Episode 17 | I Feel Like Batman Transcript

[Theme music, intro]

Today’s Guests:  Connor Pardoe [00:23]

Morgan:   My guest today has positioned himself in a pillar role in the professional game of pickleball. Connor Pardoe fell in love with the game like we all do but unlike the rest of us, he set out to create the largest prize-money circuit professional pickleball has ever seen. Despite the unforeseeable pandemic throwing a spanner in the works, the show goes on around the country. Please welcome, PPA Commissioner, Connor Pardoe. How are you, mate?

Connor:     Generally good, how are you?

Morgan:    Excellent, excellent. So, good to have you! It’s exciting!

Connor:     Thanks for having me here. Love the podcast of everything that you do for pickleball, so just appreciate being here.

Morgan:    Aww, it’s a pleasure, mate. You know, firstly, right off the bat, I’d got to say, cheers on behalf of all the professional players around the globe, you know, between the PPA and the APP, there’s a void that needed to be filled. And you guys have done it!

Connor:     Yeah, it’s been a lot of fun. It’s been a crazy year with everything and COVID and everything. But we’re trying our very best.

Morgan:     Yeah I know, buddy, appreciate that it must be a tumultuous time to say the least. But, backing it up, more than a year now, getting into the game of professional pickleball, you know I don’t wanna say the game, I mean, running professional events, creating a circuit, how did it happen? You were a pickleball player, I would assume?

Connor:     Yeah, I started playing pickleball 4 years ago now, and the way that it really happened is my dad and I were actually partners, so we’d play a lot together, we’d play a lot of 4, 5 tournaments. You know, and we started falling in love with the game. We’re from Salt Lake City so obviously we obviously went up to TLC, that’s the first time we ever saw professional pickleball. And I think it really just blew our minds, we got big eyes and we thought, holy cow, this is really amazing. You know with work, we also have the luxury to travel quite a bit with, you know work outside of pickleball. So this work is kind of an excuse for pickleball so we went around and played tournaments like the Atlanta Open, and the Texas Open, we went down to Indiana Wells, and we were able to work, so we were able to play with these amazing tournaments.

Morgan:    Amazing.

Connor:     So what really happened in this, we saw pickleball and then we looked at tennis, we’re big tennis people with big tennis backgrounds, and we thought, wow, you know there’s a great opportunity here. We think that pickleball has so much opportunity, so much upside, and we put together the PPA.

Morgan:     That’s amazing. So you say work prior to building the PPA, what kept you out of trouble?

Connor:      Our family, we own a commercial real-estate firm. So we do everything from office buildings, to hotels, to housing, to… I actually oversaw the senior living portfolio; so assisted living, skilled nursing, fifty-five-and-older apartments, that kind of stuff.

Morgan:     Nice! Alright. Anyway, you travelled to ride off. That’s awesome.

Connor:      Exactly.

Pickleball Tournament on the Onset of COVID [03: 12]

Morgan:     I won’t tell anyone that you were….so you recently ran I guess the first major PPA tournament since the onset of COVID at the tennis club at Newport Beach. From your point of view, how did it go?

Connor:      It went fantastic! I mean, obviously, COVID put a big wrench into things. To my knowledge, it’s the only tournament up to date where we actually had a tournament like that where it was a pro only tournament that still had a payout of $50,000 plus. So it was a unique thing, first of its kind. But, it went really well. I mean, we love the tennis club at Newport Beach, those guys were fantastic down there for letting us come in and put on a tournament, you know, the way we did. I mean, I think it went well. The pros liked it, I mean there were some phenomenal match-ups, I mean, you were down there. What do you think, Morgan?

Morgan:     Yeah, honestly I would have loved almost anything, really, just getting back out there. But it was, you know, I felt like it was very professional, it was very well put-together, I think everybody did their part, you know, in terms of keeping with the basics of restrictions that we all know we have to adhere to. So it was certainly a win for pickleball, professional pickleball, everybody.

Connor:      Yeah, I think it was fantastic, I mean, it was great to just have that level of competition. I think all of the professional players probably including yourself, I mean, competitions is something that thrives on. They love to compete. That’s why they do what they do, so it was really good to have that competitive fix again.

Morgan:     Yeah I was curious to see which of the players would be able to respond well to really not having the same kind of crowd that they used to and which players you know, really, kind of thrive off that and without it find it a little bit tricky, certainly not throwing any names out there, but it was kind of good people-watching more than anything else; people-behind-mask-watching.

Connor:      I agree with you, it was interesting. It was a little bit different of feel compared to Mesa, our first tournament, I mean, going from almost a thousand people watching you to talking a hundred people tops, there on championship court, it’s definitely a different scenario for sure.

Morgan:     Yeah, as far as it probably suits the kind of scenario for players that remember TLC, 4 or 5 years ago, you were certainly lucky to have a hundred people watching, so it’s not a far cry from that. So if you can remember those days and you can kind of forget the years in-between, then business as usual.

Connor:     Definitely. I think another unique thing was, you know, seeing the pro players coming back, I mean, there was a lot of people that had some body transformations. There were a few people whom I thought were gonna go the other way, people who might have worked up a little bit, you know, with all the time off, but wow, there were a few people that, you know, looked great, I mean, it looked like Matt Wright lost a lot of weight, Simone looked like she was in better shape, and most, like it went the other way.

