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Family Pickleball by Coach Tobin

Nobody coaches alone.

Every method in this practice traces back to someone — a coach, a teacher, a mentor whose work I studied or whose patience I benefited from. This page is for them.

Where the craft came from.

A coaching practice likes to present itself as one person’s invention. It never is. The way I structure a drill, the way I read a stalled player, the way I talk to a nervous kid on their first day — each of those habits was learned from somebody, and most of those somebodies never knew they were teaching me.

The coaches below shaped how this lab works. Some taught me directly. Some I’ve only studied from a distance. All of them raised the standard I hold myself to, and if you train with me, you’re getting a little of each of them whether you know it or not.

Portrait of Coach Phil Dunmeyer

Coach Phil Dunmeyer

Everybody who coaches had a first coach. Mine was Phil Dunmeyer — and Phil was a visionary. He saw this sport coming while it was still obscure, built ten courts in Tustin before most people knew what pickleball was, and gave lessons to anyone who showed up, free of charge. The only fee he ever asked was that you pay it forward. Those were the first courts and free lessons in Orange County, and the model he invented still holds up today — the club he started is, by a wide margin, the largest single pickleball club anywhere. He taught me my first lessons on those courts. Then he told me I should be teaching too, and wouldn’t let me talk myself out of it. If you’ve ever taken a lesson from me, you’ve taken a little one from Phil — and he’s put it all in writing, many times over.

Phil’s books

If one of these coaches shaped you too, tell me when we’re on court. Good lineage is worth talking about.