By: Gavin Schweiger, Follow South Jersey Community Journalist
SOUTH JERSEY – It seems like everyone and their parents and grandparents are getting into pickleball.
It’s on TV, new courts and leagues crop up all the time, and it continues to be the fastest-growing sport in the United States, and is making its way across the world.
In South Jersey, it’s no different. Between the casual players, leagues that meet multiple days a week, and tournaments that bring in people from around the country, there’s no doubt that pickleball is everywhere, and it’s here to stay.
What is Pickleball?
In essence, pickleball is a cross between other racquet sports, with a badminton-sized court, a slightly smaller tennis-style net, and oversized ping pong paddles with a more square shape.
The court itself is divided into three zones: the right and left service areas, and an area close to the net formally called the non-volley zone, and colloquially called the “kitchen.”
Pickleball was invented, or more accurately, improvised in 1965 by congressman Joel Pritchard and businessman Bill Bell. Over time it became more popular, and then exploded in popularity in the late 2010s and early 2020s. For four years, it has been the fastest-growing sport in the country.
The reason for its popularity is simple: the game itself is simple, it’s flexible and has a low barrier to entry, and the skill ceiling is as high as the imagination.
“It doesn’t take a lot of planning or require a lot of skill to get started,” Mark Kilimnih, a player in the tournament, said. “I think that’s the cool thing about it, you know, people here that are pro level and spend a ton of time playing, but then there are casual people who play recreationally.”
Pickleball players can be divided into skill levels as well, which range from 1.0 (beginner) to 5.5+ (professional-level). For many, the casual game is good enough.
Courts and casual leagues
Charles Kirchner is the recreation director of Deptford. He is also very into pickleball, which he plays in Deptford Memorial Park (Previously Fasola Park).
“I play every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at our courts. And in the morning, I teach on Tuesdays three, four classes, one at 7:30, one at 8:30 and one at 9:30. And then I teach a beginner class every Tuesday at four o’clock on our courts,” Kirchner said. “I may play sometimes on a Thursday somewhere. I may sometimes play on a Saturday or Sunday.”
This wasn’t always the case. Around 2018, Kirchner didn’t know much about the game. The mayor at the time asked him to start a pickleball program, which lead to the Deptford courts opening in 2021
“We then hired two ladies that had been part of South Jersey Pickleball. And when we did that, I picked up the game. I liked it. And then I said, I can work with this game more,” Kirchner said.
Deptford is not the only town with post-COVID pickleball openings, however. Pennsauken opened courts in 2021, Gloucester Township in 2023 and Glassboro in 2024. These are just the public parks.
New courts continue to open today, with an Ace Pickleball location coming soon in Moorestown, with one in Voorhees already opened in May. Pickle Juice expanded from its Ventnor location that opened in 2023, to another location in Blackwood that opened in July. A new public court opened in Merchantville in August.
Courts also don’t require a lot of maintenance, according to Kirchner, especially since they are newer.
“We play inside for the winter. When we come back out in the summer, I may take the blower, to blow the leaves off, and stuff like that.” Kirchner said. “I mean, you get rain, so you can’t play if the courts are wet, slippery, you just don’t play.”
With all that, it’s safe to say pickleball is not slowing down.
Casual players would agree. On the Deptford Memorial Park courts, players get together most mornings for open play. Some multiple days a week, and for Jenny Wang, it’s every morning, “Monday through Sunday.”
“It’s like a good form of sports and it’s free,” Wang said. “It’s like the poor man’s golf. It’s pretty cheap and it’s easy to get into and it’s not hard to maintain a routine.”
Greg Sclight also plays most of the week.
“It’s just a whole lot of fun. It’s addictive,” Sclight said. “You play twice, the next thing you know you’re here four days a week and you don’t know why.”
Most players also enjoy the social aspect of the game, meeting and making friends with new people through the competition and love of the game.
“It’s a social game. I think it’s a big component to it. And the games are short, 15, 20 minutes, and you switch all the time. So you’re playing with everybody and against everybody, so it keeps everything contained,” Sclight said. “There’s a lot of nice people out here, and it’s a very gentlemanly game in a way. So everybody’s here to have fun. Nobody’s here to hurt anybody.”
For the casual player, it’s a fun way to get outside, get a workout, and make a few friends along the way with a hint of competition.
Kirchner also runs leagues and tournaments that bring people together to compete even more, and do good in the process.
“The tournaments are open to everyone,” said Kirchner. “We’ll get people from Pennsylvania, Delaware, middle New Jersey, and to the shore.”
Kirchner and Deptford Memorial Park will host their fourth annual tournament to raise money for veterans in September. It’s a lot of preparation, especially since it’s divided by skill level.
“We really work hard on getting people to be in the right levels. Age group is age group, but level is, you know, we don’t know everybody from everywhere. So, what I do is before we finalize it, I will make phone calls or I’ll check with people that are in an area and say, hey, I got this new guy signed up,” Kirchner said. “So, I talk to them, and then if they say, you know, well, ‘we think we’re 3.5,’ or sometimes they say they go up into the level. It’s just a conversation because what we don’t want is somebody to enter that I don’t know, and they enter in a 3.5, and they’re really a 4.0, which is a much better player, and they beat everybody by six to 10 goals.”
Running the tournament on the day is a lot easier, however.
“When you get to the tournament, it’s just, you know, making sure everything’s fair, and the courts are clean and ready to go, and everybody knows the rules,” Kirchner said.
