A Professional Pickleball League is Starting in Portland

Have we reached peak pickleball yet? Last month, Lloyd Center announced the top floor of the mall would become eight pickleball courts. This month, the new, professional Portland Pickleball League will debut at RECS, an indoor pickleball venue in Clackamas.

Pickleball pro Jason Bock decided to start Portland’s league after seeing that a group got one going in Phoenix, Arizona.

“We have enough pros that tour around the country playing pro pickleball,” Bock says. “I want to showcase what we’re all doing and see if this is a sustainable thing.”

Bock is captain of the Rose City Riverhawks, one of the four PPL teams, including the PDX Puddle Jumpers, Bridgetown Brewers and Stumptown Grinders. And while the sport is famously popular with retirees, the ages of the PPL players range from only 17 to mid-40s. Many of them, including Bock, came to pickleball from the high-level tennis world. Bock recruited mostly from the Portland area, though there are some players from Central Oregon and Washington.

The inaugural PPL season will kick off Tuesday, Oct. 8. The sixteen pros will play in six regular season games, playoffs, and then a championship (with a cash prize) on Dec. 7. League play will mostly be on Tuesday nights at RECS to accommodate the players’ weekend pickleball tournament travel.

All matches will be livestreamed through RECS’ YouTube channel for folks who can’t make it out to Clackamas on a week night.

Watching professional pickleball when you’re used to amateurs is like witnessing “a totally different game,” Bock says.

“When people come out and sit courtside and watch top level pickleball they say, ‘I don’t know how you get to that stuff. I don’t know how your hands are that fast.’”

GO: Portland Pickleball League at RECS, 17015 SE 82nd Dr., Clackamas. 503-655-7529, portlandpickleballleague.com. Season opener Tuesday Oct. 8, 6-9:30 pm. $15.