[Other] Premium vs. baseline mids and throwing putters

[the1discChallenge]

Just wanted to start a discussion, curious on some folks' thoughts. I recently started cycling KC/DX Rocs and JK/P&A Aviars as my mid and putter set ups. It's been great to minimize the molds in my bag and I love the feel of baseline plastic in these slots. Not a recommendation, just curious what people throw and why :thmbup:

 

[PMantle]

I tried it some, but the tree hits with mids just ate them up. Now, the only base plastic I carry is putting putter. Anything with a driver wing vs. mid wing became unusable very fast.

 

[Monocacy]

If I could FH beaded mids I would probably still be throwing DX Rocs.

I really miss baseline mids in wet conditions.

 

[GripEnemy]

Base Clutch is my understable throwing putter, DX Cobra for rollers and the "Eagle" to my "Comet Teebird" - what I mean is the Cobra has more overall movement and fade. I threw them before bagging the Comet and can't seem to give them up...some rounds I don't throw it at all while others it saves me 4 strokes.

EDIT: Like Monocacy said they're great in bad weather.

 

[jmdaire27]

As PMantle said, I use premium for everything I 'throw.' More durable, flight characteristics last longer and won't change with one good mid round tree hit, and easier to replace if I lose, say, my understable mid (just buy a new one as opposed to beating in another one). With the limited amount I play these days, it's just more reliable for me. If I played every day, cycling might be more fun, having enough discs going through a cycle to not miss a slot. But, work and kiddo make play time limited.

I toy with the idea of cycling though. Seems fun. Just… again, not for me right now. I think cycling discs is becoming an ancient art with the availability of a million discs nowadays. But of course some of the die hards here will argue teeth and bone that cycling is the only way. Shrugs.

 

[GripEnemy]

^Made me think of something, sorry for the double post.

I already own a dozen Cobras so I'll throw them until I lose them all, if I didn't have such a stockpile of discs things would be different. If I started more recently, never hoarded, etc. I'd probably bag all premium aside from actual putting.

 

[autocrosscrx]

Mix of both. I have both Zero Medium and an Opto Pure. And a Soft and a VIP Harp. And DX Rocs along with Champ Roc 3's.

 

[discerdoo]

I tried cycling Quakes with D line plastic and a premium bookend. Gave that up after warping 3 rims in about 6 months. Waffling on the flight plate doesn't bother me but I can't hang with warped rims. So yeah, I like premium plastic and I'm not a mold minimalist.

I do somewhat cycle drivers.

 

[Serious-OLD]

I love Pro plastic, especially Starry pro plastic that's more durable, but I dont throw much actual baseline.

For baseline stuff I carry throwing putters to season (1 Zone, and now 1 Bullet/Praxis instead of Pure) and putting putters.

I used to throw GStar P&As but I cant get Omega4s in GStar/Frontline-X. Even my putting putters would be premium if I could get it.

That said, I've been playing long enough that there's something about the sound of stiff baseline plastic clacking together in your hands that is super satisfying, makes me happy, and makes me want to get to a course and throw when I hear it.

 

[@CD-]

Premium mids/putters/approach discs (Roc3/QMS/Aviar3/Omega4/AviarX3/Rat/Tomb/Gator/Toro) off the tee when the fairways have some tree density or rocks/gravel/roots/mulch. I use them for more constant stability & durability. More ground action with premium as well so they will skip forward a bit compared to base/midgrade plastic versions. Maintaining overstable characteristics is important when playing in windy conditions a lot.

Counter to that, I carry some Soft Omega4/R-pro Aviar & Rhyno/JK AviarX/D-blend Tomb putters and DX Roc/Roc3 for softer approaches/ground action and additional grip. These get warped up and lose stability from regular usage which is good for getting understable versions of the premium discs in the bag. I often choose to use them for water carries since they are cheaper to replace.

 

[Rastnav]

Currently I bag 4 different Pilots: Electron Soft, Electron Firm, Cosmic Neutron and Proton. I may change out the Proton for an Eclipse that' I'm going to get as part of glow round player pack.

I actually didn't intend to bag all four of them, but the electron firm is taking its sweet time beating in. Like, a very surprising amount of time, and I don't think it's likely to ever get as beat in as the soft one did after 18 holes of a one disc round. Once they are fully beat in, I don't expect I'll need to cycle anything. But just about any loss will be easy to replace with a stock disc that I then beat in again, especially as I'm pretty committed to the mold now and have lots of backups that I won't leave on the shelf.

So mold minimalism, but not dependent on plastic that changes so quickly/drastically as it beats in.

As to the question of base plastic and grip, ISTM that the current gen of plastics from the newer manufacturers just isn't nearly as slick as some of the stuff from Innova and Discraft. Maybe that's a misconception on my part, as I haven't really gelled with any Innova discs and haven't bagged them for any period of time. Also, I don't know that I've yet played a round that's full on raining the whole time, at least that I recall. Just haven't played enough tournaments, and haven't chosen to do it voluntarily.

 

[jskew113]

I threw KC Pro Aviars and Rocs for a long time. They work great for cycling and it really simplifies things.

Now I throw a mix of base and premium putters. I will always have base plastic putting putters. I really only use premium plastic putters for my stable/ OS slot and base for stable/ neutral.

I really don't bag many mids anymore. When I was throwing Rocs I'd have 4-6 in the bag. I have gravitated more to throwing putters and fairways. Bagged only 2x MD3, 1x neutral and 1x slightly OS, and they have covered everything I need.

I think if I played rocky courses I'd throw only premium, but where I am it takes a long time to beat up any premium plastics. I also don't play as often as I once did so that slows down the seasoning a good bit as well.

