Jim Dobran

Jim Dobran is a 33-year-old professional pickleball player, coach, and Head Coach for MLP's Brooklyn Aces, based in Charlotte, North Carolina. A teaching pro by trade, Dobran has racked up 7 gold medals in 5.0 divisions and has competed in over 20 professional tournaments across the PPA and APP tours since 2023. He's a doubles-first player with a patient, dinking-heavy style that has produced some memorable upsets on the big stage.

The most notable? At the PPA North Carolina Open, Dobran and partner Eric Roddy (seeded 29th) dismantled the 5th-seeded duo of Jack Sock and Tyson McGuffin 11-5, 11-2 in a match that wasn't even as close as the score suggests. The game plan was simple: slow it down, dink, and take away Sock's power game. Dobran knew Sock's tendencies from playing against him in Charlotte, and it showed. He also coaches at NIKE Sports Camps and is sponsored by ProXR Pickleball, making him one of Charlotte's most prominent pickleball figures.