PGA Championship 2015 TV schedule: Who to watch Thursday

The pro golf season's final major tournament gets underway Thursday morning, north of Milwaukee.

For the second time in five years and third overall, the PGA Championship will be played at Whistling Straits in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, hard by Lake Michigan.

The last time the PGA was played there, Germany's Martin Kaymer won his first major by beating Bubba Watson in a playoff. He wouldn't have hoisted the Wanamker Trophy in 2010 if then-tournament leader Dustin Johnson had not ground his club in a fairway bunker on the 72nd hole, resulting in a two-stroke penalty.

This week, the German Ryder Cup star talked about what it's like to win the PGA and the hardware that goes with it.

"[...] it's a great trophy to have sitting in your living room, sitting in your kitchen when you get up in the morning and you have breakfast next to it. It's a very -- it's a feeling that you achieved something very special. It's a career goal and when you win one of those big tournaments, those Majors, early in your career, it takes a lot of pressure away as well," Kaymer told reporters at Whistling Straits on Wednesday.

Since then, Kaymer has gone on to win the 2014 US Open, Watson has won a pair of Masters green jackets, and Johnson came up short against Jordan Spieth in this year's US Open.

As for the 97th annual PGA championship, 156 golfers will tee off starting Thursday morning at 7:45 a.m. Eastern time.

Some of the more intriguing threesomes that will attempt to tame the lakeside course include Sergio Garcia of Spain, South Africa's Louis Oosthuizen, and Bill Haas of the US. They will tee off on the 10th hole at 8:25 a.m.

A group of former PGA champions – David Toms, Mark Brooks, and Vijay Singh, who won his second PGA title when it was first played at Whistling Straits in 2004 – will start their first round at 8:45 a.m.

The excitement level for the golf fans will pick up shortly thereafter. At 9:05 a.m., Players champion Rickie Fowler, Australia's Jason Day and Dustin Johnson will tee off on the 10th hole.

That threesome will be followed immediately at 9:15 a.m. by four-time PGA champion Tiger Woods, Kaymer, and 2011 PGA champion Keegan Bradley.

Later in the day, Spieth, this year's Masters and US Open champion, will be paired with defending PGA champion Rory McIlroy, coming off a leg injury, and British Open champion Zach Johnson. This trio will go off the first hole at 2:20 p.m.

Wednesday, Spieth compared the layout at Chambers Bay on Puget Sound in Washington state where he won the US Open in June to Wisconsin's Whistling Straits.

"The views are pretty similar. They're both beautiful golf courses. I like golf courses alongside water, bodies of water. Chambers was brown. This is green. This is lush rough, Chambers was very little rough. It was just hit the fairways or play out of sand traps. You could also run the ball up certain holes at Chambers. You can't do that here. Especially with the softer conditions. This doesn't play like a links golf course at all. Chambers was as close on American links as I've played to playing overseas. But it was also still not the same," Spieth said during a press conference at Whistling Straits.

Right behind them will be another trio of former winners: Jason Dufner in 2013, 2008 winner Padraig Harrington of Ireland and 2005 champion Phil Mickelson teeing off on the first hole at 2:30 p.m.

As for where you can watch the PGA action, there will be live streaming at PGA.com, beginning at 9 a.m. Eastern. Cable channel TNT will begin its first round broadcast coverage at 2 p.m. Eastern Thursday.

[Editor's note: The original version of this story included incorrect starting times for golfers.]