NML Pickleball Rankings 2.0 – Doubles

📸 hellabaae

We have decided for next time that we will (most likely) rank the top 10 players rather than only 5. It’s a lot of fun to go through this exercise and we think it’ll be even more fun to debate the rest of the list rather than only have larger categories after the top 5. However, you’re stuck with a top 5 for the time being. It is part 3 of the 2.0 version of NML’s definitive player rankings!

In case you missed it, our definitive Singles Rankings 2.0 from last Thursday and mixed doubles from Friday.

For your additional reading pleasure, here are the links to our previous version 1.0 rankings – Singles Rankings 1.0, Mixed Rankings 1.0, Doubles Rankings 1.0

Top 5 Women

1. Anna Leigh Waters – Anna Leigh gets the top spot. She may not have the top results, but we think what she has done this year with Leigh, is the most impressive. MLP was another great showing for her, where she partnered with the steady Lee Whitwell, but was able to assert herself and be a dominant force. With the rest of our top 5 rated players teaming up next year, Anna Leigh is going to have her work cut out for her, but if anyone is up for that task, it is the young Waters.

2. Catherine Parenteau – Catherine brings a consistency that few others players can replicate in the women’s game. She has also been the most consistent player results wise this season in women’s doubles – winning with both Callie and Jessie. The reason, we have her number 2, is that to maximize her abilities Catherine really needs a partner with a fair amount of power and weapons, like a Jessie or Callie. This is why in the MLP draft we would have gone with Anna Leigh number one, because you knew you weren’t getting that power player at sixteen. Catherine is still a tremendous player though, and if she and Jessie can dominate next year she may have an argument for the number one spot.

3. Lucy Kovalova – Lucy is clearly the best right side women’s player, and her counter-punching is about as elite as it gets. The reason Lucy is not really vying for a top two spot, is at this point she just seems to be a right side player. When Simone got hurt she was not able to really step up and take a bigger role to help ease the pressure on Simone. Something tells me we are going to see Lucy back on top of some podiums next year, as she partners with Callie Smith.

4. Callie Smith – Callie comes in just ahead of Jessie in our rankings on the basis that her results have been slightly better than Jessie’s when she is not playing Catherine. It is obvious that both players have been at their best this year when they are getting to play alongside the super consistent Parenteau. Callie has some of the best hands in the women’s game, but she still makes a few too many unforced errors for an elite player.

5. Jessie Irvine – No player this year benefited more from mid-season partnership change ups than Jessie Irvine. Once she started playing with Catherine, she became a regular podium presence including ending the year with a couple gold medals, at the PPA Championship and the Masters. With Callie is playing with Lucy next year, and Jessie is playing with Catherine next year, we should get some real clarification on the Jessie versus Callie debate. Jessie’s inability to produce any results without elite partners does raise some questions as we saw that problem at MLP for her too.

Stock Up: Vivienne David, Lea Jansen, Lauren Stratman, Andrea Koop, Lee Whitwell

Vivienne David definitely took a big leap in the last couple months of the year, which was highlighted with her gold at Hilton Head with Lea Jansen and her and Lea’s undefeated performance in women’s doubles at MLP. Lea has improved all year and it will be interesting to see if she can make another leap in women’s doubles next year. Lauren Stratman finished the year on a high note with her silver with Irina at the PPA Masters. We continue to believe in Andrea Koop’s talent, but she does not play the same number of tournaments as the other players on this list.

Stock Down: Simone Jardim, Corrine Carr, Irina Tereschenko, Leigh Waters, Michelle Esquivel, Susannah Barr

It might not be totally fair to Simone, this is a very injury driven result, but she is not getting any younger and after she got hurt, the top teams had a lot of success grinding her in matches. Irina Tereschenko really didn’t have any results this year, despite a lot of Jessie Irvine and Callie Smith partnerships, but she did finish the PPA year with a silver medal at the PPA Masters with Lauren Stratman.

Biggest Potential to Rise: Jackie Kawamoto, Jade Kawamoto, Yana Grechkina

All three of these young ladies have shown tremendous potential. One the big questions is how much will they play next year? Yana acquitted herself at MLP and just had a dominant performance at the APP’s NexGen event. The Kawamoto sisters have both put up some real results in limited APP Tour stops.

📸 benjohns_pb

Top 5 Men

1. Ben Johns – Ben in men’s doubles and singles is not the same story as Ben in mixed. While he has clearly mailed in some tournaments in mixed, Ben’s losses in doubles have not appeared to be for a lack of effort. The losses have still been few and far between in doubles, but there have been losses. He lost to Mario Barrientos/Austin Gridley and AJ Koller/Riley Newman in Las Vegas with Collin, then at the PPA championships settled for a bronze with a loss to Dekel/Adam when playing with Matt Wright. However, there just can’t be any doubt that he’s the #1 men’s player out there. Men’s doubles has historically been the place where Ben has been most vulnerable so it will be interesting to see if he and Collin continue to be completely dominant or just sort of dominant in 2022.

2. Matt Wright – We flip-flopped on this one between Riley Newman and Wright, but Wright gets the nod with the head to head results. Wright was inches away from taking down Newman/McGuffin at the US Open and that really came down to Kyle Yates’ cramping issues. The pair then proceeded to take down Newman/McGuffin in Denver later in 2021. The ability for Wright to be that alpha and beat an elite pairing with a less than elite partner is a testament to his place in the rankings. The fascinating partnership will be pairing the two alphas together of Newman and Wright in 2022. It seems like that could go either really well or really poorly.

3. Riley Newman – We can’t forget that Riley was able to take down the Johns brothers with AJ Koller in Las Vegas. In hindsight, though, that Vegas victory doesn’t look quite as impressive as it initially did with Koller proving to be one of the elite players in pickleball. Newman’s lightning quick hands are his best attribute and propels him to elite status in the world of pickleball. The Tyson partnership was clearly getting somewhat stale before the end of the year. While they finished strong at the PPA Masters, there were a number of sub-par results for the duo. Newman is a unique individual and even from a chemistry standpoint playing with him is not likely the easiest task. We are not sure where his game is going to grow but there’s no doubt he’s a top 3 men’s player in the world right now.

