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Happy MLP Finals week to all who celebrate. After months of nonstop events, the four top teams have assembled in New York City to fight it out for a shot at the title.

Can Brooklyn or Dallas play spoiler, or will this come down to a battle of the titans — Anna Leigh Waters and the 5s vs. Anna Bright and the Shock? It’s the blood feud everyone is hoping for. We break down all the storylines below.

In This Issue:
— The next pro tennis convert?
— 3 keys to a killer drip shot
— The greatest comeback story ever

Let the games begin.

A Massachusetts man has sued his town over ongoing noise complaints associated with pickleball courts at the local high school. The constant popping noise has degraded his quality of life, he says, leading to heightened stress and more fights with his wife.

What feels better: body-bagging an opponent, hitting an ace, getting a lucky net-cord winner, or making the other team start arguing with each other? Zane and Nico discuss on this week’s PicklePod.

After a bizarre loss to a 22-year-old in North Carolina, tennis star Daniil Medvedev contemplated a life change. “Maybe I should start a career in pickleball,” he quipped. “Not too late. Doubles … With Jack Sock.” We’d certainly tune in for that.

There are countless intangibles that make ALW so great. But one surefire technique that sets her apart is her backhand swing shape. Every approach is set up the same way, but she can hit an aggressive dink or devastating drive in the blink of an eye. Fellow pro Zane Navratil breaks it down.

If there’s one shot pros love that amateurs generally skip, it’s the drip.

Not the drop. Not the drive. The spinny, deceptive, off-speed middle ground. It’s easy to execute once you know what you’re doing. And a nightmare to deal with on the other side of the court.

Here are three tips for adding some more drip to your game.

❎ First, the why. The drip prioritizes spin and placement over pure power. Instead of ripping a drive, you’re sending a diving, topspin-heavy ball deep into the kitchen. Hit correctly, it instantly puts your opponents on defense and sets up your next shot.

❎ To hit it right, drop your paddle-side knee into position, and use that knee as a physical block to limit your paddle backswing. Next, drop your paddle face entirely below the ball before contact, brushing up and through the back of the ball and finishing at your paddle-side shoulder.

❎ If a full drive is hit at 100%, a drip is somewhere closer to 60 or 70%. Keep it about a foot above the net and aim deep in the kitchen. The slower pace and heavy topspin will cause it to dive at your opponents’ feet.

Here’s the kicker: Unlike a standard drop, a drip is tricky to take out of the air and nearly impossible to attack off the bounce. Even a great drop can be sped up. Not so much with a well-executed drip.

Convinced yet?

➡️ Watch and learn.

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Pick the size that matches how you play.

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Six months ago, Grayson Goldin suffered two strokes and temporarily lost his ability to fully communicate. Doctors couldn’t tell him exactly how much of his speech would return. His first steps back toward pickleball were literally that: 10-minute walks, light dinking, and painfully slow progress.

This weekend, he won his first PPA title in Shenzhen.

Goldin joined Zane and Nico and walked through the entire journey — from waking up unable to form sentences, to navigating his recovery and MLP uncertainty, to finally breaking through in China.

And the gold-medal match was appropriately ridiculous. Down 10-5 in the third, Goldin rattled off seven straight points to steal the title.

“It wasn’t necessarily about the win,” Goldin said. “It was the culmination of just everything.”

➡️ More from Grayson.

On this week’s PicklePod, the guys go deep on this weekend’s MLP Finals in New York — aka, as Zane calls it, the “Super Bowl of pickleball.”

A few predictions:

— Both Zane and Nico have the St. Louis Shock winning it all.
— Nico is calling for a Brooklyn upset over New Jersey; Zane still has the 5s advancing.
— Both give Dallas just a 1% chance to win the championship. Savage.
— Zane says anything other than a Shock-5s final would be a disappointment.

Plus: Grayson Goldin explains how to generate serious power on the serve, the crew drafts the best feelings in pickleball, and we learn that getting your opponents to start fighting with each other absolutely qualifies.

➡️ Watch the full PicklePod here.

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We’re laying it on thick with MLP Finals this issue, we know. But in just a few days, the 2026 season will be over for good. SORRY we’re so excited. It’s only one of the best pro events all year…

Quick refresher: This Friday, the final four teams face off in the winner-takes-all MLP Finals weekend.

Semifinals take place Friday and Saturday. The 5s were the top seed, so got to choose their opponent between Brooklyn and Dallas.

The two winning teams will face each other in the finals on Sunday — a best-of-three series for the title of 2026 MLP Champion.

A Shock vs. 5s final would be electric. Both teams are brimming with superstar talent, and yet neither has hoisted the MLP trophy.

Will we get the matchup everyone wants, or can Brooklyn or Dallas play spoiler and make things more interesting?

➡️ Event format, predictions, storylines, and more — all right here.

A review from the Dink Fam...

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