Paved Paradise and Put up A Pickleball Court

Is there a war on pickleball?

If you ask the people in the wealthy Bahia Mar marina community of Fort Lauderdale, Florida who are feeling the heat from approving a luxury oceanfront development plan (i.e. swank hotels, swank dining and shopping, swank on swank on swank, but tragically no Hilary Swank…yet!) that includes demolishing several very popular basketball courts in order to install pickleball courts, the answer really feels like a yes. You can pry my pickleball Serv-a-tron Swatter 9,000 out of my cold, dead hands! The ordinary millionaire folk of Bahia Mar marina, who take their pee-ball very seriously, are saying right now over martinis made with freshly squeezed money juice.

It galls them as well as the developers who stand to rake in much money-money-green-green from this enterprise that the only thing standing in the way of that coveted pickleball trophy (that you just know is a bronzed pickle no one ever mistakes for a fancy and somewhat ambitious sex toy) are some asphalt and nets. Besides, ever since Michael Jordan left earth to go play basketball for Bugs Bunny, the sport has been circling the drain. People protesting the overhaul of this seaside area point out that the basketball courts have not only been a beloved community staple since the 1970s, but they routinely draw a large diverse population of players and spectators. Some of them bus, bike, or walk from surrounding areas just to use the courts. They fear this is another move to gentrify the neighborhood. I fear it’s another move to continue making pickleball a thing.

What I think of when I hear the term “pickleball.” Happy Fun Ball, SNL (image via CNET)

I’m siding with the people who want to keep their basketball courts. Not because I like basketball. It’s fine. I’ll allow it. Like a lot, or, all sports, it’s not for me. Maybe if there were more dance breaks and if every twenty minutes they set the net on fire to make slam dunks more interesting. Maybe. I just think we don’t need a new sport that is not even new, but more like a blended concoction of badminton, ping-pong, shuffleboard, and sort of racquetball. It reminds me of one of those kitchen sink type casseroles you bring to parties:

Oooh! What’s in this?

Potato chips, cream of mushroom soup, black beans, shrimp, little marshmallows, a layer of cheese, a layer of peanut butter, pineapple chunks, and some graham cracker crumble on top.

Yum…?

Pickleball came about the way almost anything is invented: accident and boredom. This is also how Alexander Graham Bell came up with the telephone. He really wanted to prank call Edison.

One sunny summer afternoon in 1965, in the quaint locale of Bainbridge Island, Washington State, a couple of golf buddies named Joel Pritchard and Bill Bell finished up their game and headed home. When they arrived they discovered, much to their annoyance, their families hanging around looking for something to do because Netflix and chill had not yet been invented.

Someone suggested badminton. Someone else said they couldn’t find the shuttlecock. Another person snickered at the term “shuttlecock.” Someone rolled their eyes while that other person remembered how a certain someone used to be way more fun before kids came along. And it went on like this for quite a while until either Pritchard or Bell made the classic dad move of abdicating responsibility by saying, “Hey kids! Why don’t you see if you can make up a game?” They were already on the badminton court, so, sadly, a new kind of water polo was never going to happen. Instead, they started messing around volleying different types of balls over the net using various kinds of paddles. Yet we still can’t cure diabetes. I am flummoxed.

As for where the name came from, Joel’s wife, Joan, told an interviewer: “The name of the game became Pickle Ball after I said it reminded me of the pickle boat in crew where oarsmen were chosen from the leftovers of other boats.” Wow, Joan. How much more obvious can you get? I mean, c’mon, who doesn’t know the intricate ins and outs of crewing? Who can’t work those into everyday conversations? You’re embarrassing yourself, Joan. Seriously.

Like, SERIOUSLY, don’t. (Image via NBC)

In order to make pickleball not just badminton-but-different, they also had to devise a court set up and, of course, rules. Another reason why I do not enjoy sports are all the rules. There are too many! A couple are very straight forward: three strikes, you’re out. They put that one in the song so that even toddlers can remember it. But from there it’s a straight shot to rules within rules that get wrapped up like some kind of athletic turducken:

When one or more players are attempting to pass after a ten yard down, but before the penalty field off-sides infield fly rule has been called, that player will be allowed to run a traveling boondoggle into the seventh quadrant of the pitch. However, they must also be within 3 meters of the Trench of Uncertitude before the goalie has yelled “Heyyyy macarena” but after the third base umpire finishes his doughnut.

Because of this I didn’t bother to familiarize myself with any of the pickleball rules. I know there is serving since this is a pong-minton type of game and that net is there for a reason. That reason is not to reenact the “Playing with the Boys” volleyball scene from Top Gun. Sadface indeed. I also came across this sentence: “Slow soft shots in the non-volley zone, called dinks, are used to limit the opponent's ability to attack,” which convinced me that if Yacht Rock were a sport, it would be this.

The pickleball court has different components. One of them is called the “kitchen.” When I discovered that, I thought, well this is promising! I watch The Great British Baking Show. Competitive baking is a sport! Just look at the devastation on a contestant’s face when Paul Hollywood “tut-tuts” over the baker’s “soggy bottom” pie crust. Crushing–worse than the ‘73 series between those two teams that everyone always brings up at Thanksgiving while I am dissociating. In pickleball the kitchen is the zone of non-volleying, a designated space designed to keep players from wapping aggressive net shots. If these people think the kitchen is a “non-aggression” zone they’ve clearly never cooked with a bunch of Italian Nonnas. Wasted opportunity fickle pickle players, if you ask me.

Pickleball probably should have gone the way of competitive croquet and pistol dueling, but it looks like it has made itself at home among other western sports like tennis and electoral gerrymandering. What does this mean for the embattled ballers (pickle and basket alike) at Bahia Mar marina? What will shake down? Which side will prevail? I can’t say for sure, but I have a feeling it will ultimately come down to the dinks. In sports as in life it always does.

Postscript: Maybe this is artistic karma, but I caught this article right before publishing this piece: An expansive outdoor pickleball and padel complex featuring a bar and cafe is headed for Boston. Ballers is set to launch sometime in July. Sweet Moses, no. Though I have to give them that name—Balllaaahhhhs. That’s a slam dink alright.