Meeting Pickleball Pioneer Steve Paranto

Speaker 1 0:00

Hi, I'm Shelly Maurer and I'm Cher Emrick. Welcome to Life.

Speaker 2 0:04

Lessons from Pickleball where we engage with pickleball players from around the world about life on and off the court.

Speaker 1 0:12

Thanks for joining us. Welcome everyone to Life Lessons from Pickleball. We are truly honored to have with us today a living legend of the game, pickleball Hall of Famer, steve Paranto. Steve, you were there at the very beginning, competing in the very first Pickleball Championship in 1976, and you've been a driving force in the sport ever since, with a competitive career that spans six incredible decades. You're the longest running tournament player in pickleball history and Steve, your contributions go far beyond competition.

Speaker 2 0:52

You were the very first certified IPTPA pickleball instructor and have been teaching pickleball since 1980. And your father actually designed the very first composite pickleball paddle, a breakthrough that helped modernize the game and elevate its play.

From Ventriloquism to Vietnam Veterans

Speaker 1 1:10

But before we dive into your incredible contributions to pickleball and your family's role in shaping the game, we want to start with something a little different. Your childhood wasn't just athletic. It was actually, Steve, incredibly fascinating. You played tennis and bowled at the college level. In fact, we were involved in every ding-dang sport there is. But what really caught our attention was that as a kid, you were a ventriloquist and you even performed for Vietnam veterans, which really touches our hearts, Vietnam veterans, which really touches our hearts. How in the world did you, you young Steve Paranto, end up on a stage with a puppet bringing joy to people who truly needed it?

Speaker 3 1:53

Well, hey, thanks for having me on your show. Yeah, you bring back some old, fun memories of being a ventriloquist. I've always been passionate about hobbies and things I got into, and along with my father he was the same way. I don't know if you remember, but I'm 69 years old. Pick them all, you're 70. We all say that.

Speaker 3 2:16

But when I was about 10, Sears Catalog, which was you know, that was the catalog where you chose your toys for Christmas, which was you know that was the catalog where you chose your toys for Christmas and there was a Ventoliquist doll, danny O'Day, that I wanted so bad. And I still remember Dad thinking, oh you're not, we're not going to get my son a doll. You know if he has a doll right, and my mom talked him into letting me get that and I got good at it and started entertaining at school and doing Cub Scout shows. And then, before I know it, my dad is making me a handmade carved dummy from a book that he read that Paul Winchell wrote a famous ventriloquist when we were kids. And then my dad's taking me around to talent shows and had me try out for the talent troupe that would entertain Vietnam veterans before they go to Vietnam. And so I made it.

Speaker 3 3:15

I was the only kid in the show but I loved doing that. And then as a school teacher it came in so handy to have my characters because I've had different puppets and mannequins and ventriloquist characters over the years. One of them, named Kenny, became part of the school and the kids just I mean Kenny was part of the school. We entertained at the Christmas shows, the end of the school year show, the Halloween show, and when I finally retired from teaching. I don't know if the kids were more sad that Mr Paranto was leaving or that Kenny was finally graduating from fifth grade. That was the story that he finally got his fifth grade diploma and was going to leave the school. So kids were crying that Kenny and Mr Paranto were leaving.

Speaker 1 4:00

Oh, that is too sweet.

Speaker 2 4:02

I was always fascinated by ventriloquists when I was a kid. Just the way you can project your voice.

Speaker 3 4:08

Yeah, do you still do it so now, and so for many, my first, probably eight years after retiring. I retired when I was 54. I had a show called Parentos Pals and I did daycare center shows about five days a week during the summertime and I even did that while I was teaching school. That was my summer gig. I've always done jobs that I like and it was just really fun I got. I was really being motivated to do so. Everything evolved around the characters, but it was music, magic and juggling evolved around the Ventriloquist characters. And now today, many times when I have parties here at the Playhouse, one of my characters will come out and maybe even sing a pickleball song or something.

Speaker 2 5:00

Sorry, go ahead, Cheryl. I was just going to say those lucky kids, because you were an elementary PE teacher for 30 years and how fun.

Speaker 3 5:08

Yeah, it was a perfect occupation for me.

