About 433,000 viewers at a time—that’s how many pairs of eyes were fixated on last weekend’s DoorDash MLP Finals that pitted the underdog Columbus Sliders against the no. 2 seed New Jersey 5s.
That number is significant for Major League Pickleball (MLP presented by DoorDash), as it makes this season’s Finals the second-most watched professional pickleball match of all time on any network. In this case, the network was CBS, and it drew 433,000 average viewers, per Nielsen.
The Sliders ultimately came out on top, roaring back from a 0-1 deficit behind the spectacular play of Andrei Daescu and Parris Todd, who came up big in the second and third matches. That victory completed a Cinderella run of sorts for Columbus, who came into the playoffs as just the fifth seed, and were “handpicked” by the top-seeded St. Louis Shock. But the Sliders turned the tables on the Shock, and the rest was history.
It turns out, the Finals they played opposite the Anna Leigh Waters-led 5s just made history, too.
The DoorDash MLP Finals was hosted at CityPickle at Wollman Rink in New York City’s Central Park, and played in front of sell-out crowds all weekend, capping MLP’s 2025 season of 10 regular season events, a Mid-Season Tournament, and two rounds of Playoffs, all from April to August.
League season-to-date highlights, as of the end of the regular season, featured strong year-over-year growth across a multitude of business and fan engagement areas, including sponsor revenue (more than double last year’s total), ticket revenue (+28%), social media impressions (+277%), YouTube views (+156%), total minutes viewed on Pickleballtv (+105%), and telecast hours (+83% on linear TV across national, RSN, and local partnerships).
