Hi friends!

This week broke my brain a little.

I dropped a brand new spin durability video where some paddles lost over 20% of their RPM after just 100 ball cannon hits. Others lost zero. Like, actual zero. I'll get into the highlights below, but if you want the full breakdown with the rankings and the high-speed footage, the full video is linked in the section!

We also recorded KewCast 104 with Eddie. Two new paddles on the bench, an Eric Oncins stat line that hasn't been done in five years of PPA finals, and an update on the JOOLA lawsuit.

A lot to get through. Let's dive in!

In this week's email:

Read time: 9 mins

PICKLEBALL NEWS

PPA Sacramento crowned a new mixed doubles champion, and the stat line is wild.

Eric Oncins and Tyra Black won gold in their very first event together. They beat the Johnson siblings, JW and Georgia, in five games.

But here's the part that broke the brain: across the entire match, their combined serves, returns, and third shots produced ZERO ERRORS. Zero serves long. Zero returns wide. Zero thirds in the net. Thanks to The Dink newsletter for covering this story.

PPA tour statistician Jim Ramsey says it's the only time it's been done in any PPA finals since 2022. And the first time ever in a five-game finals. Eddie and I sat there comparing it to our own third shot accuracy. I guessed I'm somewhere around 60%. Eddie said he'd be thrilled with 40%. These guys did it 100% across five games against world-class opponents.

Worth noting: Ben Johns & ALW were not in the bracket. So the door was a little more open than usual. But you still have to walk through it, and Eric Oncins and Tyra Black walked.

First, Eric Oncins did something else in Sacramento that lit up the chat: when the ball dribbled over the net at an angle that made hitting it impossible, he leaned in and blew it back over.

The point continued. The crowd went nuts. Lead ref Don Stanley physically cringed on camera and slapped Oncins with an unsportsmanlike conduct warning, citing his discretion as the ref.

Eddie and I both think it was creative, quick-thinking, and totally legal under the current rule book (although that just changed with the new UPA-A rulebook - more on that later). There are body shots in pro pickleball that are way more unsportsmanlike than blowing a dribbler over the net. But I get the other side too. If every pro started doing this every match, it would start to feel goofy on a national broadcast. And what about fanning the ball with your paddle? Same energy. Different optics.

My read: it's a heads-up play, it gets eyes on the sport, and the rare-occurrence factor is doing a lot of work.

Hunter Johnson got tossed from his match after chucking his paddle on the way to his seat. It bounced and clipped a spectator. He didn't mean to. But it also didn't look like he stopped to apologize.

I've had the urge. I think every player has. But this is exactly the kind of incident that forces enforcement, because next time it could be an eye. The right call from the ref, even if you feel for the guy in the moment.

Two weeks ago we covered JOOLA filing the ITC complaint to block paddle imports. Last week, they expanded.

JOOLA filed patent infringement lawsuits in multiple federal district courts on April 9th. These are aimed specifically at monetary damages, including "treble damages" (three times actual damages) for willful infringement. So now you've got the classic two-track strategy: ITC blocks the imports, federal courts go after the dollars.

Friday Pickleball put out an official statement that I thought was actually really well done. The gist: "The technology in those JOOLA patents is from a previous generation. We've already moved on to next gen. We'll defend ourselves fully if we have to, but we're confident this resolves quickly."

Here's where I'd push back on JOOLA's case. If I'm reading the patents correctly, the construction they're claiming (center core with a foam-or-air channel and a carbon fiber rolled frame channel) has prior art. That's been done before JOOLA filed. I’m sure every defendant on the lawsuit is looking hard for prior art. We’ll see where this goes...

ITC moves faster than federal court. Maybe 15–18 months for a final determination. The federal cases take longer, but an ITC ruling will absolutely influence them. We'll be watching.

DURABLE GRIT VIDEO

This is the segment I'm most excited about this week, and it dropped on the channel as its own video.

