Players Feel Wind Down to Their Skins : Golf: Everyone struggles, but Azinger and Stewart share lead at $80,000 after nine holes.

PALM DESERT — Some of the world’s finest golfers hit it on the rocks, over the green, off the fence post, under the bushes, through the cactus and sometimes even in the hole.

The ball traveled to many strange and varied destinations Saturday on the first day of the Skins Game, the unseemly result of persistent wind that gusted to 45 m.p.h. and turned Bighorn Golf Club into one long, hilly air tunnel.

All in all, it wasn’t a particularly good day for golf.

Paul Azinger thought it fell short of that.

“It was awful,” he said.

Maybe, but it didn’t turn out all that badly for him, because he won four skins and $80,000, the same amount Payne Stewart took with three skins.

Tom Watson won $50,000 with two skins. Fred Couples was shut out but undaunted.

“I’ve got zero money, but I think I’m in good shape,” he said.

It was not a particularly good day to be a golf ball. Balls went so many places they needed passports. They could have used a few Band-Aids after all the rocks they hit.

There was Couples hitting downwind on No. 6, the ball striking a fence post on the fly, 430 yards from the tee.

“It was the only good shot I hit,” Couples said.

The ball wound up across a cart path in the sand among rocks and cactus, but he wound up with par.

There was Azinger on No. 7, his drive missing the fairway and landing in the desert, followed by a second shot that landed a few yards away in the sand under a bush.

Then there was Stewart on No. 7, where he missed the green, the ball landing in the gallery on the other side of the ropes.

“You all were supposed to kick it over there,” Stewart kidded the gallery, pointing to the hole. “If it had been Arnie, it would have been right down there now.”

What happened on No. 5, a 280-yard par four, was typical.

Azinger’s drive landed in a ditch to the right of the green with a bush in front of him. His chip failed to move the ball and he picked up.

Couples drove into the brush and took an unplayable lie.

Stewart drove into the brush, chipped to the rough in front of the green, hit a wedge to seven feet and missed his par putt.

Watson drove the rough in front of the green, chipped to the fringe and two-putted for par, worth $20,000.

The wind not only changed directions and affected the balls in flight, but it also moved balls on the green after they already had stopped rolling.

Bighorn’s elevated tees didn’t help keep shots any straighter, either, because of the wind.

Couples drove out of bounds on No. 9, a $30,000 skin Watson claimed with a six-foot birdie putt.

Azinger got off to a flying start with a 15-foot birdie to win a $20,000 skin on the first hole. He holed a 50-foot bunker shot on No. 4 to win a $60,000 skin after carryovers on the second and third holes.

“I was relieved,” Azinger said of his opening skin. “Last year was rough. My biggest fear was to come out here and not win a skin.”

Stewart was shut out until No. 8, which was an $80,000 carryover skin. Stewart made a 20-foot putt for par, then Azinger, Couples and Watson all missed their par putts.

“I didn’t think all three would miss,” Stewart said. “But that’s the Skins Game.”