Estate Living Digital Publication Issue 3 March 2015 | Page 20

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competition in 1930. 1930 was, as
all golf buffs will tell you, an annus
mirabilis in golf history. It is the year
during which Jones achieved his
‘Impregnable Quadrilateral’ by winning
both the US and British amateur
crowns and annexing both the Open
Championship and his own ‘home’ US
Open Championship.
Apart from his seven ‘Pro Majors’,
Jones also won Amateur ‘Majors’ in
the form of six US and British amateur
titles – 13 majors and all in less than a
decade!
To affect a ‘fair’ comparison with Jones’
record, let’s focus on the currently
acknowledged top three and their
records and revise them against the
limitations Jones faced as an amateur.
This means that we can allocate
Nicklaus his two US Amateur titles,
but we must remove from his career
record any USPGA and Masters titles
and the revised tally is then 9 – 3 Open
Championships, two US Amateur titles
and four US Opens, and this ties him
with Tiger, who gets to bank three US
Amateur titles, three Opens and three
US Opens.
Of the current top three, Hagen is a
big loser as he won five USPGAs and,
therefore, goes back to a career total
of only six Majors and, in this rating
system, Jones with 13 Majors comes

out clearly on top. But – okay, I can
hear you say, “Surely the Amateur titles
are as unfair to most of the ‘modern
generation’ pros as the inclusion of
the USPGA and Masters are to Jones’
record?”
If we revise the approach and only
use the Major titles that were either
in existence when Jones was playing
or in which he was eligible to play, this
leaves the National Opens of Britain
and the United States.
Taking five Major wins as the qualifying
benchmark, the top of the log, in
alphabetical order, now looks like this:
Bobby Jones – 7
Jack Nicklaus – 7
Harry Vardon – 7
Walter Hagen – 6
Tom Watson – 6
Tiger Woods – 6
James Braid – 5
Ben Hogan – 5
JH Taylor – 5
Peter Thomson – 5
From third on the current all-time list,
Woods drops to joint fourth with six
Majors. If form is temporary and class
permanent, then we can assume that
this will change and he is, therefore,
‘bubbling under’ and bracketed with
a host of other players who will not
be adding to their tallies. Just a notch
or two below this group is our own

Ernie Els with four Majors (two Open
Championships and two US Opens)
and he remains one of a few active
players who can still change the status
quo.
How golf arrived at its Four Majors
(three of which are in the United
States) is an interesting story in itself,
but it could be argued that, if we want
to compare players across the ages,
then there is some balance and almost
a poetic justice in a list that leaves only
results in the Open and US Opens as
the benchmark for golfing immortality.
Let’s see how well Tiger Woods does in
the Open Championship and US Open
over the next few years and my bet is
that he will ultimately prove himself
to be as good as it gets whatever the
timeframe, points of reference or
generation.
Of course, if we introduce results
in a ‘fifth Major’ – thought in some
sectors to be the South African Open
(it is the world’s second oldest National
Championship, after all) – then Gary
Player and Bobby Locke would climb
right to the top of the listings with their
multiple wins and we would need to
revise the list again!
John Cockayne
Estate Living Golf Editor