Morgan:     Yeah, I think you’re stuck with a lot of time in your hands, and you’re not forced to go to an office to do 9-5, I think probably in the short while everybody went into comfort eating, but after a couple of weeks, if you’re a professional, and if you consider yourself an athlete, you now look at, with all this time on my hands how am I gonna use it the wisest. And yeah, the players that felt like their conditioning wasn’t as good as before have now ample opportunity to tighten that up, and yeah, it might be one of those pivotal moments in professional pickleball that spurs on the physical transformations that take what the game was maybe just two-three years ago, to another level.

Connor:      I agree with you, a hundred percent.

Morgan:     Given that obviously the tennis club at Newport Beach was a privately owned venue, is that something that PPA will necessarily be seeking to help circumvent the restrictions placed on us all by COVID?

Connor:      Yeah, I mean, Morgan, I think that’s something that has been a plan for us from the deck of, the PPA vision it’s going to better, newer, private, more luxury, upscale clubs. That’s something that we’re trying to do we really pride ourselves in our venue, you know our choice of where we’re gonna be taking our tournaments and yeah, I mean, the rest of our schedules through the rest of the year, they’re all at privately owned clubs. It’s something that we want to continue in the next years as well.

Morgan:     Great, so there’s you know, your average professional player can therefore have a sense of security that the tournaments that are coming up aren’t possibly gonna get cancelled.

Connor:     You’re right. We’re trying to get away from the city, parks, and really elevate the experience and overall venue, I think private clubs can definitely do that.

Morgan:     Beautiful. You know is a “never say never” kind of thing and I wouldn’t want to hold you to any promises but it seems like a good method to ensure the continuation of PPA events.

Connor:      Yeah, definitely. You know, COVID, we never know what’s gonna happen tomorrow with what’s been going on. We’re confident that the rest of the tournaments for the rest of the year are going to happen. So as of our plan right now, all of them are planned to happen. And there mustn’t be any drastic change, that’s where we’re at the PPA tour.

Morgan:     Brilliant. Exciting times!

Connor:      It is. We’re having fun. We’re just excited to get back out there.

Morgan:     We’ll take a quick break there from the Commissioner. I’ve always wanted to have a friend I can call the Commissioner. I feel like Batman. Anyway, just a quick break for a word from our sponsor, CoachME Pickleball.

Sponsor: CoachME

Pickleball Moving Forward [09:06]

Morgan:     Alright, let’s head over back to Commissioner Pardoe.

So with the speed of professional pickleball growth, do you think the time is coming to accurately define what a professional player is? Or do we already have a working definition?

Connor:      Yeah, definitely. I think as the professional sport continues to grow, a definition is something that continues to be very important. That’s why, in place, we actually have our PPA tour rankings. We believe that this is something that we’re putting into place now, it’s gonna be more valuable 2,3, 4 years down the road, but at some point, these tournament registrations have to be capped. And that’s where our ranking systems are gonna come into place.

Morgan:     Okay.

Connor:      So if you’re ranked up on the top 32 teams, you’re gonna be able to play. Other than that, you’ll have to work on your rankings. I think the days of just a 5-0 being a pro pickleball player, I think those days are very, very short, I think they’re very limited for sure the way the sport’s growing.

Morgan:     Excellent. And how many points do you get for hosting a podcast and having the commissioner around; 100 points? 200 points do you think?

Connor:      Whatever you need, maybe 500? That’s what we gave to gold medal winners.

Morgan:     Pretty good. Well, you heard it folks, I immediately get something better than the 47^th seat. Appreciate that. So tell me, this might be a tricky question to answer. But, do you think professional pickleball and amateur pickleball will kind of always need each other? It’s kind of like a symbiotic relationship. The amateur division makes up the huge number of the crowd and their entrance fees typically help to pay the prize money for the pros. But on the other hand, the pros’ attempt to supply entertainment, has a draw card, and people want to see and gets to mingle with. You know, you don’t really see that kind of symbiotic relationship in majority of professional sports. Can the two be successfully separated? Or shouldn’t they?

Connor:      That’s a great question. And I think that’s the question that all of us in pickleball have been asking ourselves. Because, really, I think that makes the sport so unique because we don’t really see that anywhere. Are we opposed to having professional pickleball not incorporated with amateur pickleball and have them separate things? No, we’re not opposed to doing that. You know the time comes where that makes the most sense to do something like that, by all means we will be behind it and we would support it. Where we’re at right now, I think that having amateur pickleball and professional pickleball they go hand in hand. Like you said, for us, it’s not so much the entry fee. I mean we were able to hold that tournament in Newport and we’re fine just off sponsorships and you know, capital that we’ve been able to raise. For us it’s about the overall environment. If you can look at the Mason Tournament compared to the last tournament, we just barely had in Newport, you know, crowd size, the overall interaction with everybody and the overall experience, I think that thrives on, you know, having amateurs out. I mean that’s why we have our slogan, “Play where the Pros play.” We want to be able to play where the pros play, enjoy your own level of play and then be able to stick around, get a beer, get some food, and watch the best people in the world play. That’s what makes pickleball so special right now and that’s what we’re going after right now, Morgan.