I just published the most rigorous spin durability test I've ever run. Controlled environment, 70 degrees, 50% humidity, brand new ball for every paddle, >2000 frames per second on the high-speed camera. Then I fired 100 shots at 70 mph at the exact same spot to simulate accelerated wear and re-measured spin.

The headline: three durable grit paddles lost basically zero spin after 100 hits. Not "minimal." Zero. A couple of them technically gained a tiny bit, which suggests the initial wear may actually expose more grit underneath the surface.

Here's the rough tier breakdown:

The big takeaway: initial spin does not equal long-term spin. And every single durable grit paddle outperformed raw carbon fiber on retention. But not all durable grits are created equal.

One quick certification note before you buy. Two of the tier 1 paddles (Honolulu J2CR Blue Grit and the 11Six24 Vapor Power 2) are UPA-A only. The Spartus P1 is USAP certified. For most rec and local tournament players this won't matter. But if you're playing a USAP-only event like the US Open, that's worth keeping in mind.

Also, just because some of these paddles didn’t lose spin in my controlled testing, it doesn’t mean they will keep their grit and spin forever in the real world. The spin on any paddle will eventually fade. But we’re seeing some of the best spin durability on these recent releases.

I'll be running this same protocol on Thrive's Clear Fusion Grit, Luzz's 984 Aero Grit, and Cyclones' Nanograph Grit next.

PADDLES OF THE WEEK

This one's been sitting in the lab for a minute. Hayworth ran one tournament with it before going to the Tornazo. KK (Kaitlyn Christian, no idea why the K) is still playing it.

Listed as 14mm. I measured 13mm. They say MPP center foam, which surprised both of us. It does not feel like any other MPP paddle I've hit with. It feels like a solid sheet of something. Stiff. Dense. Almost like foam-infused plywood.

Stats:

Eddie called it stiff as a board, and he's right. The pop is instantaneous. The ball is off the face in a blink. But there's almost no feel coming back into the hand, just harshness. It's a niche profile. Singles players who want pure pop might love it. For most of us, it's a hard sell at $175 when there are better feeling paddles in the same price range.

I jumped the gun on the podcast and accidentally talked about the 2026 version of the Glider before its release. Oops, sorry, Luzz! So I’ll hold off in this newsletter until the embargo drops.

This is the one I want you to actually pay attention to. Released April 15th. $100 with code JOHNKEW. Available for pre-order.

If you've hit with the original MPP Turbo elongated, imagine that exact build in a widebody. That's what this is. Same lower-pitched thunky sound (we did a side-by-side audio test with the Luzz Inferno, the Speedup, and the old Rhombus Ripple R2.14, and the MPP Turbo Widebody was the lowest of the bunch). Same massive sweet spot. Same instant response.

KewCOR: 0.404. High power category. Poppy.

Eddie's take after six games: "No errors, John. You're Eric Oncins reincarnated." The forgiveness on this thing is genuinely unreal. He hit very few off-target balls.

I'll say it plainly. This is the best $100 paddle on the market, and it might be one of the best paddles at any price right now. The only knock is the widebody shape feels a touch dated compared to some of the modern silhouettes, and the handle could be longer for two-handed players. Performance is undeniable.

If Enhance ships their durable grit upgrade later this year and keeps the price under $125, this thing is going to print.

Enhance MPP Turbo Widebody (10% off with code JOHNKEW)

TALES FROM THE BALL CANNON

I keep iterating on the cannon methodology, and Eddie pushed me on this one.

I ran a regression analysis comparing my arm spin (Stalker 3S radar gun) against ball cannon spin at 40 mph and 60 mph. Same paddles, same setup, same conditions.

Basically a tie. Neither is statistically significant on its own, but both show a clear positive correlation. Since 60 mph gets RPM numbers closer to what I'm actually generating with my arm on top spin serves (around 2,300 for the elite tier), I'm staying at 60 for now.