Speaker 1 5:11

It really was. It's like you've been a kid all your life and you just bring out that joy in everybody you are associated with, and especially with these kids. Being a teacher, you even taught juggling in school. I just thought that was so cool. What great hand-eye coordination, especially for pickleball. So, speaking of pickleball, how were you actually introduced to it?

Speaker 3 5:34

My freshman year of college I went to a two-year college. It was about 40 minutes from where my high school small town was Eatonville. It's called Green River Community College and what really made me want to go to college was to play tennis. I really that was. Then I became passionate about tennis and I was on the tennis team at that community college and it rains a lot. This is not too far from where the sport was invented. This was in Auburn, washington, not too far from Seattle, and it rains all the time. We didn't have indoor tennis facilities and we saw these people playing on the wood floors with these wooden paddles, playing with oh well, let's try that it's raining out.

Speaker 3 6:16

And a lot of us on the tennis team played a lot of pickleball or that was the fall of 1974. So I played and then we had tournaments 74s. So I played, I, and then we had tournaments. Probably one month into my pickleball career we had intramural tournaments at the college and a partner of mine, dave Lester we just kind of had a knack for pickleball because we also had some table tennis experience and he had a lot of badminton experience and combining those sports. Um, we dominated the college and and our and our. We won every tournament, um, and then we would always wind up playing each other in the finals of the mixed and the finals of the singles.

Speaker 2 6:56

I have a trophy that says 1975 from oh my gosh, I was gonna say, and that was back with those old wooden paddles when you were doing that uh, so it was similar to this paddle.

Speaker 3 7:12

Uh, this was one, you know, when pickleball ink, when barney mccallum was, you know, cutting out paddles out of plywood. This is basically the shape he made and this was one of the models, and this would have been one, one of the paddle types that we used at that time. Yes, wow.

Speaker 1 7:26

And then, at what point did you decide, hey, there's something off with this paddle.

Speaker 3 7:30

So my dad was my biggest fan. He would come and watch us play and he wasn't even a player yet, he was a Boeing engineer and we kept losing in the finals to the same team. They were top tennis players. I'll probably think of the name in a second. His dad was the Booth Gardner's son oh, I'm drawing a name blank on his first name, but anyway, a very good tennis player kept beating us in the finals and I went and I was at home at Eatonville with my parents that weekend and I go.

Revolutionizing the Paddle with Dad

Speaker 3 8:08

The ratio is all wrong on these wooden paddles. I weighed my wooden paddle. I weighed a pickleball it was 13 times heavier. I weighed my tennis racket in a tennis ball it was only seven times heavier. So I mentioned that to dad. This is ratios all wrong. Then, about two weeks later, he's already making prototypes which turned into this company. This is one of the first pro lights dad made and this is floor paneling from Boeing jet airplanes. He was a Boeing engineer and before long Dad's playing too, and became a very good senior player and became addicted to the sport and he was actually inducted into the Hall of Fame the first year with Barney and Joel Pritchard and Mark Friedenberg and Billy Jacobson as players, so I got to do his induction speech, which was pretty cool.

Speaker 1 9:02

And then it was just a couple years later that you were inducted, right.

Speaker 3 9:06

Yes, and I got to tell my dad that I was being inducted. He was dying at the time.

Speaker 1 9:12

Oh so.

Speaker 3 9:12

I got to tell him, but this picture is from that first championships in 1976. That's me hitting the overhead.

Speaker 1 9:22

That's a nice shot.

Speaker 3 9:24

When I still had some muscles and could jump. But that was that first tournament. That's kind of historical now, 1976 at SeaTac Athletic Club near SeaTac Mall at the time, and now there's even a book written on that. The man who owned that club, johannes Lissicki, just came out with this book. It's on Amazon about that tournament and about everything leading up to it.

Speaker 1 9:49

And what's it called?

Speaker 3 9:50

It's called Pickleball, the Bicentennial Tournament 1976. And I told him well, I got a picture. It's a picture I just showed you and he goes. Well, I've got a lot of pictures. I didn't know these other pictures existed. There's a picture in here of me hitting an overhead with Barney McCallum in the front row watching.

