Month: September 2026 (Page 2 of 5)

Wednesday, September 23, 2026 (Court Day #970)

A couple of days ago, Dave Cox reached out to me and asked if I wanted to be a fourth on Wednesday morning at 8:30 a.m. After check staffing and what I needed to get done, and with no idea who the other two players would be, I agreed.

Today, when I left my house just before 8:15 a.m., it was sunny with mostly clear skies and 55°F. But now officially being fall, it seems that having the temperature below 60°F in the morning is now more common.

This morning was an example of the difference between the west side and the east side. Immediately, after getting off the freeway at a very backed up Soquel Avenue exit, I drove right into a solid bank of fog. But then, as I started getting closer to Brommer Park, it started breaking up a little. Funny.

Even with the heavier traffic on the freeway, I was still pulling into the Brommer lot at 8:30 a.m.

Brommer Park

When I walked in, Dave was warming up with Lena.

I figured she was part of our foursome, but Dan Dewey and JP were standing nearby and joined the court and Lena stepped off.

Games

We did a short warm up then launched into games.

In the first one, Dave and I lost 10-12 against JP and Dan.

We mixed up partners. JP and I lost 2-11. I returned 2-3 of Dan’s serves long.

Dan was next in my rotation and he and I won 11-4 in a very quick game.

Then it was back to Dave and me. We won 11-3.

JP and I were leading the last game 9-8 but then ended up losing 9-11. There were two or three shots where I made the right selection, but failed on the execution, primarily hitting the ball too long of the court.

We finish up that game at 10:05 a.m. I packed up my things and headed home to squeeze in some work before heading to the Bay Area.

Analysis

Aside from the first warm-up game which was a 12-10 win for JP, he lost every game. His closest loss was with me in the final game (9-11). There was merely a one point spread in score averages between Dan, Dave, and me and less so (0.75 spread) if the first game is thrown out.

And?

I walked away from the courts feeling like my time there was incomplete. I was getting dialed in, then it was time to go. It usually takes me a few games to get really warmed up. I felt that I had my good moments and my less than good moments.

I was having some strange issues with serving today. I missed a couple left or right which is very unusual. It wasn’t quite the yips, but I had to dial back my serves a little bit and be a little more careful. It was odd.

Dan has started developing a serve as a weapon, that’s good! The more challenging, the better! After the first game or two, I got acclimated and returned all of his services properly. Maybe not as deep as I wanted our placed exactly what I wanted, but my returns play. My returns were in play.

The Po-Po

The police down in Long Beach wrote 40 citations to players using the courts after the dusk closure time:
https://lbpost.com/news/pickleball-tickets-deforest-park-long-beach-police/

Club Hands

I learned a new pickleball term from a podcast. “Club hands” (or “clubby hands) describes when a player generates a lot of power at the net with very little swing.

MRI at Stanford

I left Santa Cruz around 2:30 p.m. to head to Stanford to get an MRI on my lower body as part as an of an ongoing research project. This was the final and third year of me getting scanned. I do have to say that lying on my back and having my legs locked into a straight position with the weight of my leg resting on my heel caused significant pain in my right knee. It wasn’t unbearable, but it was a 7 or 8 out of 10 and enough that the thought of me squeezing the “alert bulb” in my left hand crossed my mind. It was very, very uncomfortable, but I could manage the 45 minutes or whatever it was for the scan. But I was very happy when I could move my leg afterward!

Once the scan was done, I met up with my son about 15 minutes away—he is up taking care of his girlfriend’s cat at her apartment while she is traveling—and we went to a Mexican restaurant for dinner. My degree is in computer science and he’s working for a A.I. company doing audio such as voice recognition and so we talked tech stuff, along with football, and some family stuff.

I should add that each time I get my knee scanned, I give the Stanford folks permission to share any issues with my doctor. Apparently, they’ve never found anything to report, since I’ve never heard anything from my doctor. That’s good news.

Cartoon

Do you have pickleball on your mind?
https://www.instagram.com/p/Ddo2vevSHxL

Words from Surgeon

A good overview of pickleball injuries from an orthopedic surgeon.

Number of days on a court: 970
Number of total hours: 3,550
Number of paid coaching hours: 237.5

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

Tuesday, September 22, 2026 (Court Day #969)

This is one of the reasons I wear eye protection every time that I play:
https://fb.watch/v/3M4-EOo74/

It was 66°F with clear skies when I left work at 6:25 p.m. The sun was already below the trees on the horizon, not a huge surprise given that today is the first day of fall.

Skypark

I misplaced my Kitchen Blockers glasses so I end up using a pair of slightly scratched clear plastic safety glasses. It wasn’t too bad. At least they didn’t fog up tonight, which sometimes happens with clear lenses.

Games

I was asked by three women—regulars—to play with them. I played with Melissa against Maria and Karen G. We won a close game. I was warming up and I made fewer and fewer errors as the game went on.

