Cinderella Story, Out Of Nowhere

It was as if Carl the greenskeeper somehow weaseled his way onto the first tee of a glitzy celebrity tournament, wandered among the fashionable in the pouring rain, cast his eyes heavenward and mumbled, “I don’t think the heavy stuff is coming in for another couple of hours.”

It was Bill Murray, of course, and the event was the 3M Celebrity Challenge on the eve of the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am. And it was funny, of course.

Dressed a lot like Carl the greenskeeper from “Caddyshack” and teeing off in weather not unlike the deluge the minister sloshed around in, Murray joined Kevin Costner, Clint Eastwood, Huey Lewis, John Denver, Glen Campbell and former astronaut Alan Shepard in a five-hole round that produced some good shots and some great laughs.

But that’s part of the appeal of this tournament. The story is always the celebrities and the weather. That was true Wednesday, when a second day of heavy rain closed Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill and Poppy Hills to practice.

It didn’t stop the determined sevensome from playing, however.

Sloshing through standing water that covered the tops of their shoes, they made their way to a No. 1 tee that was nonetheless surrounded by cheering fans.

Costner, in a fashionable beret, cracked a wry smile when the emcee made a “Waterworld” joke, and Campbell, huddled under a hat not unlike that worn by Gilligan on “Gilligan’s Island” both stepped to the tee and smacked respectable drives despite the rain.

Denver, Campbell, Eastwood and Shepard did likewise.

Then came Murray.

No fashionable dress here. That goofy face, with a perpetual half-smirk, half-smile that seems to say he knows a joke he ain’t telling, peeked out from under an Army surplus camouflage hat with earflaps framing his head.

A respectable swing - perhaps a little too big for the layers of clothing he had on - hit the ground a little too soon, sending a spray of water into the air and popping up his drive like a weak out to shortstop.

Mulligan. This time better, a solid shot safely in the fairway.

The rain, which stopped by the time the players got to No. 18, is supposed to stay away when the tournament gets going today.