Speaker 3 10:08

So, you're playing in front of the inventor and then when you do a closeup of the people in the audience, my parents are in the audience and I knew they were there, but I couldn't remember where they were at. I just remember my mom saying in between matches, you better eat something.

Speaker 1 10:25

Good mom. Oh, that is so cool, and you mentioned you're at the playhouse, so tell us what that means. You're at the playhouse.

The Paranto Playhouse in Oregon

Speaker 3 10:36

Yeah, so this is the Paranto Playhouse. I have two indoor courts here. I have ping pong table, foosball table, darts, miniature bowling alley, shuffleboard, hockey game I probably already said darts, karaoke and a golf simulator. But you know what everybody wants to do. I have all these games, but they're mainly just playing pickleball. That's how much fun pickleball is. I might have every game in front of them, but they're just. My friends are playing pickleball.

Speaker 2 11:09

And you forgot to mention the home brew on tap.

Speaker 3 11:12

Yeah, I ran out recently, so I've got to brew some more. But yes, but see, now I'm coaching a lot of kids now, so I have root beer on tap and some uh, uh sweet tea on tap now too. So, yeah, I got to be careful those teenagers aren't getting into my uh, into my beer and you're in beaver creek in oregon.

Speaker 1 11:37

Yeah, oh my gosh, now do you have a house that's right next to this playhouse.

Speaker 3 11:43

And you built it, I built the playhouse, the house we live in is a farmhouse that was built about the year I was born, so 70 years ago.

Speaker 1 11:54

Wow, wow, yeah, it's an old farm area here. And we saw that you also honored your dad, who's, like you said, was your number one fan and has been such a part of the whole game, and you have honored him there on the court. Can you tell us about that?

Speaker 3 12:14

Yeah, In fact I was just telling people yesterday that were unaware of it because they were asking about my dad. My dad's been gone now for six years, but his ashes are under both courts where we tap paddles and that gave me chills.

Speaker 2 12:28

Yeah, that's so cool he likes.

Speaker 1 12:31

He loved that you said. I think you said that he was always good about tapping paddles. No issue, even if things didn't go his way.

Speaker 3 12:38

Yeah, he was a a great uh sport. I never, I never saw my dad get upset in any sport and he was an athlete, he was a top bowler. He um both of us had uh 300 games in competition and league. Uh, I, I, I never saw my dad um get angry on a pickleball court or bowling or golfing or anything we ever did. He just always was having fun. So, yeah, now my mom, on the other hand, she was very competitive and we had a court on a lake in the early 80s when Dad was inventing the paddle and you know how sound travels across the lake and we had lights.

Speaker 3 13:24

We'd play late at night and Mom would be. Maybe some foul words were coming from her mouth and from clear across the lake. One night we were playing and we could hear somebody say hey, lady, it's only a game. And we could hear somebody say, hey, lady, it's only a game.

Speaker 1 13:43

Little did they know.

Speaker 3 13:45

Yeah, so I do get a lot of that competitive nature, I think, from my mom. I try to emulate my father a little more than my mom on the court.

Speaker 1 13:59

Oh, that is really fun.

Speaker 2 14:01

You're still doing competitions now.

Speaker 3 14:03

Yeah, I just played, went to Arizona with my mixed doubles partner and I stayed with a men's doubles partner and all of us all three of us are 70-year-old virgins. So these were our first 70 and over tournaments, because we're all three 69 years old but calendar year 70. And uh, we did quite well. Judy and I won, uh, both, and we're playing top players in our age in Arizona. In fact, there was even four or five people from the hall in the hall of fame in these brackets that we were playing and so it was just a blast to see everybody. Um, this week I have Larry Moon coming. That's in the Hall of Fame. I always tell everybody I know Larry Moon's the best player in the world in my age bracket and he's been that way for the last 10 or 12 years that I've known Larry. So he's coming this week. But yeah, that's one of the great things about this sport. What other sport can you think of where you look forward to getting older?

Speaker 1 15:00

I know.

Speaker 3 15:04

I'm 70. I can play in the 70s.

Speaker 1 15:07

Next year I can too. Yeah, yeah yeah, actually, shelly. Yeah, shelly would like to be a senior pro.

