Welcome to my new blog which is a passion project that talks about everything racket and paddle sports. The blog is called racketandroll.com and I will use my love of writing and playing tennis and pickleball to share stories, news, tips and updates, and anything else that comes to mind about Tennis and Pickleball. Why do I want to write about these two sports? Because I have found that there are many long-time tennis players now also playing pickleball with similar stories to mine, with several telling me they would love to have one place to go to learn more and stay current with both sports. If you love tennis and pickleball then bookmark the racketandroll.com website and read the introduction below to learn more about my blog.
There’s a Tennis Court at the Park down the Street
I grew up in an apartment building in Los Angeles as a kid and while we all had a couple of baseball bats, a few footballs, and several basketballs between us, none of the kids in our neighborhood owned a tennis racket. But the courts were just down the street from our apartment complex, and they were always open after school and a lot of the time on the weekends, so we had to learn how to play.
We didn’t have a lot of money back then so a few of us convinced a parent to drive us to Goodwill and we were able to find some “gently used” Tennis rackets that became our entry into the world of tennis.
Lots of Tennis Balls Flying into the Parking Lot
At this point none of us kids in the neighborhood knew anything about tennis, much less the difference between a forehand or backhand or a volley. It’s not like we practiced everyday or anything like that because we spent most of our time playing baseball, basketball, and football out in the street or at the park down the street.
But since those tennis courts were so close to where we lived, we certainly made time to try to learn the game, and that meant in our first few times on the court we hit tennis balls in every direction with many flying over the fence and in to the parking lot. So many shots were hit in to the parking lot that in the beginning one of us just stood in the parking lot catching tennis balls to avoid hitting the parked cars. Over time, the adults that also played on the courts while we were there would get annoyed at us repeatedly hitting balls in to their court, as well as in to the parking lot and pelting their cars with errant tennis balls. So, we had a rotating tennis ball “guard duty” in the parking lot to solve that problem.
Can I Get a little Help, Please?
One of our parents came to watch us play one weekend and took pity on our lack of ability to hit a tennis ball. So, he piled us all in to his car and we drove off to one of the local elementary schools in our community. At that time, most elementary schools in Los Angeles had handball courts in the school yard and this Dad taught us to use those walls to learn how to hit a tennis groundstroke and gain some consistency with our shots.
We made it back to that school a couple of times to practice our tennis shots and while I didn’t know it at the time, this was the closest I would get to having a tennis lesson.
Practice Makes Perfect As They Say
At this point maybe a year had passed since we first took up this funny (to us) racket sport called tennis. And we were finally at a level where we could hit the ball back and forth over the net somewhat consistently. Remember, this wasn’t our everyday sport, but since we were getting better it actually became fun and when it became fun, we naturally started to play more.
I wouldn’t actually call us tennis players at this point but we were at a level now where if someone ever asked what sports you play we could add this sport as a new one to our athletic resume.
Developing a Passion for the Game of Tennis
And while time moved on and some of us moved away, attended different schools, and made new friends, most of us kept up with playing the game of tennis. I ended up playing baseball in high school and college but always made time in my free time to find a friend that played tennis and tried to get some court time here and there.
As you get older you realize, it becomes harder and harder to find 9 friends with time to play Softball or Baseball, playing football is almost unheard of once you get out of college, and while pick-up basketball was always part of the plan, I still kept playing tennis with friends that loved the game.
I’ve got an Extra Racket, Want to Play Some Tennis?
In my neighborhood growing up in Los Angeles I didn’t know one person that played in a junior tennis tournament, took a lesson, or had a coach that taught them the game. All my friends through high school and college played the “ESPN Sports” as I call them – Baseball, Football, and Basketball, and tennis for most of us was just an afterthought. Something to kill time with a buddy if no one else was home.
But as I got older, I found that more people are open to learning the game and by this point I owned a couple of tennis rackets and I always had an extra racket for a friend if he/she wanted to play. And that is how I “evolved” in to developing a love for the game because I stuck with it, kept playing, and because of tennis I have met a lot of people that I may not have crossed paths with if it wasn’t for being on a tennis court.
I am Tired of Hitting Against the Wall, can we Hit on the Court Already?
I have expanded my tennis abilities and skills now that I have a family and I added “tennis coach” to my athletic resume. Long story short, I started by introducing my son to the sport of Tennis once Little League Baseball and AAU Basketball ran its course.
I started him with tennis when he was 12 years old and chose tennis because I was familiar with the sport and I wanted his athletic career and ability to play to be determined by the scoreboard, not a coach who may or may not have his best interests in mind.
He resisted a bit at first because tennis is not the most popular sport in our community for kids to play. My son ended up making his high school tennis team but it was hard to embrace the sport in his early high school years because other kids made fun of him carrying a tennis bag to school on match days. Despite all of that, he stuck with it and my son ended up playing on the Varsity Tennis team in high school where they made it to the State Tennis finals and took home second place.