4. Dekel Bar – Men’s specialist Dekel Bar missed our top 5 back in the 1.0 version of the rankings and we thought at the time that he may have deserved a top 5 spot. It’s now very clear that Dekel is a top 5 men’s doubles players. His game has evolved substantially over the past couple of years and he continues to get better. He puts Tyler Loong to shame when it comes to what a human is capable of doing with an Erne. It’s obviously more than the Erne for Dekel though. He covers a ridiculous amount of court with his you can’t teach the reach length, and his hands measure up in high-end firefighting. Bar has also simply become a steadier player overall in terms of cutting down the unforced errors. He’s made podiums with 5 different partners in 2021, including a breakthrough win at the PPA Championships with primary partner Adam Stone. That’s a good sign in men’s doubles for Mr. Bar.

5. Tyson McGuffin – There is a noticeable drop off after the top 4 slots and we put Tyson on the list because of his dependability. He has usually been the beta partner with Riley Newman, but as we saw at MLP he and Zane were able to thrive together. McGuffin is going to be that beta again with Jay Devilliers next year but there should be concern as to whether there is enough firepower between the two of them. There are a lot of podiums in men’s doubles for McGuffin who has noticeably made an effort to be a more aggressive player in 2021. You probably could have put either Jay Devilliers or AJ Koller in this spot, but McGuffin’s slow but steady improvement as a doubles player is what lands him inside our top 5.

Just Missed the Cut: Jay Devilliers, AJ Koller

Devilliers is almost a poor man’s Dekel Bar/Ben Johns in men’s doubles. He is able to cover a lot of court but he just doesn’t have the same weapons. We mentioned it in our 1.0 rankings but it still seems like he needs to find a way to get more juice on his backhand somehow. He also doesn’t have the same natural power that the very elite alpha players possess both in terms of what he can do with his shots and the hands in firefights at the net. Like Newman/McGuffin, the Pat Smith partnership obviously became quite stale and he should be rejuvenated playing less tournaments in 2022 with new partner, Tyson McGuffin. We really like Devilliers, but it’s a real question to ask whether he has come close to maxing out his ceiling. 

On the flip side, AJ Koller’s sky is the limit. Who knows where his ceiling is at considering he already smashed whatever anyone thought his ceiling was as a player. Nothing looks conventional about the way he plays and he could stand to lob a little bit less, but that’s nitpicking a guy who has leapfrogged past a lot of very good players.

Stock Up: Zane Navratil, JW Johnson, Dylan Frazier, Adam Stone, Rob Nunnery, Rob Cassidy, Kyle Yates, Erik Lange, Callan Dawson

The two guys with the biggest room to separate themselves in our Stock Up list may very well be Zane and JW. Navratil will be with Andrei Daescu and JW Johnson is #good. Frazier and Nunnery are the other two guys who are ones to watch when it comes to the question of how high their ceiling can be. 

Stock Down: Collin Johns, Patrick Smith, DJ Young, Jeff Warnick, Steve Deakin (not his fault, injury) 

Collin played better at MLP and he had a nice 4^th place with Erik Lange at the PPA Championships, but we may never really get our answer to who he is as a player. Is Collin just an elite Ben Johns specialist? It’ll be curious to see who Pat Smith plays with in 2022 as his game does not seem to be evolving. Smith actually works a non-pickleball full-time job making it much more difficult to dedicate the time needed. Unfortunately for Deakin, having a major wrist injury going into year 48 of life as a pickleball professional is far from ideal. We have to wonder if Deakin has gotten lost in the shuffle of partnership musical chair and it’ll be interesting who he can line up for 2022 – maybe Pat Smith? 

Biggest Potential to Rise: Andrei Daescu, Thomas Wilson 

The most intriguing new partnership of 2022 may be Daescu and Zane Navratil. There are slated to play together quite a bit next year and that seems like a great fit for both of them. Daescu has always had the talent needed to thrive and we’ll have to see if playing consistently pushes him closer to more consistent elite status. Thomas Wilson, cousin of AJ Koller (you’ll see that fact thrown out 40,000 times next year), should be playing a good chunk with Koller in 2022 and he’s got serious game. Not completely fresh to pickleball, Wilson now looks to be going all-in on being a pro and he gets the good fortune an elite partnership very early on in his journey.

Agree or disagree? Let us know in the comments below or email us at nmlpickleball@gmail.com

NML Pickleball Rankings 2.0 – Mixed Doubles

📸 Taylor Jenson

We started with singles yesterday and we’re moving onto mixed today. Look out for our doubles rankings on Monday!

In case you missed it, our definitive Singles Rankings 2.0 from yesterday.

For your additional reading pleasure, here are the links to our previous version 1.0 rankings – Singles Rankings 1.0, Mixed Rankings 1.0, Doubles Rankings 1.0

Top 5 Men

1. Riley Newman – We have described Riley’s style as being a Tasmanian devil on the court, and I think that still applies. He has now shown that he can make this style work with partners who are not just his sister Lindsey either, with the prime example of that being his and Catherine Parenteau’s gold medal win at the PPA Orlando Cup. He is also finishing the year pretty strong, taking silver at both the PPA Championship and the Masters PPA with Lindsey, who is currently five months pregnant. Riley still seems to pretty much just rely, on his natural athleticism, and counting on his hands being faster than his opponents, but you cannot deny the results.

2. Ben Johns – Surprised? Ben’s last 6 tournaments have resulted in a total of one mixed podium, a bronze medal at the APP’s Atlanta Open with Lauren Stratman. This six tournament stretch also includes the PPA Vegas Open where he ended up deciding the night before not to play, and to go to California instead (Freestyle!). That means in the last five tournaments he has actually played in, he has one medal. Prior to Ben and Simone losing the gold medal match at the Takeya Showcase, Ben had been on an insane mixed winning streak, where he had not lost a mixed tournament in almost two years, and had only dropped two matches in 2020 and 2021 up to that point, but had still won gold on both of those occasions. After losing that Takeya Showcase, Ben, on the Freestyle Boys Podcast, said he felt like when he was fully engaged that nobody can beat him in mixed. I tend to agree with this sentiment, but you need to demonstrate it on the court, and we have not been getting that on court performance from Ben lately.

