Truth & Rumors: Is PGA Championship turning point for belly putters?

On Wednesday, Graeme McDowell met with the USGA's Mike Davis to voice his opposition to belly putters, according to Hank Gola of the New York Daily News. GMac, who lost the last two majors to players using anchored putters, had this to say of the conversation:

"I think reading between the lines from what the R&A and the USGA are saying, I would say the change is coming," said Graeme McDowell Wednesday. "How imminent that change is obviously a different question..."

...They feel like their research has shown that putting under pressure down the stretch on the back nine on Sunday, when you can anchor the putter to a part of your body . . . that just takes one extraneous movement out of the putting stroke," he said. "It's just kind of a physical fact that if you can just take one element of movement and motion out of the stroke that holing putts will become easier.

"But having said that, if it was so easy, everyone would be using one," he said."

Meanwhile, Webb Simpson, a belly-putter practitioner who clipped McDowell at the U.S. Open in June, picked up on that last point, and drew a very different conclusion:

"Do I think they should be banned? No, and here's why," he said. "You take a wooden driver compared to a 460 cc's titanium, and to me that's a lot bigger difference than a 35 inch putter to a 45 inch putter. Also last year, the strokes game putting, nobody in the top 20 used a belly putter or a long putter. If anybody says it's an advantage, I think you've got to look at the stats and the facts."

Simpson, though, is preparing for the end of anchored days. He says he's already ordered two short Scotty Camerons. "I'm...kind of telling myself to expect it," he added.