GET YOUR POLITICS OUT OF MY PICKLEBALL

FAULT LINES EMERGE AS GOVERNMENT GETS INVOLVED IN AMERICA’S WEIRDEST, FASTEST-GROWING SPORT

- JASON RUSSELL

ANABA WINES IS set on 16 acres of beautiful Sonoma land, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. It offers “premium Rhône-style blends” and woodfired pizza; a bottle of their 2018 WestLands Pinot Noir costs $74. It also has a pickleball court. People in high-fashion athleisure refine their serves, returns, and dinks in pickleball lessons led by a certified instructor as golden hour settles over the Sonoma Valley. Later, a wine educator leads them through a wine tasting paired with an artisanal cheese board.

The scene looks a little different where David Litman learned to play pickleball: the rec yard of a federal prison in Lexington, Kentucky. Both Anaba Wines and the Federal Medical Center in Lexington are mentioned in the January/ February 2023 issue of Pickleball Magazine, which says of Litman that the sport “enabled him to avoid conflict with fellow inmates—as long as he would continue to excel on the court, win his matches and cover the bets that were a daily ritual.” It helped him pass the eight months of time he served. The court can be seen on satellite images available on Google Maps, not too far from the prison’s fences.

Pickleball is everywhere, and yet not everywhere enough. It started as a sport popular with the retirement crowd, but now has just as many fans among the young. Pickleballers can be found in swanky wineries and federal lockups. It started on backyard courts and neighborhood streets, but now faces overwhelming demand in public parks.

The sport has grown large enough to have its own economy. Shoemakers, like Acacia Sports, make specialized pickleball shoes, designed to aid in the game’s quick and frequent side-to-side movements. Podcasts like