Smash Olympics, Pickleball Cocktails & De-Influencing Energy | Smash Park Team

🚨 Smash Park is changing the game! Pickleball?  Axe throwing?  Giant Jenga, cornhole, and a SHOTSKI?! 

We sit down with Cody and Jerry from Smash Park, the pickleball and entertainment hotspot that's bringing serious fun to courts across the country.

 We’re talking:
🔥 The rise of Smash Park leagues and how they cater to every skill level
 🍹 Pickleball happy hours – genius or just an excuse to day drink?
 🎯 The Smash Olympics—yes, they’re combining axe throwing, pickleball, and more into one epic challenge!

And in Dink or Destroy, we’re diving into the world of de-influencing – is this the end of consumerism or just another marketing ploy?

🎧 Tune in, weigh in, and keep the dink soft and the energy BIG! 💥

Transcript

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Speaker 4 (00:00.078)
Smash Olympics.

Yes

at the heart of what Smash Park is, is Pickleball.

This is Big Dink Energy, the pickleball podcast that's half insight, half nonsense, and all entertainment. If you love pickleball, don't take yourself too seriously and think a little trash talk makes the game better. Welcome home. This is the place where life and pickleball intersect. We celebrate the chaos, call out the nonsense, and put the fun back in dysfunction. You're either in or you're out. And if you're still listening, you're in. So let's go.

Big Dink Energy starts now.

Speaker 3 (00:50.19)
Okay, so yesterday we got invited to an open house, which was super awesome.

Dink Den. Dink Den in Waco, Texas. Shout out to you guys.

At the time we got there, it wasn't very busy, which was nice for us. So we started playing, just all of us, our family, you know, just on, they had six courts and we were just on one court. And there was four other people next to us playing. I lost, so I was off our court. And I noticed that one of their players, you know, gathered all her stuff and walked away. So being nice, I walked over there, because they were just hitting the ball.

That's our community, that's the Pickleball community.

So I walk over there and I was like, do y'all need a fourth? And they just kind of looked at me and then they kind of looked at each other and they were like, okay. And first of all, that was like my first indication. Like that's not the warmest welcome and that's not the welcome I was looking for. And you know, my sister and I go all over the place and play pickleball at, you know, different places in the States. And everybody has always been like super welcoming.

Speaker 5 (01:55.693)
Welcome

Yeah, so, okay, red flag number one. Finally, they say yes, and I go and I'm next to this guy because now I'm his partner because he was the one that whose partner left. So we back up, we're about to play.

I want to say I saw the guy and he wasn't like phenomenal shape or anything like that. Just an average person on it. average player. Wasn't like, you know, pickleball superhero or anything like that.

No. And so we're about to start and the people on the other side will call her like Madame Wimbledon because yes, because she literally backed up and then she said, are you ready? To you? To me. And I was like, well, yeah, I mean, I'm ready.

You should call her Karen.

Speaker 1 (02:37.502)
But not in a friendly tone, Morita.

Not really. so, number two, wails this ball at me. Like she's trying to get on ESPN, like top 10 plays. Of course I miss it. I wasn't expecting that. And then my partner, coach Chad, we'll call him because he pretty much schooled me the whole time. Move up, move back. Don't be in the kitchen. Watch the line. Be over here. I'm like,

Red flag number two.

Speaker 5 (03:07.574)
Are you gonna move up? I heard him say, are you gonna move up?

Yeah, I'm like, dude, it's not boot camp. Like, I just wanted to play, right? So just fall. Right. And then he'd get mad when I was like, I'm sorry, but I don't know the score because it the game was moving so fast and the balls were flying at me. saw. Yeah, and I. Yeah, and I just well, and I I remember looking over at you guys going like, this is gutthroat. Somebody get me out of here. Yeah. So we're done now. Right. And.

here for a friendly game of pickle.

Speaker 1 (03:25.076)
So many fly right by your face.

Remember Zero?

Speaker 3 (03:38.804)
the score is just terrible. And so I was like, well, thanks for letting me play, you know? And the lady was like, well, you had some good returns. I'm like, okay. So warm. So the best part here is when we got done and we go up to like tap paddles or whatever, they, all three look at each other and they're like, now do you want to play our game of cutthroat we were playing? So I was this huge inconvenience apparently. And I was just trying to be nice. Like the...

Nice.

Speaker 3 (04:07.498)
Apparently I interrupted what they were doing. Yeah, so so just say no, we're playing a game. would have been like, okay cool

But there is no need to be rude.

The whole thing was weird because it was like the place, was for Dink Den in Waco, Texas again, it was their grand opening. was come see our pickleball courts, play for free, see what we're all about. Yeah, but these people who acted like this was their personal court, their personal shop that they go to all the time, totally, totally standoffish. I watched, we played on the court next to them and I watched when a couple of our balls went over.

