The landscape of professional pickleball shifted dramatically at Major League Pickleball (MLP) Columbus, delivering a weekend packed with historic sweeps, roster shakeups, and an abundance of on-court drama. From unexpected team renaissances to high-stakes execution failures, the tournament shook up the power rankings and left several franchises searching for answers.
The New Jersey Fives Break the Curse
The definitive story of the weekend belonged to the New Jersey Fives, who finally managed to banish their ultimate demon: the St. Louis Shock. Entering the weekend, the Shock had completely owned the head-to-head matchup for the last two years. However, New Jersey didn’t just break the streak—they tore through the competition.
The Fives swept through group play in dominant fashion, highlighted by a blistering 3-minute-and-16-second “golden pickle” (a 11-0 victory where the serving team scores all points without losing a side-out) in women’s doubles against New York. They backed that up with another pickle over Miami later in the day and locked up the top seed in their pool with a sweep of the Columbus Sliders.
New Jersey’s roster depth proved lethal. Entering the weekend, the team faced major question marks regarding its partnerships, but the duos of Anna Leigh Waters / Noa Canerio, Will Howells / Noa Canerio, and Will Howells / Georgia Johnson answered the call convincingly, dropping only a single game across six matches all weekend.
Panic Time for the St. Louis Shock?
On the flip side of New Jersey’s triumph was the stark reality facing the St. Louis Shock. On paper, finishing third in the first MLP event and second in the next is a strong start to a season. However, expectations shift dramatically when a front office invests $1.2 million into a single superstar like Anna Bright. For the Shock, anything short of a championship title is viewed as an absolute failure.
The frustration within the camp was palpable. Following their loss, Bright took to social media to vent her frustrations on a Twitter critic. However, the primary operational concern for St. Louis rests on the shoulders of Hayden Patriquin. According to advanced metrics from Real Clear Stats, Patriquin struggled heavily in Columbus, logging game-high unforced errors in both men’s and mixed doubles while posting the weakest player impact score in each match.
Because of MLP’s strict roster structures and the massive financial capital tied up in their top talent, the Shock lack the flexibility to make a meaningful backup move. They must simply trust that Patriquin, Gabe Tardio, and Anna Bright can find their chemistry before heading to their home crowd in St. Louis.
The Columbus Sliders: Injury, Trades, and White Castle
The hometown Columbus Sliders provided plenty of entertainment, starting with a bizarre medical scare during warmups. Roster staples Danny Kovalik and Paris Todd suffered a severe lack of communication during a practice session when Todd accidentally struck Kovalik square in the nose on a third-shot drop, sending him to urgent care.
The lack of immediate on-court cohesion showed early as they fell to the California Black Bears, but the Sliders quickly recalibrated by pulling off a major mid-tournament trade. Columbus traded Alex Strong to Phoenix in exchange for Judit Castillo and cash. The roster upgrade paid immediate dividends; with Castillo in the lineup, the Sliders steamrolled Miami 21-5 in a DreamBreaker and rattled off consecutive 3-1 wins over the Black Bears, the Chicago Slice, and the Atlanta Bouncers.
Though they were eventually blanked 4-0 by the unstoppable Fives, the hometown squad salvaged their weekend with a victory over Palm Beach on Sunday—all while refueling on free burgers provided by their highly visible local sponsor, White Castle.
Feel-Good Stories and Roster Debuts
The Palm Beach Royals captured the hearts of fans in Columbus with the undisputed feel-good story of the year. Earlier in 2026, Grayson Goldin suffered two strokes, casting a massive shadow over his athletic future. In an emotional return to action, Goldin subbed in for Dekel Bar during a critical group play match against the Las Vegas Night Owls, ultimately clinching the match point in a DreamBreaker and celebrating on court.
Palm Beach also benefited from the official MLP debut of Sophia Seving. Seving silenced skeptics questioning how she would hold up against elite pro talent, turning in a 3-2 record with Tina Pisnik in women’s doubles and an undefeated 5-0 run alongside Tyson McGuffin in mixed doubles.
Old Habits and the Mid-Tier Grind
For pro player and commentator Zane Navratil, the tournament marked a highly anticipated debut with his new squad, the Chicago Slice. Facing his former team, the Fives, right out of the gate, Navratil provided the comedic highlight of the weekend when muscle memory took over and he accidentally shouted, “Let’s go Fives! Go Fives!” mid-match, drawing laughs from both sides of the net.
The Slice fought hard, putting Anna Leigh Waters “on an island” and holding a match point against Canerio and Waters before ultimately falling 3-1. Chicago went on to sweep the Black Bears and Florida Smash, finishing a respectable seventh place out of a brutal, uneven 6-team pool.
The uneven pool distribution remains a heavy point of contention across the league. With 20 teams in MLP and 11 attending each event, pools are inherently unbalanced. Teams placed in the smaller 5-team groups enjoy a massive statistical advantage, as four out of five qualify for the bracket, compared to four out of six in the larger pools.
The Basement and the Need for a Salary Floor
While teams like the Las Vegas Night Owls (5th place, 10 points) and the Atlanta Bouncers (8 points) showed flashes of competitive grit, the Carolina Hogs continued to struggle heavily. The Hogs went 0-4 on the weekend, landing dead last and failing to threaten the field.
The team’s ongoing struggles serve as a weekly reminder to analysts and fans alike that MLP may desperately need to institute a competitive salary floor—similar to structural guardrails used in the NFL and NBA—to prevent franchises from permanently operating at a talent deficit and compromising the league’s competitive balance.
