A little while back, I ran into my tennis buddy Cody. I met him when he was working at the Treasure Lake Tennis Center, during high school summers. He was a developing high school player, definitely had in interest in the game, and was a quality young man, the kind you hope that your daughter brings home. We would sometimes go out on court, and play some. We began to lose track of each other when he went to college, and I sometimes wondered if he still played tennis.
When I did run into Cody, he immediately asked me, “Have you played pickleball yet?” I hadn’t, and wasn’t planning on playing it, but he excitedly replied, “Try it. You will love it!”
So I watched a little bit of pickleball on TV. It seemed as if it were table tennis played on top of the table. The court was about a quarter the size of a tennis court. You used a wooden or graphite paddle, and the ball was like the wiffleball I batted around the backyard as a kid. The game seemed to be easy to learn, although about as interesting as watching paint dry. I guess that the easy learning curve is enough to account for its rise in popularity. I still was not sold on it, but I decided to investigate further.
One of the ladies in my Tuesday tennis clinic at the lake also plays pickleball. Moreover, she is a physical therapist. I sought her opinion.
She agreed that it is easy to learn, but that injuries abound, many happening to people who were not physically active prior to trying pickleball. She also agreed that one of my suspicions about pickleball was true. Pickleball players who previously played tennis learned “tennis etiquette,” in other words, a sense of manners picked up from tennis. They carry that sense of etiquette with them to pickleball, and all is good.
Many players new to pickleball who have not previously played a racquet sport do not have this sense of manners. Moreover, since they were able to pick up the game so quickly, they sometimes tend to have a sense of entitlement about the whole thing. A fellow tennis player in a nearby town relayed to me that he was confronted by the head of the local pickleball association, while he was playing tennis. It seemed that the picklers had laid tape on the tennis court surface for pickleball lines. The trouble was that they used duct tape, which became a hot mess in the summer sun. When he pulled up the gooey mess, the pickle queen arrived in short order, and tried to goad him into taking a swing at her, cellphone in hand to record the confrontation. He backed off, but pressed charges; she ended up with a $500 fine.
So, wondering about all of this, I decided to attend an area pickleball tournament, just to watch.
My suspicions were definitely confirmed. Truthfully, it kind of seemed as I was in the midst of a cult gathering, only without the kool-aid. One pickler, who knew I played tennis, asked me what I thought. I replied, “In tennis, the serve is the most important shot in the game. It can be very challenging to serve well. You guys serve underhand, and just the put the ball in play. Stevie Wonder could learn to serve in pickleball.”
He huffed off, but was replaced by another member of “the cult.” I told him, “Look, how about this? You and I will play pickleball, and then we will play tennis. Cumulative score wins. I’ve got two Benjamins in my wallet that says that I will win. You in?” He quickly disappeared, so I looked for another pickler to irritate, since I hadn’t yet met my daily quota of irritating people.
As I walked around the courts, wishing that Apple made a watch that tracked one’s daily irritation total, I saw someone who was a medium-level high school tennis player a few years back. He had to inform me that he was now a certified pickleball instructor. I asked him about the course work and the certification exam.
He replied, “Oh, it’s all online.” I took that as my cue to leave.
So…tennis or pickleball? It comes down to a hard-earned skill versus instant gratification, etiquette versus attitude. I think I will stick with tennis.
Though, if you want to try pickleball, go right ahead. Just mind your manners, or else I will show up wearing my new t-shirt, which reads “Pickleball: The Dumbing-Down of Tennis.”
