Welcome back to The Pickleball Clinic Newsletter!

Are pickleball rules good as they are or do they need to be tweaked? Today, we’ll reveal the new rules our pickleball community wants to implement, a new group of pickleball thieves, the keys to hitting a great third shot drop, and a whole lot more!

Let’s go! 👇

Responses to the questions we pose on our social media accounts often give us gold mines of information for how our community feels about various pickleball topics. 

A recent question we asked in our Facebook group and Instagram page proved to be no exception. Here was the question: "If you could invent one new pickleball rule, what would it be?” 

What were the answers? Let's go...

One person wrote "No second bounce for serving team," which appeared to mean that the serving team would no longer have to let the ball bounce. 

Interesting. So that would of course eliminate the concept of the third shot drop — although it could happen on the return instead. The positional advantage in each point would also switch to the serving team, which would probably make games go a lot faster. Hmmm, we kind of like it the way it is.

Another comment was "The return must make it past the kitchen line." Not a bad rule change. As it is, returns should be deep so that the returners can push the serving team back and have more time themselves to get to the kitchen. 

So this new rule would essentially just punish mishits (which isn't necessarily a bad idea) and those who take advantage of people who don’t move well by purposely giving them drop shots they can't get to. We kind of like that new rule.👍

And now for the funny responses, which we all know and love...

One person wrote, "No lobbing short people over 65."😄 

This is kind of brilliant because most lobs (at least those not hit at the kitchen line to catch someone off guard during a dink rally) are the wrong shot to play. The logical exceptions are if someone is extremely short or if they can't move very well — and then that's just wrong for moral reasons.😃

A few more fun ones...

"Never roll your eyes at your partner, i.e., don’t play with your husband!!” 

"A rule that says people can't invent new pickleball rules."

"Some sort of involvement of an actual pickle."

"No knee pain rule."

Use the same grip for all shots at the kitchen line.

You should keep the same grip for all of your shots at the kitchen line, regardless of whether you're hitting a dink, volley, forehand, or backhand. When all players are at the kitchen line you're only 14 feet away from your opponent. You don't have time to change grips! I generally recommend using the continental grip because it allows you to hit all shots efficiently.

Our Biggest Giveaway to Date

🚨Giveaway Alert🚨 We’ve partnered with 5 of pickleball’s favorite brands to give 3 winners a SUPER basket of goodies including a paddle, shoes, shades, an outfit, and sunscreen (over $900 in value per basket).

So you might just want to enter for a chance to win! Click here to enter.

Pickleball’s greatest player of all time, Ben Johns, answers the question, “What’s the most important thing a player can do to go from 3.0 to 4.0?”

“Hey Bulletin Readers!

To get from a 3.0 to a 4.0 I’d say the best thing you can do, despite it being a cliché by now, is to improve your 3rd shot drop and the associated shots in order to get to the kitchen line safely. If you increase your percentage of getting to neutral at the line, you’ll drastically increase your win percentage”

To increase your understanding of pickleball, there aren’t too many better people to follow than Ben Johns. Here he is on Instagram and YouTube.

Timeout — Are You Using Franklin Balls?

Timeout! Are you playing pickleball without the right pickleballs? That’s not allowed. You need to use the right pickleballs, which are the Franklin X-40s.

Just to clarify, you are technically allowed to use another type of ball.😄 However, just like you SHOULD run up to the kitchen right after your return and you SHOULD try to hit your serves and returns deep, you definitely SHOULD play with Franklin X-40s because they’re the best balls out there! Use code “clinic15” for 15% off.

We have no words for this — just watch and wait a few seconds. 😂

Sticky Fingers

Two weeks ago, we wrote about a pickleball thief who was essentially running a Ponzi scheme.

Today, we're looking at new pickleball thieves out there, this time of the “sticky fingers” variety.

A business called Game-Set-Match Inc., with three locations in Colorado, was hit by a series of thefts at all of its stores, resulting in an estimated loss of $30,000 in pickleball paddles.

A group consisting mostly of women raised some suspicion at one of the locations, which prompted a review of the store’s security footage.

It turns out that while some of the women were distracting staff members in one part of the store, others were stealing paddles by putting them underneath their shawls and dresses.

"This group came in and targeted specific things on specific days and basically came down here and repeated it almost like it was a route," said the owner of Game-Set-Match Inc., Adam Burbary.

Since the series of thefts, the stores have rearranged their merchandise such that the expensive pickleball paddles are now within eyesight of its employees.

Burbary has filed police reports for the thefts at all three locations, and they are currently under investigation.

Upon hearing the news, JOOLA, one of the premier pickleball paddle manufacturers, donated 30 paddles to the store, which practically brought Burbary to tears, "It kind of restores humanity to me a little bit. Makes me feel like people get it and care."

Pickleball will take over your days — and your nights!😂 

The Pickleball Shoes You’ve Been Looking For

Diadem is officially the Official Shoe of The Pickleball Clinic. In fact, it's so official that we made an image above stating that it's our official shoe. 😄 

OK, enough "official" talk. What you need to know is that The Pickleball Clinic's co-founders Aaron Reznik and Matt Slowinski go way back with Diadem. They connected with Diadem's co-founder, Evan Specht, when they started their tennis academy back in 2020, and both tennis companies branched out into pickleball at the same time.

Diadem is a premier paddle brand and they just came out with a shoe that will be taking over pickleball! Yup, it's called the Court Burst, and it's the result of a collaborative effort by a team of elite footwear designers and engineers dedicated to creating the ultimate blend of speed, comfort, and performance.

It hasn't even been released yet (yeah, it’s that cool), but you can pre-order it now! And you should because Diadem is an incredible brand! Oh, and did we say they're our Official Shoe brand too? 😃 

Pickleball Comedy Gold

If you like pickleball and you like laughing, then you have to check out these two videos.👇 We’re confident that it’s the greatest two-part pickleball comedy series of all time. See for yourself below — and get ready to think about dinking balls in a whole new way!

Talking Pickleball

So you've met Coach Ray, Lisa's husband, and Marge.😂 Now it's time to meet Lisa...

Talking Pickleball Part 2

Remember what Ben Johns said above about the most important thing you can do to improve your game? It was the third shot drop!

Well, good thing Coach Tanner is here to show you exactly how to hit it.👇

Key takeaways:

• Emulate the motion of throwing a bean bag.

• Don’t grip your paddle tightly — think 3 or 4 out of 10 for grip pressure.

• Don’t take a backswing — and follow through up to your chin.

• Aim for your opponents’ backhands.

Hunter Fieri (son of Guy Fieri) and his fiancée, Tara Bernstein (a professional pickleball player and social media creator), hosted a celebrity chef pickleball tournament over the weekend that was open to the public!

Presented by Whispering Angel, the competition was held at Miami Beach Golf Club with general admission tickets priced at $1,000. 💰

Hope you enjoyed this week’s newsletter. See you next week!

- Your Friends at The Pickleball Clinic

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