Something's off with my Genesis controllers

[CatalystiCam]

So I bought a Genesis finally back at the start of December. Haven't actually used it too much yet other than kicking back occasionally with Sonic 2 & 3. Here in lies the problem.

Trying to spin dash is brutal for some reason. Control pads detect 8 directions, I'm aware, but it's almost like the generic 4 directions have a smaller detect zone than the diagonals. Anytime I try to spin dash, 9 times out of ten, sonic will just start walking left or right before I can attempt to spin dash. I've never had this issue with the sonic games, and I've played the hell out of both on Virtual Console, XBLA, and Mega Collection. Don't think it's for lack of skill is all I'm saying. Pressing directly down aint difficult.

Thought it may have been the console but it's not, the crummy 3rd party controller I got with the console works fine for this, but the 2 official Genesis controllers do not. Kind of one of the big selling points for me on the Genesis, was the great controllers.

Both controllers are the ones made from Taiwan, which I've read are worse than the ones made from China? One has red lettering on the controller, and one is normal, both are black controllers.

Bottomline, control pads seem a bit off on these 2, they don't want to seem to let me push just down, because sonic almost always walks left or right anyways.. So I ask; anything I can do? Is the whole China controllers better than the Taiwan controllers true(in which case controllers aren't hard to come across thankfully)? Or are they just a bit worn to the point that they don't detect right anymore?