There's still a weird drop-off worth flagging. Three paddles (the Honolulu J2CR Blue Grit, the Spartus P1, and the 11Six24 Vapor Power 2) match my arm RPM almost exactly on the cannon. The rest are off by up to 700 RPM, with the Chorus Coda being the biggest gap. The relative ranking holds. The absolute numbers don't.

My theory: at 60 mph and a 30 degree paddle angle, ball slippage is exaggerated on less aggressive textures. The ridiculously gritty surfaces grab. Everything else slides a bit. I'm still iterating. More to come.

For now, the most useful thing the cannon does is the before-versus-after durability test, because everything is controlled. That part is rock solid.

KEW & A

The Coda is a high-power, high-pop paddle. Latest KewCOR I have on it is 0.43, which is right up against the legal limit. So you're playing one of the poppiest paddles on the market and the ball keeps popping up. That tracks.

The J2CR sits in the middle of the high power category. Less pop than the Coda, but still a lot. Maybe not the move for someone working on touch.

You also mentioned you played better with the J2NF. That makes total sense. The NF is on the borderline between all-court and power, which is exactly where I'd point you.

Other strong options: the Six Zero Coral (durable grit, all-court, low end of power, easier to control), and the Spartus P1 (KewCOR 0.38, top of all-court, ridiculous spin that's extremely durable). All three of those will help your pop-up problem more than the J2CR will.

Most durable grit paddles are still peel-ply based. Same process as raw carbon fiber: a sheet of pre-preg carbon fiber gets a cloth pressed into it under heat and pressure, the cloth peels off, and the negative impression of the cloth is the texture. That epoxy texture is what grabs the ball.

The difference with some durable grits is they're infusing the epoxy with hard particles before curing. Six Zero is using actual industrial-grade diamonds. That's the hardest material on the Mohs scale, harder than anything the ball is going to pick up off the court. Other brands are using ceramic and a couple of materials I promised I wouldn't spill on. The concept is the same: when the epoxy peaks wear down, the particles underneath are still there and still grabbing the ball.

Spartus P1 is doing something different. Under the microscope it's just particles, particles, particles. No peel ply texture I can see. Mostly ceramic elements. Selkirk's Infinigrit is sprayed on and uses a more durable epoxy. Different roads to the same destination.

Who's next: Enhance has a durable grit in the works. Vatic has something coming. Thrive's Clear Fusion Grit. Luzz's 984 Aero Grit. Cyclones' Nanograph Grit.

My prediction: by the end of 2026, almost all major brands will have durable grit options.

Mostly, yes. Here's the math.

USAP's rule of 24: the paddle's max length plus its max width can't exceed 24 inches. Square corners maximize the surface area and the sweet spot. That's why every modern competitive paddle is rectangular instead of circular like most other racquet sports.

If you make a perfect circle (lollipop) shape, you lose a ton of precious twist weight, and surface area. If you make it 16 by 7.5 instead of 16 by 8, you've left half an inch of width on the table. That half inch is twist weight. Twist weight directly correlates with sweet spot width.

There are two legitimate reasons to undersize. First, swing weight. Some pros want a lighter paddle in their hands and accept the smaller sweet spot as the trade. Rafa from Gearbox did this for a while with his hybrid shape, betting that hand speed plus spin weight (swing weight plus twist weight on flicks) would beat sheer surface area. He's since gone wider on most paddles, but he's smart and I wouldn't bet against him circling back.

Second reason: aesthetics. Honolulu makes a literal pizza-spatula-shaped paddle that maxes the rule of 24. Plays great. Massive sweet spot. Looks ridiculous. Almost nobody buys it because of that.

I’m finally back in business with another (warrantied) high-speed camera, and here’s the priority list:

Thanks for reading. Eddie and I appreciate every one of you who shows up week after week. The audience growth this year has been unreal, and it's because you keep sharing this stuff with friends who care about what's actually under the paddle face. It means the world to us.

See you in the next one.

—John

Save with code JOHNKEW on every paddle mentioned this week: