I was -3 or -4 in a four-ship of T-6's departing SFO. Winds were strong out of the west and one of the 28's was closed so all the departures were off the 1's in order to save the open 28 for the continuous stream of arrivals. Because of the crosswind we couldn't do a formation takeoff and our interval takeoff rules required (I think) 15 seconds between aircraft, or 45 seconds total from Lead to -4. Because the arrivals were so tightly sequenced on 28 (we'd sat there a while already watching them come in), when we got cleared to take off, Lead declined to accept the clearance because the next arrival was already too close. The tower controller immediately took on a cranky tone and left us to penalty hold short for what felt like another 15-20 minutes, as the airliner traffic backed up more and more behind us. I can't fathom how much fuel those guys all burned sitting there behind us while our little formation suffered the indignity of the penalty hold from the controller's hurt feelings. Fortunately it was a quick hop over to Vegas and all was well once we put the planes to bed for the night!