Off-Piste Play · No. 05
A softball to the face taught me what protective gear is worth when you leave it in the bag. Twenty stitches later, I wear glasses on the pickleball court.
In this one: the softball lesson · what the eye-injury numbers say · the night our game stopped · what the ratings on eyewear mean · the glasses I wear
On the cover: a day game in my Smith Wildcats, mirror lens in. They are not rated for pickleball. More on that inside.
The short version
If you play for years and never take a ball to the eye, great. That is the goal. But nobody gets to choose the night it happens, and it is better to be safe than sorry. I did not learn that on a pickleball court. I learned it on a softball field.
My softball league had some serious players in it. A few had played in the major leagues. Others were former Division I college players. And then there were guys like me, who just wanted to stay fit and stay active.
I kept seeing people get hurt, and I was surprised that nobody wore a helmet. My opinion on why: pride. Everyone wants to look tough. Nobody wants to be the wimp in the helmet. It is that simple.
What I learned the hard way
It was only a practice game. That was the whole reason.
I decided I did not care how it looked. I am an actor. I audition. I cannot walk into a room with a bruised face. So I bought a helmet with a face mask. It was super light and pretty comfortable.
The first night I brought it, not enough players showed up for a real game, so we played a practice game instead. I thought, I don't need the helmet for a practice game, right?
Wrong. Somebody hit the ball. I was on first, running to second. The third baseman threw it as hard as he could to the second baseman, who missed it completely. It hit me square in the face.
The ball hit so hard that my teeth came through my lip. I got twenty stitches, and I still have the scar. The whole time, the helmet was in my bag.
I learned that one the hard way so you don't have to. I do not want to be the guy who is too proud to wear protection. I also do not want to be the guy with a pair of protective glasses sitting in his bag when a paddle, or more likely a ball, finds his eye.
Twenty stitches and a scar on my lip. The whole time, the helmet was in my bag.Off-Piste Play
What the numbers say
The first national study of the problem came out in late 2025. It only counted the people who went to an emergency room.
In October 2025, the medical journal JAMA Ophthalmology published the first nationwide look at pickleball eye injuries. The researchers used twenty years of emergency-room records, from 2005 through 2024, to estimate how many players across the country were hurt.
Two honest notes on those numbers. First, they only count emergency-room visits, so the real total is higher. Anyone who went to an eye doctor or an urgent care, or just went home with an ice pack, is not in there. Second, close to twenty million people play this game, so the odds on any one night are small. They were small on the softball field too.
Eye protection is still optional at every level of pickleball. USA Pickleball does not require it. The American Academy of Ophthalmology recommends it. And a survey presented at the Academy's 2025 meeting found the two main reasons players skip it: they do not know the risk, and they find the gear uncomfortable. I would add a third that people do not tend to write on a survey. Pride.
Wednesday night, clear lens in. No glare off the court lights, and I forgot they were on my face.
Closer to home
A few weeks ago, in our mid-week game with the RMV Mid-Week Pick'lers, I hit a lob. Both players on the other side ran back for it. Both had their heads down, watching the ball.
One of them got there and slammed it from down low. It went straight up into his partner's face and caught him in the eye.
We stopped play for about fifteen minutes. He was dazed, and the eye swelled up. Nobody did anything wrong. It was two guys going for the same ball, which happens in every game we play.
Even after that, only two of us wear glasses now. Me, and the player who got hit.
What I tried
I did not want to spend more money on glasses. So I went through the ones I had.
First I tried the safety glasses I use for construction work, the kind you buy at Home Depot. Then I tried the shooting glasses I wear at the gun range. Both had the same problem. We play at night, and both pairs threw a lot of glare off the court lights.
Then I remembered my Smith Wildcats. I use them for ski mountaineering and for skiing on warmer days. They come with two lenses, a mirror lens for sun and a clear one. I put the clear lens in and wore them to the night game.
They were perfect. Very comfortable. I forgot the glasses were on my face. And there was no glare, which was the most important thing.
The fine print
Full disclosure, before anyone buys anything because of this column.
The Smith Wildcat is a sport sunglass. It was not designed for the impact of a pickleball, and it does not carry the safety rating that pickleball eyewear is tested to. Not all impact ratings are the same, so here is the ladder, from the one made for our sport down to the minimum.
So where do mine fall? As far as I can find, at the bottom of that list. Reviewers describe the Wildcat lens as an impact-resistant carbonic lens, which is a tough plastic. But Smith's page for the Wildcat does not name a safety standard. Smith saves the Z87.1 and military ratings for a separate line it calls Elite.
Here is the part that stings a little. The Home Depot glasses and the range glasses I gave up on probably carry a higher impact rating on paper than the ones I wear. If you own a pair, look for “Z87+” stamped on the lens or the temple. I just could not see through mine under the lights. And glasses you will not wear do the same job as a helmet in a bag.
So I am not telling you to go buy Smith Wildcats for pickleball. I do not want to be responsible if they fail to protect you. For me, I was willing to take the chance. I think they will do the job, and I know they are better than nothing at all. If I were buying glasses only for this game, I would look for ASTM F3164 on the label.
Why I bought them in the first place. Ski mountaineering, mirror lens in. Pickleball came later.
Why these work for me
What I really like about these glasses is that I can use them for more than one thing. Hiking. Bicycling. Skiing. Ski mountaineering. And now pickleball. For me, anyway.
These are not cheap glasses. Smith lists the Wildcat at $257. For that you get a nice hard case, a clear lens, and the sun lens you choose. Swapping lenses takes a minute. Mirror lens for a day game or a ski tour, clear lens for Wednesday nights.
They are good at a lot of things, and that is what I like about them. One pair that I already own, that I will actually put on, beats a drawer full of glasses I leave at home.
The verdict
Protective gear only works if it is on you. I owned a helmet the night I took a softball to the face. It did nothing for me from inside a bag.
So my advice has two parts. Get a pair of glasses you can see through, at night, under your own court's lights. Then wear them every time, including the practice games. Especially the practice games.
Nobody at the courts is going to think less of you. And if somebody does, that is fine. You can see them clearly. ✦
The Smith Wildcat glasses in this column are my own pair, which I already had for skiing. Smith had no involvement in this piece. The Wildcat is not certified to a pickleball or racket-sport eyewear standard, and I am not recommending it for that purpose. I am not an eye doctor. The injury figures are from a study published in JAMA Ophthalmology in October 2025.