It was open play

Speaker 5 (04:43.918)
You know, we got kids with us and we're, you know, we're just mediocre pickleball players. That's why we started this thing. And it looked like it was like the biggest inconvenience to them. Like they were, they had their own tournament going on that nobody else knew about.

Right, and she served it at me so fast and so hard, like the very first time, and I'm thinking...

It was a good serve. I I watched it fantastically. Barely skimmed

Like, why do you hate me? Yeah. Why do you hate me right now, lady?

Yeah, and that's not our... Maybe it's just our expectations are, I don't know, too low, too high, but for the community, I mean, there's been no place that we've gone that I remember that it wasn't welcoming. I don't care if you're a super duper, whatever that is, a four or five, I mean, I don't know what a duper is to begin with, but why not be welcoming? Why not be encouraging to people who are...

Speaker 3 (05:36.942)
And you knew the game was gonna go fast cuz I know you saw me play cuz they were they knew when I walked over they were probably

Do you want to talk about the outfit she on or no? If we can do it at another point or something?

Well, mean, just I don't think you need to wear a sun hat when you're indoors.

We had indoor courts. What's up with the visor?

Like, let it go,

Speaker 1 (05:56.884)
There's no reason for that. We're all here to have fun. If, you know, this wasn't a professional event. I mean, the venue and the ding-dong, everything was fantastic. The owners are amazing. Yeah, they were great and welcoming. But when you have people that are just rude, it just ruins the entire experience.

Shout out to you.

Speaker 3 (06:17.74)
It's like casual, not competitive. I don't know. And I'm not great either, but when my sister and I travel, we played with some kids that had never even played before. And they were like, can we play with you? And we're like, of course. And then we just dipped the ball back and forth. didn't keep score. We were just like, OK. And each time, we just kind of gave them like, this is something you do. This is a new rule. Or let's try it this way. Let's try it that way. But before I go on and on, just saying, I was just like, no, no, ma'am.

Like, get out of here.

Yeah, I was, you know, we were invited because of our podcast and we're going to have Dinked In on for sure. But it did seem like, well, if you're here to sell Dinked In and this is going to be where you play, I mean, it's kind of a turnoff for me. Like, am I going to encounter you next time I come to Dinked In and I just want to, you know, be my mediocre self and you're going to be, you know, hogging your courts and treating everybody around you like they're not pros like you are? I don't know. And I do want to give a shout out to Dink Ninja as well. We, get to play with some of his paddles. We're going to have him on the podcast.

Go find him on all his socials, but that's a podcast for another time. So yeah, I think the Karen there, the Karen, the Dink Karen, would probably come up with a better name. If you have a better name suggestion, hit us up on bdepodcast.com and let us know if you have a better name for the Karens of the courts that we're kind of talking about today.

And she wouldn't be listening to our podcast because it's way beneath her.

Speaker 5 (07:39.802)
Listen, I go to courts because I have the bar already set low because I want to be able to step over it. That's right. All right, let's hear a word from our sponsor. Listen, you know, dinkin balls is our sponsor for our podcast. You think your game's good enough for boring balls? Think again. Dinkin balls are here to spice up your court time. They are USAPA standard built for laughs, not for a long time, but for a good time. Designed for players who know the best games are about the fun and not the trophies like court Karen we just talked about. Every purchase supports our military and first responders because hey,

Your ball should make a difference on and off the court. Fellas, you know what I'm talking about. Stop playing with bland balls. Go to dinkinballs.com and get yours today. That's D-I-N-K-N balls.com. Dinkin balls. Play with confidence, even if you sh...

Speaker 5 (08:29.518)
All right, we've got Cody and Jerry from Smash Park represented on here today. So guys, thanks so much for agreeing to be on the podcast. Love having you guys.

Yeah, thank you very much for having us.

Listen, I am excited to be here. I mean, I'm supposed to be working, so you're taking me away from work for a little bit, so you're my hero for the day. Yeah.

And so I'm a semi-pro podcaster, so I guess I call this work too. And I found out the other day that a game of pickleball averages out to about three miles of running, so now I'm an endurance athlete as well.

I will say this, I am going to absolutely no doubt about it, be the worst pickleball player that will or has been ever be on your podcast, unfortunately.

Speaker 3 (09:09.29)
No, because I'm on.

I know.

I got weak ankles, I get winded too easy, I like donuts too much, so it's...

We set the bar way low. It's easy to walk over a bar when it's so low. We are very mediocre out here. So I love it. That's awesome. But man, you guys at Smash Park, you guys are killing it, So tell me, let's get into the first, like, how did Smash Park start, I guess?

Jerry, do you want to hop into that?

Speaker 2 (09:36.086)
Yeah, I have been here for about two and a half years. We are working on year six, I believe, at my location, which is in West Des Moines, Roseville, which is a suburb of Minneapolis. That's been open for about a year and a half. Cody's out in La Vista in Omaha, Nebraska suburb. They've been working on a year. We're building Westerville, which is right outside of Columbus, Ohio, trying to get that ready for football season. don't know how many Buckeye fans there are in the area, but.

