Remember that old saw about the only two things that are certain in life? Death and taxes, right? Add this third one: upon conclusion of the PGA Championship each year, journalists, influencers, and colleagues will begin everything from a kvetch to a tirade about what is wrong with the tournament. “It’s not a major championship,” they will belch, and that’s where this manifesto begins.

There are four major championships in men’s professional golf. They haven’t always been the same ones, and there are former ones whose winners are not credited with a major win. The Western Open is the shining example of that oversight. This, however, is not the place nor the time for that debate. Imagine being a professional prior to 1915, when there were only two professional majors (U.S. Open and Open Championship). The amateurs could play in all four (U.S. Amateur and British Amateur, plus Opens) but not the pros. Again, not the time nor the place…

All major championships are made up of invitees and qualifiers. At the Masters, five amateurs minimum make the scene. At the Opens, there is usually more, as open qualifying exists, whereas it does not for Augusta. The PGA Championship is the only one of the four where zero amateurs compete. Back in halcyon days, all touring professionals were members of the PGA of America. Even Jack Nicklaus had to serve a period of apprenticeship, during which he could not compete in major events as a professional. In the late 1960s, the tour became renegade, splitting from the PGA of America. Since then, two sets of rules have been the norm. PGA Professionals continue to serve apprenticeships and work long hours in shops, while touring professionals ply their trade as sojourners around the green-grass world.

At the PGA Championship, in place of the amateurs, twenty club professionals qualify each year to compete at the association’s pre-eminent tournament. Over the years, a number of them have represented the PGA with great distinction, even challenging for the title. The list below shows the decorated few that have finished inside the top forty since 1971. It is not a long list, nor should it be.

4: Jimmy Wright, 1971 (NCR)
T-11: Don Bies, 1973 (Cantebury); Tommy Aycock, 1974 (Tanglewood Park); Lonnie Nielsen, 1986 (Inverness Club)
T-12: Denny Lyons, 1983 (Cantebury)
T-15: Michael Block, 2023 (Oak Hill)
T-17: Jay Overton, 1988 (Oak Tree)
T-19: Bob Boyd, 1990 (Shoal Creek)
T-27: Buddy Whitten, 1983 (Riviera)
T-28: Tom Wargo, 1992 (Bellerive)
T-30: Bob Boyd, 1994 (Southern Hills)
T-31: Chip Sullivan, 2004 (Whistling Straits)
T-31: Stu Ingraham, 1993 (Inverness Club)
T-40: Steve Schneiter, 2005 (Baltusrol)

Like all major titles, the PGA Championship is conducted at 72 holes of stroke play. It has been that way since 1958, when the event changed from match play to medal. There are many who pine for a time that they never knew, a halcyon era of great difference. The competitive world moved away from match play at the professional level some seven decades ago. For a time, there was a match play event on the men’s tour, and there continues to be one on the LPGA.

The men’s tours reserve their love of match play for team events, and college golf has followed suit. There is something connected between hole-by-hole competition with teammates. Whether contested at singles, foursomes, or four-ball, match play is a wondrous team competition.

What it is not is a viable method for determining a major champion. Match play is unpredictable. Match play allows concessions. Match play suggests that the best player in the field may run up against a hot streak over four, six, or eight holes, and be eliminated with no appeal to the court. Match play is volatile, fickle, unpredictable, and capricious. It is a marvelous way to keep people in the game for a club or friendly match, but such uncertainty should not be leveraged to determine a major titleist.

We all have opinions, and we are entitled to them. When Ben Hogan spoke of his major championship record, he spoke of the 1942 Hale America Open, an event that he won. It was conducted by the USGA, identical to a U.S. Open, but was not considered a U.S. Open. Hogan considered it a major, but the world does not. I consider the Olympics to be a major. They bring some (but not all) of the world’s great golfers to one of the most nerve-wracking venues of sport. They take place once every four years, something of a unicorn, but not quite a brigadoon. They’ve only been played three times (2016, 2o2o/2o21, 2o24) in the modern era.

These are opinions. Others are of the notion that the Players Championship is a major, and should join the other four, or replace the PGA. The Players Championship is identical in nearly every way to the Masters: spring, same southeast USA course every year. It cannot be included. It is a spectacular event, and is valued by the professionals, but it cannot ever be considered a major, while the Masters still lives on.

My suggestion for a fifth major is an interesting one, that perhaps soothes and ameliorates all egos. Its working title is the Lord I Was Born A Traveling Major. Perhaps Floating Major is a bit less wieldy. The International Golf Foundation and the major tours and associations can work together to establish a rotation throughout Central/South America, Canada, continental Europe, Africa, Middle East, Asia, and Oceania. Every four years, the floating major would be the Olympic Games. The other years would sequence in the fashion elaborated below, presuming a 2030 start:

2030-Match play @ Canada
2031-72 holes medal play @ Africa
2032-Olympic Games 72 holes medal play @ Australia/Oceania
2033-72 holes medal play @ South America
2034-match play @ Middle East
2035-72 holes medal play @ Continental Europe
2036-Olympic Games 72 holes medal play @ TBD (Turkey/Chile/Indonesia in running)
2037-match play @ TBD

In this way, every eight years would see three major events played at match play. It would be unique and should travel across the globe. As there are seven underrepresented regions, the Traveling Major would make a stop there every seven years.