Weather delay hits the PGA Championship as storms roll into Baltusrol

We were just 15 minutes into the CBS afternoon broadcast of the third round on Saturday at the PGA Championship when the weather warning horn blew. The course is soft, players are posting mid-60s rounds, Phil Mickelson and Justin Rose both said we might see a new major championship scoring record, the leaders were just hitting the course ... and then it all came to a halt.

The forecast called for some possible afternoon storms, but not until a little later in the day. We were still 40 minutes from the final group even getting to the first tee. Jordan Spieth was just one hole into his round. Business was about to pick up; Jim Nantz had us ready. The storms just started moving up from the south at this northern New Jersey course earlier than expected.

The PGA of America posted weather warning signs for the crowd and players about an hour prior to the horn actually blowing. This was also one of those horns that did not give players the option of finishing the hole they were on -- instead, you had to stop immediately and pick up where you were in the round.

That especially sucked for Marc Leishman and Russell Knox, who were on the 18th green. Knox saw an official nearby with the horn ready and hustled over to tap in his last putt of the day. Leishman then addressed his, but the official didn’t give him the time to finish out and blared that damn thing. It means not only Leishman will have to come back out for one, or possibly two, final putts, but also Knox, who is done with his round, needs to witness and attest.

This is not expected to be a quick delay either, with the PGA of America saying right out of the gate that play will be suspended for an hour -- approximately 3:20 p.m. ET. So we know we’ll be sitting around for at least that long while the lightning comes down, and hopefully it’s not too intense that course repairs are needed and the maintenance and grounds crews need to do work.

The final tee time was scheduled for 2:55 p.m. ET, which would have those last two players of Jimmy Walker and Robert Streb finishing up just after 7 p.m. That leaves about an hour, maybe 75 minutes, of daylight cushion. The PGA can’t really afford much more than an hour delay if they want to get everyone through 54 holes by Saturday night.

The rest of the weekend is also complicated by the enormous field that made the cut. The top 70 and ties make the cut, and a total of 86 players got through to the weekend, which is huge. We were one putt away from it being an even 70 players, which would be an 80-minute shorter block of tee times needed on Saturday and Sunday.

We’ll keep this updated as more info comes out on the Saturday afternoon schedule at Baltusrol.

Update from the PGA of America does not sound promising:

We’re now three hours into the delay and it looks like play may be done for the day.

The forecast is also awful tomorrow too. This is going to be a Monday finish, hopefully.