Say goodbye to Alameda’s Bladium, hello to pickleball club The Hub

The ongoing pickleball revolution has boomed into Alameda with a loud “thwack” as The Hub, a club devoted to the increasingly popular sport, recently debuted down the street from Spirits Alley on Alameda Point. Related Articles Easier on players’ knees than tennis, pickleball’s origins go back to its invention in 1965, when it was first adopted by seniors. Having moved well beyond that niche, 35 million Americans of all ages today play pickleball on a regular basis.

“It’s a lot easier to play than golf. You can pick it up a lot easier,” says Hub co-founder Ted Angelo, whose business has replaced the former Bladium Sports & Fitness Club (see for details) in the hangar at the former Naval Air Station Alameda. “Think of ping pong on a bigger table.

Think of tennis on a smaller scale. “You just need to be able to get the ball back and forth. There’s different levels involved in it, but if you’re 80 or 8, you can play the game.

You can pick it up relatively fast. That’s why it’s so popular. ” Angelo says another reason pickleball has taken off is that it’s not as hyper-competitive as tennis.

“Generally, tennis is more of a singles game. Pickleball is more of a doubles game. It’s a social game.

Everyone’s friends, it’s nice. I mean it gets competitive at higher levels, but nobody hates anybody and the games are over in 15 minutes. It’s not long; it’s not drawn out.

” It’s also fun. “If you go to YouTube and watch the 2023 pickleball national championship, everyone’s talking and music’s on. You don’t have to be quiet.

It’s like watching ‘Happy Gilmore’ in golf. Everyone cheers, everyone’s yelling, everyone’s walking around. It’s not exclusive,” says Angelo.

Pickleball is also on the rise as a professional sport. Lebron James and Mark Cuban own teams, there’s a pro league (the Professional Pickleball Association) and players can actually make a tidy living at it. “If you’re Number 200 in the world in tennis, you’re just out there doing the grind.

You’re not making any money. If you’re Number 50 in the world of pickleball, you’re probably making $150,000, $200,000 a year,” says Angelo, who recently attended the pickleball national tournament in Dallas, where 5,000 signed up to compete and another 25,000 watched in the stands. “The top pros are making a couple million a year,” he says.

Pickleball also makes sense from a business perspective as owners of money-losing tennis courts are looking to add the sport. “All the country clubs now are putting in pickleball courts because they have all these dead tennis courts,” says Angelo. He should know, as The Hub’s first location in San Diego is on the site of a former tennis club.

The Hub’s Alameda location features eight indoor courts, seven outdoor ones in the process of being built as well as full workout facilities. The new location is part of a statewide chain that includes an all-outdoor pickleball club in San Diego, an all-indoor one in Campbell and plans to build six more in California. To further enhance the sport’s social aspect, plans are in the works to put in a waterfront bar where pickleball players can unwind after a few sets at the Alameda location.

“That’s going to be hot,” says Rosanna Shook, the wife of The Hub’s landlord, Brad, who along with partner David Shook ran the property when it was Bladium. A newly constructed wall now separates The Hub’s pickleball courts from the remaining soccer fields. When the outdoor courts are completed, the retractable wall separating the indoor and outdoor courts can be pulled open to take advantage of sunny days.

With the the sport’s popularity on the upswing, public court space at playgrounds such as Bushrod Park in Oakland is tight. For more accomplished pickleball players like Skip Sewell, 46, a former Ultimate Frisbee player who plays pickleball six times a week, having to wait in line to play on a crowded public court can be a buzz-kill. “The lights are not great.

The courts are temporary. There’s a lot of setup and breakdown, and there’s always a glut. If you go there any night of the week, there’s 25, 30 people waiting at a time for a court,” Sewell says of other nearby pickleball courts.

“In Oakland and I think Alameda there’s much less court space than there are players,” he adds. “There’s not one centralized spot where everyone knows they can drop in and get good games at any time. If we lived out in Lafayette, Walnut Creek, Concord, there are lots of courts out there.

“They have a lot more access, but this (The Hub) is kind of it for us at the moment. ” A monthly Hub membership runs $135 for pickleball and the fitness center. The one-time drop-in rate is $25.

The Hub is at 800 W. Tower Ave. For more information, visit .

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