PGA Round One Quick Roundup: Stars Struggle, Rain Coming

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Jimmy Walker torched Baltusrol early and watched as many of the world's best struggled with the Lower Course.

Michael Shamburger has this roundup of the tough day for favorites and stars, beyond Henrik Stenson, Day and Fowler who both posted nice scores. As Dave Kindred writes, sometimes it's a cruel game for even the best, sometimes they get lost and there are so many opportunities to struggle .

Stenson continued the trend of epic ballstriking, and according to Golf Channel's Justin Ray, he's hitting 79.8% of his greens over his last six major rounds.

Martin Kaymer played beautifully and lit up after the round talking about his upcoming Olympic experience, reports Alex Myers.

Less pretty was Dustin Johnson's round of 77 with the Stenson group. Jason Sobel on DJ's struggles.

Sam Weinman with some of DJ's quotes after the round. It was a short discussion.

Brentley Romine with the Spieth (70) roundup.

Romine also has notes on Brooks Koepka and Chris Wood making Ryder Cup pushes.

Rory McIlroy had 35 putts and Brian Wacker suggests it may be time for McIlroy to make a change. All his putting stats according to this Golf Channel tweet were...awful.

This was an interesting revelation from Bob Harig's report, which suggests that some of the confidence woes may be green reading driven. At least at Baltusrol.

"With the poa annua greens, you start to look a lot into them. You read it from behind the ball and you see one line; you read it from behind the hole and it looks slightly different. You put yourself in two minds sometimes."

Ian O'Connor at ESPN.com followed Phil Mickelson and also considered the evolution of his career since the last time Phil played Baltusrol.

Durability might be the most underappreciated part of Mickelson's career. When Woods was pummeling people in his dynastic prime, most contenders dropped on command and never got back up. Mickelson at least staggered to his feet and kept working the problem. "And once Phil got over the hump," his caddie, Bones Mackay, said Thursday, "it got to a point where he couldn't wait to be paired with Tiger."

Mickelson claimed 33 of his 42 PGA Tour victories after Woods' first two victories as a pro late in the 1996 season. Mickelson also won all five of his major championships after Tiger's most dominant stretch -- the seven majors he won in an 11-major stretch from the 1999 PGA to the 2002 U.S. Open.

Golf Digest's Birdies and Bogeys gives a quick roundup of day one.

The weather forecast overnight stinks. The long range has some electricity issues as well.

Bill Raftery, Baltusrol member and beloved announcer, stopped by the booth.

Justin Thomas went with bold pants, but Horschel lurks Sunday with some doozies.

The legend of Beef Johnston grows, writes Weinman.

Johnston's post-round interview at Golfweek.com

Patton Kizzire is ready for football season!

Nice to see Amanda Balionis on the TNT broadcast doing interviews. Jeff Newton posts a Q&A about her role this week.

While the Zurich lie-detector ads continue to spiral, surpassing the lame "your wife's cooking" campaign, I'm at about Defcon 3 with the new Omega HOF ad. I have trouble seeing ever reaching the status of the prior Hall of Fame spot. But it's only Thursday...