Pro Pickleball Explained: PPA Tour, MLP & the Players to Watch

Pickleball isn't just a backyard game — it has a thriving professional circuit with sponsors, broadcasts and genuine stars. Here's the landscape.

The two big tours

• PPA Tour (Professional Pickleball Association): the premier individual tour, running a long season of Slams, Cups and Opens across the year, culminating in a season-ending championship.
• Major League Pickleball (MLP): a team-based league with a franchise format, played in a fast, mixed-gender team scoring system.

The two operate under a unified umbrella organisation following a 2024 merger, which has professionalised scheduling and player contracts.

The players to watch

• Ben Johns — widely regarded as the greatest men's player in the sport, dominant across singles, doubles and mixed.
• Anna Leigh Waters — the dominant women's player, frequently sweeping singles, doubles and mixed titles at the same event.

These two are the faces of the sport, and the depth behind them grows every season as more athletes turn pro.

Why it matters for you

Watching the pros is the fastest way to learn strategy — the dinking patience, the third-shot drops, the speed-ups. Notice how rarely the best players hit the ball hard from the baseline; it's all control and placement.

Want to play like them? It starts with the fundamentals — our third-shot drop and dinking strategy guides — and a paddle that rewards control, like the ProFoam Pro.

Tours, schedules and rankings evolve each season — treat this as a primer on how pro pickleball is structured.