Speaker 3 15:14

She's too young to do it now. Yeah, yeah, A couple more years. Yeah, 50 is a senior pro and oh 50 is a senior pro.

Speaker 2 15:22

Yes, I'm just waiting to get older and older, so as far as the pros go, seniors 50.

Speaker 3 15:29

And you know that's a short lived career because by the time you're 55, you're probably you're getting to be a little bit long in the tooth to compete with the 50 year olds.

Speaker 1 15:37

That's right. Yeah Well, 63 or something show. So, so cool.

Speaker 3 15:43

But there's always an age division for you. So in fact, speaking of that, visiting my playhouse yesterday was Joyce Jones.

Speaker 1 15:51

She was on our show as well.

Speaker 3 15:53

Oh, great, Great. Well, she was just at my house. She gave me this. This is her, you know, Guinea's Book of World Records oldest competitive player. So she played with Lala's Ladies yesterday and gave me a paddle and gave me this to put on the wall. So I've known Joyce for quite a while. I remember when Joyce was about the age I am now.

Speaker 2 16:09

Oh, wow.

Speaker 3 16:10

Thinking oh good for her.

Speaker 2 16:16

And now she's 94, right 95.

Speaker 3 16:20

She had her birthday while she was here. She came to play in a tournament up the road near Bend Oregon and she was celebrating her birthday while she was in a tournament this weekend.

Speaker 1 16:33

Yeah, you'll be doing the same thing, Steve.

Speaker 3 16:37

I have no doubt about it. I hope so. Yeah, like I said, everybody wants to be like Joyce. Everyone wants to be like Joyce in every way, her kind heart, her generosity and her great competitive nature.

Speaker 1 16:50

I mean just a remarkable person. Oh how fun that she was just there with you.

Speaker 3 16:55

Yeah, just yesterday.

Sharing Life Lessons from Pickleball

Speaker 1 16:56

Oh, very cool, Very cool. Just there with you, yeah, just just yesterday. Oh very cool, very cool. So in all these adventures you've had steve on and off the court. What life lessons can you share? Either lessons that you learned in life that you use on the court, or lessons you learned on the court that you used in life.

Speaker 3 17:15

Well, I, I, you know you always hear the people say that do something you love and then it's like you're working for free. You know, I mean, I mean you know it's like you're getting paid for free. That's how I feel about choices I've made, being a PE teacher and now I'm a pickleball instructor, and I've been. I mean I'm getting, I'm now getting paid money to teach pickleball. I was doing free clinics, for we would knock on fitness clubs and say, can we do an exhibition? And it was all for free. We did that for years.

Speaker 3 17:45

A lot of our people here I guess you've had Wes on the show. Wes would be. I would ask Wes to help. He would always help. Joy Lysing, christine Barksdale, who now lives in Arizona, enrique Randy, my doubles partner, randy Bythe. We just did all this for free because we loved it, and now people are paying us to do these same things. So if you could ever find something that you love and have a passion for and then give back to it, you're going to get. I've gotten so much more in return than I've ever feel like I've given it you're going to get.

Speaker 1 18:20

I've gotten so much more in return than I've ever feel like I've given. That's lovely. That's lovely.

Preserving the Spirit of the Game

Speaker 3 18:28

How would you quantify the changes that you've seen in pickleball over the years? Oh, I would love just to travel around talking about that to fit to pickleball clubs, because I've seen all the changes from at least I didn't know, I wasn't there from 65 to 74 at the at the court on Bainbridge Island, so I didn't see what happened then but from tournament level on, seeing equipment change you know my dad had a lot to do with that yeah, to a point now where I think we've gone too far in a lot of ways. I mean, we can't even measure who has a legal paddle anymore when you go to a recreational game, when you go to a local tournament it's the wild, wild west right now what paddles people are using and what could be delaminated. So we have to fix that.

Speaker 3 19:17

You know I watched the ATP shot occur because it never used to occur because we had nets strung from one wall to the other, so there weren't posts. Oh, atp being, when you can get it around nets strung from one wall to the other. The Ernie shot. We always figured that was an imaginary line. Now Ernie Perry is a friend of mine, he's played here a couple times at the playhouse, so we never pushed that limit.

