Just after a few hours before the PGA Tour and PGA of America signed their deals to move, the European Tour announced that it would move in 2019 to September, which tour chief Keith Pelley called a more favourable date. The Associated Press reported on Monday that two officials involved in the discussions, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the PGA of America and PGA Tour will discuss details of the 2019 move as early as Tuesday at Quail Hollow. The move to May also puts the PGA Championship in the middle of the major championship season — after the Masters, before the U.S. Open — instead of being stuck at the end in August when courses typically are softer because of the summer heat and sports fans have one eye turned toward football. Here, straight from the mouths of Pete Bevacqua of the PGA of America and Jay Monahan of the PGA Tour, is your new and improved golf schedule: March, the Players at TPC Sawgrass; April, the Masters; May, the PGA Championship; June, the U.S. Open; July, the British Open; August, the FedEx Cup events; September, the Ryder Cup in even-numbered years and the Presidents Cup in the odd ones. The move comes after years of discussion about a switch, pushed by golf's return to the Olympics in 2016 that forced last year's event to be played only two weeks after the British Open and two weeks before the Olympic tournament in Rio. The Players Championship, traditionally held in March two weeks before the Masters, moved to May in 2007 to get away from the biggest major of the year and create a sequence of big events through the summer.
In golf, the PGA of America and the PGA Tour jointly announce that the PGA Championship, currently the last of the four men's major championships to be held each year, will move from its current August date to May effective in 2019. In the same year, The Players Championship will move from May to March.