Smaller tournaments like this are easy ways for players to test their skills in a lower stakes environment.
Tournaments, small and large
For the really competitive, however, there are larger tournaments, like the LBI Pickleball by the Beach tournament, which took place at The Picklr in Manahawkin in early August.
Players from around the country and of all different ages took part in the tournament, which ran for three days, filling the building with the pops of pickleballs striking paddles, and chatter amongst players waiting for their time to play, and small business owners selling CBD oil and pickleball gear.
The building itself is also new, only opening in March, so this is the first time the tournament took place indoors, making it so wind and foul weather weren’t issues for the players coming from around the country, some as far as Tennessee and Florida.
The tournament was divided into men’s, women’s, and mixed doubles at different skill levels, from 3.0 (intermediate) to 4.5 (advanced).
The players were also a large variety of ages. For Andy Jones, the organizer of the tournament for eight years, that’s what’s special about the sport.
“You could be eight years old and 88 years old and you can all play in the same court,” Jones said.
Tournaments of this calibre are taken much more seriously. A USA Pickleball sanctioned event, the Pickleball by the Beach tournament had strict standards for paddles and etiquette. Participants needed to be a member with USA Pickleball and also paid a $75 registration fee. Players hoped to win prize money — as much as $500 for the winner of their division.
Tournaments at this level also have trained referees.
“I think this tournament is very popular because there’s a referee on every court. It’s expensive,” Jones said. “I have no care. I’m never going to have a tournament without a referee on every court.”
The tournament’s referees had a wide array of certifications, from fully certified to trainees shadowing other referees, like Carole Galante, who started training a year ago at 74 years old. Referee training involves a lot of rules and information, which culminates in tests taken at each level.
To achieve level one referee status, a trainee needs to pass multiple tests, including scoring at least 90% on the Referee Test. To get full certification, one must ace every test.
For most skill levels of the tournament, the average age was around 50 years old. However, when the more advanced 4.5 level circuit started, something happened that serves as an “early indication” of where pickleball may be in the future, according to Tom Neale, owner of the Manahawkin location of The Picklr, where the tournament was held.
“The average age here dropped by 10-15 years,” Neale said. “This is what young people are doing now.”
The average age of the 4.5 level tournament participant was around 30 years old, and a lot of the young players came from tennis backgrounds.
“I think it’s [pickleball players coming from tennis] a common thing for people,” said Julia Sternberg, a 4.5 tournament participant who also played tennis. “[I was] just trying to find another competitive, like, outreach post-college. And it really became popular outside of Philly.”
Tennis backgrounds were not uncommon for both younger and older players. The easy transition is a common reason to join the sport, but the community is another big one.
“I think you just meet a good community of people in this area to hang out with, play an activity,” said Jessica Hendry, a level 4.5 player in the tournament. “ I think once you graduate college or if you go to school and don’t have a sport, it’s nice to do something instead of just drinking.”
While the tournaments are competitive, there’s a camaraderie between players, who will even go out and see each other outside of playing pickleball.
“Like half the teams are all friends and half the teams we don’t know as well. So it’s like we’re all rooting for each other. But it’s kind of a fun little intense battle.” said Jordan Denish, Hendry’s partner at the tournament. “It can be kind of a weird dynamic, but it’s like all fun.”
Pickleball’s not going anywhere
With its rapid growth in both casual and professional settings, there have already been a lot of changes to the sport, the technology, and its perception. For some, it’s a new avenue to try in making it to higher levels. For others, the changes could be somewhat disheartening.
“Sometimes in some ways the game has went from, it used to be playing chess,” said Herman Junkermann, a casual pickleball player. “It’s somewhat leaning back towards playing checkers. Just straight force, you know, ‘I’m going to make my move and that’s it.’”
With continued paddle technology upgrades and aggressive playstyles, pickleball will likely continue to look different as time goes on.
Pickleball has also come under fire in certain places for being loud. The pop of the ball hitting the paddle can reach 70 decibels. In Ridgewood, NJ, pickleball made headlines for its noise complaints, along with other places around the country, even prompting the New York Times to publish an article about the noise and legal battles around it.
South Jersey has had no such complaints so far. This is likely due to South Jersey’s more open nature, where pickleball courts and public parks are usually farther from residences.
Even with the changes and issues, there’s no indication that the game itself will go away. For those who are older or retired, it’s a great balance of exercise and social time.
“When you play this game of pickleball, you realize this is more fun than walking and not as strenuous as doing aerobics or whatever else,” Kirchner said. “If somebody lobs a ball over your head, you go, ‘Okay, I’m not getting that.’ And you just say you lose that point, you keep playing, but you’re still in the game.”
For those that are younger, it’s an upcoming way to get outside and get social as well.
“You meet new people on a daily basis, so it helps you with social skills and stuff like that.” said Jailynn Mulhern, one of the LBI tournament participants. “I just fell in love with it. And when I started I was like the only young person on the court and now it’s full of young people, so it’s great to see it ‘cause I’ve got friends that are like 60 years old now, 20 years old, 30, like all around.”
The ease of play, the social factor, and the scalable nature of the game makes pickleball a versatile and addictive sport, and the fastest-growing in the country. It’s not just a fad, but a mainstay.
“And right now, as a sport, you’re watching these popular great players playing, and they’re playing in all these high-priced tournaments, winning all this money,” Kirchner said. “I think it’s going to be a hot commodity over the next 10 years.”
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