On the same day Happy Gilmore 2 hit Netflix, Callaway’s Odyssey brand dropped a limited-edition replica of Happy’s legendary hockey-blade putter – complete with bent shaft, oversized grip and a headcover that looks like it was stolen from a high school locker room.
It retails for $499.99, which felt steep until it sold out in under 15 minutes and started flipping online for more than double. The price may be wrong, Bob, but the demand was straight off the tee.
If you’re not a golfer, go ahead and skip to the next paragraph. Or just nod politely while pretending to know what any of this means.
The specs? It’s built with a 44-inch shaft, a 57-degree lie angle, 0-degree loft and a 21-inch grip – ideal for an arcing stroke or just flinging it down the fairway in frustration. The putter features a black stepless steel shaft and a black stainless-steel head, fitted with Odyssey’s legendary White Hot urethane insert in the primary hitting area, plus additional inserts in the heel and toe for extra feel and forgiveness.
USGA legal? Hard no.
Avid golfer and NBA star Steph Curry tried it out, taking part in the “Happy Putting Challenge” to see how many putts he could sink in 30 seconds. The outcome? Let’s just say the ball was too good to go to its home.
While it may look like something you’d bring to a fight in a beer league hockey game, it’s built like a true Odyssey. The brand’s reputation for premium putters means even a joke club has to meet its visual and quality standards, which required actual R&D to ensure it performs like a real club, not just a prop.
“It’s a case of ‘If we’re going to do this, we want to create something we’re truly proud of,’” Nick McInally, vice president of global marketing at Callaway, told The Wall Street Journal. “We’re going to make sure that nobody can create a better-performing hockey stick putter.”
Callaway didn’t stop at the putter, though. It released matching Chrome Tour balls printed with classic one-liners like “It’s all in the hips” and “Tap tap taparoo,” ensuring that even your worst shots could be blamed on Happy instead of your appalling swing.
@heybarber Happy Gilmore putter is elite! #hockey #golf #happpygilmore #happygilmore2 ♬ Tuesday's Gone – Lynyrd Skynyrd
And the best part? Golfers don’t hate it. It has been well received by players who care about specs and slapstick, and resale prices are already pushing four figures. Nostalgia sells. Adam Sandler sells harder. And the putter was surprisingly embraced by people who take the game way too seriously, proving once again that 90s-core merch doesn’t have to make sense – it just has to hit the right memory.
For a sport that pairs whispering with light day-drinking, the Happy Gilmore putter fits right in. It’s a beautifully dumb reminder that fun still moves product, and this one found the sweet spot between collector hype and midlife-crisis-disguised nostalgia.
