← All articles

2026 Pickleball League Draft: $1.23M Secures St. Louis No. 1

2026 Pickleball League Draft: $1.23M Secures St. Louis No. 1

Team representative bidding at pickleball draft

St. Louis Shock landed the No. 1 overall slot and used it to select Anna Bright, part of a reported $1.23 million winning bid for that pick alone. The 2026 Major League Pickleball draft is an auction for draft position, not a direct player purchase, so bid size determined who picked first. Full team-by-team results and rosters follow below.

TL;DR:

  • The draft’s two parts produced 66 selections: 28 required starter slots began at $10,000, while 38 depth picks began at $1,000.
  • Teams protected 54 players by February 15, with each keeper occupying a top four spot on rosters requiring three men and three women.
  • Teams with established starters could conserve spending for fifth and sixth roster spots, where less expensive picks often targeted Dreambreaker specialists.
  • Because teams can use any two men and two women in a Dreambreaker, matchup versatility can matter more than adding another star.
Flexleagueplus
Run Your Own Pickleball League
Flex League Plus helps managers organize pickleball leagues, while players sign up, arrange matches, and report scores.
Explore the league software

Table of Contents

How the 2026 draft results shook out across both parts

The 2026 MLP Draft presented by Skechers ran in two parts and produced 66 total selections across the league’s rosters. Part one filled the required starting slots, 28 picks in all, while part two added depth with 38 additional selections for fifth and sixth roster spots.

Two stages of pickleball roster selections

St. Louis Shock’s top bid to select Anna Bright set the tone for the entire board, and other franchises followed with aggressive early spending to lock in top-four starters before turning to cheaper depth picks later. The gap between those headline bids and the rest of the board was steep, a pattern recapped by The Dink as a defining feature of this year’s event.

Here is how the draft broke down structurally:

  • Part one: 28 picks dedicated to filling each team’s four required starting roster spots, with bidding starting at a $10,000 minimum.
  • Part two: 38 picks dedicated to fifth and sixth roster slots, with bidding starting at a $1,000 minimum.
  • Total selections: 66 picks across all 20 teams, combining keepers already locked into top-four spots with newly drafted players.
  • Headline bid: the reported $1.23 million winning bid for the No. 1 slot, used by St. Louis Shock to take Anna Bright.

Teams that entered the draft with fewer keepers had more flexibility but also more roster holes to fill in part one, which pushed several of them into the early bidding frenzy, as explained in this guide to building team rosters. Clubs with several kept starters could hold back and wait for part two, where they picked up specialists at a fraction of the cost of the top slots.

The rules that shaped bidding, rosters, and the live broadcast

The draft followed a structure built around keepers, bidding tiers, and strict roster composition rules. Teams locked in protected players ahead of time, then bid for the right to pick from whoever remained in the pool.

  1. Keeper deadline: teams finalized protected players by the deadline, and 54 players were kept league-wide, each required to occupy one of their team’s top-four roster spots.
  2. Bidding mechanics: teams bid on draft slots, meaning the order in which they pick, rather than bidding directly on a specific player.
  3. Part one minimums: starter slots carried a $10,000 minimum bid, reflecting their required status on every roster.
  4. Part two minimums: fifth and sixth roster slots carried a $1,000 minimum bid, opening the depth market to more teams.
  5. Roster composition: each team carries six players, three men and three women, with limited exceptions for gender balance.

54 players were kept ahead of the Feb. 15, 2026 keeper deadline, locking a large share of each roster’s top-four spots before bidding even began.

Live coverage aired on MLP’s YouTube channel and Pickleball TV, with a recap show airing March 1 at 12 p.m. ET for fans who missed the original broadcast.

What the bidding patterns reveal about team strategy

The steep drop between the top few bids and everything that followed tells a clear story about how front offices valued talent this year. Spending clustered hard at the very top, then thinned out quickly once the required starter slots were filled.

