Major League Pickleball Announces Groups for First Four 2026 Events and Venue Updates

Let’s start with the venue update - Newport and San Diego have swapped. San Diego at the Barnes Tennis Center is now Regular season stop #7, from July 16-19. Last year, that same venue served as the first round of playoffs. However, Newport Beach (Tennis and Pickleball Club) has now become the second round of the 2026 playoffs, essentially swapping venues/dates.

Now let’s look at the first four events of the 2026 MLP season. As a friendly reminder, all teams play a total of five regular season events, with every team participating in the Mid-Season Tournament in July.

This is the breakdown of how many regular season points each team earns at each event:

• 1st – 25 pts
• 2nd – 18 pts
• 3rd – 15 pts
• 4th – 12 pts
• 5th – 10 pts
• 6th – 8 pts
• 7th – 6 pts
• 8th – 4 pts
• Teams finishing 5th in pool play: 1
• Teams finishing 6th in pool play: 0

Teams will be vying to make Sunday, which includes the top 8 teams from the event. 

Groups for the First Four 2026 Regular Season Events

MLP Dallas

• Group A (5 teams): COL, DAL, NJ, ORL, PHX
• Group B (6 teams): BAY, CAR, LA, STL, TEX, UTA

MLP Columbus

• Group A (6 teams): ATL, CAL, CHI, COL, MIA, NJ
• Group B (5 teams): CAR, FL, LV, PBR, STL

MLP St. Louis

• Group A (6 teams): BRK, LV, LA, PHX, SoCal, UTA
• Group B (5 teams): ATL, BAY, ORL, PBR, STL

MLP Austin

• Group A (5 teams): CAL, CAR, COL, MIA, SoCal
• Group B (6 teams): ATL, BAY, DAL, FL, NJ, TEX

Tice’s Top Storylines

• The St. Louis Shock do not face anyone who made the semifinals in the 2025 MLP Playoffs in their first three events
• The Columbus Sliders have to play Dallas, New Jersey, Orlando and Phoenix in MLP Dallas, without Parris Todd, who is suspended for the event
• Brooklyn only plays in one event in the first four events, which helps them gel a bit more with lesser pressure
• While the Palm Beach Royals are grouped with the St. Louis Shock in the first four event groups, they have been blessed with lesser competition in the rest of the group

As a recap, if you have questions that aren’t answered in this article, chances are that they are answered in the two 2026 Competition Updates articles I wrote earlier in the year:

• MLP Announces new 20 team format, end of challenger level in 2026
• New MLP Rules for 2026: Full Roster Usage, Event Winners, & Expanded Playoffs