I got the email in early October. It was from a Senior Director at Desert Champions, the group responsible for running the Nationals. "Good to see you in Vegas" the email read "are you available to talk tomorrow about working together at Nationals? How about 12:30pm?".
That email and the subsequent phone call (it actually took place about 30 minutes later once my kids were in bed) transformed my planned 12 days at Indian Wells from a Third Shot Sportswork trip into something very different. I was to be responsible for the planning and delivery of the official livestream broadcast for the Nationals -- and ambitious project of over 100 hours of coverage that included commercials, sponsor obligations, interviews and guest co-hosts.
I had done a fair bit of play-by-play work before (Pickleball Channel, CBS Sports) but this new role as the Producer was bigger and more complicated. It is fair to say that it was a little outside my comfort zone. This was a new beast.
The preparation included shared Google Docs outlining the "content plan" as well as texts and phone calls to make sure we were on track. I messaged Bill Francis from The Imagination Company, the Utah-based outfit that would be running the cameras. We had never worked together before but I had seen some of his streams from the Tournament of Champions.
Filawas the official apparel supplier of the tournament and they needed sizing information for shoes and clothing -- and quick. I was to be coaching in Florida in late October, so they shipped some samples to my hotel there to try on. A speedy email response and they were able to work to get the new clothes embossed with the tournament logo in time for the event.
I started to think about who I'd love to get in the booth to help do some analysis, but as I built my list I realized it was too early for commitments or schedules to be made, since their availability to stop by would often depend on their tournament performance and schedule. So I could plan -- but not that much. I was quickly learning that this was going to be a think-on-your-feet kind of project. Like any big event, you can make all the plans you want but you better be ready to drop them at a moment's notice and adjust.
Once it was made public that I’d be hosting Live @ Nationals I started to get message from people. Most were congratulatory. Some were people asking to be in the booth. The good news was, many of these people were already on my wish list. While we couldn’t yet set the schedule, we each knew that there was a desire to make it happen. I was off to a good start.
Fast forward a couple of weeks and it’s the day before the tournament. I met the rest of the team in the booth as well as the marketing team from Desert Champions. What I loved about this situation was that I was given the freedom to do my work, but also supported when I needed it. My boss Philippe and his team were terrific to work with.
I have to admit, it didn’t take long before I felt comfortable in this role. After all, as a professional coach I’m used to spending eight hours on my feet and doing a lot of talking. And luckily for me, the topic of pickleball was something with which I was pretty familiar. Perhaps the most fun was having various guests in with us. National Champions like Simone Jardim, Matthew Blom, Alex Hamner and (as of this tournament) Leigh and Anna-Leigh Waters dropped by as did Wesley Gabrielsen. Coaching experts like Sarah Ansboury, Morgan Evans and DJ Howard stopped in to say hello. We spent some time with USAPA people like John Jermstadt as well as other people establishing themselves in the PB world like Jay ‘Gizmo’ Hall and Noe ‘The Pickleball Doctor” Sariban. Michelle Esquivel brought her insights, as did Rob Cassidy and Lauren McLaughlin. It was a real eclectic mix of people which was something I enjoyed about the job.
The hours were long but satisfying. My boss was happy. Due to a variety of time and technological constraints, I wasn’t able to implement all of the plans I had. I wanted to do more roving footage. I wanted to shoot more matches on side courts. I wanted to spend more time talking with fans and players. Next time, I guess.
One of the things I wasn’t really prepared for was the post-Nationals talk on social media. I just didn’t consider that people would be particularly opinionated about the job we did. Perhaps that was naive. The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive but there are definitely critics. As one learns to expect on social media, some people are more constructive with their criticism than others. I guess the things to do is to take it in a stride, be proud of the work you did and work to make it even better next time.
Thank you to the team that made it possible: Bill, Janae, Jeff, The Flightscope Guys, Steve, Lala and the Desert Champions marketing team. Special thanks to all of you who took the time to watch and comment.
Want to watch the action? You can find it here.