PRO-AM TIME: The Celebs (And Pros) Are Out To Play At Pebble Beach

Stuart Franklin. Getty Images.

Pebble Beach time! One of the golf's greatest gems hosts the most renowned pro-am tournament on the planet. The pro-am has been a tradition in Cali since Bing Crosby founded it in San Diego all the way back in 1937. After a brief hiatus during WWII, it moved to the Monterey area to be played here at Pebble Beach, Cypress Point, and Monterey Peninsula CC. 

It's gone through some minor changes throughout the years (including no amateurs last year due to COVID). The modern format has us at Pebble, Montery Peninsula, and Spyglass Hill. The players (and their amateur partners) will rotate among those 3 courses on the first 3 days, and the top 60 pros make the 54-hole cut. Final round on Sunday at Pebble for all the marbles.

Advertisement

Last year it was Tom Hoge taking the grand prize after out-dueling Patrick Cantlay and Jordan Spieth. Spieth and Cantlay each held the lead at the turn with -16, but Hoge turned in a 32 coming home including 14, 16, and 17. Meanwhile, Spieth and Cantlay each fizzled down the stretch and Hoge was able to take home a 2-shot win with a stress-free par on 18.

Last year's leaderboard and recent winners… 

2022 Leaderboard

Recent Winners

The Course

Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill, and Monterrey Peninsula are each par 72's (okay MP is a par 71 for the pros and a par 72 for us mortals) in the neighborhoods of 7,000 yards, which is just about as short as it gets for Par 72's on the PGA Tour. Most of the golf played at Spyglass and Monterrey won't be televised, so I'll focus on the more notable Pebble Beach. 

Advertisement

Pebble Beach is iconic for a reason. It was designed by Jack Neville and Douglas Grant and opened in 1919. Throughout it's history numerous famous names have been consulted on design tweaks such as Alister Mackenzie, Jack Nicklaus, and Arnold Palmer, but the goal from the jump was to create as many holes along the Monterey coastline as possible. They sure as hell accomplished that with picturesque views of Carmel Bay directly along 8 of the holes and easy sightlines out to the water on nearly the entire course.

In terms of play, this is a 2nd shot golf course, maybe more so than any course on Tour. If you're digging into meaningful statistics, Strokes Gained: Approach is where to look. Biggest reason for this is that the average green size at Pebble Beach is merely 3,500 square feet, which is nearly half the size of the Tour average. The greens are tiny. Players will miss plenty of greens, so Strokes Gained:Around the Green is a point of emphasis. There are 118 bunkers on the course too, so give sand save percentage a look too. All four Par 5's are reachable (the uphill 14th being the longest) provided you put your tee shot in the right place and you're not hitting into the wind. More on that later. Both courses feature poa annua greens which can provide for some bumpy putts late in the day. Saw that in a big way last week at Torrey Pines. Best remedy there, as always, is to hit em tight.

Best Hole - 7th Hole, 106 yards

Lachlan Cunningham. Getty Images.

So many of these holes would take this honor easily at other courses. The 6th, 7th, and 8th is up there with the greatest 3 hole stretches in all of golf. It just might be the best. The 17th and 18th provide for some great finishes as well. But I simply must give this award to the par 3 7th. It's a top 5 par 3 in all of golf. It's also the shortest hole on the entire PGA Tour. 

You might think it's as simple as flipping a lob or sand wedge down the hill, but it's also one of the most vulnerable greens on the course to the wind off the water, which is often in the face. It's nearly completely surrounded by bunkers and long is no good here, which can come into play when they put the pin back right. But really it's all about the views. Nothing better. Nothing.

The Weather

Advertisement

This is pretty typical of the weather here every year in February. Temperatures in the 40's, 50's, and maaybe creep into the low 60's. We're going to be seeing a lot of QZ's, sweaters, and maybe even the occasional umbrella out there. Wouldn't be Pebble Beach without a little rain. Hell, even this guy knew to bring his umbrella to knock-off Pebble Beach. 

The thing to keep an eye on is the wind picking up as the tournament progresses. Like most coastal tracks, the wind is one of the course's most useful defenses. There's some modest wind in the forecast now but with how small these greens are, this course could change dramatically when it picks up on Sunday. Ya love to see it.