We are aware that Simone has been battling injuries and that her performance has been hampered, but it is worth noting that during this losing streak, Simone played the APP Hilton Head tournament with JW Johnson, and took gold with JW, with an impressive win over Jessie Irvine and Jay Devilliers in the gold medal match. This result made it apparent that you could still get it done with Simone as a partner, so it is far from fair to put all of the blame on Simone for their recent troubles. Also, instead of trying to pick up some of the slack for injured Simone, Ben has seemed to check out of this partnership, and has been far from fully engaged in their matches. This checking out on partnerships, is something we have noted with Ben before and it will be interesting to see if this continues to be a pattern for him, going forward.

Yes, Ben was fully engaged and was mostly dominant in MLP outside of his first match against the Chimeras. But the reason why we gave Riley the top spot is we felt Riley would still be making some podiums the last 5 tournaments with Simone as his partner, in her current form, while Ben has just been mailing it in. It shouldn’t be okay to stop trying and his results in mixed have been worse than any player in this top 5 since Orlando. We need to see it on the court from Ben in 2022, for him to get his top spot back.

3. Matt Wright – It has been a bit of an up and down year for Matt in mixed, but primarily up. After losing to Ben and Simone 12 straight times, he and Lucy finally got the best of Ben and Simone, at the Takeya Championship to claim gold. Matt and Lucy also ended the PPA season on a high note, coming back from 2-0 games to zero against the Newmans to take gold at the Masters at La Quinta. However, along with these successes we have seen Matt and Lucy in less finals lately, as they have missed a couple podiums and picked up a few bronzes as well. Matt has elite weapons and he uses them well in mixed to keep the pressure on opponents. Matt also gets the benefit from playing every tournament with Lucy. Matt’s attacks and power keep him near the top in mixed, but he does not have the same defence as the players above him and that is why he is third on our list.

4. Jay Devilliers – Jay had a strong finish to his mixed year, going on a real tear with Jessie Irvine, and capping that run off with a gold medal at the PPA Championship. Jay, with his tremendous length and athleticism, is able to cover large portion of the court while keeping the pressure on his opponents. The one thing I don’t think Jay has that the players above him have, is quite the same level of attacks and finishing power. I think both Ben and Matt certainly have him in that regard. It will be interesting to see if he and Jessie can keep their ascension going next year. If so, you will definitely see Jay moving up this list.

5. Tyson McGuffin – There is a drop off after the top 4, to Tyson at number 5 in our opinion, and there were a few players vying for this spot. Tyson does not have the same arsenal of weapons or the length and reach, that the others above him possess. He does however possess great consistency, court coverage, fitness and just an overall competitiveness. His gold at the PPA Texas Open with Callie Smith, showed he can still get the job done in mixed doubles.

Just Missed the Cut: AJ Koller

AJ has been getting results and his gold with Jessie Irvine at the PPA’s Las Vegas Open was very impressive. He got it done with Lee Whitwell at MLP. Nobody’s overall doubles stock is risiing more than Koller.

Stock Up: JW Johnson, Dylan Frazier, Zane Navratil

The kids are going to be alright. We know they had a lot of trouble at MLP, but that doesn’t take away from the upward trajectory. JW won a couple of APP events this year including Hilton Head over Jay Devilliers and Jessie Irvine with Simone. And Frazier has had good mixed success with different partners. Zane finished the year strong in mixed, including winning the APP’s Atlanta Metro Open with Andrea Koop, and defeating Ben Johns with Lauren Stratman and Jay Devilliers with Lea Jansen in doing so.

Stock Down: Dekel Bar, Adam Stone, Jeff Warnick

We have noted Dekel’s ability to put together a whole day in mixed a number of times now and our biggest MLP regret was ranking him so high for the men. Stone hasn’t had good results mainly in his Corrine Carr partnership. We are not sure any player’s stock has dropped more than Jeff Warnick this year. After a number of podiums last year with Jessie Irvine, his only podium in mixed this year was at Red Rock, where the frozen hard ball really seemed to suit his style. Otherwise we just don’t think that Warnick has the consistency to get it done at the top pro level these days.

Biggest potential to rise: DJ Young

DJ has all the tools to be an elite mixed player, the question is can he put it all together on a consistent basis? We see flashes here and there like his APP gold with Vivienne David. At a certain point, we might have to quit the tantalizing potential of DJ.

Top 5 Women

1. Lucy Kovalova – The mixed female rankings was where we had the most disagreement internally. Without Simone at the top, this #1 spot could have gone a couple of different directions. We ultimately settle on Lucy Kovalova with this spot due to her consistency. She’s also coming off a giant comeback win at the PPA Masters over the Newman’s. Until recently, Kovalova and Matt Wright were the obvious #2 mixed team – not good enough to beat Ben/Simone, too good for everyone else. While they haven’t always been the obvious #2 team over the past 2 or 3 months, Kovalova’s overall comfort with playing her role in mixed while having arguably the best countering ability of the women is what puts her at #1 for us. It has to be stale at times playing with the same mixed partner and the one time she played without Wright, her and Steve Deakin almost took beat Ben/Simone twice. When you try to envision pairing Lucy with any of the other top players, you have to picture her still winning a ton.

2. Jessie Irvine – The unsustainable Jeff Warnick run ran its course and, since Irvine got together with Jay Devilliers, her game has been able to shine in mixed. She probably doesn’t get enough credit for how successful she was able yo make that partnership with the enigmatic Warnick. This may be too much recency bias putting her at the #2 slot but her consistency has shone through over the past couple of months. Irvine has elite power on both her attacks and counters, and she is a very steady forehand dinker despite her lack of variety overall in both her soft and power game. Her results at MLP were underwhelming but we’ll give her a pass on that one considering her overall body of work.

