Being square in a rounded world
The time for Square Line Golf's new putter grip may be now.
Things that are square: Rubik’s Cube. A chessboard. A pizza box. A hamburger at Wendy’s or White Castle. A digital QR code. A putter grip.
Whoa, now. A putter grip?
A square putter grip, one inch in diameter, and its company, Square Line Golf, is the brainchild of Robb Nunn, a PGA of America Life Member. It can be found at SquareLineGolf.com. The grip ($35) is made of a dense proprietary material and comes in two lengths — the standard 10.5-inch model and a longer 13.0-inch grip.
It sounds a little outside-the-box. Putter grips have long been oversized, almost squarish but with soft, rounded, squishy edges. The Square Line Golf grip has firm edges.
Even more outside-the-box is the story behind Nunn’s creation. His father Stan Nunn was an avid golfer. He asked his young teenage son, Robb, what he thought about a square putter grip. “I said I didn’t know,” Robb recalls. “I told him I didn’t know if it was legal.”
Fifteen years later, Dad mentioned it again. Robb Nunn still figured it probably wasn’t allowed under the Rules of Golf. After Stan Nunn passed away in 1994, Robb’s mother, Kathleen, asked, “What did you ever do with Dad’s idea about a putter grip?”
Nothing, Robb answered. And that’s what inspired him to pursue the concept. “The third time’s the charm,” Nunn said in a phone interview from Michigan.
So Nunn got a square putter grip made. He called it U Squared. SuperStroke later produced something similar called the SS2, but it had rounded, soft edges like four comfy flat tires.
Nunn tried making some grips but ran out of financing in 2015 before finally securing his patent in 2016. He met Matt Simmons in a Michigan golf store in 2024. Simmons had engineering and molding expertise. So they became partners and developed a grip and a business plan.
The grip is made from a proprietary material that is impervious to liquids, not including acid. It is compressed by a hand-milled still to make it more dense. “It feels to me like what a putter should be,” Nunn says. “SuperStroke is spongier.”
What’s the advantage of a square grip? It is easier to align with the putter-face than a regular round, pistol-shaped or oversized grip. If you’ve ever regripped a putter or had one regripped, you know how difficult it is to get the grip on so it’s perfectly aligned and the putter-face is square to the target. The flat sides of the Square Line Golf grip eliminate that problem. Other putters on the market have addressed that issue, too, such as the FlatCat. But Nunn’s grip is the firmest grip I’ve ever tried.
“The first time I used it, I had 21 putts and shot 63,” Nunn says. “The second day I shot 64.”
That sounds like marketing blarney, sure. When Nunn first contacted me about taking a look at a square putter grip, I immediately hated the idea. I prefer a thin, pistol-shaped grip and that’s what I’ve figured out works best for me over years of mediocre-at-best putting. A square grip? I didn’t even want to try it.
Nunn sent me two samples, one in each size. The grips are surprisingly heavy, due to their density. I had the Square Line Golf grip installed on a putter from my basement that was not on my active roster, if you know what I mean. Honestly, I didn’t want to screw up one of my favorite putters.
We golfers all secretly want instant magic when we’re looking for a new putter. There was no magic when I picked up the Square Line attached to a center-shafted blade that had a shimmering face. In hindsight, I should have used a putter with a heavier head. After five minutes on the practice green, I was not all that happy.
The size of the grip was a bit too big for my usual claw grip technique. I did like the flat sides the Square Line grip gave me so I thought, “Why don’t I just putt with the conventional grip I gave up using 15 years ago?” Thirty minutes later, I had totally changed my mind. I have kind of a square-to-square stroke and the grip’s flat sides felt so comfortable with my conventional grip. I went back to letting the index finger on my right hand rest of the grip’s back side — the side opposite from the putter-face — and it felt so comfortable and familiar.
I spent another 45 minutes making stress-free strokes and holing putts on the practice green in mass quantity. I almost laughed out loud when I poured in three 20-footers in a row at one point.
What works for me are the sharp edges of the Square Line grip. Those edges make it easy for me to get my hands in the same position on the club every time. The edges serve as markers, I know exactly where I want to feel the edge with the third and fourth fingers of each hand. On a rounded grip or pistol grip, it is easy to grip it slightly differently without realizing it. The Square Line grip solves that issue.
Putting on the practice green, of course, isn’t the same as putting on the golf course during a round. Or having a par putt with money on the line. Or playing in a tournament. It’s winter in Pittsburgh, so I can’t test it for real yet to see, mainly, if I can go back to a conventional grip after all these years. Why did I quit using a conventional grip? Because I had to. My stroke was breaking down or flinching or the blade was staying open. I don’t know. The claw grip was an easy fix because there is hardly any learning curve to using it.
After I explained all this to Nunn, he said, “Yeah, you have to use this grip to really get it. And we like to say, why spend $400 on a new putter when you can spend $35 on a square grip to make your putter feel like new?”
I am going to install Nunn’s longer grip on a different putter. Nunn suggested using a 340-gram head for perfect counterbalancing. Well, the bullpen in my basement has something like that. There could be an intense putter battle for a spot in my starting lineup this spring. There will be tryouts and the top contenders, whatever they are, will (sorry about this) … square off.
Hope springs eternal.
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I was pretty sure square grips were an old idea made new again but couldn't really find anything re that. i figured some sharp eyed reader would supply the answer, and you did. Thanks!
interesting, thx.