CBS continues to bet on pickleball becoming the sport of the future.
The Carvana Professional Pickleball Association (PPA Tour) announced a deal with CBS Sports on Wednesday for the 2023 season. The network will provide over 30 hours of coverage for what’s been described as the “fastest-growing sport in America.” The tour will be aired across CBS, CBS Sports Network and Paramount+.
Connor Pardoe, the CEO of the PPA Tour, released a statement on the deal:
“Pickleball has built an impressive name for itself in the world of entertainment in an extraordinarily short amount of time, and our agreement with CBS Sports is an important symptom of that,” said Pardoe. “Thanks to networks like CBS Sports, we’re able to showcase our sport and our professional athletes across the globe.”
This isn’t the first time that the PPA Tour and CBS have joined forces to televise pickleball to a national audience. Last year, the Skechers Summer Invitational was broadcasted on the network from Aug. 13-14 and viewership hit an all-time high. With ESPN’s inaugural Pickleball Slam doing impressive numbers earlier this month and the continued success of the Association of Pickleball Professionals (APP) on both networks, it’s only fitting that CBS would throw its hat in the pickleball ring again. Of course, some of those broadcasts have involved tennis legends, but the viewership numbers speak for themselves.
It should be noted that earlier this year, APP announced agreements with CBS and ESPN for all tournaments during the 2023 season. Both networks have already aired coverage of multiple events, including CBS Sports Network airing pickleball events from Punta Gorda and Mesa. In total, both networks will deliver hundreds of hours of APP Tour pickleball programming, which includes 12 hours of live matches and highlight drive-program on CBS Sports Network.
The next APP tournament that will be highlighted on CBS Sports Network will be the APP Sacramento Open at 7 p.m. ET on May 1.
CBS Sports will have its first weekend of coverage for the PPA this Friday, April 21, with the Tour’s Newport Beach Doubles Shootout. Live coverage will take place from 3-6 p.m. ET on CBS Sports Network and then on Saturday, it will be on CBS and streaming on CBS from 1-2 p.m. ET.
The current schedule model appears to be that the PPA Tour and CBS have agreed upon one weekend each month — except June — from now until August. It remains to be seen what the ratings will look like, but if all goes well, pickleball seems like it could become a permanent fixture on CBS and its other partnered networks.
[PPA Tour]
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.