3. Anna Leigh Waters – One of us suggested putting Waters at the #1 spot, which would have been more of a potential based ranking. AL lands in our #3 spot though because she hasn’t actually won anything in mixed. Although the partners haven’t been the best, she has had a number of tournaments with Tyson McGuffin who did win a PPA tournament with Callie Smith. Waters has played with JW Johnson with okay results, but JW was able to get a gold with in a strong Hilton Head field with an injured Simone Jardim. Anna Leigh may very well go out with Ben and run the world in 2022, but we have to see it before we anoint her as top dog in mixed.

4. Catherine Parenteau – Parenteau’s mixed results have left something to be desired. However, when she has played with Riley Newman, who should be her primary partner in 2022, they are threats to win every time they step out on the court together. Parenteau is a slightly poor woman’s version of peak Simone Jardim and that really is meant in the most complimentary way. She doesn’t have quite the weapons of the players above her on this list but that’s okay when she provides such rock solid play elsewhere.

5. Simone Jardim – We have to keep Simone on this list because of her incredible run with Ben and then her recent gold with JW Johnson at the APP Hilton Head. Sure, Simone is injured and basically all the pop has been sapped from her game at this point. On the other hand, more of the blame should fall on Ben for their failures together and that’s demonstrated by the fact she was able to win with JW when she was losing with Ben – that Hilton Head field was strong. Jardim was basically unbeatable with Ben for about a year and a half. Let’s not count her out at the first sign of adversity and see what she can do if she can get her body back close to 100%.

Just Missed the Cut: Lindsey Newman, Callie Smith

You take Riley away from Lindsey and you wonder what you have. Their styles fit so well together and Riley can make up for Lindsey’s complete lack of anything offensive. But the fact is that Lindsey is an elite mixed player because of her consistency, defense and ability to reset almost literally anything. In contrast, Callie Smith’s mixed results haven’t been there relative to her ability and that likely comes down to not enough consistency for mixed play, which requires the woman to be more of a setup player. We believe strongly in Callie’s ability but she has to show more than flashes in the mixed game to crack the top 5.

Lea Jansen and Lauren Stratman both continue their upward trajectory in the game, and their results show. Stratman’s partnership with Pat Smith ran its course and she showed at the PPA Masters she can compete at the top level with an unestablished mixed partner in Julian Arnold. Jansen will be playing exclusively with Tyson in 2022 and it’ll be fun to see how that one goes – they have shown good chemistry in limited partnerships together.

Stock Up: Lea Jansen, Lauren Stratman, Andrea Koop, Vivienne David, Lee Whitwell, Susannah Barr

Andrea Koop is underrated because she plays less but she showed at MLP how valuable she can be at the highest level. Obviously, Lee Whitwell showed out at MLP and her 2022 results will be fascinating to monitor. On the flip side, Barr had a poor MLP performance but her mixed game was still okay there, which is where she has thrived in 2021. Barr’s stock is still way up and the question is always going to be for her whether she has the consistency to hang week in, week out at the top level.

UPDATE: The article has been edited to include Vivienne David in stock up. This is an obvious oversight on our end as Vivienne has had an incredible run, capped off recently by going undefeated with Zane Navratil in mixed. She doesn’t reach ‘Just Missed the Cut’ status yet but her stock may have risen higher than anyone. She arguably falls into ‘Biggest Potential to Rise’ category but she’s too good for that. She’s a darkhorse for finding her way into the top 5 at some point.

Stock Down: Leigh Waters, Corrine Carr, Irina Tereschenko, Michelle Esquivel

I think the theme of this list is players whose games have stagnated. Waters is still good but the stock down comes down to other players really elevating their games to a new level like Jansen and Stratman. The same goes for Corrine Carr who had a brief uptick in results earlier in 2021 but has now come back down to earth – the weapons and hands aren’t strong enough for what the top level is in pickleball now. Esquivel has big weapons but nothing much has changed about her game. She was exposed at MLP as the weak link of her team and we can’t say we know what’s going on behind scenes, but from an outsiders perspective it doesn’t appear she’s grinding her game.

Biggest Potential to Rise: Jillian Braverman

We first highlighted Braverman as one our #1 Under the Radar female players and, in our view, she has proved that was warranted. We’ll be curious if she plays more tournaments in 2022. We still think she should have been drafted to play MLP as personality concerns in that team environment shouldn’t be taken too far. At this point, she’s still more unrealized potential than anything else.

Agree or disagree? Let us know in the comments below or email us at nmlpickleball@gmail.com

NML Pickleball Rankings 2.0 – Singles

📸 waters_pb

It’s been a hot minute since we have done any rankings but the people have been asking for them! After promising new rankings for a while, we are here to deliver. Over 6 months of tournaments have elapsed since our last installment of rankings and it really is fascinating to see how much has changed in that period of time, which is keeping in the spirit of the rapid evolution of pickleball. We’re splitting up our rankings into three parts just like last time- singles, mixed doubles and doubles. We have singles today, mixed doubles will be posted tomorrow and we’ll start off your Monday next week with the doubles rankings – that is what people in the business call a tease folks. So here it is, the second installment of the definitive NML PIckleball player rankings.

For your additional reading pleasure, here are the links to our previous rankings – Singles Rankings 1.0, Mixed Rankings 1.0, Doubles Rankings 1.0

Top 5 Women

1. Anna Leigh Waters – The last time we did player rankings, we asked the question, why doesn’t Anna Leigh play more singles? This was after the US Open, where she had taken bronze in singles, but it was her first time playing singles this year. Since then she has competed in singles in every tournament she has played in. In her last 7 tournaments, Anna Leigh has come away with 5 gold medals and 2 silver medals, so it is safe to say she has found her stride in singles. Her rolling shots tend to keep opponents on their heels, and her great court coverage allows her to keep a lot of balls in play, forcing opponents to hit more shots than they would like to. When returning serve, I think she needs to continue to work on coming to the net consistently and forcing opponents to make difficult passing shots. #1 or not, always things to improve.

