Mickelson struggles with driver

Phil Mickelson struggled off the tee in his first round of the year, shooting a

2-under 70 to fall six strokes behind leaders Zac Blair and Murray Grayson at The American Express.

“I didn’t score as I probably could have or wanted to, but I really had a good day,” said Mickelson, the

49-year-old Hall of Famer competing for the first time since November.

“It wasn’t quite as sharp as I wanted it to be, maybe a little bit rusty, but it was a good first day.”

Grayson and Blair shot 64 in sunny and mostly calm conditions. Grayson closed with a bogey on the par-4 ninth on PGA West’s Stadium Course in California, also the site of the final round in the pro-am event.

“I’ve been here since December 30 working on the game and I feel like I probably am the most prepared of the field for all three courses,” said Grayson, the 2017 Barbasol Championship winner.

“Coming off of a long off-season, you never expect to come out the gates like I did firing, but I’m comfortable around all three of these courses. I love it out here in the desert.”

Blair had a bogey-free round at La Quinta Country Club.

“It was perfect, course was in really good shape,” Blair said. “Drove it really well, made some good putts. But it’s a little easier out here this week right now than it was in Hawaii last week, so it’s nice.”

Rickie Fowler, Scottie Scheffler and Hank Lebioda shot 65. Fowler and Scheffler opened at La Quinta, while Lebioda played PGA West’s Jack Nicklaus Tournament Course.

Fowler is playing the event for the first time in six years.

“It’s a good start,” Fowler said. “Obviously you look at scores, it’s usually pretty low out here, especially when you look at weather like this and the conditions of the courses. Conditions are perfect here at La Quinta. Greens are about the best that we see all year.”

Mickelson, also the tournament host, birdied the par-5 fifth and sixth holes to get to 3 under, then gave away two strokes on the par-4 eighth when he drove left into the water and hit his third left of the green.

“I’ve been working on kind of a little low shot to get it in play and I hit it a few times [yesterday] and I didn’t hit it as efficiently as I wanted to, but the miss wasn’t as bad as some of my other drives,” said Mickelson, the tournament winner in 2002 and

2004.