Minjee Lee changes to broomstick putter in quest for third major

After an underwhelming display at the 2024 Australian Open, Minjee Lee has made one major tweak to her game as she looks to create some Aussie golfing history in 2025.

Minjee Lee, Australia’s most decorated active golfer, has made one of the biggest changes of her career and will now use a broomstick putter as she chases a historic third major.

Lee spent an intense month with coach Ritchie Smith at her Perth base over summer trialling the switch to an unanchored long putter, which counts Adam Scott as one of its most famous advocates.

The 28-year-old will use the new flat stick for the first time at the LPGA’s season-opening event in Florida this week.

The change was made at the request of Smith – one of the world’s most formidable coaches who counts Minjee and brother Min Woo, Hannah Green and Elvis Smylie among his proteges – after an underwhelming display on the greens at the Australian Open last year.

Lee struggled with the putter in Melbourne last year. Picture: Sarah Stier/Getty Images/AFP

Fighting jet lag after arriving in Australia only 24 hours before her opening round tee time, Lee was never in contention as she chased a first national championship, struggling on the Melbourne sandbelt’s tricky green complexes.

She eventually finished tied-seventh, 14 strokes behind winner Jiyai Shin.

“I think it’s important to recognise we’re not making this decision because she’s had a problem with her putting, we just think there’s an opportunity there,” Smith said.

“Her short putting hasn’t been great, but her long putting has been really good with the short putter. We just need to change it up so her short putting can get better, which we think it will.

“We’re not in our first year of being on tour. We’re limited with the amount of time we have left to work on getting our confidence back with the short putter.

“We have long, long periods during the year where her putting is great. We had a look through the middle to late part of the year, she hardly missed a putt inside three or four foot.

“But Kingston Heath has found her out twice and it really knocks her confidence around. We don’t have time to try to get that confidence back so we said, ‘right, we’ve just got to make a decision’.”

Lee had a difficult end to 2024 after blowing a three-shot lead during the final round of the US Open in Pennsylvania, as she closed in on another major and the largest prize purse in the tournament’s history.

Lee is chasing Aussie history in 2025. Picture: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images

No current Australian men’s or women’s golfer has won two majors – Scott, Jason Day, Cameron Smith and Green have one each – and a third title would lift her above Greg Norman and David Graham on the all-time list for this country.

The change to the long putter – which can’t be anchored to the torso under golf rules – is designed to steel her for another shot at golfing immortality later this year.

Lee’s LPGA stats from the 2024 season painted a blunt picture; she was among the world’s best from tee to green, but was losing on average 0.92 shots to the field per round in putting.

The broomstick putter has been trialled by a number of leading men’s players in recent years, with Will Zalatoris, Akshay Bhatia, Lucas Glover and Ben An joining Scott as converts.

“The main reason we’ve gone to a broomstick is she’s so much further from the ball and it gives her a different perspective of how the putt looks underneath her,” Smith said of Lee.

“We’re going to have a whole new fresh start because we know the other aspects of her play are world class. We’re going to give this a crack for a while.

“We know over the course of the last two to three years, her stroke has got technically better. But she’s not seeing the reward for it on the golf course.”

Lee ended last year at No. 18 in the world, the first time she had finished a season outside the top 10 since 2017.

She will join Green in the field for the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions in Orlando.