I played with linebacker Hispanic Mike against Aaron Hicks and Jess. We won a lopsided game. 

Alec and I got into a game against lefty, talkative Michael and Ashley. Alec and I won the first game in decisive fashion then we played again and won that one decisively as well.

Singles

I played two games of full-court singles against Alec at his prompting. It is literally been years since I played singles. (Skinny singles for drilling, sure, but full-court, nope.) And even then, I had maybe played singles half a dozen times in my decade of pickleball. Regardless, he beat me twice 11-0. There were sideouts, but they were mostly from self-inflicted errors from him and not so much me hitting winners. Singles is such a different game.

Jess and Jerry were playing a singles game next to us. After our game was done, Alec went to go play Jerry. Jerry said that he is playing in a singles tournament this weekend because he couldn’t find a doubles partner. Jess asked if I would play singles with her, and I agreed. I went ahead 4-0, and after a few sideouts, I found myself ahead 10-1. Jess scored a few points, then the lights clicked out a few minutes after 8 p.m.

It was a bit wild, there were three singles games going on the courts as time was expiring on the lights. There were no doubles games going on. This is supremely rare!

And?

I felt good about my play tonight, that’s unusual for playing under lights.

Number of days on a court: 969
Number of total hours: 3,548.5
Number of paid coaching hours: 237.5

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

Sunday, September 20, 2026 (Court Day #968)

This amusing video was sent to me on Wednesday by one of my former staff. It came through when I was busy working and I totally forgot about it until this morning and then watched it. Aliens play pickleball:
https://fb.watch/v/4_0sC8hKg

Health

I didn’t sleep well last night and woke up with a mild headache. I hadn’t played since Tuesday night, so with the five days of rest, my knee was feeling better than it has been lately.

It has been almost 3 weeks since I tripped and fell on my paddle, but there is still a significant bump on my right leg above my knee. I will say that the welt feels as though it has shrunk to half the size this week. So, progress.

Weather

It seems that fall arrived this morning. It was overcast and a chilly 59°F. There were also faint traces of mist on my windshield when I left my house.

On the freeway, precipitation got heavy enough that I had to use the wipers to clear my windshield. Fortunately, that was the extent of it, and there was no problem with rain at the courts.

Brommer Park

I pulled into Brommer Park at 9:15 a.m. The courts were half empty and the lot itself was only a little bit over half full.

Today was good. While I didn’t get a lot of games with all strong players, I did get a handful.

Games

My first game was with Kim Bartley against Kenny and an Indian woman, Shika, who says that she lives in Scotts Valley and typically plays out there. I would say she’s a strong 3.5 level player.

Probably the best game of note was Kim McGinty and myself playing against Mo and Kim Bartley. Kim M. has improved substantially over the last year. In an upset, Kim and I beat Mo and Kim B. It was not a lopsided game, it was close. The key to handling Kim B.’s attacks are being in the right place on the court. When I was at the right place at the net, I had very little trouble handling her hard drives.

Today was the first time I got to play with Kim Bartley in months. Mo had been talking about how much she has improved. Kim can rip strong forehand and backhand drives with accuracy. It’s impressive. She’ll take advantage of any highball or any error in court positioning by her opponents. She’s very fun to play against.

Mo complimented my serves. After one, she said she really had to get underneath the serve to get it back over the net. With the topspin that I apply to the ball, my services tend to stay lower than a lot of people expect.

Last Game

I played an assortment of games over the roughly three hours that I was at Brommer.

The last game of the day was David L. and I against Mickey and Mike “Beefcake” O’Brien. David and I won 11-6. It was David’s second game and he was still getting warmed up. He was making more errors than was typical for him. (David doesn’t show up at Brommer on Sunday mornings that often, I think I’ve seen him twice in the last year.)

Mike O’Brien went for an erne after I hit a dink off my right side. Unfortunately for him, the shot wasn’t deep enough, and Mickey hadn’t shifted over to cover so I merely hit the ball into the hole that was left for a winner.

When that game finished, I checked the time. 11:57 a.m. I had classes starting in 90 minutes.

And?

Today was night and day compared to how I felt after Tuesday night. Tuesday night I felt dejected over how poor I had played. Today, I was getting a steady flow of compliments from my opponents and I felt that I was playing very well.

New Paddle from Aireo

Aireo, whose co-founder is a Stanford professor, has a new paddle coming:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DdgwV65l-2f/?img_index=2
It has an electroplated edge guard—fancy! It’s officially releasing on Tuesday.

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Monday, September 21, 2026 (No Play)

This is a funny little clip about the sound pickleball makes:
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DdWsFAmRCia

The Pope declares pickleball the eighth deadly sin:
https://www.instagram.com/p/DdFaQKlIBJv
(Actually, the Pope seems like a pretty cool dude, he grew up near Chicago!)

Number of days on a court: 968
Number of total hours: 3,547
Number of paid coaching hours: 237.5

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