Thursday, August 20, 2026 (Court Day #956)

This is a great rally during an mixed doubles MLP match with Anna Leigh Waters:
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DbuGcuFRbbg
Did you notice at the end where ALW nearly tackled her partner to keep him from falling into the kitchen? It’s totally legal provided she doesn’t step into the kitchen herself while doing it.

Rules

What continues to surprise me are the comments on social media posts that make it obvious that the person has never read the rulebook or taken a class with a good coach. If you play pickleball more than just once in a while, you owe it to yourself to read the rulebook. And certainly don’t share your “knowledge” when you don’t know what you’re talking about. It seems most players learn the rules through a chain of word-of-mouth and things get lost in this real world “game of telephone”… not to mention that some rules change over time.

In my time of playing over the last 10 years, there have been many rule changes. Most are subtle, but some are quite significant. For instance, when I started playing, if a serve hit the net but still landed in the service box, it was a let and the serve was replayed. Perhaps the biggest, was the addition of the drop serve, first as a provisional, temporary edition, but then it was made permanent the next year.

Another Tesla Paddle

Tesla and Selkirk are back with a new collaborative paddle called the Aurum:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DcRaBxniVz2

Paddle Shapes

Here is a good overview at the various paddle shapes provided by the USAP:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DcRjKAwkquF

Heading To Skypark

By 6:15 p.m., I was on Highway 17 and driving towards Scotts Valley. It went from sunny to mostly overcast, but it was still a warm 73°F.

My knee continues to bother me, especially when going up and down stairs. I also have a strange pinch near my collarbone at my right shoulder today. It is, what it is.

Skypark

I pulled into the Skypark parking lot at 6:22 p.m.

Aaron Bartley and I played against Shreyes and Marquis. We lead 10-8 but ended up losing 12-10. 

We also lost 12-10 in a second game. We had a comeback but it fell short. 

More Games 

I played with a guy named Holt and we won 11-0 versus Chuck and Garrett. 

We swapped partners and this time teamed with Garrett. Garrett’s team had a better showing but we still lost 7-11 to Holt and Chuck. It wasn’t a true evaluation of the teams considering that I was trying to hit to Holt since he was the stronger player across the net.

Playing with Ahbi

Ahbi and I played against Chris and Shreyes. We won the first, lost the second, and were leading 8-2 when the lights clicked off at 8:32 p.m. Apparently, the City of Scotts Valley’s plan of turning off the lights at 8 p.m. is still being implemented! (It was supposed to go into effect a few days ago.)

Knee

My knee doesn’t usually bother me while playing too much, but I was definitely feeling it by the next to last game. And if I wasn’t trying not to, I would’ve been limping a little bit.

And?

So what to work on? I think over the course of the evening there are a couple of balls that I should’ve let sailed along—yes, hitting outballs. I hit one of those two for a winner, so it wasn’t a complete disaster. Nonetheless, I need to work on letting balls go.

I feel that I do a good job mixing up my serves. Predictability is the enemy of points. When you do the same thing over and over, your opponents get comfortable. They can react quicker and have a plan since they’ve seen it before and their brains don’t have to process what’s happening on the fly and can instead just react.

Whole Foods

This is interesting.

The co-founder and former CEO of the Whole Foods grocery chain John Mackey started playing pickleball and gained a whole lot of new friends:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DcSK27eERId
This is a common theme. Pickleball is so social. The players are relatively close to each other. The same are only 10-15 minutes then you have time to chat and/or rotate partners. This take is not a surprise to me at all. I’ve heard it hundreds of times.

Friday, August 21, 2026 (No Play)

Disney’s Goofy cartoon features pickleball—click the arrow to scroll through the various frames of the strip:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DcOwXqAm2SP

Number of days on a court: 956
Number of total hours: 3,521.5
Number of paid coaching hours: 228.5

To start at the beginning of this blog click on “1st Post” in the menu above.