The short answer: Tetsuya Sato, 56, a five-time All-Japan Doubles Champion and former Davis Cup player, struggled when he first took up pickleball with Japan’s Pickleball X group. Learning the third-shot drop changed his game, and he went on to win the Senior Pro 50 category in Ariake, Tokyo. He now aims to compete on the PPA Tour.
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From Power to Precision: A national tennis champion’s rebirth in pickleball
By Fabrizio Lavezzari, Japan Correspondent
In the high-octane world of professional tennis, the volley is a weapon of aggression. It is a punch, a statement, a decisive end to a point. For Tetsuya Sato, a man who spent decades perfecting that punch on the world stage, the transition to pickleball offered a rude awakening. The weapon that had served him so well in Davis Cup became his greatest liability in the “Kitchen”.
Sato, 56, is not your average crossover athlete. His resume reads like a checklist of Japanese tennis royalty: a five-time All-Japan Doubles Champion, a collegiate star at Nihon University, and a former member of the Japanese national team who stood shoulder to shoulder with icon Shuzo Matsuoka.
Yet when he first stepped onto a pickleball court with Japan’s top training group “Pickleball X”, he did not dominate. He struggled.
“I thought, simply because I was a volley specialist in tennis, that I could handle this easily,” Sato admits with a self-deprecating laugh. “I had this image of pickleball based on power, hard hits, fast hands. But for the first three months, I could not hit a third shot drop to save my life. I was terrified of the soft game.”
This is the story of how a master of power learned the art of precision, and why a former national champion is now dedicating his second act to professionalising pickleball in Japan.
The golden era and the “bubble economy”
To understand the scale of Sato’s transition, you have to understand where he came from.
Sato’s tennis career developed during Japan’s economic bubble era of the late 1980s and early 1990s. It was a time of corporate excess that filtered directly into sport.
After graduating from Nihon University in 1991, he joined a corporate team affiliated with NEC. In today’s terms, that might mean a desk job and evening training. In his case, it meant something very different.
“Strictly speaking, I was an employee, but I lived the life of a full professional,” Sato recalls. “The company was incredibly understanding of tennis. They funded my overseas tours entirely. For eight years, I did not have to work in the office. I just played.”
That system carried him to the top of domestic tennis. He was selected for Japan’s Davis Cup team in 1990 and 1991, when the squad was an exclusive group of four players.
While Shuzo Matsuoka was competing in the World Group, Sato was right there alongside him, anchoring doubles. He was part of Japan’s competitive core during a golden era.
The missed connection
Sato’s path into pickleball almost happened two decades earlier.
In 2006, while living in New York, he used to drive to a tennis club in the suburbs.
“I remember seeing these small courts from the freeway,” he says. “I thought, what are those strange courts? There were about five of them. I passed them every day.”
He never stopped. Never asked. Never turned off the road.
“If I had stopped then, I might have been a pioneer,” he says, almost amused by the thought. “But I just drove past.”
It was only years later, back in Japan, that the paddle finally arrived.
The adjustment was not gentle.
For a tennis doubles specialist, the instinct is hardwired: move forward, take the ball early, finish the point. In pickleball, that instinct often creates problems.
“In the first three months with Pickleball X, I was lost,” Sato says. “I had the technique, but not the understanding. I treated it like mini tennis. I hit everything hard.”
The psychological barrier was clear. The drop shot, a neutralising tool in pickleball, felt unnatural.
“In tennis, a slow ball gets you punished. In pickleball, it is control,” he explains. “I had to force myself to slow down. I had to learn that slowing down does not mean giving up.”
The turning point came when he stopped trying to impose tennis logic on a different game.
“I realised the people winning were the ones playing the soft game.”
He began drilling the third shot drop repeatedly, resisting the instinct to rush. Gradually, the tension eased.
From student to master
Once the adjustment clicked, his athleticism reasserted itself.
At a major tournament in Ariake, Tokyo, Sato went on to win the Senior Pro 50 category against top players from across Asia. But he is not focused solely on results.
Instead, he is analysing the structure of the sport itself in Japan.
“The biggest issue we have is what I call Gym Pickleball,” he says.
With limited outdoor facilities, most play takes place indoors on wooden courts with indoor balls.
“The game becomes too fast indoors. The ball skids. It rewards hard hitters. It does not teach the real soft game.”
For Sato, this is a serious developmental problem.
“If we want Japanese players to compete internationally, we need proper outdoor courts.”
He also sits in a unique position between tennis and pickleball communities, advising clubs considering conversion.
“Tennis people are cautious,” he says. “They worry about noise, about losing space. But pickleball is more social. It lowers barriers. It brings people back into racquet sport.”
The road to the PPA
Now 56, Sato is not slowing down.
“My ultimate goal is to compete in the PPA,” he says.
He trains with younger players, often decades his junior, and continues to refine his game.
Alongside that, he has launched a podcast, “Kitchen de Aimashou”, to grow awareness of the sport in Japan.
Looking back, he is reflective but clear-eyed.
“I used to think winning was about hitting the ball past someone. Now I know it is about placement, patience, and connection.”
He pauses.
“I am a rookie again. And I am enjoying it.”
For the man who once drove past those first courts in New York, the detour has become the point.
He has finally arrived at the kitchen line.
