PGA Championship should be stripped of major status and replaced by underrated tournament

Have you ever sat there and questioned why something you’ve accepted as fact your entire life actually came to be that way?

Like, who decided blue was… blue? And why do four events in golf get to call themselves major championships?

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I can’t help you with blue and yes I need a hobby.

But in case you’re interested in golf, the majors are little more than a popularised idea among golf media, players and governing bodies that manifested itself over many decades.

There is no Jedi High Council that decides. None of the ‘criteria’ is written down anywhere that matters.

So let’s have a crack at defining a major championship. For me, it’s about identity – and asking the most important questions in professional golf.

The Masters and Augusta National arguably have the greatest identity in all of sport – the tradition, the green jacket, the golf course. They can stay.

The US Open is the toughest test in all of professional golf. That meets the bar. All good.

The (don’t say British) Open represents the purest test in golf, asking the game’s best players to step back in time and see if they can do it on the links like Old Tom Morris did. That’s a major, if ever I saw one.

You can probably see where I’m going with this. So let’s just spit it out – I don’t think the PGA Championship should be a major anymore.

If the PGA Tour think they can just call The Players a major and get away with it, then surely that applies to removing them as well?

This is what Rory McIlroy had to say about Aronimink – which will host this year’s second major when it begins on Thursday.

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“I think in this day and age, I’m not sure if it’s going to test all aspects of your bag,” the reigning Masters champion said on Tuesday.

“Strategy off the tee is pretty non-existent. You know, it’s basically bash driver down there and then figure it out from there.”

That sounds an awful lot like every single PGA Tour event – and that’s what the PGA Championship feels like now, a really big PGA Tour event.

Does it actually bring any major vibes to the table? Other than the pre-established idea that it just is one?

OK, it presents an opportunity for PGA professionals to play. That’s different. But they’re never going to win or affect the leaderboard in any way. 

They say it’s the strongest field in all of golf and that might technically be true when it comes to how deep it is.

But let’s be honest, all of the majors have the 50 best players and they’re the ones that matter. And if you called something else a major, I’m sure everyone would show up there too.

Also, look at the golf courses they go to – places like Quail Hollow which we’re used to seeing on the PGA Tour. They’re just set up a little bit harder. 

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Next year, we’re off to PGA Frisco. Great. Not too long ago, McIlroy actually namedropped that place to drive home a point about why venues matter.

PGA Frisco was his example of somewhere that has no significance whatsoever against places like St Andrews and Augusta.

If you asked every player in the game – other than Jordan Spieth who needs the PGA Championship for the grand slam – all of them would have this event last on their list of majors they want to win. 

And then you look a little deeper into what the PGA of America are doing elsewhere. They’re making an absolute mess of the Ryder Cup – both from a logistical and a strategic standpoint.

Can golf not just turn around to the PGA of America and say: sorry, lads, you’ve had your chance, it’s someone else’s turn now.

Let’s go to a land Down Under

At the risk of sounding like a management podcast… we have the problem, now what’s the solution?

If I was replacing the PGA Championship, I would make the Australian Open a major.

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Make the game truly global. Australia has some of the best golf courses in the world and they ask questions that PGA Tour players don’t get asked very often.

It would provide a proper test and the atmosphere would be incredible – because there’s an amazing and underserved golfing audience out there.

Ironically it’s one of the few things LIV Golf have done right – capitalising on the golf culture in Australia. 

We could also stretch major season out to November or December and inject a bit more interest into golf at the back end of the year.

There’s too much going on in May. Tottenham might get relegated, for goodness sake. 

Again, I defer to McIlroy, whose opinion matters far more than mine.

Speaking ahead of his return to Australian last year, McIlroy said: “The Australian Open, for example, should almost be the fifth major.

“The market down there is huge with potential. They love golf. They love sport.

“They have been starved of top-level golf. And the courses are so good.”

The more you listen to McIlroy on the PGA Championship and the Australian Open, the more you realise this might not be the spiciest of hot takes after all.