If there are come check us out. Pickleball, axe throwing, darts, karaoke suites, duck pin bowling. could, I could name a hundred thousand.

Yeah, you guys have it going on. And I came to a new term just by researching you guys was entertainment. And listen, you spoke right to my heart as soon as you used words like that, right? A little bit of entertainment. I can almost feel like an athlete. I'm very adjacent to athletics when I'm there doing pickleball. And then you got the food and you got the drink. mean, why wouldn't people go to Smash Park?

No, I

I mean, listen, it's a fun place to just be at. It's got, I'm gonna sound like I'm Gen Z. I promise I'm not that young. I think Cody might be, but it's got good vibes. Even as an employee, as a guest. I mean, we just did a special where we did $2 margaritas. We call it Smasharitaville, sort of our take on the national margarita day. We ended up selling like 800 that day. I feel like I smelled like tequila and sour mix, but it was a fun time. I mean, we had a couple hundred people in this building.

Speaker 2 (11:07.98)
We do all sorts of stuff like that all the time. Fun place.

It makes me think of like an athletic Dave and Busters.

okay, yeah. It's like, yes.

Have Dave and Busters?

So we do. I would say we're like Dave and Buster's on steroids. They have a few more arcade games than us and we have legitimately everything else that they don't have. But no, it's a fun place and it's, I know we were talking before we hit record about the weather outside. Like I said, I'm in West Des Moines, Iowa. If you've ever been to the Great Plains, my dear listeners of this podcast, it gets cold and it gets cold big time. But we're creeping towards 50.

Speaker 2 (11:46.542)
which is fake summer for us out here. So I'm about to bust my shorts out. I'm about to have some fireball. I'm going to be outside in our yard. We're going to open up the patio. We've got an outside bar. We're going to have a hell of a time is what we're going

Jerry, now the only thing I'm picture now is those are gonna be two short shorts and the pockets are hanging out the bottom. Is that correct?

Listen, I got a little scrawny leg, so I can't do that, unfortunately.

So Cody, tell me a little bit about Nebraska.

actually used to live in Des Moines four or five years ago is how I first learned about Smash Park. once I moved to Omaha, I one was opening up. I reached out and that's the first thing wanted to do was get in and become a part of it also. I'm currently the recreation coordinator. So right now I think between the three locations, we've got about 500 league teams between Pickleball and Cornhole. Again, every location probably has 150 to 250 individual Pickleball players there.

Speaker 4 (12:41.962)
It's been incredible. And I think to your point, coming into a new market, it's that question of how can we build a product that the people are going to love? So some of that's been continuing to refine our leagues for other venues as well. yeah, really speaking to our league players here, what is they're looking for? And everyone's had an absolute blast the last eight months we've been open in La Vista and we're excited to again, bring that to Columbus. So

think the biggest thing, you know, I'm not the best pickleball player in the world. I didn't know much about it until I started working here, which is why we brought somebody in like Cody, someone who just lives, breathes it. No offense to all of you. It's a little bit like a cult and he is within your cult and he's sort of expanded our leagues and our knowledge. And we've done things like King and Queen of the court, which I didn't have anything. I didn't know anything about it. He's got ladder leagues. We're trying to implement them here.

So you can sort of move up and down tiers and just sort of have heated competition in your leagues. It's just a nice dynamic and it just shows the seriousness of, you know, we listen to the players because you guys are the ones that know what you want, what makes it fun, what makes it enjoyable. And Cody's one of them. Cody's, Cody's try hard. He, I mean, he's, he plays in pickleball leagues. So it's, it's good to have sort of that heartbeat just.

beaten through the company because we do. mean, at the heart of what Smash Park is, is Pickle.

You you brought up a good point. know, it is the, it's the combination, it's the amalgamation, you know, of your side of knowledge for things and then Cody's side of knowledge for things. And yeah, the cult that we call pickleball, I think it's because most of us, we graduated from beanbag toss, or I mean- Cornhole. You know, the cornhole, to now being a little bit more athletic, but it does take both sides because I'm showing up to a court, you know, I see guys with-

Speaker 5 (14:32.712)
Just using two hands on a racket for a backhand shot, like, who has that much coordination? That's so ridiculous to me, Pickleball is the great combiner of things to the sport.

all walks of life, y'all have goat yoga?

I think they have it there. do puppy yoga here. don't know if they trust the goats in Iowa quite yet.

You could probably import some buffalo or something though, that may be a little bit more challenging. So a couple things that jumped out to me right away. Number one, your drink cups are shaped kind of like a pickleball, is that right?

We do have some with it. That's our social bowl. So it's sort of like a fish bowl shaped like a pickle ball. It's, it's meant to be shared. I would say not all people tend to do that. If you saw some of our guests on Fridays and Saturday nights, I don't think they do, but no, we've got a bunch of different flavors. know, we've got a great bar manager here, Mike. comes up with all those cocktails, cooks them up for us, keeps them on rotation. So all of the guests that come in, they are not.

