It was the weather and not the golfers that dominated headlines on Saturday during the third round of the 2016 PGA Championship at Baltusrol Golf Club in Springfield, New Jersey.
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Kerry Haigh, the PGA of America’s chief championships officer, said no consideration was given to Saturday’s play having a two-tee start with threesomes, which would have accelerated play and had more players finish. Hope is that Round 4 action can begin at 8:40 a.m. with the current top of the leaderboard attempting to go off at 3:25 p.m.
Play was suspended at 2:14 p.m. because of lightning in the area. They were among only 37 players of the 86 who made the cut to complete the third round.
“I’m guessing we’re going to be here until at least Monday, hopefully not Tuesday”, said Robert Streb, the co-leader with Jimmy Walker at 9 under. The rain will be added to what fell Saturday afternoon and what was anticipated to fall in the overnight hours leading into Sunday morning.
Streb birdied his last hole, after missing a birdie putt on the hole before, to card a seven-under 63 on Friday to move into a tie for the halfway lead.
Streb had also become the 28th player to shoot 63 in a major – and third in the space of 16 days after Phil Mickelson and Henrik Stenson at the Open – with his second round, which contained eight birdies and a solitary bogey.
The big movers among those who completed rounds Saturday were Kevin Kisner and three-time major champion Padraig Harrington, who won the 2008 PGA Championship.
Kerry Kaigh, the chief championship officer for the PGA of America, said there were three cells of unsafe weather.
It was the third time in five years that weather messed with the PGA Championship.
Holding a one-shot lead over both world number one and defending champion Day and British Open victor Stenson, Walker holed out from a greenside bunker to birdie the 10th.
Rain was always in the forecast for the weekend.
They hold a two-shot lead over reigning champion Jason Day and Emiliano Grillo, with Open victor Henrik Stenson a stroke further back in fifth.
But Day put on the pressure, reaching the par-five 18th in two. He shot a 68 in the third round and was at 1-under 209.
As he was finishing, Harris English began his third round by missing his tee shot so far to the right that he couldn’t play it and wound up making a double bogey.
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“Obviously, the rain is going to soften up the golf course, so you’ve got to be a little bit aggressive”, Day said. It was just an average day, as I said. I think you better attack it every time you get a chance on the PGA Tour, he said after his round on Saturday.
