Quote:
Originally Posted by Mrprez
I get that but why the server number? Why not 5 serving 3 and hit the ball.
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As a lifelong tennis player I don’t know why they didn’t just use tennis scoring. That would have made much more sense. However to answer your question each player on a side serves until they fail to win the point. Then the serve goes over to the opposing team. Since each team can only score points while they are serving stating whether you are server number one or server number two enables correctly keeping track of when the serve goes over to the other team and keeps each team from serving more times than they deserve. As someone who has played a lot of pickleball I can tell you after some long points that move you all over the court with lobs and dinks and volleys it’s easy to forget which team member served first if you aren’t disciplined in saying the score correctly before each serve. I hope that helps.
Now on to the comments by a few people about instructors that were perhaps being a little too “energetic” in their efforts to discourage backpedaling on court. Your instructor may have been a complete pompous self consumed jerk. If that was the case please please either try a different class with a different instructor or find out when one of the courts near you has open beginner level play and just show up with your pickleball paddle. Introduce yourself to those waiting on the next game and ask them to help you learn the game. You will find the overwhelming vast majority of beginner level players will be very friendly and almost excited to include you and to help you learn the game of pickleball. It’s an awesome way to meet and make new friends!
Ok that being said the advice you got about not backing up or backpedaling as you play pickleball is probably the most valuable thing you (especially if you are a senior citizen) can ever learn about pickleball. If you are in your late 60’s and certainly if your are in your 70’s or even 80’s losing your balance while backpedaling on the pickleball court and falling backwards onto the hard unforgiving surface will almost certainly put you at significant risk of breaking a hip or an arm or of getting a concussion. For the most part pickleball is a fun social completely safe game/sport no matter what age you are and you don’t have to be super agile or in the peak of fitness to play but backing up should be avoided.