Ben Johns: Paddle, Playing Style, and Career

Ben Johns is the most dominant player in professional pickleball history. Born in 1999 in Silver Spring, Maryland, he picked up the sport as a teenager and turned professional in 2018. Within two years he had reached the top ranking - and he has not left it since.

What separates Johns from the field is not raw power. He is known for elite patience, an almost unbreakable dinking game, court IQ that sets up attacks multiple shots in advance, and the ability to reset hard-driven balls from defensive positions that most players cannot handle. He wins through accumulated pressure and precision, not pace.

He graduated from the University of Maryland with a degree in finance while simultaneously competing on the pro tour. He holds the world number one ranking in both singles and doubles simultaneously - a distinction no other player has matched for as long.

His older brother Collin Johns is also a professional player, and the two are one of the most recognized doubles partnerships in the sport.

Ben Johns plays with the JOOLA Ben Johns Hyperion CFS 16 - a signature paddle he developed in partnership with JOOLA. It is available to recreational players at the same specs he plays with on tour.

The Carbon Friction Surface face is the defining feature. CFS is a raw, uncoated carbon fiber face with a pronounced texture that grabs the ball on contact and generates more spin than smooth-faced paddles. It is a performance-oriented surface that rewards clean contact and punishes off-center hits.

The 16mm core thickness is on the thicker end of professional paddles - thicker cores produce more pop on drives while maintaining touch at the kitchen. The elongated shape adds reach and leverage on groundstrokes and is noticeably longer than a standard paddle shape.

JOOLA also produces a Swift variant of this paddle with a lighter swing weight for players who prefer faster hand speed at the kitchen.

Honest answer: only if you are playing at 4.0 or above.

Not sure if you are ready for it? Take our paddle quiz - it asks about your skill level, playing style, and budget and matches you to the right paddle for where you actually are.

Johns is a soft game specialist who also possesses elite hard game capability - a combination that makes him nearly impossible to play against at any speed. His defining traits:

• -Exceptional dink patience - can sustain kitchen rallies far longer than opponents want to
• -Elite reset ability - neutralizes hard drives from anywhere on the court
• -Reads opponent positioning early and sets up attacks multiple shots in advance
• -Consistent third shot drop that rarely gives opponents an attackable ball
• -Calm under pressure - rarely makes errors in high-stakes points
• -Effective in both singles (requires superior athleticism) and doubles (requires superior IQ)

His game is a model for what pickleball at its best looks like: not power, but positioning, patience, and the ability to wait for the right ball to attack.