Do Tiger Woods' Record and David Duval's Opinion Mean the Players Is Now a Major

Tiger Woods’ record may be one way to decide if The Players Championship is a major. And one of Woods’ contemporaries, David Duval, winner of the Players and British Open and former No. 1 in the world, has made his decision.

Woods already owns four green jackets, four PGAs, three U.S. Opens and three British Opens. Those kinds of tournaments are golf’s measuring sticks. Everyone agrees that they are the toughest tournaments to win each year.

If The Players were a typical PGA Tour event, if it were not major worthy, considering the skill level of a healthy Tiger Woods in his early 30s, it’s possible that Woods could have amassed eight victories at TPC Sawgrass, not two. There are already three courses where Woods has eight victories: the Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill, Bridgestone WGC at Firestone CC and Torrey Pines GL where he won seven Farmers Insurance Open titles and the 2008 U.S Open.

Isn’t it possible that Tiger Woods’ record tells us that The Players, with its strongest field in golf, with its testing course, is every bit the equal of the other majors? Isn’t it possible that Woods’ own major record proves that The Players is even harder to win than tournaments already designated as majors? Harder than any rough-on-steroids U.S. Open, harder than any sideways-raining British Open?    

According to David Duval on Golf Channel, the Players “is a major championship in everything but designation.” Duval should know.

Woods agrees that the course is demanding. So far he’s not convinced on the major status, but maybe he has not viewed it through the prism of his own achievements.

“When you’re on, this golf course is—it doesn’t seem that hard. You can really go low,” Woods said. “You feel like every round you should shoot 67 or lower, and then you get days where God I feel like I can’t break 75 here. It’s one of those places, it’s very polarizing. You either have it or you don’t.”

According to Duval and Golf Channel’s Brandel Chamblee, the difficulty is in the shots that are required to successfully play TPC Sawgrass. The challenge is built into it by designer Pete Dye. A tee shot may call for a fade and a second shot may require a draw. It’s not that you can’t play the course with other shot shapes, but the guy who can play it the way Dye designed it to be played and can execute his shots, he’s going to be the winner.

And there are other factors. First, there’s the strength of field.

“I think you’ve got to consider it that every player in this field has a chance to win this golf tournament,” Duval added. “These are proven professionals, proven great players. I don’t think you can say that of any of the other four majors can you? That every player in those has a chance to win? I don’t think so.”

What he refers to is that The Masters has a number of past champions in the field who typically do not make the cut of top 44 and ties. It also has amateurs. The U.S. Open and British Open have qualifiers that anyone with a low enough handicap can enter. A significant number of golfers come from the qualifying rounds. They also have amateurs. The PGA Championship includes 20 club professionals.

Duval further contends that the “four majors” number is based on the last 65 years, not on the history of golf.

“The argument that it would mess up history books, the Masters got designated a major at some point early ‘50s, mid-‘50s. It certainly wasn’t when it started,” Duval continued. “It was the Augusta National Invitational when it started. But it got anointed one.”

He insisted there were not always four majors. “Back in the ‘20s, there were five or six.”

Originally, there was one, the British Open. Then, 25 years later, the British Amateur was created. Nearly 40 years after the debut of the British Open, the U.S. Open and the U.S. Amateur were first played.

So there was one. Then there were two. Then there were three and four.

When the PGA Championship came along in 1916, that was five, and for a while the Western Open was considered in the mix, for six. The Masters would have been seven had it been invented. It did not begin until 1934.

In 1960, when Arnold Palmer and writer Bob Drum invented the modern grand slam, the list of important championships in men’s golf changed once more. However, the new Arnold Palmer / Bob Drum grand slam eliminated the amateurs, and it also made the Masters an instant major, some 25 years after its creation.

So, with a checkered past of major designations, isn’t is possible that Tiger Woods’ record now proves David Duval’s contention that The Players is a major, whether it’s the first, second, third, fourth or fifth. If it was easy to win, Tiger Woods’ house would have five, six, seven or eight Players trophies. As it is, he’s at two and counting. That’s fewer than any of his other major championships.      

Kathy Bissell is a Golf Writer for Bleacher Report. Unless otherwise noted, all quotes were obtained firsthand or from official interview materials from the PGA Tour, USGA, Golf Channel or PGA of America.