Predictions aren't something I'm particularly good at, but I'm very good at seeing the inevitability of things that have already happened. However, of all the things that I did, in fact, not see coming, there is one thing I never saw coming the most.
Pickleball is, apparently, too loud.
I would have predicted criticisms about some strange, barely-related or measurable injury or an increase in "court rage" incidents or, I don't know, parking, maybe? However, complaints that pickleball is too loud in a world where monster truck rallies exist was not in my top 10.
But as with most predictions, I was wrong.
OK, some backstory here. For those of you unfamiliar with pickleball, good to hear you're out of the coma. And, while you were unconscious, pickleball was invented and went from being a backyard game to something of a national phenomenon.
It's a cross between ping pong and tennis or racquetball or basically any sports that involve a paddle, a net and a ball. Yes, it takes in a lot. It is also, apparently, the Fastest Growing Sport in America. I know this because any time anyone mentions pickleball, they are sure to add that it's the Fastest Growing Sport in America. In fact, I believe that might actually be it's name: Pickleball, the Fastest Growing Sport in America.
How it got the name "pickleball" is part of its lore. Seems the game itself was completely fabricated out of thin air and various equipment from other sports in the Washington State back yard of a guy who had been, among other things, a U.S. congressman and lieutenant governor.
His wife came up with the name because she said the game reminded her of some obscure practice in the sport of crewing where the leftover rowers from other teams are combined and their boat is called the pickle boat. OK, not seeing it. But I will say nothing screams "white people" like a sport named after some odd thing they do in crew.
It also confirms something anyone with sons knows, namely that if you leave two or more males in a space with assorted things that may or may not look like sporting equipment for any length of time, they will invent a game with specific scoring and rules and, typically, some embarrassing punishment for losing. Thankfully, the current state of pickleball doesn't technically involve the punishment.
Whatever its etymology, the sport has literally taken off faster than a rowing crew when they fire the gun. Which is an example that makes sense to very few of us, including me. Let's just say it's become really, really popular really, really quickly. There is a professional as well as numerous amateur leagues, actual rules, referees and all that good stuff.
The sport is growing so quickly that it's taking over abandoned (or potentially not so abandoned) tennis courts, rec areas and, basically, any flat surfaces that will allow for a net.
Therein lies the problem. The game has become so popular that it is being played anywhere and everywhere folks can play it. Which is fine, even great since it provides people with a chance to stay active, make friends, get out of the house, etc.
However, a pickleball being hit by a paddle produces a unique sound. Think a Wiffle ball being struck by a wooden bat. Again, next to a monster truck, not so much. But on a scale between jet engines and no sound at all, it ... registers. And since there are lots and lots of pickleball players in lots and lots of locations, most of them near other things like houses and apartments, well, I would imagine that unique sound made by quite a few players all at the same time can be at least noticeable.
And noticing things seems to be what a lot of us are all about these days.
Now that folks in charge of this sport (hereafter referred to as the "big pickles") are to be commended in that they are investigating ways to make the game as audio friendly as possible. Industries have actually grown out of pickleball noise abatement, demonstrating once again that the only thing we're better at than making up odd games is making money off them.
All of which leads to two things I can, with certainty, predict. One is that, given enough time, we'll make a game out of literally anything. And the other is that someone will find a way to complain about it.