Sunday, January 12, 2025 (Court Day #758)

It was a beautiful day and warm for January. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and it was 55°F as I left my house a few minutes after 9 a.m.

I’ve been teaching classes for Rec.us for over a year, so it has become a little bit routine. However, to properly run drills, I need balanced pairs and to have actual games, I need full courts—meaning all eight students that are registered have to show up. Last weekend, the first week of classes, in my Advanced Beginner class, a couple who was signed up didn’t come. I emailed them a few days ago and got no response, so I followed that up with a text yesterday and now, over 12 hours later, I still have not heard anything from them. I don’t know if they’re coming or they’re not coming. It makes it difficult for me to arrange substitute students… teaching adventures!

Brommer Park

I arrived at Brommer about 9:15 a.m. to plenty of parking.

My first game was paired with Gary against Dave Ryan and Evan. Not a big surprise that we lost but at least we managed to make a little bit of a game of it. I was playing very, very well.

Next up, Sam and I won 12-10 versus Dave Ryan and Evan. That was a challenging and great game. 

Dave Cox

Dave Cox arrived and called across the divider that one of his arranged players wasn’t going to make it and I was welcome to join his group as a fourth. I was in the middle of a game, but I told him, “Ok.” A bit later, Gary was playing with them and I eventually replaced Gary in their group of four on a reserved court.

I played a game with a guy named Ken versus tall, lefty Greg and Nick. Ken missed a lot of shots—he was probably warming up. We lost.

Monterey Guys

After that game, I was ready for a bigger challenge. And I joined Dave Cox and his two friends, Chuck and Tony from the Monterey area.

In our first game together, Tony and I won 11-1 versus Chuck and Dave. I was making very few errors and dominating.

We swapped sides and played a rematch, winning again 11-7.

After one game with Chuck as my partner, he shared a comment about our opponents were hitting everything to him and avoiding me.

I played two games with Dave against Tony and Chuck. I noticed that they were targeting Dave. Good news, we won both games regardless—not that Dave is a weak player, he’s not.

I left Brommer Park a few minutes after 12 noon. Home, then off to teaching.

I was happy with my play today. I played well. Not perfectly, but above average for me.

NFL Pickleball

The NFL Wildcard games were today. Kyle Brandt, a host on the NFL’s Good Morning Football, had a pickleball-themed skit during a playoffs broadcast to talk about the Denver Broncos. (The Broncos went on to lose badly to the Buffalo Bills.) This was no mere few-second mention. This was a good 2+ minutes on national television. If you watch, notice the brief appearance of his opponents. You can even tell by the way that they move that they are good players—even if they are obviously taking it really, really easy on Kyle and his partner.

Fun stuff! I was a bit puzzled when he stated,”Pickleball is the air fryer of sports.” But air fryers seem to be a trendy appliance. Even my wife bought one for our kitchen about a year ago!

Podcast

So, I listened to that Jill Braverman podcast that has stirred up controversy in the past few weeks. What was shocking to me to learn is that the UPA (PPA/MLP) pays ESPN to get their matches broadcast on the ESPN network. This blew my mind. Generally, networks pay for sports content, but in this case, it’s the reverse! It sounds like the UPA are trying to prime the pump—that is, if ESPN sees a boatload of people watching those pickleball matches, then EPSN might pay for broadcast rights in the future. The UPA is gambling on the growing popularity of pickleball. It occurred to me, this may be why they bumped Genie Bouchard into the round of 16 in her first pro tournament with very little pickleball experience… the UPA was hoping that she would draw eyeballs to the broadcast. (Of course, you may recall, the Genie got more or less destroyed in her first pro pickleball outing, though she’s doing much better lately.)

They were saying on this podcast that it is going to cost about $100,000 per paddle company to their paddles certified for use in the PPA and the MLP matches. It’s a $50,000 base fee in exchange for the publicity they receive from the pro events, plus a large certification fee per paddle, which would typically total about $100,000 per company. Obviously, we will not be seeing new or small paddle companies on the UPA circuit.

Cam & Mal on Social Media

There is a young couple, Cam and Mal, who have 353,0000 followers on Instagram. Mal, the wife, is 8-months pregnant but they went out to play pickleball anyway because Mal “misses it”. Hey, nearly 1/3 of a million viewers, we’ll take the exposure!
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DEyhU1Ep9gj/

Genie Buchard Glasses

Pro Player Genie Bouchard, who recently got smacked in the eye during practice which resulted in a scratched cornea, appeared at a tournament last week wearing eye protection. Smart.

I will say I was a bit curious about her eyewear. Well, as luck would have it, an ad appeared in my social media feed for, wait for it… Kitchen Blockers. These are unique. What makes the difference? No lenses. They run about $70, so not as cheap as popping lenses out of cheap sunglasses, but better protection.

Number of days on a court: 758
Number of total hours: 3,062
Number of paid coaching hours: 105.5

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