  • Teams treated the first pick or two as star acquisition, willing to pay a premium well above the $10,000 floor for proven names.
  • Once required starters were secured, front offices shifted to part two looking for Dreambreaker specialists rather than general depth.
  • Gender-balance rules meant some teams prioritized filling a specific position type over simply taking the best player available.
  • The flexibility to use any two men and two women from the roster during a Dreambreaker tiebreaker, as explained by Regan Family Pickleball, rewarded teams that drafted for matchup versatility over raw star power.

Pro Tip: Watch which players a team drafts last, those cheap fifth and sixth slot picks often end up as the Dreambreaker specialists who decide close matches.

Reading roster construction this way matters for anyone tracking team strength heading into the season, since a $1,000 depth pick can carry outsized weight in a tiebreaker format. Captains thinking through similar tradeoffs on their own rosters can find more detail in this roster management guide for team captains.

Key dates from the keeper deadline through the draft

The 2026 offseason moved through several checkpoints that shaped the rosters fans are now seeing.

  1. February 15, 2026: keeper deadline, with 54 players locked into top-four roster spots league-wide.
  2. February 27, 2026: live draft day, broadcast on MLP’s YouTube channel and Pickleball TV with a March 1 recap show.
  3. Post-draft trade window: opened shortly after the draft, giving front offices a short period to adjust rosters based on how the bidding played out.
  4. July 1: waiver window opens later in the season, giving teams another chance to adjust depth as matches progress.

What the draft means for players and fans this season

The roster moves from this draft set up several storylines worth tracking as matches begin.

  • St. Louis Shock’s headline bid for Anna Bright raises expectations that the franchise plans to build its season around her as a focal point.
  • Teams that loaded up on Dreambreaker specialists in part two are worth watching in close, tiebreaker-driven matchups.
  • Players drafted into fifth or sixth slots should expect a specialist role rather than a starting spot, with their biggest opportunities likely coming in Dreambreaker situations rather than every match.
  • Fans curious about the broader format can get more context from this breakdown of MLP format rules.

Why draft strategy and league management share the same logic

Running pickleball leagues for years has shown me that draft decisions and league operations both come down to the same thing: clear rules applied consistently. Watching how MLP teams balance keepers, bids, and roster slots mirrors what we help league organizers handle every season on Flex League Plus.

— Robert

Running your own team league without the spreadsheet chaos

Flex League Plus gives organizers roster, scheduling, and payment tools for competitive pickleball leagues. We support singles, men’s doubles, women’s doubles, mixed doubles, and team formats, and our app integrates with DUPR and Stripe for registration payments.

Flexleagueplus

Feature What it handles
League formats Singles, men’s doubles, women’s doubles, mixed doubles, FLP teams
Player verification DUPR approved integration
Payments Stripe-powered registration collection
Platform fee $25 one-off per division (pricing)

Those tools cut the admin work of running a draft-style league down to a few clicks instead of a shared spreadsheet, and organizers planning their first season can see the full feature set on our pickleball league software page.

FAQ

What is the best pickleball team?

There is no single official ranking of the “best” pickleball team, since performance shifts throughout the season based on matchups and injuries. St. Louis Shock drew attention early in 2026 after landing the No. 1 draft slot and selecting Anna Bright with a reported $1.23 million bid.

What is the round robin format in a pickleball tournament?

A round robin format has every team or player face every other entrant in their group before advancing, rather than being eliminated after a single loss. Major League Pickleball uses variations of this structure during regular-season play before shifting into playoff brackets.

What is the MLP playoff schedule?

Specific playoff dates are announced separately from the draft and are not part of the keeper or draft coverage. Fans should check the official MLP competition updates page for the most current schedule as the season progresses.

What is the pickleball league called?

Major League Pickleball, known as MLP, is the team-based professional league that runs the annual draft covered here. Players and organizers looking to run their own team-style leagues can use Flex League Plus to manage rosters, scheduling, and payments for formats similar to MLP’s team structure.

Sources