Unveiling the PPA Tour: Everything You Need to Know

Intro

Today’s blog post will take a deep dive into the PPA Tour. If you’re like me and just got into pickleball, you’ve probably started to watch some professional pickleball on YouTube, Pickleballtv.com, or maybe from some other source. Early on, I started seeing associations such as PPA, APP, & MLP, but never knew what they meant or what the main differences were. Naturally, I wanted to learn more about each league, what made them unique, who their top players were, and many other aspects of each league, but I couldn’t find any articles online with the knowledge that I was looking for. I imagine there are a ton of you all out there who want to learn more about these leagues and haven’t been satisfied with your Google searches, so I figured I would research, compile, and write in-depth articles about each of the “hottest” current professional pickleball tours. This is the first article of the series, and it will specifically focus on the Professional Pickleball Association (PPA Tour), which in my opinion is the current top professional pickleball league to watch.

Background

The Professional Pickleball Association (PPA Tour) was established in 2019 by Connor Pardoe & based in Draper, Utah.

Connor came from a tennis family, as his dad played D1 tennis but he had an aunt who was really into pickleball. He subbed in a tournament with that aunt and was immediately hooked. Connor worked at his company’s real estate company and spent 3 years managing an active senior living facility portfolio, where he had the opportunity to extensively watch and play pickleball. He quickly realized a couple of things: How easy and fun it was to watch pickleball, the low barrier to entry cost and athleticism-wise, and the casualness associated with the sport. From there he started recruiting pickleball top talents such as Catherine Parenteau, and Tyson McGuffin to play in the PPA, and from there the rest was history.

The PPA is best described as an individual-based head-to-head competition. While there are singles, and doubles events, there aren’t any permanent teams, players can choose their teammates and shuffle their doubles “team” around as much as they want. Since its creation, the PPA has pushed the slogan “Play where the pros play” They enforce this by having separate divisions for all age ranges and skill levels (pickleball skill levels will be covered in a different blog post) With the PPA offering structured tournament play for the professional and amateur crowd, it has allowed them to rapidly expand their fan base, by allowing fans to really be a part of the experience.

The PPA has other value propositions that make it unique, including a unique & fun atmosphere (pro player meet & greets, clinics, live entertainment, games, shopping, VIP upgrades, and food and beverages), an intricate scoring and ranking system (52-week, and the race), and hosts the most coveted title in the pickleball world, the PPA Finals. This perfectly segways us to the next section, season structure.

Season Structure

In 2024, the PPA announced that it was expanding to 26 tour stops that would be played across 16 different states. Most months of the year include at least two tour stops, however, there are a few outliers this year. April will have four tours, August will have three tours, and December only has 1, and that tournament is the PPA Finals, the most coveted pickleball title in the world right now. In 2023, the PPA Tour distributed $5.5 million in prize money, and this year, based on my calculations for the season structure of 15 Slams, 5 Cups, and 4 Opens, the estimated total payout for 2024 should be around $2.6 million.

Pay Structures Broken out by Tournament Type

PPA Slam Total = $125,260

	Men’s Doubles	Women’s Doubles	Mixed Doubles	Men’s Singles	Women’s Singles
Round 16	$688	$688	$688	$254	$254
Quarterfinalists	$1375	$1375	$1375	$509	$509
Semifinalists	$2750	$2750	$2750	$1018	$1018
Runner-up	$5500	$5500	$5500	$2035	$2035
Champion	$10000	$10000	$10000	$3700	$3700
3rd Place Bonus	$500	$500	$500	$165	$165
Bonus Draw Champion	$1000	$1000	$1000	$370	$370
Total Payout	$33504	$33504	$33504	$12374	$12374

PPA Cup Total = $113,298

	Men’s Doubles	Women’s Doubles	Mixed Doubles	Men’s Singles	Women’s Singles
Round 16	$619	$619	$619	$229	$229
Quarterfinalists	$1238	$1238	$1238	$458	$458
Semifinalists	$2475	$2475	$2475	$916	$916
Runner-up	$4950	$4950	$4950	$1832	$1832
Champion	$9000	$9000	$9000	$3330	$3330
3rd Place Bonus	$500	$500	$500	$165	$165
Bonus Draw Champion	$1000	$1000	$1000	$370	$370
Total Payout	$30304	$30304	$30304	$11193	$11193

PPA Open Total = $101,322

	Men’s Doubles	Women’s Doubles	Mixed Doubles	Men’s Singles	Women’s Singles
Round 16	$550	$550	$550	$204	$204
Quarterfinalists	$1100	$1100	$1100	$407	$407
Semifinalists	$2200	$2200	$2200	$814	$814
Runner-up	$4400	$4400	$4400	$1628	$1628
Champion	$8000	$8000	$8000	$2960	$2960
3rd Place Bonus	$500	$500	$500	$165	$165
Bonus Draw Champion	$1000	$1000	$1000	$370	$370
Total Payout	$27100	$27100	$27100	$10011	$10011

How do scoring and points work for the PPA Tour?

Admittedly, scoring and ranking for the PPA Tour is complex and can easily become confusing, so I will try to break it down in a simple manner.

