[Photo: NurPhoto]
Ryan Gerard dropped a 37-foot birdie bomb on the penultimate hole to seemingly seal a win at the Memorial Tournament, but J.T. Poston answered with a birdie putt on the 18th hole to force overtime. The 50th playing of the event came to a finish with Poston winning with a par on the second extra hole.
The fact Poston won with a par exemplified his final round. Poston started the day four shots ahead but was unsteady, standing three-over-par for the round before making three birdies in his last five holes, zipping his 7-iron approach from 154 metres at the last to seven feet.
Poston gained eight-plus shots on his approaches with his Titleist T100 irons. He also ranked third in putting with his TaylorMade Spider Tour X mallet. It was a recent golf ball change, however, that is the key equipment story.
At last month’s PGA Championship, Poston talked to Titleist reps about testing some options that could be a little better for him in the wind as he felt like he was over-spinning his irons and full wedge shots.
He tested the current Pro V1 and new Left Dash version at home the week after the PGA. At the Charles Schwab Challenge at Colonial, he spent more time on the range with Titleist’s tour team and made the decision to put the Left Dash in play. Heading into the Schwab, Poston ranked 85th on the PGA Tour in Strokes Gained/Approach (+0.024) but did better at Schwab and nearly topped the field this week, finishing second in that stat.
Said Poston after Friday’s round at Muirfield Village: “We actually switched to a different golf ball. I went to the Left Dash that Titleist makes last week. It’s supposed to help me a little bit in the wind. So we felt like today was going to be a good test of that and it obviously performed really well. We had a couple shots that I felt like I didn’t quite hit ’em perfect and it hung in there pretty well.”
He hung in there well enough to get a handshake from Jack Nicklaus, too.
What J.T. Poston had in the bag at the 2026 Memorial Tournament:
Ball: Titleist Pro V1x Left Dash
Driver: Titleist GTS3 (Mitsubishi Diamana BF 60 TX), 9 degrees
3-wood: Titleist TS2, 15 degrees
7-wood: TaylorMade Qi4D, 21 degrees
Irons (4): Titleist T150; (5-9): Titleist T100
Wedges: Titleist Vokey SM10 (46, 50.55 degrees); Titleist WedgeWorks (60 degrees)
Putter: TaylorMade Spider Tour X Torched