Speaker 2 (15:34.934)
having the same thing over and over again.

for sure. And then the other thing for me that was awesome was the Schatzky. Holy moly.

Sometimes it takes a little bit of getting somebody to go on the shots key because it looks intimidating and the height differences is a problem like I'm only 5'10 Cody's a little bit taller than me so we're gonna have to have a little bit of work to get that but the thing is

There's coordination necessary. So some skill, some strategy.

Cause you don't want to wear it.

Speaker 5 (16:02.808)
Now, Well, the outsider wants you to. For sure. When you're getting into it,

But once you bring out one, because we've got like, it's like got a neon light. You could see it coming. As soon as you bring out one, everybody in the whole venue stares at it. They want the next one. We just try to have fun. That's what we do. It doesn't cost anybody extra to do anything like that. If you've got a group of friends here, I mentioned Fireball because I am not the classiest of individuals. So I enjoy Fireball, but if you're an orange peel person or whatever you are, and you and a couple of friends want to do it.

We'll just bust it out just so we can have a little bit of fun with it. Yeah. could do all four of the shots keys at once. It's a talent that just, we, can't even imagine.

That's awesome. Cody, what you got?

Speaker 5 (16:43.694)
We could probably sell tickets to that. That I think we could broadcast for sure. Okay, so Cody, let me ask you, axe throwing, pickleball, duck pin bowling, arcade, Jenga, if you had to design a competition and you had to put two of those together for a team, what did you look at?

That's a good question. That's something when I first got there, kind of took over the leagues at Smash Park. I knew we had the pickleball. I knew we had the cornhole and the darts. So this is something I've kind of been cooking up, but what I've wanted to get going is almost like a Smash Olympics or Smash. Where, know, you come six weeks and instead of just playing pickleball every week or cornhole every week, maybe one week, it's, hey, we're going to rotate around. You're going to do ax throwing this week. Are you going to do this? So I've kind of been looking at a way to say.

Yes.

Speaker 4 (17:29.996)
How can we incorporate all of this and give people the full Smash Park experience in one neat and tidy League package?

Yeah, a punch card or something like that. Like I nailed it, here's my score. So listen, I think this is an exclusive. We're doing this right now. We're telling people, I bet you it's coming.

Yeah, like a sport.

Yeah,

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You get 10 of them together. We got a Smash Park to Cathlon now. Yeah. I'm putting that on the YouTube for

Speaker 4 (17:51.373)
Right.

No, this is already going to be in our next manager meeting, I feel it.

This is awesome. Okay, from both of you, I need one of these. You've been out there for a while, two different locations. Funniest moment you've seen on the courts.

Yeah, so I'll start off. There was a group of little old ladies, sweet little old ladies that come in every day of the week, once a week. And I think there's about 16 strong of them. They'll book out most of our courts. They'll go in there. They'll play. They'll have a good time. So I think at some point they realized one of their gal pals, her birthday was coming up. So what they did is they basically reached out to us and we just installed a new camera system. So any single play you have, recording session, you can record that.

But what they did is they actually organized a flash mob and they called it for Smash Park, they called it a Smash Mob. Yes. So next thing you know, there's 16 little ladies out on our court basically doing like a line dance to Happy Birthday. forget the exact song, but we were able to capture that all on video. We were able to send it to them and really make a lifelong memory. And again, that's kind of what we're all about at Smash Park. Those crazy memories, things that you wouldn't get anywhere else.

Speaker 5 (18:58.67)
That's incredible. I love that. I love that atmosphere for that kind of stuff. Jerry, what do you have?

Mine's a little more intense. our Tuesday leagues, Tuesday women's competitive six to eight. Now this is some of the best players in the Des Moines area. They, it's the same chunk of people that play every single season. They know each other. It's intense. have long been the person that closes on Tuesday. So I have run their tournaments for the better part of the last probably five or six seasons. We get into a pretty heated match and.

I'm going to say Mel's name because I love Mel. She's one of the best people that walks into this building and she is not someone to be trifled with. is top of the corporate, you know, down up, up here in Des Moines. She's a, she's a big wig. So she does not take guff from anybody. Okay. There was a player, they kept hitting the ball directly at her. And let's just say she did not take kindly to such an atrocity. Yeah. And the person was not apologizing. If you're going to hit somebody, you know, my bad.

I love where this is going.

Speaker 2 (19:58.286)
That's all we ask. We're reasonable people. We're not barbarians here in Iowa. Contrary to what some people may be.

You believe? That should be on the billboards for Iowa, just by the way.

Barbarians. No, so we get to the match, they end up losing. This is the championship and they get second place. Well, at Smash Park, we give out medals. have a podium that we put them on first, second and third. We put their pictures on our wall of champions. Mel had no desire to get that picture from me. And I was like, I was like, I was like, Mel, you got to just help me out. Like, you know, Cody's going to be mad at me if I don't get that picture. So just.