2. Lea Jansen – The last time we did the rankings, we had Lea just missing the list, despite coming off of her first big performance, a silver at the US Open, but leading into that tournament she had shown a real lack of consistency. Since then, however, she has shown a very high level of consistency, reaching the final in 6 of her last 7 tournaments, with the lone exception being the PPA Championship, a tournament she ended up having to withdraw from. The biggest question for Lea with singles heading into next year is if she can catch up to Anna Leigh, who has had her number since Lea took down Anna Leigh to win the PPA Orange County Cup.

3. Catherine Parenteau – Catherine is the third player who we regularly see on the podium at the large tournaments and she too has an Anna Leigh problem, having had the misfortune of drawing her often on her side of the draw in a number of the single elimination PPA tournaments. Catherine is also more prone to take a loss to a player outside of the top three than Lea and Anna Leigh, which is why she comes in at number three. We also question whether she has the ceiling that Lea and Anna Leigh have. We see both of those players with room to grow in their singles game where we do not see the same upside with Catherine.

4. Callie Smith – Callie is another player who has really just started playing a lot of singles this year, and her results have certainly been promising. It is obvious that she has put a fair amount of work into her singles this year. She has a pretty strong record head to head with Catherine, but has struggled to get a win against Anna Leigh or Lea, which is why she comes in at number four on this list. With this being her first year really playing singles, one would have to think that there is still another level she can reach in her singles game.

5. Jillian Braverman – After Callie, it is a significant drop off. Jillian provides the best combination of potential and results of the remaining players. Her big serve, powerful groundstrokes and length and athleticism make her a legitimate threat out there. She has yet to show that she can beat any of the players above her on this list, but also beats pretty much everyone else. She also plays far less tournaments than the other players on this list. It would be interesting to see if with more singles repetitions if she could continue to move up on this list.

Stock Up: Lauren Stratman, Lee Whitwell

Lauren Stratman has some of the better passing shots, and has shown she can get some results when she plays, especially in the smaller brackets. Lee Whitwell, showed if you need a player for four points at least, she is your girl at MLP. Whitwell is a few years away from the senior ranks, if she chooses to play some singles there, one would have to think her ground strokes will allow her to do some damage there. She won’t be playing on the pro tour in singles most likely but how is her stock not up?

Stock Down: Irina Tereschenko, Michelle Esquivel

Since her gold at the US Open this year Irina really hasn’t gotten any results in singles other than she did get a bronze at TOC. Michelle Esquivel seems to be playing less and less singles these days, and is not getting results when she does. Age is not on the side of either player.

Biggest Potential to Rise: Vivienne David, Kaitlyn Christian

As we highlighted coming out of MLP, Vivienne David is a player on the rise. Gritty cannot quit Kaitlyn Christian (I actually had to talk him out of having her in the top 5 in our initial rankings this year). I get that there is raw talent and potential there, but she currently, understandably seems very focused on tennis, and when she has played lately the results, have indicated she cannot dabble and expect to have success at the highest level.

📸jdubpickleball

Top 5 Men

1. Ben Johns – Ben hasn’t been quite the unbeatable force in pickleball that he was when we did our initial rankings. His singles has still been strong for the most part but Johns did not medal at TOC back in August, losing to JW Johnson and then Spencer Smith. That ended his crazy 100 plus match singles winning streak. He also went to the PPA championships and lost in straight games to Zane Navratil before withdrawing from the loser’s side. We’ve come up with a lot of potential excuses for Ben’s dip in the level of his play, but the fact is that his results haven’t been Ben-like. Even though we’re expecting a motivated Ben going into 2022, if we keep seeing more losses we’re going to have to stop with the excuses at some point.

2. Zane Navratil – Putting Zane at #2 in our initial rankings back in April seemed like it may have been a mistake for a brief period of time, but Navratil has had a rock star finish to the 2021 season. Navratil won the last 3 singles events he played in – PPA Texas, APP Hilton Head and PPA Championships. Outside of the USA PIckleball Newport Beach Championships in June, Navratil has really had Tyson McGuffin’s number. The only reason to drop Navratil from the #2 spot is betting that his serve won’t be the same weapon in 2022 with the chainsaw being banned, which is too speculative for our liking. Zane is a grinder and we expect there’s going to be continued improvement in his game as we go into a new season.

3. Tyson McGuffin – It’s quite impressive that Tyson is still playing at the level he is. McGuffin has played a lot of pickleball over the last few years and there has been massive evolution to the sport yet he still finds himself at the top of the singles game. He ended the year off strong with a silver at the PPA Masters. The reality is that Tyson’s upside is capped by his age and very limited development of a backhand groundstroke. He is as tough a competitor as they come and he probably works harder than any other pro out there. How long will hard work and grit be enough to stay at the top though?

4. Jay Devilliers – We talked about Jay’s high ceiling, low floor in our first installment of the rankings. Devilliers’ consistency was incredible across all parts of his game during the middle part of the year but the low ceiling/high floor part of his game reared its ugly head in the latter part of the year. It is notable that his fluctuating results in singles may be due in large part to playing so much pickleball in 2021 and he should be playing a bit less in 2022 as a PPA contracted player. Nevertheless, his lack of consistency leaves him in this #4 spot.

5. JW Johnson – We talk a lot about consistency and that is no different for JW: Consistency has been a bit elusive for JW in singles despite some huge wins, including taking down Ben and Tyson at TOC. That’s no small feat. There has been major improvement in his singles games and the results speak for themselves. He creates a lot of difficulty for opponents trying to score on him with some of the best volleying at the net out there. The problem is that he’ll still go tournaments where he has too many losses against guys outside the top tier. JW has done enough to vault himself into the top 5 to end 2021.

