“A classic Robert Bettinardi milled blade from the Ben Hogan collaboration era, a collectible piece of the brand's roots. Traditional toe-hang blade for an arc stroke with the firm one-piece milled feel.”

The Baby Ben is the putter that put Bettinardi on the map – and it did it as an emergency substitution. Days before the 2003 U.S. Open at Olympia Fields, the USGA declared Jim Furyk's gamer non-conforming (a crown 'tongue' not connected to the sole). Bettinardi's shop was 25–30 minutes from the course; Furyk arrived around 11 a.m., spent roughly seven hours testing, and walked out with a wide-body aluminum mallet Bettinardi calls 'probably one of the first high-MOI putters ever made.' Furyk won by three. A gold commemorative Baby Ben now sits at Bettinardi HQ, and the model secured the company's first major just five years after it went independent.

A major-winning putter (2003 U.S. Open) with a documented, dramatic seven-hour-fitting origin story and status as one of the earliest high-MOI mallets, memorialized in a gold display at Bettinardi's headquarters. That provenance is covered by independent golf media (Golf.com, MyGolfSpy) – more than a check-mark, genuinely storied, though not a mass-market icon.

Players with a straighter, straight-back-straight-through stroke who want a stable, forgiving mallet head – the same profile Furyk (a notably steady, mechanical putter) chose. Collectors and Bettinardi/Furyk fans are a real secondary audience given the major-win provenance. Confirmed arc-stroke players who need toe hang should look at a Bettinardi blade (BB1) instead.

• Jim Furyk won the 2003 U.S. Open at Olympia Fields with a Baby Ben, chosen in a ~7-hour emergency fitting after the USGA ruled his previous putter non-conforming days earlier – Bettinardi's first major and its breakout moment.
• Bettinardi describes the Baby Ben as 'probably one of the first high-MOI putters ever made' – a wide-body aluminum mallet, notable for that era.
• A gold commemorative Baby Ben is displayed at Bettinardi's headquarters as a company landmark.
• Sources describe the Baby Ben as a wide-body high-MOI mallet, not a blade.
• The putter's documented fame is the 2003 U.S. Open and it circulated during the 2003–05 Ben Hogan alliance. Its exact introduction date is not cleanly documented, so 1998 is plausible but not confirmed by the sources found.

Emerged from Bettinardi's early independent years (the brand went solo in 1998 after milling putters for Titleist/Scotty Cameron 1993–98). Its 2003 win coincided with the 'Hogan Milled by Bettinardi' alliance (2003–05), when some Bettinardi putters were stamped with the Hogan name. As an early high-MOI mallet it predates and helped point toward the mallet-forgiveness arms race later dominated by Odyssey 2-Ball and TaylorMade Spider designs.

A vintage, low-production putter with genuine collector interest because of the Furyk major win, so it trades on scarcity rather than a set market. Clean private-party examples realistically run roughly $150–350 in 2026, with tour-issue, Hogan-stamped, or commemorative variants commanding well more and standard well-worn examples less. Expect wide price scatter and occasional inflated 'collector' asks – condition, stampings and provenance drive it more than any book value.