It didn’t take Jordan Spieth very long to quickly warm up on a chilly Thursday morning north of Los Angeles.
Starting on the back nine, he birdied his first two holes in the opening round of the Genesis Invitational hosted by Tiger Woods at Riviera Country Club. And after the sun finally broke through the clouds and the thermometer passed 60 degrees, Spieth had a total of seven birdies to offset two bogeys and signed for a 5-under 66.
That placed the three-time major champion and world No. 14 atop the leaderboard in the early going of the final tournament of the West Coast swing. It wasn’t one of those edge-of-your-seat rounds Spieth tees up on a regular basis, there wasn’t any out-of-this-world scrambling, and there definitely wasn’t an edge-of-a-cliff, hair-rising moment like his shot on the eighth hole at Pebble Beach two weeks ago, where he tied for second.
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Instead, it was Steady Eddie type of golf; he missed just four greens in regulation, there were no chip-ins or hole-outs, and his longest birdie putt came from 20 feet. That included a 7-footer on the 10th.
“I kind of caught the left lip to make that birdie putt and last week I didn’t seem to catch any of the right side of kind of the breaks on the greens, so it was really nice,” said Spieth, who tied for 60th last week in the WM Phoenix Open. “Put in a lot of work the last three days on the putting green, hours and hours with (coach) Cameron (McCormick) to try and really get comfortable stroking it. It was nice to kind of feel like that hard work paid off by getting a break there on the first couple holes. I was able to kind of putt pretty confidently from there.
“I’ve been striking the ball really well, got a little off on the weekend last week but this whole stretch, really for the last six months I’ve been striking the ball really nicely. It’s just been about having the putter heat up.”
The stars have come out for the Genesis as the top 10 players in the official world ranking are in the field. And the stars didn’t take long to light up the leaderboard near Hollywood.
Another Texan joined Spieth at the top of the leaderboard as Scottie Scheffler, playing in the same group, also posted 66. Scheffler, who won last week’s Phoenix Open for his first PGA Tour title and is ranked No. 9, eagled the par-5 first and added four other birdies to offset a lone bogey.
Many of his peers think once Scheffler won his first title the floodgates would open. Scheffler has said he’ll just keep playing his best but there was a difference in his first tournament as a PGA Tour winner: his grouping. He was put in the A-list category and played with Spieth and world No. 1 Jon Rahm.
“I definitely got a different pairing, finally got out of the first‑off group, so that was nice,” Scheffler said. “I didn’t feel much different. I think it took me a little while to kind of get going. Early pro‑am yesterday, early round today, coming off last week, I didn’t really get as much rest as I wanted to.
“But I’ll get some rest this afternoon.”
Among a large group at 67 were No. 2 Collin Morikawa and No. 8 Justin Thomas.
Rahm shot 69, as did No. 7 and Olympic gold medalist Xander Schauffele.
Among the late starters were top-10 players Viktor Hovland, Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson, Hideki Matsuyama and Patrick Cantlay.
Spieth, who won last year’s Valero Texas Open to snap a nearly four-year winless drought, is seeking his 13th PGA Tour title. Early last year, he was trying to find his form and was clearly not the player he is today.
“I have a lot more tools,” Spieth said. “I feel like I can hit any shot if it presents itself fearlessly and at this point last year I still felt a lot more scar tissue, didn’t want to play certain shots really, especially like taking 5 or 6, when you get in between clubs and you’ve got to hit something softly with a pinch fade or even a high draw taking some off.
“I really wouldn’t have even tried it last year at this point.”