Pickleball has been named the fastest-growing sport in the nation over the last two years, with 4.8 million Americans playing. The City of Cleveland is getting in on the action and using a huge under-utilized space to encourage more to play the game.
Within the historic walls of Cleveland's century-old public auditorium is a glimpse at America's latest pastime. The over 20,000 square feet of space in Downtown Cleveland is sometimes rented out on weekends for large events like concerts or graduations, but it's not entirely booked and busy. To get more use out of the space during weekdays, the Chief Operation Officer for Cleveland, Bonnie Teeuwen, got an idea.
"You see this venue here, it seems to be screaming something to happen and pickleball was the idea," said Teeuwen.
Every Tuesday, the Public Auditorium has transformed into indoor pickleball courts for the past month, and it's popping off; the courts get filled fast.
"We sent a note to all our friends who play pickleball to tell them to come on down, so it should be lots of fun," said Joanne Yarbrough. "There's so much space, and it's great."
Players play for free from 5 to 8 p.m., but the city might start charging.
"We don't want it to be too, too crowded, but we also don't want to charge too much money to be used so that's the real goal," Teeuwen added. "We hope with people coming in here to play pickleball they might have some ideas for how they want to rent the space."
Cleveland City Council President Blaine Griffin thinks this is a good use of the space for now but wants to continue marketing the auditorium to generate revenue for the city. Just the other week, the NCAA Women's Final Four headlining performer, Latto, took the stage inside the venue.
"Of course, concerts and plays and those things are important, but I would venture to say other things like sports events or other special venues or other things where we're trying to coalesce and bring the entire city together," Griffin said.
For now, many feel pickleball is a serve in the right direction.
"I am just a competitive person, I really don't get to show it a lot especially during work so coming here and getting beat up with my best friends is the best thing ever," said Jaden Baxter.