Just Missed the Cut: Gabriel Joseph 

Joseph is a supremely talented player who hasn’t played nearly as much as the other guys above him on this. In his relatively limited tournament play, Joseph’s results haven’t been stellar. His last 3 tournament results included having his day ended by JW Johnson 15-4 at the PPA Masters, going 1-2 at the PPA Championships and barely missing out on bronze with a 12-10 loss to Dekel Bar at the PPA Takeya Showcase. He hasn’t medaled at any pro event since the APP So Cal Classic in June where he was able to take a gold in a field that featured JW Johnson and Jay Devilliers. The talent is there for the speedy and dynamic Kyrgios, but the results haven’t been.

Stock Up: Jack Foster, Dylan Frazier

Foster’s results have slowly been trending upwards and he even broke his 4^th place curse at a recent tournament. He seems to be working on both the physical and mental side of his game. The windmill forehand is always going to be there so if he could find a passable backhand drive it would be immensely helpful to him. Frazier just got started on his singles foray mid-way through 2021. Despite zero backhand drive, Frazier still finds a way to get it done against good competition. He’s only going to get better.

Stock Down: AJ Koller, Dekel Bar, Collin Johns

As AJ’s doubles results have gotten better, his singles results have suffered. It’s not quite as exciting to have to grind singles days when you’re a legitimate doubles podium threat every weekend. Speaking of not being thrilled by the grind, have you met Dekel Bar? Our running theory is that Bar isn’t a natural grinder, which is most apparent in the lack of improvement in his fitness. The singles grind is the toughest of them all in pickleball, hence why Bar plays sparingly. His best result in Red Rock was on the heels of a day off due to a rain delay. The running theme of stock down for men’s singles is guys not wanting to grind singles, and we see no other reason for Collin Johns not playing singles other than the work it takes. Anyway, that’s a lot of use of the word grind for one paragraph.

Mental Training Update 

Ryan Sherry has added timezone training in addition to the mental preparation training since we first did our rankings. He wasn’t planning to be at MLP but he joined the party last minute to literally do that, which is party. With his very intense training program, he’s our choice for the best 4-point singles player in the men’s game.

Agree or disagree? Let us know in the comments below or email us at nmlpickleball@gmail.com

NML Pickleball Rankings – Mixed Doubles

Jeff Warnick and Jessie Irvine are a force in the mixed game

Yesterday, we gave you our definitive singles rankings. Today, it is the definitive mixed doubles rankings. Once again, we expect there will be no disagreement with our list. It is a definitive list.

Top 5 Women – Mixed

1. Simone Jardim – Since teaming up with Ben in mixed they have won every tournament they have played and have dropped very few games while doing it. Even before partnering with Ben, Simone was the dominant women’s mixed double players. One example of how dominant Simone and Ben are, is you can look to the men’s cash tournament they played in Florida last spring where they took gold beating Dekel Bar and Adam Stone, your US Open men’s silver medalists. Simone’s defence, the best in the game, makes her such a steady partner and then she has enough weapons to keep you honest and to punish you if you give her something.
2. Lucy Kovalova – Kovalova and Wright have clearly been the second best team mixed over the last year and a half and I think you have to give Kovalova a lot of the credit for that. In the one tournament that she hasn’t played with Wright, the 2020 Florida Grand Slam, she played with Steve Deakin and they took silver taking Ben and Simone to 3 games twice. I suspect a lot of men out there feel like if they had Kovalova they would be out there playing Ben and Simone for gold. I am not sure that’s completely right, but Lucy is clearly number two and would give whoever her partner is a great chance to make that gold medal match. She probably has the best counter of all the women out there. She will punish you.
3. Lindsey Newman – Lindsey’s defence remains second only to Simone’s among the women. With defence so often carrying the day with women in mixed, it keeps her in the mix as she can grind all day. An underrated part of her game is probably her ability to move on the court, allowing her Tasmanian Devil of a brother to be everywhere on the court, while still being where she needs to be, when she needs to be there. If she wants to climb any higher though, and for her and Riley to actually start pushing Ben and Simone, she needs to add some better weapons and attacks to her game. Her defence first, second and third style is too predictable for opponents and does not put enough pressure on them.
4. Callie Smith – Smith probably has the best hands of any of the women in the game. Anybody looking to attack her has to be very careful as she will punish you if you don’t get the ball in the right spot. She hasn’t been able to play a lot of mixed due to not playing on Sundays for religious reasons, but when she is out there, she is certainly one of the more feared women, and for good reason.
5. Jessie Irvine – Irvine would have been higher on this list last year, but she and Warnick have struggled to find their consistency this year and more often than not have come up short, after pretty clearly being the #3 mixed team last year. Irvine has all of the raw tools and solid results, but we are starting to wonder if she can reach that very top echelon, something that seemed a given when she first burst onto the scene.

Honorable Mentions

Knocking on the Door: Catherine Parenteau, Anna Leigh Waters, Leigh Waters and Lauren Stratman

Catherine Parenteau – As a Simone mini-me, you would think she would be right up there, but her results have been mixed, in mixed (pardon the pun). One wonders is this just a matter of her not finding the right partner, or is something missing in her mixed game, preventing her from regular podiums?

Anna Leigh Waters – As we said in our US Open live blogging, if someone wants to take a shot at the mixed throne, Anna Leigh has the highest upside to be able to accomplish this. She is playing mixed with Tyson McGuffin in a month at the PPA’s Georgia stop and it will be very interesting to see how they do.

Leigh Waters – Leigh’s hands hold up in the mixed game very well, but as Gritty always loves to point, she just loves to bang the ball at the guy a little too often, and until that changes we think her upside is limited in the mixed game.

Lauren Stratman – Steady game that plays well in mixed. It’s unclear what the upside is for her but there are some very quality results over the past year.   

The Veteran: Irina Tereschenko

Irina is solid but, ultimately, she is a limited against the top players. She is not an easy out with the right partner, but the consistency isn’t there for her in mixed.   

