Thursday, November 22, 2018 (Court Day #227)
Thanksgiving Day
It rained yesterday and overnight. Looking out the window, it was overcast and everything was wet. The debate was on in my head. My right elbow is still hurting from the tournament. The courts will be wet. Will there be anyone there? Will it be a waste of 30 minutes of my time to drive out to Brommer Park and find no one there? The sun was peeking out periodically from the clouds. Would it be enough to dry the courts?
Being that I’m a bit of a fanatic, I—of course—opted to drive out and just hope.
I was also concerned that I might be a 5th wheel once I got there. Being a bit of a nerd, I did some calculations in my head on the way. There would be four possible scenarios:
1) I’m the odd man out, the 5th player of an already full court of a privately arranged game. (Worst case.)
2) I’m one of two players sitting out. This is ok. We can drill or do singles.
3) I’m one of three players sitting out. This is ok. We can drill or play “2 on 1”.
4) I’m the fourth to compete a court. (Best case.)
So there is a 3/4 or 75% chance that if there are players there, that I’d be in a good situation and only a 25% chance I’d be a 5th wheel. I realized later, you could also consider the possibility that there would be no one on the court, but even that’s sometimes better than trying to butt into a privately arranged game!
I pulled up just before 10:30 a.m. to only a small handful of cars in the parking lot. Hmmm. But as I drove through the lot, I could see some players on one of the pickleball courts. All right! Fingers crossed!
I grabbed my stuff and walked down to the courts. The best of all worlds, there were exactly three people! It was my lucky day!
Mike, Mandy, and Pete playing as I arrived. Out of town visitors.
Odd. I didn’t recognize any of them. “Need a fourth?”, I called out. “Yeah!” came the enthused response. Perfect. I was happy to see them and they were happy to see me.
Then the question was: “Are they any good?” or “Are they too good?” It’s not much fun when they can’t get it over the net. Or if you are by far the weakest player on the court.
Visitors
There were Mike and his wife Mandy from Santa Barbara and Pete from San Diego County. Funny that I’d come to the courts and I’d be the only local. Mandy did grow up around here, graduating from Soquel High School the same year that I graduated from Harbor High but moved to Southern California afterward and didn’t come back. And Mike said he has relatives in Santa Cruz County.
Pete and I teamed up and it resulted in fairly balanced teams. (Question answered!) Pete and I won the first two games and lost the third. Mike and Mandy were stacking. It’s not something I’ve ever seen in a pickup game, but they were obviously used to it and only had to make pre-point adjustments a few times. (These were obviously players who take their play a bit more seriously!)
A couple of older men appeared about 11 a.m., drilled then played singles on a court past the divider behind us. They stayed about an hour then left. Around noon, two little kids appeared. I figured they’d head over to the adjacent tennis court. Nope. Next thing I knew, they’d pulled out a couple of wooden pickleball paddles and a ball! Nifty.
We continued played game after game, swapping sides each time, for two hours straight. We probably got in eight games. It was awesome.
At the end of the session, we’d just about split the games between Pete and me versus Mike and Mandy. Pete and I lost the last game 12-10. Like I said, pretty balanced. We are all decent players. The day was a little breezy at times which factored into the games some.
So?
Honestly, I played pretty well overall, but it was a mix of lots of standard vanilla shots, occasional lame shots, and occasional awesome shots. Consistency is the bane of my existence. That and hitting balls that would otherwise sail out. I suppose the promising thing is that I can go toe-to-toe in a hard rally at the net and hold my own. But then I’ll hit a dropshot into the net. And I hit at least three would-be kill shots right into the net—so painful! I have to fix that! Regardless, I was solidly in the mix. I wasn’t weakest and I wasn’t the strongest.
Erne, a First
A first today, Mike successfully executed two Erne shots against me. I never had even one against me before. (One prior attempt, yes.) I don’t see those often at my level, but eventually I’ll need to develop a better defensive strategy for those. Mike was quick, I didn’t even see those coming; just —bam—point over. I figure Mike is a 4.0 player—maybe a 4.5—he was the most skilled on the court today. He might be higher and perhaps was messing around, not playing his most focused. He hit a number of forehand drives into the net and hit a couple shots from between his legs—one of which popped up the ball that I hit for a winner. (He was definitely messing around with that one!) He had very fast serves that were often difficult to return. Those are always good to face. Mike would also hit power shots low over the net. Some I handled just fine, but others, not. I’ll have to start trying to get an Erne. Once I figure out the strategy for pulling one off, I’ll start to understand a better defense.
Observers
As we started our last game, about 12:15, a woman came through the gate and sat and watched our game. Soon, the rest of her friends appeared and warmed up in the court vacated by the two older men.
When we finished up our final game and were packing up—I gave Mandy one of my business cards in case they came to town again and wanted to play—when one of the new group came up for a second and she said they’d been hoping to play with us “… though we’d probably get clobbered. We’ve been watching.” (Sounds like we made a good impression!) Our group debated among ourselves for a minute, and we took a step back into the courts, but it looked like they had a good number of people with a game already going, so we turned around and headed to the parking lot instead.
A final round of waves goodbye and I was on the road for home right about 12:30. A great Thanksgiving morning! I’m thankful!
Number of days on a court: 227
Number of total hours: 620
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