“Sorry.”

If you play in a regular group, you've heard it. You've probably said it. An “easy” dink lands in the net. Sorry. A return sails long. Sorry. You miss a put-away. Sorry.

Carol, a member of our community, posted about her weekend group of about ten women. The apologies come after almost every point. She keeps telling them there are no sorries in pickleball. It isn't sinking in.

Coach Tony took this up on the podcast with Kyleen Dye from the TRP coaching team. Kyleen knows this one well.

Why we say it

To be sure, the apology comes from a good place. It's courtesy. You care about your partner. You want them to know you take the game seriously. And if you're the newer player in the group, saying sorry can feel like the cost of being there.

But look at Kyleen's experience. She started playing with a group of women who all began at the same time and had no experience at all. Same level. Same mistakes. They still apologized to each other.

That tells you something. The apology isn't really about the shot. It's a habit.

We see it at our camps. On the first morning of camp, nerves can run high. “Sorry” is heard all over the courts. And many of the players at our camps tell us they never played a sport before pickleball. They're stepping into something new and difficult. That's worth celebrating. Not apologizing for.

Why it's worth letting go

Here's the truth. Mistakes don't interrupt pickleball. They are pickleball. Most rallies end in an error. Both you and your partner will miss shots in every game you play.

When you apologize for a mistake, you treat something normal as something wrong. And your brain is listening. Each "sorry" tells it that the last shot was a problem to be managed. So you carry it into the next point. That takes bandwidth. Bandwidth you need for playing the best rally you can.

It changes your partner's job too. Now they have to respond. Reassure you. Tell you it's fine. Two players are thinking about the last rally instead of the next one.

When a partner apologizes to Coach Tony, he tells them this: “I guarantee I'm going to make a mistake, too.” Probably soon. If that's true, and it is, the apology isn't needed.

How a group breaks the habit

Carol has trained herself not to apologize for every perceived mistake. Her group hasn't. That's the hard part. A habit this common rarely goes away one player at a time. One person can't change the whole court.

So make it a group conversation. Get together, name the habit, and agree to drop it together. Kyleen does this at camp over lunch. Once the excessive apologizing is named, people start to notice it. That afternoon, when someone says “sorry,” they look over at her and catch themselves.

Then give the group a replacement. People will still say sorry. It's hardwired. So pick a silly word to answer it with. We suggest Bingo-rama. Someone says sorry. The group hollers, “Bingo-rama.” Everyone laughs, and the player remembers. Little by little, the sorries fade.

The other kind of sorry

There's a second version of this. It sounds like: Am I good enough to play with this group?

A player once told Tony about a trip she took. She brought her paddle. She was an athletic 3.5 with some prior sports background. She found a group of men at the courts. She walked up and asked to play. They asked her level. She told them the truth. 3.5. They said no.

So here's what Tony told her. Next time, observe the group. If your judgment says you can hang, you're a 4.5. If anyone questions it after the game, tell them your coach, Tony Roig, rated you a 4.5. “Have them send me an email,” he suggested.

Tony is still waiting for that email.

Your rating isn't the point. The point is to trust your own judgment and stop apologizing for showing up. Take Kyleen's advice. Go out there, feel powerful, and play your game.

And if you're the one being asked if a stranger can play with your group? Be welcoming. One game with a player from out of town won't hurt you. 

Somebody welcomed every one of us into this sport. If they hadn't, we wouldn't be playing.

Extra coaching tip: Listen for the “sorry” that happens in your head. Plenty of players stop apologizing out loud and keep doing it silently. The effect is the same. You're still carrying the last point. When you catch it, swap it for a short, neutral note about what happened. "Too high." "Not enough energy." Then let it go. The apology keeps the mistake alive. The note turns it into information and closes the file.

Original content made by humans. Adapted from Episode 314 of Pickleball Therapy, “Sorry NOT Sorry with Special Guest Kyleen Dye,” with the help of AI, then edited by hand before publishing.