Zane Navratil has built a rather impressive pickleball resume since turning pro in 2020.

From winning medals and MLP titles to co-hosting the popular PicklePod podcast, Navratil definitely has a genuine passion for America's fastest-growing sport.

The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater product recently spoke at the 2024 Pickleball Business Forum where he shared some insight for high-level tennis players interested in embarking on a new adventure on the 20x44.

“The first question is: Do you really want it?” remarked Navratil. “There’s a lot of people that might be coming off a pro or college tennis career and they’ve seen a bunch of people who were former tennis players now succeed in pickleball. I would be a perfect example of that. I played Division III tennis. I had a great time, but I was not this super special tennis player.”

Now, Navratil is a veteran among his peers.

And he currently ranks in the Top 20 in men’s doubles on the PPA Tour.

“The question is: Do you want this as a living or do you love pickleball?” asked Navratil. “If your answer is that you want this as a living, then it’s probably not the right thing for you. You have to be obsessed with this game. You have to practice somewhere between as much as a tennis player and a golfer practices, which is spending hours a day drilling on the court.”

Navratil went on to explain that players must be willing to do whatever it takes to succeed. Sometimes, that can look like uprooting your life to move to a pickleball hotspot like Austin, TX where other pros are training. 

“If you don’t respect this game, it doesn’t matter how good you were at tennis,” he insisted. “You have to be obsessed with this game to get anywhere.”

A former collegiate tennis player in her own right, Anna Bright commented on the topic as well.

She mentioned that several tennis players have already picked her brain about pickleball.
And they generally assume that the transition from tennis to pickleball is fairly straightforward.

“Some people see pro pickleball as something easy and some kind of escape from a normal job, but it takes a lot of hard work, talent, and skill,” said Bright. “Every top pro and everyone who’s regularly being shown on PickleballTV, we’re all addicted. Even if that addiction changes from the start to where we are now, you still have that addiction. That’s a requirement.”

Navratil commented on Bright’s point.

“I’ve seen a lot of people say, ‘I’ve beat someone like Anna at tennis, and she’s No. 2 in the world in pickleball, so pickleball should be easy for me.’ But, that idea has no bearing on how you’re going to be at pickleball,” he added. “Jack Sock is a perfect person to transition from tennis to pickleball. His skill set in tennis translates better than almost anybody else, and he’s had good results and bad results. But, if he doesn’t get obsessed with pickleball, he’s not going to be No. 1.”

It's safe to say that being good at tennis doesn’t guarantee pickleball success right off the bat.

Being addicted to pickleball is the first step on the journey to becoming a real pro.