WristySwing

Not to mention Parsons was one of the richest men in the world at the time too. I am huge PXG fan, but they are not DTC anymore in the true sense of the word. They are a blend of DTC and their original launches, being back to very expensive and difficult to try out if you don't live in a major urban area/near a course. DTC to me means online only, maybe the odd fitting day. I love my PXG irons, my second set of them. They feel incredible, are super long, and for my hack swing are very straight. I can't ask for much more. To the OP's question though, New Level are really nice, I had a set of those before too. Are they earth shattering and miles better than everything else? No absolutely not. It's a forged cavity back iron that every other company has. It just happens to be a bit cheaper than others at full retail. I second the poster on page 1 that said if going this route, you're much better going to a PGASS, 2nd Swing, etc and trying out their used section. You'll be able to at least hit the clubs, see what they look like, and get a pseudo fitting by someone. Not saying that can't happen with DTC, but it is much harder to do for most of us.

The only shaft that was thicker was the Wilson Fat Shaft. It was not very successful. Wilson keeps trying to make it a thing but it never takes. They re-introduced it again circa 2006/2007 and it was gone again by 2009 or so. Apart from that, Dynamic shafts (which have transitioned into Dynamic Gold) COULD be slightly heavier than the gold, but you are often talking a gram or two at most. I think the heaviest shaft you could get was the X300 at the time which was only marginally heavier than X100. You could argue it was slightly stiffer as well but I'd wager 99.98% of the world would find them similar. There are some parallel blanks that you can get now which are heavier than that still (i.e. X-flex C-Taper .370 tip is 140g), but they are designed to be trimmed so that they come out ~130g when finished meaning they wouldn't be any different than what has become the standard tour weight since probably the 1960s or so. Whoever told you that was likely trying to sound impressive but didn't really understand what they were describing. For instance, I've heard a retail employee tell someone to buy a .350 tip shaft because it was going to be stiffer than a .335 tip in their driver. While technically thicker, it has next to no impact on the flex/feel of the shaft again for 99.98% of people that will ever swing a .335 vs. a .350 tip of the same model.

That's fair, but all that matters is what feels good to a player, right? I personally think PX is the worst shaft ever made, feels like garbage across the line for me. So who's correct? Neither of us, honestly. It's just feel and players will like what they like, be it soft/smooth, i.e. a traditional bend profile or something stiffer and more linear or more pronounced stiffness in the mid and tip.

Did they let you try it or did they just drop a brain worm on you and say "see ya later!"? If the latter, that sucks and is cruel (🤣). However, you can always go to a golf store locally and ask to try the combo, or at least something close to it like in the Mizuno or Callaway cart.