How many majors to be an all-time great?
With his win at the PGA Championship, Mickelson separates himself from a group of one-major wonders to join the far more elite company of multiple major winners. That leads me to thinking about how many major championships a golfer needs in order to be considered an all-time great.
My gut says five major wins are needed to be considered an all-time great, although completing the career grand slam would surely be enough. Indeed, because very few players have even won three different majors, perhaps even making it 3/4 of the way to a career grand slam makes the grade.
Also, I certainly think success in other settings (PGA, amateur, major team events) ought to be part of the all-time-great equation, but I am not sure exactly how we might quantify a diversity of other possible golf accomplishments.
Aided by this great Wikipedia list of major winners and this About.com list of PGA Tour victories, perhaps someone can devise an all-time great formula that might help us figure out whether anyone now active other than Tiger has already earned all-time-great status. (Personally, I think Phil and Vijay and Ernie are all close, but not quite there.)
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