Review by Jordan Fuller from Golf Influence
You can see a SeeMore putter from a mile away. The distinctive shaft is the giveaway: from the black grip, a standard silver putter shaft emerges, but about ⅔ of the way down, it switches to a solid black before entering the putterhead in a nearly center-shafted slot.
The original FGP Black Blade is the quintessential SeeMore, as it’s had the brightest moments in the spotlight. Starting with Payne Stewart’s US Open victory in 1999 and continuing with Zach Johnson’s triumphs in the 2007 Masters and 2015 British Open, the SeeMore FGP Black Blade boasts three major championships and many more PGA Tour wins.
It’s a unique look for a putter, with none of the heel-toe weighting that classic blades entail and no offset. It has a beautifully milled face that puts a great roll on the ball. The shaft enters the club head right at the sweet-spot, so players used to an Anser-style blade might not like what they see at first glance. But once the technology behind the club is explained, many players are happy to convert to the SeeMore methodology.
The most noticeable aspect that differentiates SeeMore is their Rifle Scope Technology (RST), an aiming aid that will help golfers who have trouble knowing if the clubface is square. The black bottom of the shaft is designed to obscure a red dot on the putter, leaving only the two white lines flanking the red dot visible. If you can’t see the white lines, or you can see the red dot, your putter face isn’t properly aligned.
But beyond the RST is my favorite aspect of the SeeMore FGP: it’s “Face Balanced at Impact.” What this means is that the weighting of the putter is such that the putter naturally rests square to the target line when it’s held at the angle you putt with. SeeMore isn’t worried about “face balanced” putters that point to the sky, because you’re not putting at the sky.
The fact that the putter naturally wants to be square helps you get putts started on line. That should be the number one job of a putter: hit the ball where you want it to go. And the SeeMore FGP certainly does that – crucial if you want to break 80.
Golfers who are used to employing a “forward press” — a slight movement of the hands forward to initiate the putting stroke — will need to find a different trigger for their putting stroke, as a press tends to open the putter face of the SeeMore FGP and leads to a push. A forward press is often employed as a crutch for a player who’s using a putter with too much offset. Since the Original FGP Black Blade has no offset, the forward press becomes unnecessary.
I find that using a trigger of slightly bouncing the putter off the ground (much like Payne did in 1999) works wonders. I’m not a fan of starting the stroke from a static position, so just tapping the ground a few times before initiating the stroke really does the trick of relieving tension and allowing for a free, smooth stroke.
The beautiful milled face sports 2.5 degrees of loft, which is less than you’ll find in many traditional blades. But again, since the FGP has no offset, it requires less loft because the hands and the putter head arrive to the ball at the same time. 2.5 degrees is ideal for getting the ball rolling quickly: any more and you’d be bouncing it on its way, any less and it’d be skidding for a few feet before starting to roll.
The FGP Black Blade is customizable to your specs, so you can ensure that it’s at the right lie angle for your putting stroke. And they offer a counterbalanced grip with either 30 or 50 grams of weight added to the grip. I find that 30 grams of weight added to the grip helps with distance control, especially on speedy greens.
The center of gravity is focused right in the center of the clubface, with little weight extended to the heel and toe. The weighting makes a proper release of the clubhead almost automatic. With a bit of practice, the FGP starts to feel like it’s swinging itself and you don’t have to worry about perimeter weighting correcting mis-hits.
I’m normally an advocate for finding clubs that suit your game, but the SeeMore FGP is an outlier — it’s a club that, with a few minor adjustments on your part, contains unique technology that’ll help you make more putts. It might not feel quite right at first, but get used to it and you’ll quickly get used to lower scores.