotty Cameron centre-shafted blade putter in the bag and it's helped him to make 15 birdies and one eagle through 36 holes to lead Collin Morikawa by one going into the weekend.

Back-to-back rounds of 8-under and a one-stroke lead

Hideki Matsuyama goes bogey-free in the second round @TheSentry. pic.twitter.com/P8wFmd9kqO

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) January 4, 2025

Matsuyama is famously enigmatic, or maybe just aloof, in chats with the media and it's not just in English – the Japanese media also struggles to get him to say very much.

And he was typically short when talking at the halfway point in Kapalua yet he was also quite funny in those brief exchanges.

When he said that he'd just seen someone using the new putter and liked the look of it, he was asked who that person was.

"Just somebody that nobody knows," he replied.

"What do you like about it?" someone asked.

"Because (the ball) is going in," he said with a smile.

"Do you think you'll keep using it for awhile?"

"I don't know."

"How many other putters do you have with you right now?"

"Four."

His secret on the greens, it seems, is to have plenty of options and go with the one that's feeling best on the day.

His entertaining responses were not limited to his putting however.

How about: "What's the best thing you've done on the island this week off the golf course?"

"Haven't done anything," he deadpanned.

Or: "What do you think is different this week than the past few years here in Hawaii?"

"I have no idea," he said.

He might be ice cold in interviews, but he's currently hot with the putter.

READ MORE:Xander Schauffele puts new Callaway Elyte woods in bag for 2025 opener

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