Help me out. Jerry, don't, you know, she was, was upset at this person for doing it. I don't want to stand next to him. And I was like, Mel, I'll buy you a drink. If I get you a drink, will you go up there? She said, okay, you know, you know, a spot to my heart. got the picture. She looked very salty while she was up there, a little stone face. She was petty for sure, but she did take the picture. It was awesome. I got her a free drink. We ended up having a great time and she's, she's one of my favorite people that comes in here. So.

I love

Speaker 2 (21:04.748)
I don't think she'll be upset that I told that story, in fact, she'll probably be proud of it.

That's awesome. Yeah, I love that. But yeah, you're right. After you've hit me for the fifth time, your sorry or your non-sorry in this case is not cutting it anymore. And so you're probably going to receive some of that back.

I mean, and it's a competitive league. I mean, they're, very intense. They, they, I mean, they have fun. Don't get me. They love each other. They hang out, they drink afterwards, but when it's time, it's on. It's on. We're paying for blood.

That's awesome. Okay, so what are some of the for you, Cody, and then we'll go back to Jerry, a red flag in a player, when you see it, you're like, nah, whether it's Crocs, not in sport mode or whatever.

Honestly, the vibe at Smash Park, we host a lot of corporate outings. We host a bunch of like little kid baseball tournaments or whatever come in. So we see everything at Smash Park. So you got to kind of turn off your pickleball snobbiness and say, they're not playing with this $200 paddle that I am. But again, you see people in all the time that are wearing their jeans or their Crocs, little kids hitting the paddles on the ground. So it's always something crazy at Smash Park. Red Flags, I would say, would be more so the people that...

Speaker 4 (22:15.756)
Maybe take it too seriously. And again, we all know a few of those, but I think even on the pro tour anymore, you're getting some real heat about line calls, this, that, the other thing. We saw someone get kicked in the teeth a few months back in pickleball. So I think the people that turn people away are the people that are overly aggressive with their line calls or overly aggressive with their that. And I hate to say it, but again, sometimes when competitive mode strikes me, I'm the first one in line there. So that's something I personally had to work on.

Yeah, you know, for me, yeah, if you walk on the court with your face on your sweatshirt and your duper score right on your clothing, that's always a red flag for me. So I get that for sure. How about you,

It's, I can always find out in the first seven seconds how this person is going to be. It's usually like Cody mentioned, we get a lot of baseball teams. The first kid that just haymakers it over the wall and launches it into our dining area. That's usually the kid I got to go, all right, where's your parent at? Let me just, all right. Can we just make sure he keeps it within the court? Like he can whale it. We have a giant wall that separates. I just need it to not hit somebody's sheet ton of nachos and it explodes everywhere. That's all I'm asking.

Yeah. Yeah. That I don't think you're asking too much for that. I love pickleball. just don't want it in my food. That's for sure. So speaking about that, you guys have a tremendous menu. was looking over the menu you guys have, and I bet you that it's pretty consistent across the different locations. But so I'm getting ready to power up for a pickleball match. What do I have to have off the menu?

That's sort of going to depend on you, my friend. So if you want to play pickleball, our bang bang shrimp is probably the most popular option for sort of the quick eat that you can smash. But we've also got like the park burger and an ultimate cheeseburger. It's got a giant, like a cheese curd patty almost on there. Now it'll knock you out. So if you're going to play pickleball, it's probably not the play. But if you're ready for a chair nap while you're watching a show, that's what you're going for.

Speaker 5 (23:47.587)
Okay.

Speaker 5 (24:09.896)
Awesome. What do you think, Cody?

Yeah, I think that's what I love about our menu is, as Jerry said, there's something for everyone. You got your heavy greasy burgers with pork and pastrami, all that fun stuff on there, sausage. And then they've got some of my personal favorites, a little dainty garden chicken sandwich with some pesto on there.

And I want to make sure for our listeners that we just back up a second that Cody in his talk here said that we're dainty amongst himself. So I just want to make sure we're not missing that and it's not going to get edited out of the podcast for sure. Okay, so give us the elevator pitch why our fans of our podcast got to come to Smash Park where you are.

and the moment you walk into our front door, I'm just asking the people to Google West Des Moines Smash Park. And if you are not enthralled in the first five seconds of looking at that picture, you may be blind or you may be on death's doorstep because just looking at our patio makes you want to come here. It's a giant place. We've got bars outside. We've got lights everywhere. We've got cornhole out there. We've got two pickleball courts, shuffleboard, bocce ball. I could name a hundred thousand different things. And then you walk inside the building

And it's a giant venue. You've got a TV wall that is the size of Nebraska itself. I've got every single sports game on there. I've got a full bar upstairs. I've got a full bar downstairs. I've got four more pickleball courts inside. we, so the thing about our venue is we have something that's called the game zones. The other places don't have it. It's just because we're the OG location. It's got more indoor cornhole in there. It's got foosball tables. It's got ping pong tables. So.