He also played tennis in Junior College for two years and had the time of his life playing some epic matches, traveling to fun destinations to play, and making great friends along the way – all because of the game of Tennis.
Start with the Red Ball
All of this started by hitting the beginner red tennis ball against the wall lesson after lesson until he could hit the ball consistently before we moved to the tennis court. It took a bit of time to move from the wall to the court and he hated that wall over time, but once he learned the game he realized how important that wall was to give him a good foundation to learn how to hit consistent ground strokes.
Four years later after my son started playing tennis, he played some of his high school matches on the same high school tennis courts where I taught him how to hit against that tennis wall. I never had any formal tennis training, but funny how things come full circle since I learned how to hit a ball against a handball wall in Los Angeles and I used the same method to teach my son how to play using a tennis court wall near our house.
Now it’s my daughters turn as she approaches her high school years and with her we progressed from red ball against the wall, to orange ball on the court, green dot to stretch things out a bit, and now we are comfortably using green ball and we have some epic rallies that are so much fun.
While I still play tennis, pickleball is now part of my weekly outdoor sports time and I truly do love playing. But for a time, I never thought I would get anywhere close to a pickleball court, and boy was I wrong.
I am a Tennis Player, I Will Never Play Pickleball
We have a family member that lives in a nearby retirement community and several years back the community had a vote whether to remove four of the 12 tennis courts in the community that were located in an area where those 4 tennis courts were not being used very much.
That vote generated so much controversy in the community, residents had yard signs protesting against adding pickleball courts and I am told the sentiments on both sides grew so intense that some residents lost friends over the issue and to this day still don’t talk because their so-called friend voted different from what they wanted.
Pickleball generates such intense feelings one way or the other I think because tennis players are seeing quite a few tennis courts across the country being removed and replaced by Pickleball courts and that isn’t sitting well with the tennis establishment.
Myself a tennis player, I swore I would never play Pickleball because I loved playing tennis with both friends and family, and the only people I had ever seen playing Pickleball were old people.
But that changed when a young business client recruited me to try out the game and play one day, and I had so much fun with this new game, I was hooked. Pickleball was faster paced than I thought, I still got in a good workout, and it is such a social game.
Pickleball Now the Fastest Growing Sport in America
According to the Sports and Fitness Industry Association, Pickleball has just under 5 million players now playing the Sport and the growth of the sport shows no signs of slowing down. Why is pickleball growing so fast? I will give you my point of view for what it’s worth since I just started playing the game this year.
For players of all ages, the game is relatively easy to pick up for most players, and it is very easy to play for those with even a little Tennis or Racquetball experience. A Pickleball court is much smaller than a Tennis court which makes it easier for those with ankle or knee problems to still play the game.
For me, one of the big draws to Pickleball is how social the game is for those that play. Its easy to banter back and forth during a game, maybe share a little trash talk over to your opponents, but also being supportive after a good shot which there will be many during a game. For me, I added 30 new contacts to my phone a month or two after starting to play Pickleball regularly at my local courts.
I hear the same sentiments from others on why they love the game and if these reasons are widespread then the game will continue to grow for players of all ages.
Is Pickleball a Threat to Tennis
In the U.S. I don’t see tennis ever growing to the popularity level that the sport enjoys in Europe. The sport of tennis does not have a strong network of junior practice programs and leagues here in the U.S. compared to what exists in Europe, so the foundation for the sport to grow just isn’t there.
There was also already somewhat of a tennis court shortage in many communities making it hard for some junior players to get court time to practice. And now with Pickleball growing so fast, we are seeing tennis courts around the country being replaced by pickleball courts at a rapid pace.
Without that foundation that encourages young players to start playing the game of tennis we will continue to see the sport shrinking in the U.S. and Pickleball continue to grow. It’s no surprise why most of the college and university tennis team rosters in the U.S. are filled with international players since we don’t have enough qualified players from the U.S. to fill these roster spots.
As a fan of the sport of tennis it makes me sad to see this happen in my own backyard but for this to change somehow we need to have more junior programs that encourage young players to play tennis.
What Can You Expect to See on the Pages of RacketandRoll.com
I hope to share about some of my past and current experience with the game of tennis in the hope that some will be encouraged to try the game. For pickleball, I hope to share my thoughts on this new game with details on how to start playing, some tips as a beginner to improve your game, tidbits on some of the equipment I use as I play more and more, and a little insight on where to play.
Along the way, I would love to hear from some of those that take the time to read what I am sharing, and I would love to know more about your experience with the sports of tennis and pickleball. It would be nice to have an engaged audience of like-minded racket and paddle sports enthusiasts as I contribute to the racket and roll blog.
Thank you for taking the time to read my story if you made it this far. Leave a comment or share a bit of your story if you’d like.