Pickleball competition heats up — with millions of dollars at stake

A variety of entrepreneurs in the region are racing to get into — or get ahead — in the business of pickleball, with soon-to-be national leagues, all-encompassing social and sports clubs, and more.

By Mark Gordon
| 10:00 a.m. March 8, 2023
| 0 Free Articles Remaining!

Bob Strommen recently bought the first franchise team, which he named Naples JBB United, for the new National Pickleball League. The NPL is a team competition for players 50 and up.

Strategies

Bob Strommen is having a ball with pickles.

The financial services entrepreneur, motivational speaker and author has made it a mission in his later years — he’s 70 — to turn Naples into the pickleball capital of the world. So much so Strommen, managing partner of the Naples Pickleball Center, has trademarked the term Pickleball Capital of the World for the center, Naples and Collier County. He’s been digging and dinking to prove that ever since he took on the role, in November 2020. (In pickleball, a dink is a controlled shot into what’s considered the non-volley zone.)

“I told the staff when I got here that our goal is to look, smell and feel like the pickleball capital of the world,” he says. “And that’s what we’ve done here.”