Simple

Throughout the year, players will compete in up to 26 tournaments. Each tournament is worth a certain amount of points, and the deeper a player or team advances in a tournament, the more points they will earn. The points earned from each tournament will contribute to an overall ranking for pickleball players that is called the “PPA Rankings”

The PPA Rankings are important because it is used as a qualification and seeding factor for upcoming PPA tournaments. Additionally, the top eight players at the end of the season at the top of the PPA Ranking will qualify for and compete in the PPA Finals, which determines the #1 Pickleball player in the world for each event.

Exact/Complex Breakdown

There are three types of tournaments

Slam (2000 points)
Cup (1500 points)
Open (1000 points)

There are two scoring assessments for the PPA Tour Rankings

52 week: Points earned in the past 52 weeks of play
The Race: Points earned in the current calendar year

There are two types of draws

Progression Draw: This type is used for Slams and Cups and uses the following format. Each day includes all five pro divisions
- Tuesday: Qualifiers
- Wednesday: Round of 32
- Thursday: Round of 16
- Friday: Quarterfinals
- Saturday: Semifinals
- Sunday: Finals
Traditional Draw: This type is used for Opens and uses the following format. Each day includes all rounds of play up until the final
- Wednesday: Qualifiers
- Thursday: Men’s and Women’s Singles
- Friday: Mixed Doubles
- Saturday: Men’s and Women’s Doubles
- Sunday: Finals

There are three types of professional brackets, which are called draws, and they go as follows

Qualifier Draw
- Amount of players
  - The amount of players varies for qualifiers. Sometimes there aren’t enough people to host a qualifier, I have also seen instances where there are 32 – 67 players/teams in the qualifiers.
- Seeding process
  - PPA Touring players who didn’t qualify for the main draw
  - PPA points determine the remaining seeds
  - WPR is used to determine players with no points and players that have the same number of PPA Points.
Main Draw
- Amount of players
  - Up to 48 players
  - Up to 8 of those players can come from the Qualifying Draw
- Seeding process
  - Top 10 PPA points players over the past 52 weeks
  - PPA Touring players
  - Committee seed picks, seed 13 & 14 (Progressive Draw only)
  - PPA points
Points Draw
- Amount of players
  - Losers from the Qualifier Draw can enter the Points Draw to win PPA Tour points
Bonus Draw
- Amount of players
  - Losers from the first round of the Main Draw are entered into the Bonus Draw

Main Draw Points Table

1st Place	2nd Place	3rd Place	4th Place	Quarterfinalist	Round of 16	Round of 32	Round of 64
100%	80%	60%	40%	20%	10%	5%	2.5%

Bonus Draw/Back Draw Points Table

If you lose your first match in the Main Draw, you are placed into the Bones Draw.

Bonus Draw 1st	Bonus Draw 2nd
5%	2.5%

Points Draw Table

Players/Teams that lose in the Qualifier Draw will be placed into the Points Draw.

Points Draw 1st	Points Draw 2nd Place	Points Draw Entry
2.5%	1.25%	.5%

Who are the top players?

There are so many incredible players that play on the PPA Tour but for blog length’s sake, I will only include the top 10 from each event type as of the day I am writing this article (3.23.24)

Mens Doubles

Men’s Singles

Women’s Doubles

Women’s Singles

Men’s Mixed Doubles

Women’s Mixed Doubles

Who are the top sponsors of the PPA Tour?

There are a ton of sponsors for the PPA Tour, and they are split between seven levels of sponsorship: Platinum, Gold, Silver, Tour, Platinum Paddle, Gold Paddle, and Silver Paddle

The Platinum sponsors are the most common names that you will see when watching PPA events and are listed below.

Platinum Paddle Sponsors

Selkirk
Franklin
Vulcan

Where Can I Watch PPA Tour Matches?

If you haven’t already started professional pickleball, it’s time for you to hop on the bandwagon. Watching how the pros play is not only entertaining but can add so much depth and strategy to your own game. You can easily watch PPA Tour events via the following avenues:

Conclusion

In summary, the PPA Tour sits comfortably as the top professional pickleball league in the world. Allowing amateurs to “play where the pros play” remains a huge value prop and encourages many pickleball enthusiasts to not only come out and support their favorite competitors but be a part of the action too. Having the top players in the world exclusively play for their league doesn’t hurt their case either.

The PPA Tour continues to attract the top pickleball and pro tennis talent to their league and recently announced an upcoming merger with the Major League Pickleball (MLP) which is a team-based pickleball league (you can expect a future blog post on that league as well as the merger) With the PPA Tour continuing to innovate, expand, and deliver incredibly competitive pickleball events, I have no doubt in my mind that they will continue to be the top pickleball league for the foreseeable future.

If you took time out of your busy days to read this entire article or maybe just take a glance at a few of the sections that interested you, thank you so much for doing so. I am so thankful for all of the support that you all have been showing with the content that I am pumping out. If I can make any of my content more interesting or present it better for your alls liking, feel free to share your suggestions or critical feedback in the comments and I will happily read each and every comment. Thank you!