What a difference a day makes. Wednesday at Pebble Beach, the final practice day before competition rounds began, was a day of high winds and little rain – until the evening, when another “Pineapple Express” atmospheric river pounded the Central Coast with over an inch of rain. Thursday morning dawned with a mix of towering cloudscapes, rain showers, and patches of blue sky – a day when a jacket, an umbrella, and sunglasses would all come into play.
It was in this mixed bag of weather conditions that the first day of competition began in the “new look” Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Even with just 80 pairings and two courses in play, the traditional two-tee (#1 and #10) start was still in play; tee times ran from 8:45 to 10:33 at comfortable 12-minute intervals – still a desirable procedure when amateurs are in the mix. With the weather outlook for the weekend looking less than rosy – and positively nasty on Sunday, conversation around the lunch table in the media center touched on the possibility of play delays, one 36-hole day, a shortened event, or even the dreaded Monday finish. For today’s opening round, however, players and spectators alike enjoyed the light breezes and crashing surf, with – for most of the day – just the occasional brief rain shower bringing out jackets and umbrellas.
Big names in the mix
Ulster’s Rory McIlroy, back at Pebble Beach for the first time since the 2019 U.S. Open, rose to the top of the leaderboard briefly as he hit 6-under through 14 holes at Spyglass – before a bogey, double-bogey, bogey finish dropped him well down the leaderboard (the double-bogey on #8 involved a penalty for an improper drop.) Patrick Cantlay, meanwhile, playing three groups behind him, took over the top spot at 6-under after a birdie on #13, a string of four birdies at holes #17 through #2, and another at hole #5.
Cantlay went on to birdie his 16th and 17th holes to take over the top spot at 8-under. A late charge by Korea’s Si Woo Kim came up short, as a bogey at #9 dropped him to 6-under – but wait, there’s more…
Another “who is that guy” early leader at the AT&T Pro-Am
Late in the day, Thomas Detry of Belgium, also playing at Spyglass Hill, was 6-under through 16 holes and challenging for the outright lead. A birdie at #17 put him level with Cantlay – and then he took sole possession of the top of the leaderboard with a dramatic chip-in birdie from the right rough at Spy’s par-four 18th. With the new format dictating only one round at Spyglass Hill for all players, can Detry, an eighth-year pro still looking for his first win on Tour, follow up with three good rounds at Pebble Beach?
Maverick McNealy’s up-and-down round
Former Stanford Men’s Golf great Maverick McNealy coasted through most of the front nine on pars, with a lone birdie at #6, the par-five hole that plays up a five-story cliff on Arrowhead Point, but came to grief at holes 9 and 10. These two daunting par-four’s form part of the three-hole stretch (holes 8, 9, and 10) that sportswriter Dan Jenkins dubbed “Abalone Corner”, echoing the “Amen Corner” moniker given to Augusta National’s 11th through 13th.
After a par on #8, McNealy bogeyed #9 after going down the left side of the hole bunker-rough-green; he then flipped the script on #10, sailing his approach shot wide right, over the cliff but hanging up in the rough, luckily not falling all the way to the beach below. His recovery shot sailed over the green to the left rough, thence to the green and two putts for a double-bogey six and a mid-round score of 2-over.
After his adventure at #10, another string of routine pars got McNealy to Pebble’s picture-postcard closing hole, the par-five 18th, where in 2021 he narrowly missed a shot at forcing a playoff against Daniel Berger. That year, on the 72nd hole of the tournament, he sailed a beautiful high-draw 3-iron shot to 22 feet above the hole, only just missing the eagle putt that would have put the tournament into extra holes (after Berger did make eagle there, a few minutes later.)
In today’s round he followed a 304-yard drive to the right edge of the fairway, threading the needle between the cypress tree and the bunker complex there, with an absolutely stiffed second shot, a hybrid from 236 yards, to a scant eight feet above the hole. This time he made the eagle putt, making up the two-shot deficit from #10 to finish even for the round. A little more in the way of play of that caliber and we may see another high finish here at Pebble Beach from the young man who literally grew up on this golf course though his early teens.
The other NorCal-associated golfers in the field finished the day as follows:
- Collin Morikawa, former Cal golfer and 2020 PGA Championship winner at Harding Park – 5-under, T5
- Kurt Kitayama, Chico native and UNV grad – 3-under, T15
- Max Homa, 2013 Cal grad – 3-under, T15
- Former SJSU Men’s Golf standout Mark Hubbard – 3-under, T15
- Patrick Rodgers, Stanford Men’s Golf star who tied Tiger Woods’s 11-victory record – 4-over, T77
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