It Started With a Search for Answers

I'm a former tennis player because I was burned out from playing tennis. I wasn't having fun anymore and, at least for me, the spark had left the game.

Then I watched a few videos—yes, on YouTube—about pickleball, and I thought I would give it a try.

And wow. The first game I played, I was hooked.

Now understand, I played badly, making mistake after mistake. And what's up with the scoring? 5, 6, 2? And all the time asking, “Am I a 2 or a 1?”

What the heck!

But after a few weeks, I tried to play tennis again, and all I could think was:

“NO WAY! Pickleball is now my game.”

I wanted to get better at playing pickleball, so I watched YouTube videos and listened to Instagram reels promising things like “Do these three things and you'll be a pro in no time” or “The secret to becoming a pro is...”

They weren't working for me.

So I started looking for systems that made sense.

A few lessons helped. But my background in Information Technology gave me another way to look at the problem. I've always been interested in systems, how they work, and how to troubleshoot them when they don't.

Then other pieces began to come together.

My experience practicing Tai Chi, learning about how the body works, and exploring ideas from cognitive science, cognitive neuroscience, and self-help literature introduced me to concepts like Situational Awareness, proprioception, and Mental Representations.

It was a little like having a clock, a radio, and a coffee maker and suddenly realizing:

“Wow. My alarm clock could wake me up with fresh coffee, my favorite song playing, and in time to go to work.”

Sometimes, things just add up.

A Different Way to Look at the Game

What emerged was a different way to understand a familiar goal:

How do you play pickleball better?

IT Guy Pickleball looks at that question from a different perspective and uses different tools to help solve the challenge.

The IT Guy in me looks at the player as a system.

The situation is the input. The player sees the ball, processes what is happening, and produces an outcome.

When something goes wrong, I look for the points of failure in the process.

Sometimes fixing one early point of failure corrects problems farther down the chain. Sometimes fixing it exposes another problem that was hidden behind it.

That's where my years of troubleshooting experience become useful.

The Puzzle

The IT Guy in IT Guy Pickleball loves puzzles—and he loves solving them.

Combine that with my love for pickleball and my compassion for players who are struggling with parts of their game, and IT Guy Pickleball becomes a pretty purposeful, organic fit.

I'm not interested in simply telling players what to do.

I want to help them understand what is happening, discover what is getting in their way, and find solutions they can eventually own for themselves.

The goal is to help players find their way through the pickleball darkness.

And the light at the end of the tunnel?

It's not an oncoming train.

It's a sunny day at a beautiful beach, a shady lounge chair, and maybe a couple of mimosas waiting for you.

Welcome to IT Guy Pickleball.