Howdy. This is The Erne. We’re the friend that goes out drinking with you after you get dumped by your ex. It’s ok, there’s plenty of fish in the sea.

Here’s what we've got today:

• Pickleball Slam viewership numbers

• Bye bye singles?

• Largest indoor pickleball facility in America

PICKLEBALL SLAM NUMBERS WERE MASSIVE

The Pickleball Slam viewership numbers were finally published, and they are staggering.

The event averaged nearly 700,000 viewers and peaked at 796,000 viewers for the concluding doubles match between the 4 tennis legends.

To put that in context, this event had higher viewership than:

• 13 nationally televised MLB games

• 7 NBA matchups

• 5 NHL games

Interestingly, the Slam averaged 237,000 viewers under the age of 50, demonstrating just how popular the sport has become with people across all age groups.

Insane to think that as recently as a few years ago, no one even knew what pickleball was. And now we’re pulling bigger numbers than the MLB, NBA, and NHL 📈

BYE BYE SINGLES?

Over the past few days, there has been quite a bit of conversation stirring in regards to the singles format in professional pickleball. It all started with this tweet by Lea Jansen:

There was a lot of support for her comments online, and her primary issues with singles are:

It’s hard on the body. Unlike in tennis where pros play in one set of matches with one to two weeks of rest to recover, pickleball pros typically play one day of singles and the very next day play in other events.

Lack of interest. Most pickleball fans are much more interested in watching doubles (and let’s face it, most amateurs are more interest in playing doubles too).

We’ll continue to monitor this situation and report back 🫡

LARGEST INDOOR PICKLEBALL FACILITY IN AMERICA

Before you continue reading, we have a quick question for you. Where would you rank Connecticut out of the 50 states? It would probably be near the bottom of the list for us here at the Erne. Connecticut kinda stinks.

However, some recent developments have us rethinking our ranking…

Pickleball America is set to open a 28 court indoor facility in Stamford, Connecticut. 28 courts?!

The facility will also include a cafe, area for live music events, and an area for media broadcasting as the facility will be used to host professional events.

As an aside, the pickleball courts in NYC’s Central Park are up and running!

Pickleball is taking over the world (insert evil laugh)

WHAT’S COOKING IN THE KITCHEN

• New pickleball participation numbers are in, and pickleball continues to grow at an INSANE pace

• Denver shut down pickleball courts over noise complaints. With all the weed they’re smoking, we thought Denver residents would be a lot more chill…

• Oakland, on the other hand, is embracing the pickleball boom

• Pickleballers live longer. Fact.

THE PICKLE JAR

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