The 40 plus Crew: Susannah Barr

Some of you may not even have heard of Barr, but if you want an underrated woman in the mixed doubles game she is it. Her style can come across as awkward but it is very effective. Her podium in Las Vegas last year with Rob Cassidy was very impressive, and in 2019 she was able to catch a bronze with Steve Deakin at the Texas Open. Loong smartly saw the potential in Barr and has partnered with her in 2021 with some wins against very good teams. Take away the 40 plus aspect of it. Barr is on the rise so keep an eye out for her.

Top 5 Men – Mixed

Riley Newman holds the #2 spot in our rnakings

1. Ben Johns – It was already noted above but the fact that he and Simone took down the US Open silver medalists in a legitimate tournament in 2020 says it all. I’m not taking anything away from Simone in their partnership because Ben Johns wasn’t getting very good mixed results when his partner was Christine McGrath. Nevertheless, there is clearly no one else you would rather have as a partner in mixed (obviously). 
2. Riley Newman – This was a bit of a debate between us but we ultimately settled the Tasmanian Devil style of Riley for this spot. I don’t know if this style works quite as well without Lindsey, but his results were still very strong without her in 2020. His hands are so fast and he puts so much pressure on his opponents with the frenetic play. The recent results are undeniable too. The only team they can’t beat is Ben/Simone.
3. Matt Wright – It’s 3 straight bronze medals for Matt Wright and if you go back to the PPA Championships he and Lucy did not even medal there. He has gotten in much better shape in 2021 and what he does with his forehand off the bounce is about the best in the business. We are not completely selling the Matt Wright stock quite yet and his drop to #3 is more of a testament to Riley’s stock increasing than any slippage in Wright’s game.
4. Tyson McGuffin – Tyson does not have the arsenal of weapons that the others above him possess. However, his backhand is much improved from a couple of years ago, he has more speed ups and he is just so damn steady out there. Of course, the court coverage and fitness are high end as well. McGuffin with the right partner is very dangerous.  
5. Jeff Warnick – We have described Warnick in previous posts as high ceiling, low floor and you can see that in his results. He has the benefit of playing with Jessie Irvine but that does not take away from the fact that he is a monster at the net, and he does so much with low balls, especially on his backhand. He has such a weird style that is hard to play against and in mixed he doesn’t need to be as steady to make podiums.  There are still too many mistakes relative to the top players in the game but the level he gets to when he is on means he makes our top 5. As an aside, Jeff gets our award for most entertaining player on tour.  

Honorable Mention

Knocking on the Door: Jay Devilliers, Dekel Bar and Zane Navratil

Jay Devilliers – He doesn’t do anything necessarily at an elite level, but his entire game is very good. The well roundedness serves him well in mixed and if he gets a bump in the level of his partners he would be right there fighting for podiums every time out there. Devilliers could stand to do more with his backhand on in between balls out of the air though as this is the one area that is quite average for him. The backhand gets exposed in mixed more than men’s because the guy is often stacked on that left side.

Dekel Bar – The mixed results are coming. It’s not clear why his transition to mixed has been slower than men’s, but it is a different game. It looks like he is starting to figure it out and there is no reason that he shouldn’t be on the podium when he has partners like Catherine Parenteau.  

Zane Navratil – The upside is there for Zane. He covers a ton of court and has all the shots. It’s less important for mixed but his movement could probably be toned down about 10 to 15 percent. Once he finds a way to balance keeping himself under control while still putting that pressure on opponents with his court coverage, that will unlock his potential in both mixed and men’s.

The 40 plus Crew: Steve Deakin

He does amazingly well for his age and he still can do it in mixed despite his age. However, we are not sure how much longer he can keep competing at this high level in mixed as he hasn’t been as good in 2021. While he looked like he had his fitness in a good place at the start of the year, his COVID close contact isolation and being on the road 24/7 has clearly taken his fitness away from being where it needs to be at for him to reach podiums consistently in mixed.

Agree? Disagree? Let us know your thoughts! Reply in the comments section below, or email us at nmlpickleball@gmail.com

NML Pickleball Rankings – Singles

Zane Navratil and his unique spin serve

Everyone loves lists and we are sure there will not be any disagreement with the definitive NML Pickleball pro pickleball rankings. We plan to put these rankings out periodically and we are separating them into three parts – singles, gender doubles and mixed doubles. We will have the gender doubles and mixed rankings later this week. We may come out with our senior pro rankings at some point but, for now, you’re stuck with only the younger pros. Without further ado, please enjoy!

Top 5 Men’s Singles

1. Ben Johns – The undisputed top player. The last time he didn’t top a singles podium was July 2019 at the Beer City Open versus Tyson McGuffin, so he is coming up on a 2-year winning streak. He has only once been forced to come back and play a game to 15 in the gold medal match in this undefeated tournament streak, when Tyson put up a heroic effort in the gold medal match, to take it to a game to 15, but the energy required to do that unfortunately left Tyson unable to finish the game to 15. Ben just physically and mentally wears down his opponents.
2. Zane Navatril – He had a disappointing US Open, but his results this year clearly have earned him this spot in the rankings. He obviously is grinding and working on his game. We see this in his innovative serves that are clearly among the best in the game and have given him a big advantage over many of his opponents. I am curious as opponents see his serve more and more players add similar serves, whether he will be able to hold on to this spot. I think more consistency to his overall game is still needed.
3. Tyson McGuffin – Tyson’s lack of continued development in his singles game has seen his standing in the singles world slip a bit. We have been mystified by his refusal to add a backhand passing shot to his singles game, especially when he has mentioned on his podcast that he has fiddled around with one. Our opinion has been that a backhand pass is his only potential avenue to close the gap with Ben, and now as more young, athletic players with the ability to pass from both sides have entered the game, we have seen it cost him that consistent podium spot. He also might want to consider changing or adding variety to serve, which is clearly no longer tops in the game. His continued elite conditioning, competitiveness and confidence keep him a consistent threat though.
4. Jay Devilliers – Devilliers is a high ceiling, low-ish floor guy at this point, at least relative to the top 3 guys on the list. Prior to this past calendar year, Tyson and Ben never lost. Yes, there is a bit more competition now than there was even a couple of years ago but Devilliers shouldn’t be losing on the same day to Jack Foster and John Cincola (although Cincola did beat Tyson earlier this year at the World Pickleball Championships). It appears that Devilliers continues to improve his singles game with his backhand pass being his most improved weapon from the start of 2020.  He could stand to do a lot more with his serve though, which would help make his results more consistent.
5. Gabriel “Baby Kyrgios” Joseph – A great, young, explosive athlete who has elite passing shots from each side. While he is playing a decent number of events this year, one has to wonder if he might not become a consistent podium presence if he played even more with those additional tournament repetitions.

