How Phil Mickelson's Phrankenwood Stacks Up Against Other Clubs on PGA Tour

Leave it to Phil Mickelson to push Callaway to come up with a club that doesn't fit into any modern category. A club so unique, it has to be called Phrankenwood. 

From what I can gather, the Phrankenwood is essentially a Callaway X-Hot 3-wood, with the loft and shaft of a driver. 

The head size hearkens back to a day when drivers weren't roughly the size of a smart car. To be a little more precise, and I'm getting the details of this club from Michael Chwasky of Golf.com, the head is 250 cc's, instead of the typical, and maximum allowable, 460 cc's. 

In other words, the Phrankenwood is just slightly larger than the typical 3-wood. 

This is where the comparisons to a 3-wood end. Phil's Phrankenwood checks in at 8.5 degrees of loft.

However, Golf Digest's Guy Yocom spoke with Phil's caddie Jim (Bones) Mackay, and Bones said it was somewhere between 8.5 and nine degrees. This is a fairly common loft for a driver as lofts have begun to move back down.

The shaft is the length of that found on the typical driver, and specifically it is the 45-inch Fubuki k 70X Prototype shaft. 

So, from a distance, this club is essentially going to look like a driver from the 90's—due to the length, but smaller head. 

In a quote captured by Chwasky, here is what Phil had to say about his new club at his Tuesday press conference from Augusta:

"

It's almost like a small driver but its put the 3-wood technology of our X Hot into a driver. What it's done is taken a lot of spin off of it. And if you watch, you'll see a lot of the shots off the tee that I hit have a lot more scoot on them.

"

Now, the reduction in spin should make the ball easier to control. However, that also makes it tougher to shape. 

Bones is not worried about that. He told Yocom that "[Phil] can shape it enough." 

And all the while, Phil and Bones both maintain he is crushing it. Mickelson said at his press conference that he is able to hit one to two clubs less on approach shots than he has in recent years because of his added distance with the Phrankenwood. 

Recent drivers, as Golfweek's James Achenbach points out, have been producing less spin. In fact, Mickelson switched drivers to Callaway's RAZR Fit Xtreme prior to his win in Phoenix earlier this year, and he commented on the low spin produced off of that driver. 

So, this very well could be the lowest spinning driver out there. 

We won't get good performance answers for the Phrankenwood until Phil gets at least one tournament round with it under his belt, but it is already safe to say it is the most unique driver out there.