Stop Saying Sorry for Being Good at Pickleball

A perfect drop shot deserves applause, not an apology. A plea to stop saying sorry for points you actually earned.

Ok, I came in a bit hot on the headline there, I confess. But this is a topic I feel strongly about. And you should, too.

Hear me out.

The topic du jour in pickleball right now is whether screaming – or more specifically, taunting – should be a penalized offense at the pro level.

I love watching pro pickleball. I appreciate the intensity and competitiveness of many of the sport's top athletes. Winning matches is getting harder by the day at this level. The talent pool is deep and widening all the time. Teenagers are coming for the podiums in droves – and they didn't waste any of their youth on that other silly racket sport. Nope. Pickleball is all they've ever known. And it shows.

More and more, it seems, in the heat of a point, emotion manifests in a guttural yell. A primal scream. A pointed exclamation.

It can be internal. Or it can be directed at the opponent. Sometimes it crosses some imaginary line and feels... unsportsmanlike. Whatever that means.

It's a line in the sand that's the focus of ongoing discussion and debate, most recently called into question by pro pundit Jim Kloss. It's a polarizing topic, to be sure.

But for us mere rec play warriors, it's often the opposite problem we encounter more often: Opponents profusely apologizing after scoring a point, often for what was by any measure a well-executed shot.

Yes, net cords are annoying. Nobody can intentionally clip the top three millimeters of the net to consistently gain an advantage, after all. You hit a good shot, to be sure, but you also got lucky. Sigh.

Instead, allow me to briefly lay out a scenario I encountered multiple times at a recent rec session. For reference, this was a reserved court with four guys total, all around the 4.5 DUPR level.

The way we play is always the same: Play a best-of-three series, then switch partners and repeat. With four guys playing two hours, you often get to play a full series with all three partners. Perfect.

Such was the case here. Great players. Tons of finesse and dinking. Lots of building points, long rallies, speed-ups, resets, cat and mouse. The beautiful game.

Here's where the trouble came. One guy had an excellent drop shot, which he deployed on multiple occasions. At least five points, probably more. He has great hands and a real knack for the moment. They we're so well-executed, they were effectively non-returnable.

And he'd apologize after drop shot. Every. Single. One.

To be clear, he meant it. He couldn't be a nicer guy. He was just trying to be a good sport.

"Sooorrrry."

And it drove me insane. Not him. I like him a lot.

But the hidden implication.

In my mind, he wasn't apologizing for the drop shot. He was apologizing for being that much better than me. For being superior. For having a mastery of offense that my decades of athletics could simply never rival.

He might has well have been smugly saying, "Don't even bother, you oaf. Maybe this sport isn't for you, after all?"

Typing this out makes me look insane, I realize.

But I have always wondered why so many rec players feel compelled to apologize for winning points they genuinely earned.

The same goes with a well-placed lob or a violent cross-court dink.

Pickleball is a sport. Not a game. There are winners and losers. Yes, even in rec play. That's what keeps us coming back for more.

We all strive to be better. But when we are, the compulsion is to throw a hand up and meekly chalk it up to good fortune.

Enough is enough, if you ask me.

Every pickleball game is a war. No mercy. No sorries. Exploit your opponents' weaknesses and own your own dominance. Then do it again until you've claimed victory.

Maybe just don't scream about it.