Honorable Mention

• Knocking on the Door: AJ Koller – He keeps getting close with a couple of 4th place finishes at some of this year’s bigger events, but he has yet to break through and make a podium.
• Why Don’t They Play More: Collin Johns and Dekel Bar – Dekel has only played 2 single events this year earning a silver medal at Red Rock and had to withdraw from the Florida Grand Slam. Prior to that the last event Dekel had to played was the PPA Championship where he took silver. It seems odd that he does not play more, when it seems like he could be a consistent podium presence. Collin has only played one singles tournament in 2020 and 2021, the PPA Championship where he got 4th, but on the occasions he has played he has always performed at a top level.
• The 40 Plus Crew: John Cincola and Juan Arraya – We have talked about John Cincola quite a bit and we do have similar questions about his serve as we do with Zane, but we wanted the highlight Juan Arraya as well. The 35 plus divisions are silly for doubles but when it comes to singles for the 40 plus crowd to compete with the young folk is impressive. Arraya’s first pickleball tournament was September 2020 and he’s already going pretty deep into big tournament singles fields.
• Best Training Program: Ryan Sherry – Sherry gets a whole separate category to himself. He has an extensive tennis background but the fact that he gets the results he does is still perplexing. He’s not in bad shape but he’s not in particularly good shape for a 38 year old either. He does not come to the net like just about all the top players do on the men’s side. He injured himself at the Delray tournament but he has wins over Tyson, AJ Koller, Frank Anthony Davis, John Cincola and Eden Lica. Sherry has played Ben Johns to three games on two occasions. So how does he do it? The biggest outlier we see from him is his mental preparation. If you follow him on Instagram, Sherry parties like no one else out there in the pickleball world, and he self-describes this as mental preparation for tournaments. This has to be the reason he can compete the way he does in singles.

Ryan Sherry’s Mental Preparation

Top 5 Women’s Singles

1. Simone Jardim – She lost to Irina at the US Open and Catherine Parenteau has been knocking on the door of her throne as top dog in singles. Simone said on a FB live chat after the US Open that she does not know how long she is going to continue playing singles for at her age but we are be taking Simone out of our number one spot until her losses in singles become more than outliers.   
2. Catherine Parenteau – It was a surprise to see Parenteau off the podium altogether at the US Open but it is only more recently that she has been that true threat to take down Jardim in singles. I expect there is more consistency to be had here and the one off from the US Open is not enough for us to change our opinion of her being the #2 player in singles right now.
3. Irina Tereschenko – Tereschenko won gold at the US Open and her steady play means she doesn’t typically have bad losses in singles. She has had some recent losses to Callie Smith, Michelle Esquivel and Lea Jansen, but those aren’t what we would consider to be bad losses. The US Open gold was definitely surprising but she is still always a podium threat.
4. Vivienne David – Both our #4 players are the high ceiling, low floor types. David’s all around game continues to improve and the singles side of things is no exception to that. We are not sure why she did not play singles at the US Open but she has two bronze medals to her name at bigger events this year, including wins over Catherine Parenteau and Lea Jansen. The two of us are not in complete agreement with this ranking but we definitely both love the upside that she has, which is ultimately why we settled on her at this spot.
5. Michelle Esquivel – Esquivel has some of the best ground strokes out there but her singles game is limited by how much she plays on the baseline. It’s a testament to her groundstrokes that she can get the results she does without coming to the net but it limits her ceiling as a player. She had an unfortunate calf strain in preparation for the US Open and things won’t get easier for her physically with this being her age 35 year. Her results were too steady for us to leave out of the top 5

Irina Tereschenko at the 2021 Minto US Open

Honorable Mention

Knocking on the Door: Callie Smith and Lea Jansen – Callie is a player we have always thought could do well in singles if she started playing more and the results are starting to come. Tyson actually mentioned on his podcast that he gave Callie some tips during the team event at the World Pickleball Championships in December and it seems that her results have improved since that time. The biggest thing in women’s is for players to get to the net and in what we have seen from her play she is doing that more.

Jansen is a tantalizing talent and maybe that US Open silver is the breakthrough she needed. The results have not been as consistent as they need to be but she comes to the net as much, if not more, than anyone on the tour. Her mobility on the court is elite at women’s level but for whatever reason she hasn’t been able to put it all together consistently. Not yet, at least.

Why Don’t They Play More: Kaitlyn Christian and Anna Leigh Waters – We had disagreement here on whether to put Christian in our top 5. She is still playing pro tennis so has only played one tournament in the last calendar year and she didn’t even play singles there. However, she come through the back draw to beat Tereschenko in California prior to COVID and she could be the #1 singles player in the game if she wanted to. She is able to get to the net on a regular basis to put that pressure on her opponents and, again, that’s the biggest separator for the women’s singles game at this point.

Anna Leigh benefited from some draw luck with the Esquivel injury and Jardim withdrawal at the US Open. However, she still had to beat Parenteau to come away with a bronze and that is no small feat. She hasn’t played much singles, but you know she’s got the mobility to do what is necessary in singles. It’s seems like it is simply a matter of whether she wants to put that physical toll on her body with all the pickleball and soccer that she plays already.

Best Training Program: While Callie Smith has her workout Wednesday, there is not anyone on the women’s side who shares publicly they can match the Ryan Sherry mental preparation advantage.

Agree? Disagree? Let us know your thoughts! Reply in the comments section below, or email us at nmlpickleball@gmail.com