Pickleball is growing as a sport in the United States but Andy Roddick simply can’t see any stars making it in professional tennis. The former Grand Slam winner has been discussing the sport after some interesting claims from a top pickleball star.
Christian Alshon is a top-five pickleball player. The Florida native tried his hand as a professional tennis player but managed to win just $366 dollars before chancing his arm at pickleball instead.
Now, he’s ranked in the top five when it comes to the sport and he’s been making some intriguing claims on X regarding the differences between tennis and pickleball in a physical sense.
Roddick has seemingly poked fun at his claims. Since retiring Roddick has become a media boffin and can often be found covering tournaments or discussing the game on his podcast.
After Alshon’s frankly mental claims, Roddick has taken to X to post a comical response to the top pickleball star.
What Andy Roddick said to Christian Alshon on social media
Earlier this week, Alshon took to X to mention the differences between training to be a professional tennis player and a professional pickleball player.
He said on X: “Pickleball has made me a much better athlete than tennis ever did. Faster reaction time and speed are needed since the ball is only coming from 10 feet away. Point for point, pickleball requires more skill than tennis.”
Roddick has used Jack Sock as an example to Alshon to dismiss his claim. The former tennis player has chanced his arm at pickleball and is already in the world’s top 70 and has won a pro event.
The 2003 US Open champion hit back on X: “It’s pretty hard to say one of the most ridiculous things on Twitter in a given day. Tell you what. If anyone pickle person ever ranks higher in tennis than what Sock will be at the end od this year in his new paid pickle hobby, I’ll commentate a pickle match standing on my head. This ain’t a real discussion. Fun game. Dumb conversation.”
What is pickleball?
We can see you looking puzzled with the term ‘pickleball’, so let’s take a closer look at the sport that has become big in the United States.
Pickleball is a sport played indoors or outdoors and can be a singles or doubles contest very similar to tennis.
Although there are resemblances to tennis and table tennis, it has a different set of rules, paddles and court dimensions.
Using a hard, plastic ball, there is typically less bounce on a pickleball than a tennis ball and it normally results in a quicker-paced game.
The very first game of pickleball was played in Washington in 1965 and now the professional circuit is booming with a number of tournaments across the year.
In a bizarre way of doing things, you can only score a point in pickleball if you are serving.
Roddick as a point about pickleball
In fairness, we don’t claim to be pickleball experts but it’s pretty wild for Alshon to make the claims that he has.
It perhaps says it all that Sock has turned his hand to pickleball and in a matter of time he’s won a tournament and has a double-digit world ranking.
Roddick is a character. His podcasts are great and he enjoyed a really successful career as a player – losing in three Wimbledon finals and narrowly getting closer to the title.
In our view, he is spot on here. Pickleball feels like a fun game but we wouldn’t fancy any of their professional players to make waves in elite tennis.
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