Jim Alexander: At least the rain has left Riviera … we think

PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. — Mother Nature has to be toying with us, right?

A year ago, because of fires that a lot of residents from both here and Altadena are still recovering from, the Genesis Invitational — technically, the 99th iteration of the Los Angeles Open — had to be played at Torrey Pines in La Jolla.

This year, as a welcome back present? Rain, and plenty of it.

Day 1 at Riviera was delayed for roughly 3 hours in the late morning and early afternoon on Thursday, and when the horn sounded to resume play around 1:05 p.m. it wouldn’t have been a surprise if the clouds opened up one more time, just to remind us all who’s boss.

But the sun appeared, play resumed, and while not everyone finished the first round before it got dark — world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler was among the 12 players who had yet to tee off when play resumed — the weather forecast suggested that everyone should get through 36 holes by the end of business Friday and the cut will take place as scheduled.

The first groups off the tee in the morning wrapped up their days after 4 p.m., a nearly 8-hour day thanks to the 3-hour delay in the middle. Thirty groups were still on the course when the horn sounded because of darkness.

And just what does a competitive golfer do while waiting for that rain to go away?

“Played cards for about an hour,” Akshay Bhatia said. “Ate food, hung out, and then did some stretching and tried to just loosen back up and get ready to go back.”

Under the circumstances, you wonder if it’s difficult to ramp up quickly to resume the round. Bhatia, 24, who was born in L.A. but moved with his family to Wake Forest, N.C., when he was 10, got off to a hot start with three birdies in the first four holes and birdied the par-5 17th to finish at 3-under 68 for the day.

“Not too bad, no,” he said when asked about getting back up to speed. “We had plenty of time. We knew how much time we had and we were only off the golf course for a couple hours, so it’s not like your mind really shifts too much.”

Bhatia, who tied for fifth at 19-under last week at Pebble Beach, carried some of that momentum into this week. So did Jacob Bridgeman, a former Clemson standout who entered the week ranked 52nd in the world but with two top-10 finishes this season. He fired a 5-under 66 to share the early lead with Rory McIlroy, though when Thursday’s play ended because of darkness Aaron Rai was 6-under through 16 holes and scheduled to finish his round Friday morning.

Bridgeman’s was a roller-coaster start: An eagle on the par-5, 514-yard first hole, a double bogey on the par-3, 220-yard fourth hole, but five birdies the rest of the way for a 66. He also had brought some momentum with him from Pebble Beach, after tying for eighth last week at 18-under.

“It’s kind of a flashback to last week,” he said, indicating that the wind and rain they saw here was “what I think I expected on Sunday at Pebble, and it ended up being great. But the rain was tough. The wind might have been a little bit harder than the rain, but yeah, it was cool.

“… I think one of my strengths is kind of flighting shots down, hitting shots where people don’t really know how far it’s playing, what the number actually is and just kind of feeling it out. I think I do good when I’m hitting a 6-iron from 150 yards, I think I’m pretty good with that. I think today, especially in the wind, it played into my favor. I got to hit some of those shots that I saw some people hitting high ballooning shots that were getting smoked by the wind. So that’s kind of my comfort zone.”

McIlroy, ranked second behind Scheffler in the world rankings, was four under on the front nine en route to his 5-under 66 on Thursday in what was a fairly bunched field on day one.

Interestingly, during McIlroy’s pre-tournament interview session on Wednesday, the subject of how Riviera could play later in the year came up. Earlier in the week, tournament host Tiger Woods was asked if the PGA Tour’s proposed schedule adjustments might mean that West Coast events could be played later, maybe in August, perhaps as part of the playoff system.

“Well, I think that, one, you’re going to get weather not like this,” Woods said. “That’s number one. We’re going to have perfect days. It’s always perfect in SoCal here in August.”

(Some folks in the desert, and some in the Inland Empire, might contest that. But at Riviera and in Pacific Palisades? That’s probably true.)

“So yes, we’re looking at things like that, looking to go to bigger markets later in the year for the playoffs,” Woods said. “Just trying to make our competitive model better, and how do we do that.”

And when McIlroy was asked his thoughts about playing here later in the year and whether the course might play differently, he said:

“I think you’re looking at the condition of the course being … like this week it doesn’t matter if you hit it in the fairway or not. It’s actually a benefit sometimes if you do hit it in the rough because the ball’s not going to come spinning back on you. So if you do get it in August where the greens are firm, there’s more of a consideration of strategy off the tee especially, and it starts to make the guys think a little bit. It certainly becomes a much more strategic golf course in that way.

“Same as Pebble last week as well,” he added. “We mightn’t be able to play that in August because of the car show and everything else that goes on at that time of the year there, but even if you moved it a little bit later in the year there just to have the opportunity to have better weather and firmer conditions, that would be a good thing.”

Given Thursday’s conditions, anything would be an improvement. The good news? The rain appears gone for the rest of the weekend, and the temperature should hit 70 degrees by Sunday’s final round.