I have a pickleball court in my backyard. Playing pickleball on a private court is a bit different than playing on a public court in a public park. If you accept an invitation to play on my court, please comply with all of the following requests and guidelines…

Never invite players to join us without getting my consent first.

This is a simple matter of numbers. I have a single court, which is great for 4 to 6 players. There are no additional courts that can accommodate an overflow of unexpected players, so if we have 7 or more players then there will be a lot of sitting and waiting to play. Nobody wants that, so please check with me before you invite anybody to join us.

If you must back out, contact me immediately.

If you have accepted an invitation to play but you later find that you cannot make it, please let me know as soon as possible! If you wait too long to tell me then I may not have enough time to find another player to take your spot, and that might leave us with fewer than 4 players. At a public park, having 3 players isn’t a huge problem because there’s always another player dropping in every few minutes. That’s not the case in my backyard where play is by invitation only.

Please sign up for DUPR.

All matches played on my court are logged in DUPR, which is a free pickleball player rating service. We cannot log a match in DUPR unless all 4 players that played in that match have DUPR accounts. Therefore, if you’re going to play on my court, you are expected to have a DUPR account. If you are not familiar with DUPR, all you have to do is download the DUPR app to your phone (it is free) and sign up for a DUPR account (that’s free too) using your email address as your username. If you need help doing this, I’ll help you when you arrive at my place to play.

You’ll play at your own risk.

If you play at a public court and you suffer an injury, you do not expect the city to pay for your medical care. I ask that you to extend that same courtesy to me. If you suffer an injury while playing on my court, please leave me out of it. You have your own health care coverage, so you deal with it. If you ignore this request and pursue an injury claim against me, forcing me and my insurance company to get involved in the matter, then you’ll have the burden of proving negligence and wrongdoing on my part – and, regardless of the outcome, you’ll never play on my court again.

What should you bring with you?

Bring whatever you’d normally bring with you to play at a public court.

I have plenty of pickleballs, so you won’t need to bring any pickleballs. You should bring your own paddle unless you’ve asked me in advance to provide a paddle for you.

If you’ll need to charge a phone while we play, I do have an electric outlet in my backyard that you can use. Of course, you’ll have to bring the appropriate charging cord/adaptor. Please note that I’m an Android guy so I won’t have any Apple accessories that you can use.

I have outdoor furniture so you do not need to bring a chair, but you can bring your own chair if you’d like to. You can see some of my outdoor furniture in the background of the following photo.

What should you NOT bring with you?

Please do not bring chewing gum on to my property. Gum presents a clean-up nightmare that I want to avoid! If you’re seen chewing gum on my court, you will not be invited back to play again.

Please do not bring a boom box or any other means of playing amplified music. We won’t be having any music while we play on my court.

Please do not bring alcohol, tobacco products, recreational drugs, or weapons on to my property.

Please leave your pets at home.

Your paddle is the only item that you’ll bring on to the court.

Please feel free to bring your pickleball bag, bottles, food, towels, chairs, etc. into my backyard but do not bring those items “inside the cage” and on to the court with you.

There is only 5.5 feet of out-of-bounds space available on each side of the court, between the court lines and the fence. That’s probably less space than you are used to playing with. We don’t want any items cluttering up that limited out-of-bounds space to create an injury hazard. We want to keep all of the court space free to give players room to maneuver. Therefore, you’ll keep your bags, bottles, snacks, drinks, towels, etc. outside of the court’s fence. The only thing that you’ll bring inside the cage with you is your paddle. Everything else stays outside the cage.

I want to keep the court surface looking new for as long as I can, so I want to avoid stains from food and drinks. The easiest way for me to do that is to prevent all food and drinks from entering the court. If you need a drink or a snack, you’ll have to exit the cage.

I hope that the 2 signs on the court’s gate make everything quite clear…