If you’ve been to a local park recently, chances are you’ve heard the sharp pop-pop of pickleballs echoing across the courts. As a lifelong tennis player, I have to admit, every time I hear that hollow plastic sound, a small part of me flinches. It’s like a mosquito in your ear: harmless, but impossible to ignore. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate pickleball. But…
Pickleball is everywhere. It’s like someone took ping pong, blew it up, threw it on a tennis court, and said, “Let’s make this a lifestyle.” Now it’s being portrayed as “the fastest-growing sport in America,” while tennis, the sport I’ve poured my sweat, tears, and money into every year, is dismissed as “too hard,” “too serious,” or worse, “outdated.”
Tennis and pickleball do share a lot: courts, nets, serves, and questionable line calls. But they’re also really different. Pickleball is played on a smaller court, with plastic balls that sound either terrible or, to people with a unique taste, extremely satisfying (there’s no in between), and paddles that resemble oversized spatulas. The game is quicker, easier to pick up, and far more forgiving. Tennis, on the other hand, demands full-court sprints, killer timing, and an emotional tolerance for double faults.
Now, let’s be real. Pickleball courts are sprouting up like weeds, sometimes replacing tennis courts altogether. That’s right, replacing. (Schenley Oval, I’m talking about you). As if decades of Wimbledon tradition can be swapped out for doubles matches featuring retirees with paddle names like “The Dinker” and “Smash Daddy.” Pickleball paddles aren’t even strung. The balls? Plastic, perforated wiffle spheres.
Tennis, on the other hand, is a sport of precision, strength, and strategy. It asks more from you: endurance for long rallies, mental fortitude after a double fault at 30-40, and the ability to chase down every ball like your life depends on it. There’s beauty in the baseline battle, in the arc of a topspin lob, in the satisfying thwack of a perfectly-timed forehand winner. It’s brutal and poetic. It hurts in the best way.
But… I’ll admit, pickleball does have its charms. It’s fast-paced, social, and incredibly easy to pick up. Anyone can grab a paddle and have fun in five minutes, even people who’ve never held a racket in their lives. That accessibility? It’s kind of awesome. And yes, it’s probably great for your whole body (especially if, like me, you’re still recovering from shin splints from two tennis seasons ago). There’s a certain goofy joy to it, even if the sound still drives me up the wall.
Still, maybe it doesn’t have to be war. Pickleball is fun. It gets people moving, it’s social, and it has an impressively low injury rate. And tennis…well, tennis has history, depth, and the undeniable satisfaction of a clean passing shot down the line. There’s room for both. Probably not on the same court at the same time… but in the world? Definitely.
In the end, I’ll always prefer the elegance of a well-placed forehand over the pop of a plastic ball (call me old-school). And yes, I’ve been told pickleball is “great for your joints” and “less intimidating,” but so is yoga, and no one’s converting the US Open into a hot vinyasa studio.
