Grand Slam (golf) - The Men's Grand Slam

The Men's Grand Slam

The Grand Slam in men's golf is an unofficial concept, having changed over time. In the modern era, The Grand Slam is generally considered to be winning all four of golf's major championships in the same calendar year. Before The Masters was founded, the national amateur championships of the U.S. and the UK were considered majors along with the two national opens and only Bobby Jones has ever completed a grand slam with these. No man has ever achieved a modern grand slam, Tiger Woods being the closest in winning all four consecutively, but over two calendar years.

The term also refers to a tour tournament, the PGA Grand Slam of Golf, an annual off season tournament contested by the winners of the four major championships.

In annual playing order, the modern major championships are:

1. April - Masters Tournament (weekend ending 2nd Sunday in April) - hosted as an invitational by and played at Augusta National Golf Club
2. June - U.S. Open (weekend ending with the 3rd Sunday in June) - hosted by the USGA and played at various locations in the USA
3. July - The Open Championship (The Open; usually called the "British Open" in the U.S.) (weekend containing the 3rd Friday in July) - hosted by The R&A and always played on a links course at various locations in the UK
4. August - PGA Championship (USPGA) (4th weekend after The Open) - hosted by the Professional Golfers' Association of America and played at various locations in the USA.

The term "Grand Slam" was first applied to Bobby Jones' achievement of winning the four major golf events of 1930: The Open Championship, the U.S. Open, the U.S. Amateur and The Amateur Championship. When Jones won all four, the sports world searched for ways to capture the magnitude of his accomplishment. Up to that time, there was no term to describe such a feat because no one had thought it possible. The Atlanta Journal's O.B. Keeler dubbed it the "Grand Slam," borrowing a bridge term. George Trevor of the New York Sun wrote that Jones had "stormed the impregnable quadrilateral of golf." Keeler would later write the words that would forever be linked to one of the greatest individual accomplishments in the history of sports:

This victory, the fourth major title in the same season and in the space of four months, had now and for all time entrenched Bobby Jones safely within the 'Impregnable Quadrilateral of Golf', that granite fortress that he alone could take by escalade, and that others may attack in vain, forever.

Jones remains the only man to have achieved the grand slam, since before the creation of The Masters and the advent of the professional era, the amateur championships were considered major championships.

The modern definition could not be applied until at least 1934, when the Masters was founded, and still carried little weight in 1953 when Ben Hogan, after winning the Masters, the U.S. Open and The Open Championship, could not compete in the PGA Championship; the nearly concurrent PGA Championship and The Open Championship and the state of transatlantic travel made completing the Grand Slam impossible. Hogan is the only player to have won The Masters, the U.S. Open and The Open Championship in the same calendar year.

According to Arnold Palmer's autobiography, "A Golfer's Life," in 1960 he (already having won the Masters and the U.S. Open that year) and his friend Bob Drum (of the Pittsburgh Press) on the trans-Atlantic flight to The Open Championship at St Andrews came up with the idea that adding the The Open Championship and PGA Championship titles that summer would constitute a modern Grand Slam. Drum spread the notion among the gathered media and it caught on.

Tiger Woods has come closest to meeting the modern definition of golf's Grand Slam by holding all four modern major championships simultaneously — the U.S. Open, The Open Championship and the PGA Championship in 2000 and the 2001 Masters — although not in the same calendar year. This has been referred to as a Consecutive Grand Slam or, after the only player to achieve it, a Tiger Slam. In fact, even before Woods accomplished this, there was much debate over the definition of "Grand Slam". Fred Couples said "I don't know how I can put it more simply...if he wins all four, it's a Slam". As noted above, however, because there is no official definition, there is no definitive answer.

Only five golfers have won all four of golf's modern Majors at any time during their career, an achievement which is often referred to as a Career Grand Slam: Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus, and Tiger Woods. Woods and Nicklaus not only have a Career Grand Slam, they have won each of the four Majors three times.

A number of dominant players of their eras have failed to achieve the Career Grand Slam because of their inability to win a particular major. Sam Snead failed to win a U.S. Open; Arnold Palmer and Tom Watson failed to win a PGA Championship; Lee Trevino failed to win The Masters; Byron Nelson and Raymond Floyd failed to win the Open Championship, at which the former competed only once. These shortcomings have been attributed to various factors: a particular major is ill-suited to a player's game (this was cited especially with regard to Trevino and The Masters); the player lacked the ability to fully adapt to that major; the player simply experienced bad luck; or war had led to the cancellation of a major during the player's prime.