In my many years of experience, two things in sports are for certain.
There’s no crying in baseball, as attested to by the great manager, Jimmy Dugan. And there’s no such thing as rally scoring in pickleball. I’ve looked throughout the whole IFP (USAPA endorsed) Rule book, and rally scoring is mentioned NOWHERE. Yes that’s right. Not once is rally scoring mentioned anywhere in the long standing rules of pickleball.
Yet we hear, or sometimes even witness, people justifying the use of rally scoring in order to speed up the game.
I have some ideas:
If we are going to change rules to speed up games, let’s get rid of the kitchen line. Everyone kamikaze to the net and duck so you don’t get hurt. That will speed up the game instantly.
We could also eliminate that silly double bounce rule. That would allow everyone to go into attack mode right way and thus speed up the game. That could work.
Heck, while we’re at it, let’s let people serve overhand instead of underhand. Think of the speed and spin you could put on the ball. That would definitely speed up the game. Pretty soon we can have a game to 11 played in about 2 minutes if we don’t dilly dally much while chasing the ball.
What are people thinking?!?!?!? As you can probably tell. I get a little miffed when people decide on their own to change rules.
It probably doesn’t seem like a big deal at the time. “Hey we’ve got people waiting to play so we need to move the games along.” Seems so innocent to simply award someone a point after every rally. But that’s not what the inventors of the game wanted. The challenge with arbitrarily changing a rule is that every new person who is introduced to a seemingly innocent tweak of the rules then teaches that to other new players who carry it (sounds like an infectious disease) back to their home courts and pretty soon you have a rogue rule raging out of control (ok, now it sounds like a wildfire, but you get the picture, it’s all bad for the sport) that makes it hard to get rid of when you get enough courts and everyone has plenty of court time.
If you have ever had the pleasure of sitting down and talking with some of the “old guard”, you know that the pickleball rules were written in such a way to, above all else, always maintain a balance between offense and defense. That is why there is a double bounce rule. That is why you can only serve underhand. That is why we have that pain-in-the-neck kitchen line. And that is why you only get to score a point when you are serving. To do otherwise, changes the way the game is played, the strategy you would use, and the integrity and intent of the game.
If we need to reduce court wait times, simply shorten the games to 9 or 7 or even 5. Everyone learns the game as it was intended and everyone gets to play. But pleeeeeeeeeeease let’s don’t change the rules.
I hope if you are an ambassador or champion of this wonderful sport that you are doing your best to help maintain the integrity of the game. Changing the rules to seemingly benefit a location or community certainly does not do that. It only tends to teach a game that is not pickleball.
The leaders and USAPA board members have worked hard to maintain the original intent of the founding fathers from 50 years ago. And because they have done so, the game is growing at an astronomical pace. Yes, we don’t have enough courts, so let’s work hard to earn and get more. That will speed up and reduce the wait times. That is what we all need to work on.
We have some interesting years ahead. Can’t wait to help, and can’t wait to watch it grow!
-Rocket
A humorous way to make a good point! Rally scoring needs to be given a decent burial with no chance for resurrection.
Rally scoring actually makes for a better game. I played years of badminton with the old style (pickleball) scoring rules and now play badminton with the rally scoring. Rally scoring is better.
I cannot begin to tell you how much I detest rally scoring! It is a great impetus for us to expand and find new courts and new places to play….that’s how you know it’s time to get busy and approach city managers, gym directors, school admins, anybody/any place that has room for more pickleball courts. The worse thing they can do is say “no” and we’ve all heard that before so keep digging and find/build new venues. Expand instead of rally scoring!!! (*And now she steps down off of her soapbox*)
I could not have said it better.
Ok all these pro’s & con’s and I as a beginner have no idea, what is Rally scoring?
Sully, rally scoring in any sport means that someone scores a point each time a point is played, no matter who is serving. Hope that helps.
Thank you. thank you. thank you. Rally scoring sucks, so we tried regular scoring to 7 to shorten things up. Worked just fine and now everyone is happy again. Comes under the heading of “Why didn’t we think of this?”
Once upon a time NCAA volleyball used a serve-out scoring system. They changed to rally scoring and it made Volleyball a better game. Any game that uses serve-out scoring can be made better by changing to rally scoring, including Pickleball. Hey Rocket, how about my new tee-shirt that says “Rally Scoring Rocks,”?
Sorry Gary, I’m on the other side of the fence on this one. I quit watching volleyball once they went to rally scoring. But that is a different sport. Pickleball has serve-out scoring because there is a very different set of strategies used when you are serving, as opposed to your opponents serving. Rally scoring would simply take a lot of the strategy out of our great game. I’m a big fan of keeping pickleball the way it was intended to be by the inventors.
It would be great for the USAPA to officially denonce rally scoring. They are responsible for maintaining the rules and integrity of the game. Their official condemnation of rally scoring would help those of us that want to maintain the game the way it was designed argue against those that play rally score. We have centers here in The Villages that only play rally score. They even say rally scoring is the way of the future.
Please help stop this type of scoring. Thank you.
There is one quirky rule that needs to be changed. That is in the rare case where the ball is played and bounces to the outside of the left or right sideline of the court and is returned WITHOUT CROSSING OVER the net.
Richard, That “around the post shot” has been around forever in the sport of tennis, and is widely considered the most exciting shot in pickleball. So I don’t imagine you’ll see it go away anytime soon. Might as well work on it. 🙂
Adopt rally scoring or go by the way of baseball……old demographic of fans that’s dying off everyday with no young ones to replace them because the game is too slow.
Change is eminent, get in front of the curve.
Hey Missile, With pickleball growing at a record, breakneck speed all over the country, I doubt that you’ll see a change in the scoring rules anytime soon. Seems to be doing ok. Thanks for the feedback.