 

[RightAJ]

My only issue with premium throwing putters has been that premium plastic can to be more domey for the same mold. I settled on the SE Pilot as my neutral throwing putter which doesn't have that issue, but the Maiden I was throwing before it was too domey in VIP compared to the BT Mediums I fell in love with. For mids I cycle flat top Rocs in KC/DX (add a beefy Champ Roc3 or C-line MD5 for windy days), but there is definitely some added confidence carrying the same mold in various stabilities to cover a wide range of shot shapes.

 

[Three Putt]

Base plastic was all there was when I started playing, so I never really think about it much. A lot of my discs are base plastic and always have been.

I have rheumatoid arthritis in my hands so the grip thing is a non-issue; my fingers are so swollen that I can't feel any disc. I have a torn rotator cuff so I can't get enough power and/or spin on a disc to damage one very much on a tree hit. So the usual factors don't really apply to me.

Base plastic is less overstable and has better glide. It's easier to throw, period. I can take a Champ Leopard, a Star Leopard and a DX Leopard out, and the DX Leopard still flies like a Leopard. The premium plastic won't turn, won't glide, and basically goes nowhere. So since I can still kinda/sorta play throwing base plastic, it's what I carry.

There are exceptions; I throw the hell out of Z Sol's and Z Comets. Both of those discs have hellaglide and they don't make them in a base plastic so there you go. Pretty much the rest of my bag is base plastic, though.

Keep that in mind when y'all are old and busted. :|

 

[VictorB]

There's two classes of mids here to discuss.

One is the 'old school' mids that were originally designed for DX type/baseline plastic: think Rocs, Comets (TP), Wasps (Elite X), Sharks, etc. These are perfectly fine even for pro level use in baseline plastic, and fly much better in those plastics (subjective)

The other is the 'new school' mids that were designed with premium plastics in mind: buzzz, md3, truth, etc. These are really quite squirrely in their baseline plastic versions and will often drastically change after a few hard tree hits.

If you keep these things in mind, you can kind of figure out where your needs lie and how to set up your loadout. It's not uncommon to cycle molds, but it's a lot more common these days to have a variety of plastics to cover the spectrum (ie champ roc, new dx, worn dx, beat dx) It's 100% preference

 

[kevdiv48]

I have thrown DX Rocs and baseline Warlocks for the better part of 10 years, the fluctuation has been how many and/or if I have any premium plastic bookends in the bag.
For Rocs I have kept a Z Wasp as the "always fresh" Rancho Roc and just recently taken a Z Comet out in favor of beat lighter DX Rocs. The grip, glide and line shaping abilities are simply superior to premium plastic ones. Releasing a mangled DX Roc on a hyzer that flips all the way to the elusive late turning shot is one that really can't be done with a premium plastic disc. I also do like the grip familiarity with one mold.
For Warlocks I alternate between including a Diamond or all Super Softs for all short range throwing. Sometimes I like the extra bite of the premium plastic and other times I prefer the grip and glide of the base plastic ones.

 

[raceface59]

My full summertime cart bag is mostly all premium and mainly the usual Star drivers. I also have a lousy weather shoulder bag of all DX plastic. In the cart are Big Z Drone, Van Dyken Tour Series Meteor, Paige Pierce Sol and a C-Line MD3 for mids. Putter duties go to a Pro Pig, Berg, Fierce, and Gateway Voodoos in various plastics.

The DX bag consists of a Roc and Cobra for mids and a bright yellow JK Aviar.

I really like the grip of Star, and the clean look of the graphics, for me the durability is secondary. On the other side, there's just something about the dry, grainy feel of DX in the hand that I also like. I've started cycling my Teebird 3s and have three on the go. My Roc is still fairly new but I'm looking forward to cycling those too. They get pretty beat looking really fast. My Destroyer has gouges taken out of the top plate lol.

My 3-in-the-hand "bag" is now a Gstar Corvette, Star TL and probably the JK Aviar.

 

[ray1970]

I always bag base plastic putters because I prefer the extra grip because it gives me confidence to do what I'm trying to do with them. I don't think I've ever had an Electron Envy or BT Harp slip out of my hand early.

Mids, well that's a seasonal thing for me. Winter months when my hands are cold and I'm bundled up and footing could be sketchy and things are often wet I prefer base plastic mids. When summer rolls around I prefer premium plastics. Why? Not really sure. Guess it's just some sort of mental thing. I'm also weird because in the winter months I'll bag DX Rocs and in the summer I was usually switching to ESP Buzzz's. I've recently switched from the Buzzz to the Pathfinder but it will be my summer time workhorse mid in the Aura and Ethereal plastics.

 

[Lurp Nuts]

Releasing a mangled DX Roc on a hyzer that flips all the way to the elusive late turning shot is one that really can't be done with a premium plastic disc.

QFT. The way a once-overstable disc flies when it gets good and seasoned is irreplaceable. I've tried nearly every out-of-the-box understable approach disc, and they just can't quite get the same flight, especially when the wind picks up.

 

[RahvinKing526]

I use a mix of both. General rule is that harder throws require more durable plastic
Putters are mostly baseline:
Putting (Shield); BT Medium for grip
Wedges (Serpent/Shaman/Baobab); Fossil/SureGrip/Woodland [baseline] and Armor/Diamond/Alpine [premium] for different flights/ground action

Mids are mostly premium:
Approach (Suspect/Gatekeeper); Lucid/Vip-X and BT Medium/Hybrid, same reasons as the wedges
Driving (Pine); VIP for durability