Tuesday, December 16, 2025 (Court Day #883)
Two days ago, on Sunday afternoon, Andrea, the Aireo Sports marketing person, dropped off in assortment of demo paddles at my house to share locally. Yesterday at work, I printed out some labels and at lunchtime today, I applied them to the paddles. Later this afternoon, one of my private students came by and picked up the bag of paddles to try out.
Skypark
It was 61°F, practically balmy for the middle of December. When I arrived at about 6:45 p.m., three of the eight courts were empty. Quite a surprise. Someone suggested that it might be because it’s the holidays. Later, on our way out, Scott said that he was going to Mexico for the holidays and see us in the new year. Maybe it is a result of the holidays . . .
Games
My first game was teamed up with the UCSC student named Brandon who had never met before against a couple of regulars. Before the game, Bandon warned me that it had been a few months since he played. Considering that he hadn’t played for a while he did all right. It was solid 3.0 play.
I got into one more game. That was completely unmemorable.
I played three games with Dr. Alex—the birdman—against David L. and a fellow named River. I’d seen River around but I’d never played with him before. Judging just from tonight, I’d say River is a 4.0 player.
Alex and I won the first game by a few points then we had a rematch and won that one again. We played a third game and also won that one. For the fourth game, we mixed things up and I played with David against Alex and River. The score was tied 4–4 when the lights clicked off at 8:30 p.m.
And?
I played well tonight. As a matter, fact, this is about the best that I played at night in quite some time. This was equal to my daylight level of play.
Sure, I gave my opponent some gifts, but they were greatly outnumbered by nice shots. I was about to as I was about to leave, I made a special effort to walk over to where River was sitting and packing up and I told him that he played well, which he did. He thanked me for the games and told me that I have fast hands. Yep, that’s a compliment that I hear fairly frequently.
One particularly memorable shot in an early game and Alex was across from me. I left a little bit too much room between me and the right side line. Alex drove a passing shot to my right and all I could do is barely get my paddle on it, and the ball careened away off into another court. Oops!
It was 55° when I left and I was comfortable in a T-shirt and shorts.
When I got off the court, I had 45 text messages! Lots of messages from my mom, my brothers, my sister and who knows who else!
Rain is coming and we will see if there is a play on Thursday night or not. Play this weekend, and especially this Sunday, is nearly guaranteed to be out of the question.
Thursday, December 18, 2025 (No Play)
If there are circumstances in a tournament doubles match where one of the two players can’t continue, but the remaining partner still wants to play on alone, this is legal and a certified USAP referee explains in this brief article:
https://insideden.com/pickleball-blog/pickleball-doubles-injury-rule/
Paddle Battle
There is a pickleball facility franchise called Pickleball Kingdom. They are promoting a reality TV show coming out soon that will stream on YouTube. Based on the trailer, it appears to be one of those “vote a person off the island” contestant elimination scenarios
This is great promotion for Pickleball Kingdom’s franchise program. They have to be hoping that people will be inspired to become a franchisee.
Mall -> Pickleball
Speaking of pickleball franchises, a different one, Picklr, is opening up in a shopping mall in Santa Barbara.
In our county, in Capitola, there is an indoor shopping mall with some vacant spaces. Over a year ago, the facility let the community know that they were seeking ideas on how to use the empty space that formerly housed Sears. Some of us formally reached out and suggested pickleball courts. Unfortunately, the idea was dismissed out of hand without any explanation. Granted, it would take a chunk of money to get the floor into a condition to use for pickleball, that is, a surface where players wouldn’t slide and slip. I don’t know if they even considered that with the rejection, but maybe. Again, they never said.
Number of days on a court: 883
Number of total hours: 3,347.5
Number of paid coaching hours: 185.5
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