As you may recall, last Spring the folks at Mizuno Golf sent over a set of the JPX 825’s for our review crew to get their hands on.  After several sessions on the course and at the range we were pleasantly surprised by the results, so much so that one member of our testing team made a permanent switch to the 825’s shortly after and hasn’t looked back.  Now with the 2014 golf season on the horizon the folks at Mizuno presented us with a set of all new JPX EZ Irons – their latest and greatest innovation.  The JPX EZ’s are being touted as the most forgiving set or irons on the market and feature significant improvements from the 825 line.

When pulled out of the box we were immediately impressed by the style and design of the JPX EZ irons which feature an eye catching DuPont-blasted, matte black finish and distinct orange medallions.  While we were in love with the look of the clubs, we truly wanted to find out about the performance of the irons so we gave our team of seven golfers the clubs and told them to hit the range and the course and report back.  Now, on to the good stuff!

Tech Specs:

• Max Pocket Cavity (4-7): Massive sweet area, tightest dispersion, and effortless launch characteristics.
• Deep pocket Cavity (8-GW): For increased accuracy and launch control.
• HOT METAL FACE: Thin multi thickness design for maximum COR to deliver long, consistent distance.
• Harmonic Impact Technology (H.I.T): Feel and sound tuned through cavity frame design.
• Custom Set Make Ups: Available in mixed/ combo sets or with JPX FLI-HI long iron alternatives.

Demo Irons Included: 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, PW, GW

The Mizuno JPX EZ Irons are all about finding and hitting that sweet spot.  While that is a generic term these days, see what Mizuno’s VP of Product Development has to say about it:

For more from Chuck, make sure to check out the embedded video below where he describes the thought process behind the development of the EZ irons.  Which they hope helps bring that aggression into your game to hit those shots you have always dreamed about.

– MIZUNO JPX EZ IRONS REVIEW –

FEEL: 

The old story with game improvement irons like the Mizuno JPX EZ irons, is that you sacrifice touch and feel for better accuracy, forgiveness, and distance.  While this is true to an extent, golf manufacturers are making tremendous strides with these types of clubs to give golfers the best of both worlds.  Our testing team really enjoyed the feel and of the touch JPX EZ irons and found the most impressive touch point to be at impact, which our team described as explosive.  The JPX EZ’s really delivers explosive distance coupled with a beautiful ball flight. The EZ’s also features tremendous distance and forgiveness, Mizuno utilizes H.I.T (Harmonic Impact Technology), a vibration management technology, that gives players  the sound and soft feel at impact that everyone wants from a club.

DESIGN: 

All golfers know the sound and ball trajectory that occurs when you hit a perfect shot right in the sweet spot, it’s what keeps us coming back to the course.  Golf Manufacturers have taken advantage of the term “sweet spot” to promote how big and accesible the sweet spot is on their irons.  While we at Busted Wallet have become used to this promotion and tend to shy away from the term, but it is impossible not discuss it when talking about the JPX EZ line.  Mizuno is saying that the new line has sweet spot 83 percent bigger than TaylorMade Rocketbladez and more than 50 percent larger than Ping G25 and Callaway X-Hot.  While we can’t prove the size of different sweet spots, we can definitely attest that we found it early and often in our testing sessions.  Once our test team got used to the club we started seeing beautiful shots all over the range and even more on the course.  The EZ line does provide for a boost in confidence, allowing you to get aggressive on the course. The result of that aggression is exceptional ball speeds for tremendous distance.

The cosmetics of the irons are no slouch either. The JPX-EZ (and the JPX-EZ Forged) have distinctive orange medallions and accents.  Painted with the DuPont-blasted, matte black finish the irons truly are distinct and vibrant.  The irons also feature HOT METAL and MAX COR technologies to create an ultra-thin face that delivers an improved ‘trampoline effect’ to allow for a gorgeous ball flight and excellent ball speed which of course equals a very nice distance.  The four-through-seven irons offer a MAX COR ultra pocket cavity design that utilizes a thin, multi-thickness face with a sweet spot that is designed for forgiveness and a low, deep COG for optimal trajectory. The eight-iron through pitching wedge utilize a Deep Pocket Cavity Design delivering increased accuracy with the same large sweet spot and maximum forgiveness in the scoring irons.

DISTANCE: 

During controlled testing sessions on the simulator our review crew (consisting of 7 golfers) saw increases of +7.3 yards on average across the 4 and 5 irons when compared to their personal clubs.  Across the remaining irons  (6 – 9 iron) of testing we continued to experience a very good increase in distance  of +6.1 yards on average.

Overall, we were impressed with the extra distance we were receiving from the JPX EZ irons.  While the extra distance was nice our golfers really appreciated the ball flight that came with the distance.  We were getting a very nice trajectory that was giving us good soft landings on the green and allowing for pin-seeking opportunities.

CONSISTENCY: 

When working with game improvement irons the biggest thing you are looking for is forgiveness and consistency.  We will address forgiveness in the next section, we really found the consistency on these to be fantastic overall.   On shots within the club face’s sweet spot we found that these irons are extremely consistent when it comes to distance. On average there was only a small discrepancy of +/- 2.4 yards. We hit 100′s of balls and came away truly impressed with the JPX EZ’s consistency.

On most irons when you mis-hits distance consistency is pretty much gone but we did discover less overall mis-hits.  We reasoned that the massive sweet spot that Mizuno is touting is not a joke and consistently hitting that sweet was easy to find throughout the testing.

The consistency numbers overall were pretty impressive, these are the type of numbers you’d expect to see with a “game improvement” set of clubs.

FORGIVENESS: 

We have all seen the good results of when we put a nice swing on the ball and hit it exactly in the sweet spot.  The problem we encounter is that throughout the course of the round our swings are not consistent and so our ball striking is not consistent.  We buy clubs that can help us manage those inconsistencies and that’s why we were so impressed with the Mizuno JPX EZ irons.  Shots off the toe and the heel were still bad shots but with the large sweet spot there was a lot of operating room on the club face to still find an area to get off a great shot.  While hitting just outside of the sweet spot but still within in the face of the club we were still able to obtain good ball flight and trajectory.  What golfers are looking for when using game-improvement irons is a little help and these irons provide that boost.  The EZ’s really allow you to hit consistently decent shots and more importantly a lower overall score.

VALUE: 

How much would you pay for more confidence on the golf course? While some will get sticker shock at the $699.99 sticker price for Steel shafts, which we tested, or $899.99 Graphite shafts, we can attest to the quality of these irons and also were able to see noticeable difference in distance, consistency, and forgiveness.  If you are a regular golfer and looking for some help in improving your game these is a good set of clubs to help manage some of your weakness in consistency.