The Las Vegas Pickleball Cup has started. It is being held in the Royal Ballroom at the Fontainebleau Resort. Qualifiers have been completed and Tuesday featured Round of 64 action in men’s and mixed doubles, and men’s and women’s singles (there is no Round of 64 for women’s doubles).

Here’s what is happening:

 

1. What a facility! The facility is incredible. To start, the Fontainebleau is a fairly new resort and it is simply beautiful. The Royal Ballroom is part of the convention center. There are six floors to the convention center (we are on the sixth floor). The ballroom has been fully opened to create one, massive room; and it is all filled with pickleball courts! The PPA put in A LOT of work to create the courts.

 

 

2. GS and CC are top shelf. In addition to constructing all the outlying courts, the PPA has created stand-alone Grandstand and Championship courts. CC will hold 1,000 fans and GS about half that. Every seat is a great seat. These are the best GS and CC I have seen at any tournament.

 

3. This is Round of 64? We may have only been in the Round of 64 on Tuesday, but the level of play was top shelf. The talent level on the PPA Tour increases every tournament. Round of 64 play is equivalent in skill to Round of 16 play just a year ago. Similarly, Round of 16 play now features matchups that were legitimate gold medal matches a year ago. Three-game matches continued to abound, testament to how close the competition is. For example, in men’s singles, top players like Pablo Tellez, Hayden Patriquin, and Roscoe Bellamy were all pushed to a third game, with Tellez and Bellamy hanging on but Patriquin losing. Patriquin is ranked #19 in singles, but could not escape the Round of 64, that’s how tough it is out here.

 

 

4. On Thursday, we have Round of 32 play. Some matches to watch: Federico Staksrud v Hunter Johnson, Judit Castillo v Kate Fahey, Tyra Black/Dylan Frazier v Zoey Wang/Pablo Tellez, Travis Rettenmaier/Etta Wright v Jack Sock/Kate Fahey, and Lauren Stratman/Quang Duong v Jessie Irvine/Gabe Tardio. These Round of 32 matches, among others, demonstrate how tough it is to win on the PPA Tour.

 

5. Future stars? One thing I am always watching for are the next breakout players. Having spotted early on future stars such as Tina Pisnik, Tyra Black, Augie Ge, and Jaume Martinez Vich has been a lot of fun. Who’s next? I will continue to talk about Zoey Wang, although she is not so unknown any more. She grabbed her first medal last week (in singles). Expect to see her start to challenge for medals in the doubles events too. A couple names to keep an eye on are Naveen Beasley and Noe Khlif. Both have top 20 talent. It typically takes time to work your way up the PPA ladder. Players start with no points, and thus begin in the qualifier draws. If they make the main draw, they usually will have to play a top seed early. Making a top seed work hard to win may be a moral victory, but it comes with zero ranking points. Without points, it is hard to get a top player as a doubles partner. It can thus take a talented player quite awhile to work their way up the ladder. Obtaining a signature win is needed to really break out. In any event, keep your eyes on Beasley and Khlif. They have the talent to be very high level players.

 

That’s all for now from Las Vegas. If you can make it out here to watch in person, it is worth your time. If you can’t make it here, check out all the action on YouTube and PickleballTV.

 

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