The first event of the 2026 MLP season begins from Dallas on Friday.

 

Eleven of the 20 MLP teams are in action, including Dallas, defending champion Columbus, New Jersey, and LA. The 11 teams are divided into two pools, with round robin play in each pool. After the round robin, the top four teams in each pool will play in a mini-playoff to determine final points and standings.

 

I will review each pool, with some predictions. The final section will include some rumors from around the league as the season is upon us.

 

 

 

The first pool has five teams, Columbus, New Jersey, Dallas, Orlando, and Phoenix. Again, each team will play four matches, one against each other team in the pool.

 

The highlight match from this pool is unquestionably New Jersey vs. Columbus. New Jersey is a co-favorite with St. Louis to win it all this year. Columbus won it all last year with a terrific playoff run. New Jersey will run out 2025 starters Anna Leigh Waters, Will Howells, and Noe Khlif. Their one change/addition is Jorja Johnson in the starting lineup, replacing Meghan Dizon. No insult to Dizon, but Johnson is an obvious upgrade. Johnson played one recent PPA event with Waters, and they looked like a natural fit. Indeed, it is reasonable to ask whether Johnson is a better fit as a partner for Waters than is Anna Bright. Johnson is a natural right side player, meaning that Waters can play 100% left side with Johnson. When Waters plays with Bright, they have a tendency to sometimes put Bright on the left. Not that Bright cannot play left side, but any time Waters is on the right, it is a missed opportunity. You never see Ben Johns on the right, and similarly Waters should never play right side in women’s doubles.

 

Columbus also returns three of their four starters, with Danni-Elle Townsend replacing Lea Jansen. Townsend, an Aussie, has not played extensively in the US, but she is a very good player. I expect her to have some early struggles while she adjusts, but ultimately I think she is a mild upgrade from Jansen. This week, Parris Todd does have to fulfill a suspension, so Alix Truong will sub in for her.

 

The New Jersey vs. Columbus match is at 11am on Saturday and is can’t miss pickleball.

 

 

For the other three teams in Pool A, they will be in a tight fight for wins. Dallas, which lost Jorja Johnson and recently replaced her with Brooke Buckner, has the most to prove. They were a championship caliber team with Johnson, but will take a step back with Buckner. The match against Orlando will be a good tell. Orlando is a solid, middle-of-the-playoff-pack team, and is a good test to see where Dallas fits now. A loss by Dallas to Orlando would indicate that Dallas has dropped even more than most of us thought. Dallas plays Orlando in the third match on Saturday.

 

Phoenix is a poor stepchild of Pool A. They are likely to go 0-4, but their team has some young talent and is capable of a surprise. A loss by any of the top four teams to Phoenix would severely hurt the top four teams in the early standings.

 

 

Pool B has six teams, St. Louis, LA, Texas, Utah, Bay Area, and Carolina. St. Louis is one of the early season favorites with New Jersey to win it all. St. Louis runs back the same team they had in 2025, with Anna Bright, Kate Fahey, Hayden Patriquin, and Gabe Tardio. The pressure point for St. Louis is Fahey. If she plays like a top 10 player, they will be tough to beat. If she plays with any inconsistency, she will be targeted and will create a vulnerability in two of the four matches.

 

LA will send out three starters from last year, with Ben Johns, Catherine Parenteau, and Jade Kawamoto being joined by newcomer Max Freeman replacing Hunter Johnson. Parenteau and Kawamoto were on fire early in 2025, but cooled off later in the season. Johns was solid, but not spectacular. Johns is going to have to get used to playing men’s doubles with a non-top 20 player in Freeman. Will this cause him to lose interest, a problem we have seen before in MLP?

 

The St. Louis vs. LA match will be another must-see match. They face each other in the final match on Sunday. Make sure to see that one.

 

 

Texas and Utah are the other two likely playoff teams in this group. Texas revamped its roster from last year, and now features Eric Oncins, Dylan Frazier, Lea Jansen, and Layne Sleeth. Oncins/Frazier is a top notch men’s doubles team, but Jansen/Sleeth is middle of the pack. For Utah, they have a roster of Tama Shimabukuro, Connor Garnett, Allyce Jones, and Etta Tuionetoa. They also have Tyler Loong, who may need to play men’s doubles, as both Shimabukuro and Garnett are much better on the left and might struggle playing together. Jones/Tuionetoa have been a solid pairing in the past, but have not done too much in PPA 2026, so we will just have to wait and see how they do at MLP 2026.

