TaylorMade Tour Soft Review

Tour Soft is built around the largest core TaylorMade puts in a golf ball and the size is the whole design. A big, low-compression core stores energy at slower swing speeds, which is why it feels soft off every club and still carries respectably for a player who is never going to swing 105. The extended flight dimple pattern keeps it higher than most two-piece balls manage, so it holds a green from a mid-iron rather than skidding across it.

What you cannot engineer around is the cover. Ionomer is durable and cheap and it does not grip a wedge groove the way cast urethane does, so a half wedge that would check twice with a tour ball takes one hop and releases eight feet past the flag. That is the compromise, it is not marginal, and it is why the greenside grade sits two tiers under the overall rather than beside it. Everything else earns the price. At twenty-five dollars a dozen it feels better off a putter than balls costing double, and for a player who scores from full swings rather than spin, it is close to unbeatable.