Morgan:      Yeah, oh, look that’s a great mantra to go after and you know, it’s a shame that it’s a tough thing to do right now with COVID restrictions but yeah, you’re exactly right. The unique part of the game is how it is a kind of a “all for one, one for all” if we’re family social atmosphere at these tournaments and it would be a shame to lose it. I wonder though if it is a necessary evil to a certain extent for the game to you know, break through into real mainstream media whereby the big networks are choosing to you know, to play pickleball and are actively seeking you out trying to get coverage because the game has risen to such a level that they recognize your average person with the television would really like to check out Ben Johns vs. Tyson McGuffin in the finals.

Connor:      Yeah, these television stations were in conversation with few of them right now already for next year. That’s exactly right. What’s making pickleball a little tricky right now is it’s really hard to, you know, to have 9 hours of live action on Fox Sports or ESPN all day long. There’s not really any sport where that necessarily happens. So it’s how do we get creative where we can have these 4-hour block where we know, hey, we’re gonna have championship, maybe it’s a championship Sunday where all the championship matches we’re gonna play them on a Sunday, we have a 6-hour block on ESPN or Fox Sports or wherever it may be, I mean that’s something that we’re really working on at the PPA. We’re trying to be innovative, we’re gonna try new things, and you know, we’re willing to work with these different entities that really wanna bring pickleball to the main stage, to the limelight. And there’s interest out there, Morgan. Let me tell you, we have a lot of conversations going on right now and I think we’ll have some very pleasant surprises for pickleball fans next year.

Morgan:     Awesome. Well keep me in mind as a commentator, you know, I’m always around.

Connor:      I know, I love the voice, I lived in Melbourne for two years. I’m LDS so I actually served at Mormon Mission down there.

Morgan:     Oh wow!

Connor:      So I love hearing the accent cause it brings me at the time, back when I was 18 years old down there.

[laughter]

Morgan:     Good mate. So backing up to what you were saying about how to kind of make the game more exciting for the audience out there. As you talking about that, I’m thinking in my head what would I want to click on and see and that I would very much sign on to watch something like if there was a 12-block and first, you know, first half of it was essentially kind of a narrated storyline of how the two finalists got to where they are. And pick, literally, with as many cameras as you can get, you pick the best points of each match that they, both teams played that got them to the final and then show the final. Because then, you’ve got the best out there laid up, and likely the best pickleball of the day played during the final.

Connor:      I love that idea, almost telling a story up to the championship match sounds great to me. Let’s do it man, let’s bring you on. Let’s have you tell the story.

Morgan:     Alright, okay! This whole podcast thing was really just to pitch that idea and then let’s make magic.

[laughter]

Connor:       Cool, I love that idea! That’s great!                                                                               

Morgan:      Yeah, we can do that, that’d be great! Okay let’s take a little break there from Commissioner Pardoe for a Medium Tip from our sponsor CoachME Pickleball.

Sponsor: CoachME

What’s the Commissioner Has to Say About Pickleball [20:41]

Morgan:      So what’s next for the PPA? What’s the next tournament? How do people find you and sign up if need be?

Connor:       So the next tournament is going to be in Georgia and if you guys haven’t seen that venue, it’s absolutely stunning. They actually just barely held a teen tennis event out there that was on a tennis channel a couple weeks ago. But it’s at the Lifetime Fitness Peach Tree Corners…

Morgan:     Oh yeah, I’ve been to that one; it’s lovely!

Connor:      Yeah it’s lovely. It’s beautiful. So we’re actually going in, we’re gonna be resurfacing three tennis courts to pickleball courts, so that championship courts there are gonna be one beautiful championship pickleball court right in the middle, and we’re gonna take two other tennis courts and we’re gonna build another 8 pickleball courts. So we’ll have 9 permanent courts for that tournament, it’s gonna be really great, beautiful setting, beautiful place, registration’s closing pretty soon, we’re just north of 535 players, so if you’re wanting to come out and play, I think the registration closes in 10 days now, make sure to check your calendars. Yeah, you can just go to pickleballtournaments.com, click on the PPA logo that’s on the main page and you can just click on the Georgia Open logo and that’ll take you right to the tournament. We’d love to have you guys out there.

Morgan:     Fantastic! Well you heard it here folks, get on there, sign up, and shake Connor’s hand. Commissioner Connor Pardoe. Thank you kindly for your time, sir. Appreciate everything you’re doing.

Connor:      Hey, yeah, thank you. Thank you for everything you do for the sport. We need more people like you out there.

Morgan:      Oh, you’re good man. Hopefully that remark will not get left on the editing cut on the floor, talk to you soon, stay safe!

Connor:      You too, good day, mate!

Morgan:     I hope you enjoyed today’s episode as much as I have. You can find out more of this episode at Pickleball.fm, and you can follow me on Facebook at More Or Less Pickleball. The links and info about our guests are on the info or check them out at the website. Check them out, guys!

Sponsor: Selkirk Sport