Major League Pickleball player dishes on why it's become fastest&growing US sport: 'It has it all'
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In 2019, Pablo Tellez was living in Naples, Florida, and still loving tennis. It is the sport he has always played, doing so collegiately at the University of West Florida, where he won a Division II national title.
However, a trip to a tennis shop led Tellez down a path to becoming a professional athlete in America's fastest-growing sport.
Pickleball in the United States saw a 51.8% increase in players from 2022 to 2023, and it has a growth rate of 223.5% since 2020.
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As the sport has grown, Major League Pickleball (MLP) became a league for some of the best players in the world, like Tellez, who stars for the MLP's Brooklyn Aces.
Speaking with Fox News Digital, Tellez explained why pickleball has become a sport many millions of Americans are starting to pick up.
"I think it’s several things," Tellez, who partnered with LOTTO, which also co-owns the Aces, began. "First of all, it’s super fun. It’s just fun. I’ve never seen anybody at a pickleball court and not smiling and having fun. It’s a lot more social than other racket sports in the sense that you’re very close to your opponent, very close to your partner at all times. So, I think if you don’t get that social aspect, you’re not going to have fun. But everybody’s looking for it. And it’s even turned into people using pickleball for dating, pickleball as a place for finding friends and just hanging out.
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"Then, it’s very easy to pick up as a sport. When you play tennis or you play soccer, it’s going to take you awhile to be good and to actually enjoy the sport and to understand it. When you play pickleball for your first time, you’re going to be rallying back and forth. You may not be great yet, but you’re going to be having fun in that sense."
How Tellez picked it up was when he saw a pickleball tournament ad that said a $100,000 prize would be involved. As a tennis player, he thought the sport was going to be pretty easy.
However, Tellez was sadly mistaken when he saw just how good professionals could be.
"I signed up for it and I think I went 0-8. I played singles, I lost. I played mixed doubles, I lost. Then, after that, I was like, ‘Oh, this is a little harder than I thought’ and I was hooked."
Tellez started playing every day, and two years ago, he turned pro.
"I don’t like losing, and I thought I was better than I actually was," he said after that initial tournament. "But it helped me because it pushed me to try to take the sport more serious and to play regularly. I think that was the key for me – I just wanted to get better."
Now, Tellez plays for the Aces, a team that is not just owned by LOTTO, but NBA star Kevin Durant, rapper Drake and actor Michael B. Jordan. Additionally, the likes of LeBron James, Tom...
Congratulations on this exciting partnership!