Speaker 2 (25:45.986)
And those are all first come first serve. Doesn't cost you a dime. You walk in this building and if you just want to hang out and you want to play ping pong, which we do, we have a father and son that do it almost every night on Monday nights. Just come in there, just play. We've also, we've got the great menu. We've got the great drinks that we change up all the time. We do special events like the, glow pickleball, like our tournaments that we do. We've got great leagues. We've got competitive leagues. We've got social leagues. I'm, we got to stop me. I'm getting too excited.

I'm so bad. Yeah, I want to make sure our listeners know when you're traveling around Smash Park has so many locations for you and there's going to be even more. And we called it here on the podcast. I'm just going to say it's going to happen. They're going to have the Smash Park decathlon before too long. Dainty Cody is going to get on that for sure. Let people know how they can find you. You're all your socials and all that kind of stuff.

wanna go see.

Speaker 4 (26:34.688)
So every single location has its own Facebook page its own Instagram page. So search Smash Park in Facebook Instagram We also have a general website just called smash park comm and that's probably your best bet

Guys from Smash Park, Cody, Jerry, thanks so much for being on the Big Dink Energy podcast. We love it. We're gonna promote you guys. We're gonna make sure people can find you. And again, thanks for giving up your time. Jerry, I'm so sorry you gotta go back to work now. I'd love to keep it going longer. Cody, thanks for everything you're doing out there to bring pickleball to the forefront and make sure that everybody, whatever level they are, can get in and Smash Park is the place to do it. Thanks guys so much.

Thank Awesome. Thank you very much, Guy. We appreciate it. And I should tell you, you kind of have some Tyson McGuffin vibes going on here. Yeah, thanks.

Ha ha ha ha.

Speaker 5 (27:27.32)
where we talk about something pickleball related, maybe sometimes not pickleball related, but this is where we say, Dink, yes, we're gonna pass it over the net. It's a thumbs up for us or destroy, where it's just something we want to say no to, thumbs down, not for us. And we obviously always want your feedback on that. So Steph, you did have something for Dink or Destroy this time that you were pretty passionate about.

Yeah, so I want to talk about the rise of de-influencing.

D, not the letter D, but D-E.

Yes. So this is like the people who told you to go buy all this stuff on TikTok and Instagram are now telling you like, Hey, you don't need to buy that. So there's over a billion views on TikTok under the hashtag de-influencing. So this trend reflects a growing skepticism towards constant product promotion and encourages mindful consumption. I want to know what y'all think about that and what you think if it's a dink or destroy.

D

Speaker 5 (28:26.402)
De-influencing. Me personally, when I heard it, when we started chatting this up a little bit, I thought immediately how behind the times these people are. You know, we're not very political on our podcast over here, but you look at the last couple years, if you want, where prices went up and up and up and the economy was hyperinflated and they were still going on. All these TikTokers and all these influencers still going on about buy, buy, buy, do this, do this, go to my store, go to my link tree and all that kind of stuff.

And now, and you would think they would pulled back on that then when people are struggling to buy eggs even.

I feel like they're like a wolf's in minimalist clothing. you know what I'm saying? It's like, have all this, look at my, you know, unboxing or anti-unboxing should I say, but here's the link in my link tree or, you you know I'm saying? So I don't know if it's real or not.

Yeah, I mean, we I mean, I think during these periods, a lot of people struggle with disposable income for things like that. They look fancy and it was great. And I'm glad you got all your free stuff sent to you so you can unbox it for all of us and tell us why we should buy it on your TikTok shop. And paddle princess, I know you you spend some time on TikTok. What is your what are your thoughts on

Every time he means you buy stuff.

Speaker 1 (29:45.632)
Yes. Personally, I'm all for it. I get really frustrated with going on to TikTok, Instagram, things along those lines, just wanting to either research a subject or just have some mindless entertainment. every other video is an ad.

I'm like, what is that skincare? That's just rewrapped oil of Olay from the 90s.

So frustrating because you go on there and you legitimately are trying to find something and it's like, okay, yep, nope, they're just selling, they're just selling, they're just selling, they're just selling. Nobody's actually giving their honest opinion and it's extremely frustrating for the consumer out there who one, doesn't have a lot of disposable income and they're trying to find the best reviews for this product that they need and which product is gonna be the one that they buy, but it's all people just trying to sell.

Yeah, and I'm a minimalist. You are. Everybody knows that.

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (30:48.5)
Yes, you helped me. check.

Exactly. But I also think that anything that keeps people from wasting money is good. Sure. The concept is good on the de-influencing, but I'm not sure that the execution of it is good because we're using the same platforms that they're using to sell that we're using to not sell. It's confusing and I just don't know.

I see it as, when TikTok went on a ban, it seems like they came back with more selling. Like you said, Petal Princess, I think that there's more sales. is every other video where I try to develop content for the podcast on TikTok and all the socials, and I got to scroll past so much selling, but now you got to think about, okay, so now they're creating a vacuum.

