We know Anna Leigh Waters today as the superstar she has become — a Nike athlete, the first professional pickleball player to walk the ESPYs red carpet, a phenom, and the World No. 1. But her rise didn’t happen by accident. Looking back reveals a series of bold, pivotal decisions made by Waters and her family that set her on this path.

When she was just eight years old, her family sold their home in North Carolina and relocated to Florida. Her parents had always viewed Florida as a place of opportunity, a year-round playground that could double as a training ground for a budding athlete. Taking a leap of faith, they moved to what felt like paradise, opening the door to the opportunities that would help shape Waters into the player she is today.

“I had to drive an hour to go get a tennis lesson in North Carolina,” Waters shared on the In Search of Excellence podcast.

Relocating to the Sunshine State gave Waters easier access to the resources she needed to develop her game, while placing her at the heart of one of the nation’s pickleball hotspots. 

“My parents wanted to give me a chance. They weren’t banking on the fact that I was going to be good, but they wanted to give me the chance to see if I’d be good or not,” she explained. “I played about four years of tennis, which was the perfect amount because it gave me the strokes and the shot selection, but it didn’t make me so ingrained in tennis to where when I went and played pickleball, that the bounce was really throwing me off.”

Waters grew up playing a wide range of sports.

She has even described her eight-year-old self as “very hyper and energetic.”

“I always wanted to be doing something. I loved playing with the neighborhood kids. At recess, I would go play soccer with the boys. I always loved playing sports,” Waters mentioned. “WWE was one of my favorite things when I was eight years old. I would wrestle my dad and put him in these headlocks and we’d fight.”

Waters reached a crossroads in 2020. She had been competing in both pickleball and soccer, but ultimately had to choose one path to pursue.

Just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Waters was presented with an opportunity to play professional soccer in Germany.

“I was considering doing it. I was going to do school there, and we were weighing the decision of whether I should do it or not. Then all of a sudden, COVID happened and my parents took that off the table because we didn’t know what was going on. They were not going to send me away to a foreign country that they’ve never been to,” she recalled. “At the time, I liked soccer more than pickleball. COVID made the decision for me, which kind of sucked looking back at it, but I’m glad at the same time because I think I made the right choice.”

Given how her career has unfolded since choosing pickleball, it’s safe to say she chose wisely.

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