"A lot of weird stuff going on out there today," said Hicks, who finished with about half the field still on the course.
Woods hooked his opening tee shot into the deep kikuya rough en route to a six, forcing him to scramble. He rallied with three birdies through the rest of the front nine to get under par, but gave that back with another double-bogey on No. 14.
He finished at 1-over 72, four shots behind. Woods, coming off knee surgery and playing his first competitive round since the Masters in April, made three long putts as part of his back nine to stay in contention.
"Getting into the flow of the first round," Woods said when asked what his biggest challenge was in the comeback. "It helps when you hit six shots on the first hole."
Woods was part of the day's glamour threesome, along with Phil Mickelson and Adam Scott, the top three players in the world.
Mickelson, playing without a driver in his bag, overcame a balky putter early to finish at even par. Scott, playing with a broken right pinkie, finished 2 over.
Mickelson was 3 over at one point, looking on the verge of a meltdown after scraping a 5-wood through the gnarled rough on No. 12 and watching it go a grand total of about 15 feet.
He saved bogey there, though, then got on a roll with two straight birdies and found himself in the running on a course he played often as a kid. Mickelson is a native of San Diego.
"We were all in our own little area," Mickelson said of the threesome. "When you're tackling a US Open golf course, it's so tough that you're trying to just be in your own world and play it strategically the best you can, hit the best shots."
At 69, Rocco Mediate, Stuart Appleby and Eric Axley were the only other players to break 70 with about half the 156 players done. In the clubhouse at 1-under 70 were Robert Karlsson, Lee Westwood and Rickie Fowler.
A few players got as low as 4-under but quickly saw how the course could give, then take away. Steve Stricker got there by snaking in a 20-foot birdie putt on No. 16 (he started on the back), but played the last nine in 6-over 41 to finish at 73.
Patrick Sheehan was alone in the lead briefly at 4-under before he got mixed up in the kikuya. Standing ankle-high in the rough near the 15th green, he tried to get a wedge on the ball but only popped it up and advanced it about a foot. His next shot came up short of the green, too, and he made triple-bogey. He finished at even-par 71.
Then there was Hicks, who opened his round on the back and shot 33 after nine holes during which he did not make a single par. Among the highlights were his chip-in on No. 11 for a birdie.
"It was kind of nice to hear a little roar when that happened," he said.
"Who am I?" he said. "Well, I think I'm just another one of the guys out there playing the Nationwide Tour, trying to earn his PGA Tour card. There's a lot of great young players in America, and we're all out there trying to earn our way up."