TV Coverage

It's a CBS weekend y'all. Always is for this tourney. The Saturday broadcast is one of the more controversial broadcasts of the year. If you want to watch a ton of live golf from the world's best, you might have a bad time. They format the tournament so most of the notable celebs play Pebble on Saturday, and the broadcast leans heavy into that. If watching Larry the Cable Guy's swing get analyzed in slow motion or watching Clint Eastwood decay next to Jim Nantz on live television is your kinda thing, this is your Super Bowl. Personally I think it's fine and enjoyable for the most part, it just gets a bit stale because you spend half the day watching the par 3 17th, the pace of play stinks, and the lack of live golf gets to be a bit brutal.

CBS should really think about doing two broadcasts on Saturday where they ham it up with the celebs on CBS, and then have a a more golf-junkie oriented feed on CBSSN or elsewhere. Maybe PGA Tour Live on ESPN+ will help to alleviate that. We'll see.

Tiger Won Here By A Billion Highlights 

Tiger Woods played probably the best tournament in golf history here at the 100th US Open. It's not often you see a guy beat the scoring average by 15 strokes in a tournament. Tiger beat the next best guy by 15 strokes in a major tournament. Absolutely insanity. That'll never happen again.

 The USGA slays it with these docs. Here's another 45 minute gem capturing it all.

Advertisement

The Trophy

Jamie Squire. Getty Images.

Big time crystal for a very classic tournament. You can't just show up on the scene and flash crystal. It's earned by grinding as a Tour mainstay year after year after year. When you have a name like Bing Crosby attached to your tournament, these are the perks you get. This baby has the potential to own any room you put it in. Strong. 8/10. 

The Celebs

Would be remiss not to give the list of notable celebs that'll be out there. Tons of the usuals here:

The Board

Well…. as you can see, this field is… well, it's not good. Only 4 of the world's top 50 are playing at Pebble. The field for this event has deteriorated over the years, and the "elevated" event schedule on the West Coast swing starting this season has only made that worse. The celebrity element used to be embraced, but I think it's mostly viewed as a chore now. The pro-am element often makes these rounds a 6-hour slog, and nobody likes that. The younger wave of talented players have rallied around Scottsdale and the raucous environment there next week, and the WMPO being included as one of those elevated events has only furthered that. Plus, a couple guys have taken appearance fees to play the Saudi International, like Cam Young. Can't imagine the PGA Tour likes that.

Advertisement

Regardless, Matt Fitzpatrick and Jordan Spieth are co-favorites at +900 at the Barstool Sportsbook. Spieth won here in 2017 and was in the mix last year til the very end, partially thanks to this ridiculous shot he attempted (and succeeded) on 7 at Pebble.

I'm curious of whether Spieth would be here or not if it weren't for his partnership with AT&T. It's obviously a fit for his game and him and Jake Owen are a hell of a duo, but it's a fair question.

Regardless, I'm rolling with Denny McCarthy at +4000. I've put some dough on him a couple times this year under the notion that he's going to break through for a W soon enough, and I'm doing it again here. Finished 12th here last year and he's a weapon with the flatstick. Good price against a weak field. We're gonna throw some bombs this week…

Other Plays

Kevin Kisner +8000 To Win/Top 5 +1400/Top 10 +750/Top 20 +335 - Kiz hasn't played a regular PGA Tour event since Sea Island alll the way back in November. Didn't play all that well in the fall but that was literally months ago. Ridiculous price for a motivated guy in a Ryder Cup year, especially on a shorter course where he can keep up.

Webb Simpson +10000 To Win/Top 5 +2000/Top 10 +1000/Top 20 +400 - See what I just said about Kiz. Same thing, except he played the Sony and missed the cut. Guy plays one tournament in 3 months and misses the cut and now he's down at 100/1 with squints Sam Stevens and Matti Schmid? C'mon now.

Kevin Streelman Top 10 +1000/Top 20 +400 - He's on my list of "don't think, just shoot" of guys who just show up at certain courses every year.

Winner To Birdie 72nd hole +210 - Betting par 5 18th hole birdies seems to be a trend for ya boy these days.

That's what I got. 

Enjoy Pebble.