Chris Haworth spent about a year and a half on the pro tennis tour—winning less than he lost—before returning to Oklahoma City to coach. Pickleball found him later, and by climbing to the Professional Pickleball Association’s No. 1 in men’s singles, he emerged
When Chris Haworth finally got into pickleball, it didn’t feel like a career decision at first. It started as something a client kept pushing him to try after Haworth was already living a familiar tennis life—teaching. coaching. and making peace with the fact that his own pro dream never quite landed.
He had taken the pro tennis tour for about a year and a half. He traveled constantly, lost more than he won, and then went home to Oklahoma City to coach. He figured that was that—another chapter closed.
Then, a client he was teaching got into pickleball and kept after him to try it. Haworth finally did in 2022. “I kind of got hooked that first time,” he said, and the attachment kept growing. “and then it slowly grew and grew and grew.”
Within a few years, Haworth climbed to the Professional Pickleball Association’s No. 1 in men’s singles. He’s also become the sport’s most prominent openly gay man—something that still matters in a game deciding, publicly and culturally, who it wants to look like.
His husband. Jackie. travels to tournaments. and Haworth described how it feels to share the tour in a way that’s both visible and ordinary. “It feels really cool to experience it almost in a totally different way. to be able to be myself. ” he said. “Being able to represent the LGBT community is really important to me.”.
What he wants most, though, is for it to fade into the background. “On tour. he said. it barely registers.” And when Jackie is with him. Haworth said. it’s not something that needs extra explanation. “I’m just another player, and when Jackie’s with me, he’s just another spouse that comes along,” he said. “It’s nothing out of the ordinary, and it’s not something that needs to be overly talked about.”.
That hope would be easy to dismiss if Haworth weren’t winning. He is—often and convincingly—and he credits his tennis foundation for how he plays pickleball now.
Haworth grew up as a nationally ranked junior and played four years at Oklahoma State. In his words. the way he attacks still carries the old game in it: he comes from the baseline and uses topspin in a sport where many converts hit like they’re back on hard court. Size is part of it too. He is tall enough to reach without losing control, and reaching No. 1, he said, didn’t surprise him so much as validate something he’d been chasing since childhood.
“Everyone plays and expects to become number one. It doesn’t happen for everyone, so actually accomplishing it was pretty cool,” he said.
The moment that convinced him he belonged came against Ben Johns—the one name most casual pickleball fans can recognize. Haworth said he has beaten Johns a handful of times since. and even now he still sounds awed by the feat. “To be able to beat someone that’s done everything in the sport, this total legend,” he said. “Years from now he’ll still be looked at as the first great player in pickleball.”.
Outside of Johns, Haworth says, the sport still struggles with one of its biggest puzzles: the names people know. Professional pickleball is still working on building a broader set of recognizable stars.
That gap is happening as the audience expands fast. Millions of Americans play pickleball, and it has been the country’s fastest-growing sport for five years running. Last year, it pulled even with tennis in how many people play. The money has moved closer too—this spring. a $225 million investment folded the two main circuits. the PPA Tour and Major League Pickleball. into a single company.
The crowd is there, Haworth said. The stars are still being made.
He sees the problem at the local level. “You go to a random club down the street, and they can only name a few pros,” he said. For pickleball to grow into something bigger than a weekend phenomenon, Haworth believes it has to connect the millions of people who play with the people who win.
“The biggest thing pickleball is finding right now is connecting the millions of people that play,” he said. He wants stories built around players—turning them into people rather than distant champions. “Building stories around players, making them human, gives fans someone to follow.”
Age, too, is shaping the sport’s next chapter. Pickleball still skews older, with many players who came to it later in life, but Haworth thinks the future runs through the other end of the age range. Kids who grow up with a paddle, he said, could change everything.
He spent a week at a junior camp in Kansas City, where kids came in from all over the country. He said it took him back to his own junior tennis days. The pros at pickleball’s youth level are already young—he pointed to some who are 14 and 15 years old now—and for Haworth. that’s the direction the sport needs. “That’s the next evolution of where pickleball needs to go,” he said. “Getting kids involved.”.
In that same vision, Haworth said he thinks about the gay kid he didn’t get to be. He said he was never out as a junior tennis player, and he didn’t have a player to watch who made being out look unremarkable—something lived normally, not treated as a crisis.
“It doesn’t have to be this life-altering event that becomes front page news,” he said. “Just someone living a normal life, with his partner in the stands.”
Even with all the momentum around him—climbing to No. 1 and facing a sport that’s still building its star system—Haworth frames his goal in human terms. “Even if I can make a difference to one or two of them. that would mean the world to me. ” he said. “I’m trying to make sure I wear this the right way.”.
Chris Haworth pickleball Professional Pickleball Association PPA Tour Major League Pickleball Ben Johns Oklahoma State tennis LGBT athletes Jackie Haworth sports investment junior pickleball