First you were telling me what to buy and spend all my disposable income on. Now you're telling me not to buy. now there's a vacuum. What nature abhors a vacuum, right? So what's gonna fill it? Something's gonna fill it for sure.

What am I supposed to do?

Speaker 3 (31:54.456)
Well, I hope it's not those walking treadmills that they keep trying to sell me every other ad. Well, I buy it on TikTok shop and I definitely didn't buy that vibrating machine thing. The vibrating plate. That is like every other ad. I'm like, what is, I just, okay.

There's one in our house.

Speaker 1 (32:06.872)
plate.

Speaker 1 (32:13.312)
Well, one thing I like that my daughter's doing is she's doing a thing called Project Pan and anybody who knows my daughter knows that she has an abundance of everything and she just keeps buying more and more and more and right now her focus is on not buying more but actually using all of one bottle of either lotion using all of her candles.

Most girls only have only one bottle of Bath and Body Works.

My daughter has a bookshelf of every single fragrance and before every month she would transition all of her soaps body sprays lotions candles everything every month would have a different scent and Yikes, so now she is on a mission to all of all of her makeup all of her skincare all of everything that she has She is finishing the entire bottle or candle or whatever it is before and then she opens another one

And once all of those are gone, then she will repurchase. So she's on a mission to actually use everything that she has before she starts purchasing more.

That's good. Yeah, that's smart. mean, because to your point where, you know, you're talking about these people who are influencers and wanting us to buy and consume and consume and consume, these are also the same people who are thinking that, you know, turtles in the sea are getting straws cut on their noses. And so you're also you're telling me to consume, but you also want me to keep buying these products over and over again, that have, you know, their plastic, their cardboard, we're adding to the environment that you wanted to protect against, right? So

Speaker 5 (33:42.028)
Yeah, for me it's going to be a destroy.

It's going to be destroyed for me too, because I don't, just believe in being minimalist. Like if you don't need it and it's not going to bring you joy or an experience and you don't absolutely need it, then we don't need to be buying it. But I don't necessarily think we need a de-influencer movement for it.

No, it's just the next fancy thing, I think. How about you?

I think it's destroy to an extent because I think it can lead to something better.

Hmm, I like that. I like that. Well, let us know what you think over at bdepodcast.com. Go to bdepodcast.com and sound off. And another way that you can sound off, if you've got something to say, but don't want to be the one to say it, then Big Dink Energy has your back with our You've Been Served segment. You can find that up in the right of the bdepodcast.com webpage. It's the ultimate way to dish out the truth, whether it's calling out a partner who's always just a little late.

Speaker 5 (34:38.496)
reminding a friend that the kitchen violations are real or simply delivering a message with a side of sarcasm. Hopefully, you know, we'll deliver that for you. We'll serve it up. So go over there, submit your message now let us take the heat. We'll record it and you can enjoy your game by calling them out. BDEQpodcast.com, upper right click, you got served. We accept all kinds of nonsense, not just pickleball. The more ridiculous, the better. We'll record it and hopefully you'll get to hear it here on the podcast.

you

Speaker 1 (35:09.998)
heard and learned.

This is another segment I really like. It really gives, I don't know, a little bit of life advice, a little bit of pickleball advice. There's just a hodgepodge in here, a potpourri, if you will, the found, learned and heard, the FLH. This is something that we found, something we learned and something we heard during our week or during our day yesterday even. So who's got the found this time? Let's hear it.

I know. All right. OK, so something that I found that I thought was completely interesting is that there is a rooftop pickleball court on a skyscraper in New York City. New York City, excuse me. I'm out. It's a luxury club in Manhattan, and they built a pickleball court on the top of a high rise building. It does give players really good views, but to me, that's completely scary. The net is regulation height.

regulation height, but the fences are extremely high to keep the balls from flying off. And that a lot of places are also turning the helicopter landing pads on the top of high rises into pickleball courts.

This sounds like a Red Bull thing, automatically.

Speaker 3 (36:24.538)
Well, when we went to New York and I don't remember why I was in a building, they had all their park, like a park, a kids play park up on the building. Cause I mean, there's just no more light out there. And then like one of the pools was like on the top for the kids area. I don't know what we were doing, but it was just weird to see a park. It was weird to see the park on the building. Yeah. You know.

Yeah, that's what you got to.

Speaker 2 (36:46.359)
Yeah.

That that furry convention we were at.

Speaker 5 (36:52.046)
Cause right. Well, even our cars, right? When we parked the car in the garage, uh, it had to go up. was like three levels up above other cars. Uh, so everything in that area has to be built up. see that, but think of the wind, right? Anytime you've been on top of one of those skyscrapers doing a touristic thing or whatever. Uh, plus, you know, I'm glad you brought up the extra high nets because I can just see, you know, one of the serves or, or a dink going up over and then you're like, hold on, I gotta go get my ball. Oh my gosh.

Definitely if Karen was serving from Dinkton.

