Paradise Pickleball Club does a Prince

Pickleball Federation of the Northern Mariana Islands president Nelson Krum, left, in action during the group’s first-ever tournament last Oct. 30 at the Capitol Hill tennis courts. (MARK RABAGO)

Might as well call them the group formerly known as Paradise Pickleball Club of Saipan after the fledgling association changed its name to the Pickleball Federation of the Northern Mariana Islands.

PFNMI president Nelson Krum said the name-change came about after the International Federation of Pickleball made them a provisional member.

“We have been approached to join the International Federation of Pickleball and one of their requirements is rather than have a local club name like Paradise Pickleball Club of Saipan they wanted it to be either a federation or association,” he said.

Krum, who co-founded the club in August last year with his wife Donna, said the IFP is quite aggressive in recruiting local federations in their quest for pickleball to become part of the Olympics.

“So now that we’re the Pickleball Federation of the Northern Mariana Islands they’re considering us a country. There are 66 countries in the international federation and they’re considering us to be a part of that.”

Krum said becoming the 67th country to join the IFP will only make them eight countries short of pickleball being considered for inclusion in the Olympics.

“You have to reach 75 countries first for a sport to be considered for the Olympics and the International Federation of Pickleball has 66 countries now. The CNMI can be the 67th.”

IFP membership chair Steve Sidwell, in a letter to Krum, welcomed the rechristened PFNMI to the fold as a provisional member.

“It is with great pleasure that we welcome the Pickleball Federation of the Northern Mariana Islands, representing the Northern Mariana Islands, to the International Federation of Pickleball as a provisional member and the latest member country of the global authority for pickleball!

He added that with the appointment, PFNMI agrees to support the IFP constitution and bylaws as the 67th member country of the IFP.

“As a note of clarification, we have just recently added the new ‘provisional’ IFP member country classification. Going forward, this classification will be assigned to all IFP member countries who do not yet have an active National Olympic Committee (NOC) in place. Apart from this, provisional member countries enjoy all the rights and privileges of IFP affiliate member countries,” said Sidwell.

PFNMI held its first-ever tournament at the Capitol Hill tennis courts last Oct. 30 with Donn Dunlop and Leith Poole topping a field of 16 players after accumulating a perfect 105 points each in a round-robin format.

In a little over a year of existence, PFNMI has grown from five regular players to 20. It also now has three courts at the Church of Latter-day Saints along Middle Road and four courts on Capitol Hill.

With over 3 million players, pickleball is arguably the fastest growing sport in the U.S. and its popularity has spread all over the world as pickleball—with the recent recognition of the CNMI—is currently played in 67 countries.

With regards to the Prince reference, the late great American singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, record producer, and actor for a while changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol and was sometimes referred to as the Artist Formerly Known as Prince or TAFKAP.