The St. Louis Shock Win the First MLP Cup

The St. Louis Shock won the first ever MLP Cup trophy on Sunday afternoon at the Brookhaven Country Club, in Farmers Branch, Texas.

The MLP Cup was announced in January, but it still kind of crept up on teams and fans alike. Just over two months after the Columbus Sliders were crowned the 2025 MLP Champions, the MLP Cup took place, kicking off the Jenius Bank Pickleball World Championships event.

The Finals

The St. Louis Shock took on the Dallas Flash in the finals of the inaugural event. These two were the #1 and #2 overall seeds respectively, based on the 2025 regular season standings, so it was fitting they fought for the championship.

The women's match was epic, and needed overtime pickleball to find a winner. Jorja Johnson and Hurricane Tyra Black, of the Dallas Flash, were able to find the W, winning 13-11. From there, it was all St. Louis Shock.

Hayden Patriquin and Gabe Tardio were on a mission, and beat Augie Ge and JW Johnson 11-7. From there, Hayden took over a big mixed, beating the Johnson siblings 11-3. Gabe and Kate cemented the win, beating Augie and Tyra 11-4.

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Semifinals

In Semifinal #1, the Dallas Flash took care of business against and undermanned New Jersey 5s.

In Semifinal #2, the St. Louis Shock made quick work of the Brooklyn Pickleball Team, who had an epic win over the Columbus Sliders to earn the Semifinal berth.

Pool Play

There were four pools in Premier Level with four teams in each pool. The only exception was Pool 4, which had 5 teams (due to Vegas being included). Here are the results from pool play:

Pool 1

1. BRK – 3-0 – Beat COL, PHX, & ATL
2. COL – 2-1 – Beat ATL, PHX, & LOST to BRK
3. PHX - 1-2 – Beat ATL & LOST to BRK in DB, COL
4. ATL – 0-3 – Lost to COL, PHX, BRK

Pool 2

1. NJ 3-0 – Beat CHI 3-1, CAR, and LA in DB
2. LA – 2-1 – Beat CAR 3-0, CHI, and lost to NJ
3. CHI – 1-2 Beat CAR & LOST to NJ & LA
4. CAR – 0-3 – Lost to CHI & LA, NJ

Pool 3

1. DAL – 3-0 Beat MIA & TX, and SoCal
2. TX – 2-1 Beat SoCal & Miami & LOST to DAL
3. SoCal – 1-2 Beat MIA & LOST to TX, DAL
4. MIA – 0-3 LOST to DAL, SoCal, TX

Pool 4

1. STL – 4-0 – Beat NY, UT, LV, & ORL
2. UT – 3-1 – Beat ORL, NY, LV, & LOST to STL
3. LV – 2-2 – Beat NY, ORL & LOST to STL, UT
4. ORL – 1-3 – Lost to UT & LV, STL, and beat NY
5. NY – 0-4 – Lost to LV, STL, ORL, and UT

Intriguing Matches

Pool 1 - Columbus Sliders v Brooklyn Pickleball Team - This one determined the Pool 1 winner

Pool 2 - LA MAd Drops v New Jersey 5s - Columbus Sliders v Brooklyn Pickleball Team - This one determined the Pool 3 winner and New Jersey were huge underdogs without Anna Leigh and Meghan Dizon

Game Upsets

 There weren't many match upsets, but there were some very good performances with upsets in specific games:

Challenger: The Junior All-Star Team showed out well in Challenger, and took the Bay Area Breakers to a Dreambreaker, winning both mixed matches, and nearly pulling off the upset:

Jay Devilliers and Juan Benitez beat JW Johnson and Augie Ge on Halloween:

Alex Walker and Jack Sock beat Jackie Kawamoto and Riley Newman in mixed:

 Viv David and Victoria DiMuzio beat Parris Todd and Lea Jansen:

 Brooke Buckner and Zoey Wang beat Anna Bright and Kate Fahey:

 James Ignatowich and Max Freeman beat Ben Johns and Hunter Johnson AND Pierina Imparato and Max Freeman beat Catherine Parenteau and Hunter:

Challenger Level Winner - California Black Bears

With the Las Vegas Night Owls (2025 Challenger Level Champion) playing in Premier Level, combined with the fact that the Nashville Chefs were banned from playing this event, the Black Bears were the favorites.

They were able to win 3-0 over the Bay Area Breakers.

This concludes all Major League Pickleball action for the 2025 calendar year. Up next will be process and competition improvements/changes and then in 2026 the first big step will be the keeper rules and deadlines, followed by the draft. 

A quick note on possible improvements

As I posted yesterday, this was a fun go-around for the first time out of the gate, but if MLP is going to bring this event back – and I think they should – a few improvements are worth considering.

• Multiple players took the event off because they had already hit the number of events in their contract and with very little prize money on the line, there was no incentive to play.
• Figure out a way to incentivize players to participate - whether that's more prize money, PPA Points, some sort of seeding incentive, having the event count as two events toward contract fulfillment, etc.
• This one is a personal opinion, but I would have the top TWO teams from each bracket make it out of pool play - having only 1 meant there were quite a few matches with nothing on the line, because the winner of the pool was already decided.

Don't get me wrong – this event was fun. I always have fun at MLP and so do the fans. But having teams and players not really care about the outcome left something to be desired for fan engagement.