Meet Jake Ralphs

We were lucky to catch up with Jake Ralphs recently and have shared our conversation below.

Jake , so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?

I grew up a tennis player. My grandpa had a tennis court in his front yard of his place. He loved tennis so much and it seemed to rub off on me and my cousins. My cousins and I would play for hours in the hot summer days trying to improve our game to beat the other. I ended up play high school tennis and our team was so good we won the state championship. After years and years of high level tennis I attended a pickleball activity for single people and after a couple of times playing realized that I was really good at it and caught the “pickleball fever” as I like to say. That’s when I couldn’t stop playing pickleball and thinking about it constantly. I realized that this is my purpose is to bring the world pickleball and help them enjoy life even more with this game that I love. Pickle on!

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?

The Mr. Pickleball world started when I was working for a corporate Medicare job from home making good money but the company decided to cut our sales commission in half. That’s when I decided to take a risk and move away from a corporate job and do something different. I had some money saved up to help me while I figured out what I was going to do. Instead of looking for another corporate job on Indeed. I thought to myself, “I love pickleball and I’m good at it, so why not make a pickleball training company. So that’s what I did. With the help of a friend I was able to build a basic website, google page and worked on having my name up on every local web search for pickleball training. I also was the first pickleball coach to be on Groupon. Pickleball was so new to Groupon they didn’t even have a business category for it. I think I had to use Paddle Ball or something. In order to make my business cash flow. I ran some local pickleball tournaments to help the local pickleballers and spread the Mr. Pickleball word. As time went on I would add new clients monthly. Most the time they would see me online somewhere or find me on Groupon’s. Business was great. I realized that this can work and I can definitely help people get better at pickleball and live the dream. After teaching pickleball for a year or so I came across a new student by the name of Ed Beazer. He was looking for a new sport to keep him busy and be competitive after retiring from Starbucks as a District Manager. After teaching Ed for months and months I noticed he was struggling to keep his eye on the ball so I introduced and practice gold ball into our pickleball lessons and before you know it he was improving his game dramatically and playing amazing pickleball at the local courts in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Ed asked me one day. Is there such thing as a mini-pickleball for training? I said, “I don’t think so.” So, from there we did some extensive research and realized that indeed, there was no such product on the market. That’s when we decided to create the company BZER Sports named after my student Edward Beazer. After over a year of working with our China liaison company in California Rabit Industries. We had created the first mini-pickleball for training and warm-up aka “The BZER”. We launched our company in February 2024 and our now seeing sales increasing every month with high focus on social media calibration with pickleball influencers.
Our goal from the beginning has been to be the premier pickleball training product company in the world and we believe we are on our way. If you love pickleball or our wanting to learn to play you need to get yourself a BZER ball asap. Believe in yourself and believe in your passion. Take action and just go do it.
We all have a passion. So take your passion and jump into it. Take risk! As you jump others will too and hopefully you can live the dream you always wanted. Again, believe in yourself and don’t let other take your dream away from you.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

I became an expert of pickleball
I showed up everyday and was a reliable person
I believed in something bigger

Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?

My parents have always believed in me and have instilled a confidence in me that is very powerful. Your parents are definitely something that can help you succeed in life but anyone can succeed with the right actions and mindset.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.bzer.net
• Instagram: @bzersports
• Facebook: bzersports
• Linkedin: bzersports
• Twitter: bzersports
• Youtube: bzersports