Ok, I started to mess around with how I was setting the club at the top; I have always had problems getting that Hogan like lag, for some reason my left thumb at the top when it gets pressure on it from the shaft, it wants to tighten up. I really concentrated on letting the club get “deep” into my hand by relaxing the thumb. When I got a good lag I felt like I could really go after the ball with out trying to lift my shoulder or make a compensation. I normally have a medium to low ball flight but I started to hit the ball much higher. I haven’t video taped my swing to confirm a straight left arm but it feels straight and I don’t feel like I have to use my athletic abilty to make clean contact.
Does any of this make sense?
In my personal experience, it's difficult to get left shoulder up away from the ball (tilt & shoulders open) if you do not have enough lag. Club releases too early. If you have the proper lag, left shoulder can have the time to get away from the ball.
I used to let my upper body lunge forward (I could not get my shoulders open at impact) so I could still make clean contact but club would then be de-lofted a lot and I would take huge divots. Part of this was also that I was adding lot of right arm torque before impact.
SD video - LCT & concentrating on letting the club load at transition has helped me. More free swinging at first, before starting to add right arm again.
Problem can sometimes be just something wrong with your perception of what is supposed to happen during the swing. It's different to look at it on video than looking/feeling it during your swing.
As an example I realized just a few weeks ago was that target is actually behind my back at transition. I had been trying to move my hips left from where they were at transition, which was like 45 degrees wrong and the result was that my hips moved much closer to the ball during downswing. I had seen it on video many times and I had tried all sorts of drills, but it took this change in perception to change it.