Cleveland Golf Clubs
A Full Cleveland Short Game Setup at Three Budgets
What to buy at three spending levels, and what to skip at each.
The lowest budget: one club
Buy a used CBX ZipCore or CBX2 sand wedge at around 56 degrees with mid bounce. Check the grooves carefully, fit a new grip, and use it for every shot inside 90 yards.
One wedge you trust beats three you rotate at random. Golfers below about 15 handicap gain more from repetition with a single club than from having options.
Skip: a lob wedge, a specialist chipper, anything with a specific grind you cannot explain the purpose of.
The middle budget: two or three clubs
A previous-generation RTX 6 ZipCore sand wedge, a CBX4 gap wedge, and either a 58-degree RTX or a Smart Sole depending on whether your problem is versatility or contact.
Set the lofts off your actual pitching wedge, not off convention. Get the sand wedge fitted for bounce if you can — it is the single most valuable fitting in the short game.
Skip: the newest generation. Put the difference toward the third wedge or a fitting session.
The full budget: fitted current range
Three RTZ wedges, fitted for loft, bounce and grind, with shafts matched to your irons. Add RTX Full-Face 2 in the highest loft if you open the face regularly.
At this level you are buying precision, and precision only pays if the fitting is done properly. An unfitted set of premium wedges is worse value than a fitted set of previous-generation ones.
Spend the last of the budget on measurement
Whichever level you buy at, the setup is only right if the distances step evenly and stay that way. FocusGolf tracks your swings and distances automatically from a Wear OS, Apple Watch or Garmin watch, with no sensors on the clubs, and keeps a session history you can look back through. Check the wedge gaps when you buy, then again in three months — grooves wear, technique drifts, and the trend over a season tells you when something has moved before it costs you on the course.
What matters most, in order
Groove condition. Bounce. Grind. Even loft gaps. Shaft. Model generation, last.
Most golfers reverse that list entirely, and it is why so many well-equipped bags produce a poor short game.
Buying tip: Whatever the budget, leave enough of it to replace your sand wedge in two years. Wedges are consumables, and planning for that beats buying the best one once.
Model names current as of September 2026.