 

Bay Area and Carolina are not threats to make the playoffs. Carolina will fight to not finish last, while Bay Area has a little bit of talent, but not enough to compete for a playoff spot.

 

 

The top finisher in each pool meets in the mini-playoff after the round robin to determine which team wins the event. The two second place teams from pool play meet to determine third/fourth. The third place teams play to determine fifth/sixth. Finally, the two fourth place round robin teams play to determine which finishes seventh and eighth. Standing points are then awarded based on finish.

 

New Jersey should go undefeated and win Pool A fairly easily. Columbus is the favorite to finish second, but the absence of Parris Todd could lead to an upset for that second spot. I like Orlando to finish third and Dallas fourth, but Orlando upsetting Columbus would not surprise me. Phoenix will finish last at 0-4.

 

In Pool B, St. Louis should go 5-0, but LA will give them a fight. I like LA to finish second, with the Texas vs. Utah match deciding third and fourth. I give Utah a slight edge in what would be viewed as an upset. Bay Area will beat Carolina, but no one else.

 

In the mini-playoff, the New Jersey vs. St. Louis match will be like an early season Super Bowl preview, if it happens. Flip a coin on that one. How about New Jersey in a Dreambreaker? LA over Columbus for third, Orlando over Utah for fifth, and Texas over Dallas for seventh.

 

 

After the draft, teams were allowed in May to make waiver moves and trades. Most moves were insignificant. The one major one was Dallas trading for Brooke Buckner, giving up Callie Smith and cash. The moves made by Dallas before, during, and after the draft were the biggest stories of any team. Dallas was arguably the #1 team in 2025, with only a head-scratching decision during the 2025 playoffs leaving them short of a championship. Dallas then made a second horrific mistake by dropping Jorja Johnson pre-draft, instead of JW Johnson. With women being FAR more sought after in the draft/auction, the move to drop Jorja was another head-scratcher.

 

The draft happened, and sure enough the top women (Anna Bright and Jorja Johnson) went for record amounts of money, at $1.2m and $800k respectively. Excellent male players such as Dylan Frazier later went for relative pennies at $170k. Quality men went for even less with Tama Shimabukuro at $125k, Jack Sock at $105k, and Tyson McGuffin at $65k.

 

After Dallas missed out on re-picking Jorja Johnson, their internet connection apparently went out as they not only didn’t pick a player for over an hour, but they did not even bid on a number of quality women players that went off the board such as Danni-Elle Townsend, Meghan Dizon, and Mari Humberg. Dallas ended up picking Callie Smith for $50k, a puzzling move.

 

As we correctly predicted right after the draft, Dallas then immediately offered Smith around the league to anyone willing to part with a better female player for Smith and cash. Dallas finally found a willing trade partner in Las Vegas this week, with Vegas sending Buckner for Smith and a rumored $100k passing from Dallas to Las Vegas. Buckner is a decent player, but in the end Dallas paid more for Buckner than they could have paid to get Townsend, Jansen, Humberg, or Dizon, all of whom are better doubles players than Buckner. Dropping Jorja when they should have dropped JW was bad enough, but once that happened, to not replace Jorja with a better (and cheaper) option than Buckner is really malpractice. Dallas just made mistake after mistake, and that is why they have dropped from a championship team.

 

In other news, Miami general manager Johnny Goldberg continues to run rings around the other MLP GMs. While he has to manage on a tight budget, Goldberg’s specialty is finding new/cheap talent, picking up that talent, and then trading such players for cash. Miami may not win anything, but they do turn a profit! This year’s sale looks to be up and coming Nico Acevedo. Since the draft, Acevedo has picked up a gold and a silver medal in PPA events, and is looking like he might be a future star. Rumor has it that Miami has been offered the $200k max in a trade for Acevedo by multiple teams. In order to snag Acevedo, a team is likely going to need to offer a decent player AND $200k for Miami to bite. Goldberg is the best GM of any MLP team, and it is not close. Imagine if Dallas had thought to hire Goldberg away from Miami; they would still be a championship team.

 

Watch all of MLP Dallas on Pickleballtv.

 

Follow me on X @pickleball_jim.