That ball will just be gone. There's no chasing it. I don't think I could do it. I would have a massive anxiety attack.

I

I think I would too.

Speaker 5 (37:28.639)
I think I, you know, again, I think it's another Red Bull stunt. think we're going to see something come out of this. I would probably do it just for the novelty of it, but it's not where I'm, it's not my pickup game every Saturday. You I'm not, Hey, let's go down to the 30th floor and play pickleball. All right. Who's got our learned.

I have learned, so I have learned that pickleball is not just popular in our neighborhoods and in our group chats anymore, but it's popular with the MLB. I guess. I don't know anything about baseball and I don't like it, but I did learn that during their spring training, is that what they were going on? Keith Hernandez, the broadcaster.

We're in album B season right now.

Speaker 3 (38:12.482)
got interrupted by a scene of a guy without his shirt on and a lady playing pickleball in a bikini. And he literally just stopped and watched and was like, I'm so distracted right now. And it just moved over to that pickleball scene. What do you mean? Said I'm distracted in general. So it, it like panned over to this whole pickleball scene during this broadcast. And I just thought, dang,

By the guy or the girl? Me.

Come on,

Speaker 3 (38:42.018)
You know, like the Pickleball Siren song is strong right now. Like everybody's wanting, and he admitted it. Like I'm distracted. Like what is going on? This is, this is pretty cool.

Well, I mean, first and foremost, that's not our normal attire on the court. So mean, I'm known to whip my shirt off and ride my paddle around the rink like a horsey. no, that's not normal attire. For all the visuals you all just got out there for sure. But Paddle Princess, I know you're big into baseball. Your son is big into baseball. So what's your thought?

I love baseball. I don't know necessarily how the two coincide.

I just think it's, Pickleball's exciting and so he was distracted by it because he was like, finally something entertaining.

It says baseball is boring and I need.

Speaker 1 (39:27.234)
can kind of see that.

I don't think that's what made him distracted. I think it may have been the attire of the lady friend out there.

I do agree that pickleball is more fast-paced, know, you're constantly moving going and going and going for me. It's the Individual part of baseball that I enjoy. I think both sports have Positives and negatives it just kind of depends on what you enjoy, but I think that they're both really great sports

So that's what I learned, that pickleball could, you know, interrupt MLB broadcaster.

I like it.

Speaker 5 (40:01.262)
Yeah, I think it was the outfits on that one. So I have a herd. This is something I heard. came across in my research in my feeds, because obviously all my feeds now are pickleball related for some reason. It's almost like the algorithm is tracking me. But some restaurants are adding pickleball happy hours with drink discounts after playing. What do we think? Marketing move or just an excuse to day drink?

I don't care what the reason is. I'm all for it. Remember when we were driving by and I was like, there's a pickleball court at that restaurant and I kept trying to call him, but it kept going to a phone tree. I wanted to go to that. I wanted to go there so bad because why I'm waiting for my food, I can play a game like it's it's brilliant.

They were packed.

Speaker 1 (40:40.974)
Yeah. Yeah. I love it.

Yeah, you're getting me to your court if you have dark beer. Listen, if I can pour it in the glass and it sucks the light out of the room, that's the kind of beer for me. So heads up to you pickleball players that are courts that are doing this.

With so many of the fast food restaurants taking out their play scapes and everything like that, I mean, we've gone to a couple of restaurants where they've had play toys for kids. It's so nice for families. Now imagine having a pickleball court out there and some cornhole, like all those ice houses that do that.

or don't be in bagtas.

It makes it a more welcoming environment where you know you're going to go to that court and you're not going to interact with the Karens that we did yesterday. You're going to interact with other families and other people out there just to enjoy the day and have fun. That's what they're there for.

Speaker 3 (41:29.965)
I love it. I'm all for it.

Yeah, couple of Johnny Walker blues and I'm playing a lot better game, I'll just tell you.

And what did you have yesterday to drink?

something fruity and fun.

something

Speaker 1 (41:41.314)
I know. was delicious though. But it just makes for more relaxing environment.

I agree. Yeah. Pick up your paddles. Pick up a burger. I love it.

But a cocktail is definitely not going to improve my pickleball game. There's nothing that can play.

I'm done.

it was so awesome to be your partner yesterday. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (41:58.825)
I'm sure it will.

Much better than my partners.

Hey, toss a 50-50 on that one. A little column A, a little column B. So tell us what you think about that. The Found, Learned and Heard section, go to bdepodcast.com and chime in. Let us know what you think.

Yeah, I'm not the

Speaker 5 (42:15.554)
That's it for this episode, unless you've got something to say. Think we got it wrong? Have a better take? We want to hear it. Find us at bdepodcast.com or at bdepodcast on the socials. Drop us a message. We might just feature you in the next episode. If you had a good time, well, same z's. If not, maybe try again. We grow on people. So you know the deal. Follow the show, tell a friend and leave us a review or just pretend this never happened. Until next time, keep the dink soft and the energy big.

you