Speaker 1 19:52

Go ahead and say what an Ernie is.

Speaker 3 19:56

So, Ernie, is when you can cheat the corners and you, you know you can jump the non-volley zone and just as long as you're outside and hit a ball, it's a great shot. I mean, I love that shot and I think the ATP is a great shot too. It's where I think we've gone too far is maybe not maybe. I think we've got to get a hold of the power on the paddles. I'm okay with the spin we've gotten to, as long as we don't go more spin. If we get too much spin then we don't have enough area to play the court in most of the clubs because you can hit the ball too deep, bounces too far, push people off to the side, into the walls, so I don't want us to go any farther there.

Speaker 1 20:42

I like that you want to share that message. We had Clay Roberts on our podcast and he's known as Mr Pickleball because he helped make the game Washington's Sport.

Speaker 3 20:57

I was there when that happened. Were you there?

Speaker 1 20:59

Oh, how cool. And he's so much about keeping the original spirit of the game and the very first serve of any match. The server should say are we ready to have fun?

Speaker 3 21:13

My men's partner, craig Palermo. He's one of my men's partners. The first thing he, uh, he always says is let's have some fun out there. Before we start any tournament or match, craig Craig's known for saying that. And so, yeah, let's have some fun out there. Uh. Another partner, randy Byther, who I, I do believe we're the longest running team. We've played in tournaments practically every year since the late eighties. Oh, wow, we were teaching, for we were teacher friends. Um, he's one of those guys that likes to find out everything about the other people on the other side of the net, even if we're going to play a. You know where are you from, how long you been playing, um, and you know joking with them, uh. So, uh, that's the beauty of, of, uh, of our sport is, uh, the, the with them. So that's the beauty of our sport is the social aspect, and that's not a new thing to be said, that's something that we all know about.

Speaker 1 22:09

It is something we know, but it's also something to keep highlighting, because it can get lost in the competitive spirit and I love that that's still being maintained and, in fact, the community that's for us is what brought us into this incredible sport and never going to leave it right 95 if I'm still alive. Hope I'm still playing.

Speaker 3 22:31

Oh, I do want to say uh, yeah, I'm hosting a podcast. It's called the pickleball fountain of youth. Oh, thank you you, yeah, and talk about. We all want to be playing this game the rest of our life and our show is really geared for the senior player. You can watch it on Selkirk TV and we're also on YouTube.

Speaker 1 22:51

Awesome, say the name again.

Speaker 3 22:53

The Pickleball Fountain of Youth.

Speaker 1 22:55

Pickleball Fountain of Youth podcast. Everybody go for that one right after this. Oh, steve, this has been so fun to catch up with you and, I feel, your dad with us right now. He's been so instrumental, and not only in the game but also in your life, and you've been so instrumental in the game and in our lives, so it's really lovely to have this kind of full circle, and your mama too. Bless her Love that she was yelling and they could hear her across the lake.

Speaker 3 23:26

They both enjoyed playing a lot.

Speaker 1 23:29

Oh man. Well, thank you so much for being a part of this show.

Speaker 3 23:33

Oh, you're welcome, I enjoyed it.

Speaker 2 23:35

Thank you, we really appreciate it.

Speaker 1 23:37

Really appreciate it and we so appreciate all of you who are watching and listening. Thank you so much. Oh my gosh, steve Bronto from the get-go. How nice to hear his story, and there are videos of his ventriloquism, so go on and watch those too. Awesome, awesome awesome, thank you all, and we look forward to a new conversation next week. Bye-bye. Awesome, awesome, awesome, thank you all, and we look forward to a new conversation next week. Bye-bye.

Speaker 2 24:03

Bye-bye. If you love our podcast, we'd be so grateful if you'd take a few seconds to follow or subscribe to Life Lessons from Pickleball. This ensures you'll never miss an episode and helps us continue these wonderful conversations.

Speaker 1 24:18

On Apple Podcasts, spotify or wherever you listen. Go to the show page and tap the follow button in the top right corner, and on YouTube, click the subscribe button under any of the episodes. Thanks so much. Hope to see you on the court.