The attack of the pickleball people

I wrote a very serious story in March about pickleball, a sport many assume was invented during the pandemic so people could get together outdoors and exercise, but not too much because tennis becomes way harder with age and no ambulances were available in 2020 for middle aged people with torn hamstrings and exploding knees.

Someone who likely worked in marketing said let’s shrink a tennis court, play doubles a lot, and use lighter balls that don’t hurt as much when slammed into a human face. And we’ll use wooden paddles instead of tennis rackets, to mitigate some of the face-smashing.

And hats … we’ll wear hats, the buying of which will distract people from this terrible disease. Because you can’t worry about skin cancer while ignoring an Earth-changing killer disease.

Let’s also ignore the fact many of us already played this decades ago in elementary school and simplistically called it “paddleball.”

No no no. It was 2020 and we lived in a futuristic, sci-fi “Andromeda Strain” world. “Paddleball” sounded like something played in the 1970s by people who looked like Elliott Gould.

The times called for something light and whimsical sounding during otherwise desperately serious times when millions perished (and still are) from a new disease that unfortunately made people with internet connections believe they knew more than big-brained professionals who spent half their life in medical school.

Thank God we kicked that guy who told us to drink bleach out of the White House.

So, no, it’s not “paddleball” you fools. It’s “pickleball,” which also starts with a “P” and has three syllables. “Pickleball” sounds a bit zany and rooted in invisible logic no one understands but just accepts.

Kind of like how medicine used to be.

I’m not saying there’s not a perfectly good reason it’s called “pickleball.” I’m saying I won’t look it up because I hate pickles.

So in March I wrote a news story about city-funded pickleball courts being shut down permanently after only 13 months, because it seems pickleball makes people insane.

The city converted two tennis courts into eight pickleball courts, added a bunch of other amenities - including sound insulation a consultant said would totally work (it didn’t) - and $887,000 later, turned the pickle people loose.

That doesn’t sound like a lot of money in 2026, with all these headlines about billionaires shooting jillion dollar rockets into space and at other countries because they weren’t hugged as children. But the city only has about 37,000 residents; that $887,000 isn’t pocket change.

City leaders were being responsive to their constituents, which I applaud.

Unfortunately, they didn’t realize some of those constituents confuse pickleball with a toga party.

The courts became a regional draw, which cities usually love hearing because it means outsiders spending money in their city, instead of getting liquored up and peeing on people’s lawns.

The courts were tucked tightly into a neighborhood that suddenly had to deal with far more people than predicted, behaving with a level of obnoxiousness usually found only in European stadiums selling truckloads of discounted malt liquor at professional soccer matches.

Pickleballers told the city council the courts promoted friendship, good health and community togetherness.

Neighbors didn’t sound very friendly, mentally healthy or community minded when describing the unending sound of plastic balls pinging off rackets for hours on end. They described people yelling and cheering, leaving trash, turning matches into parties, using alcohol and drugs, and urinating in public.

In other words, the Cow Palace parking lot just before a 1982 Judas Priest concert.

The pickle people allegedly brought lawn furniture, played loud music, brought barking dogs, smoked, flew drones over private yards, and scaled fences to play during non-operational hours.

That’s some kind of sick mind-control right there. Have you tried scaling a fence as an adult? A couple years ago I forgot the previous 35 years, tried scaling a fence, and ended up pleading with a dispatcher to send me one of those helicopter ambulances to keep me from dying.

Anyway, police and city employees spent way too much time answering complaints while the city tried remedies like adjusting hours and shooting pre-cooked flaming Safeway chickens out of a cannon at afterhours players until they went home.

I may have editorialized that last part a little. I’m just trying to help.

Neighbors threatened lawsuits. The mayor said she was “pissed off” during a council meeting, during which another council member quoted Abraham Lincoln.

Do we even know if that drone was armed? It’s nuts.

The mayor - with whom I’ve had a few conversations and seems like a very nice lady - was right to be pissed off. The city hired a consultant who - and professional pickleball consultant just can’t be a real job - didn’t grasp the idea that pickleball sounds really annoying. Or that pickleball courts need four sides of sound insulation instead of two because … rectangles.

The city ate nearly $900,000 on the deal but, to its credit, is still looking for a new site for the pickle people.

Meanwhile, I have a friend who was interested in buying a pickleball team, which I had no idea someone could do. But now he won’t, because the prices have shot up dramatically the past couple years because the sport’s popularity is skyrocketing.

There are many things I have finally aged enough to grasp: The relativity of time, the fact Graham Bonnett is actually a great singer, and the IRS is really bad at counting.

But I could live to 300 and still not understand why anyone needs a drone at a pickleball match.

My daughters have a dad to feed, so please consider paying $8 a month to read these columns. Find more nonsense in Tony’s book “Lying Drunk,” available from Barnes & Noble at https://bit.ly/46xoaJJ or Amazon at https://a.co/d/cYNCUPp).