?My confusion is with the degrees...I would have thought the shorter rod would have been stiffer and faster....?

?The part of the tip that makes it faster. That missing 5.5" adds leverage and therefore speed to the tip section.?
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You have to be careful of the use of the words ?faster? or ?slower? . They are adjectives and have no meaning until you identify the noun they modify. Rods are often described as fast action when the speaker actually means fast responding or recovery.

A fast action rod is one which first appreciably bends near the tip. The AA provides a measure of this
A fast responding rod is a ?stiffer? rod which exhibits a higher fundamental frequency.

The action of a rod has no relationship to its stiffness.
If you cut off the tip of a rod, it will be shorter and have a faster recovery, but its action will be slower. Words do mean something, so watch your grammar.