Matthew Perry’s Pickleball Coach Gives Glimpse Into Actor’s Final Moments

Matthew Perry‘s close friend and pickleball coach,Matt Manasse,was one of the last people to see him before he suddenly passed away, and now Manasse is sharing insight into the actor’s final moments.

Manasse recalled how Perry–who he described as “genuine and caring”–quickly became “obsessed” with the sport, suggesting he found it helpful during his sobriety and explained that the two would get together to play a game four or five times per week.

“Pickleball, I think, was an outlet for him,” Manasse told Entertainment Tonight in an interview on Sunday, Oct. 29. “It was something that he became obsessed with, and that was his new healthy addiction, and he loved it.”

“He thought it was something that could help in his recovery and he was doing an awesome job,” Manasse also relayed to People.

He said Perry, who was open about his history of substance abuse, also encouraged others in recovery to pick up the sport. “He would bring other people to the court sometimes that were going through similar things and try to use pickleball to help them as well,” Manasse relayed toEntertainment Tonight. “He really had his heart always open and would always try to make everyone laugh, too.”

“I feel lucky to know him,” Manasse added.

Manasse noted that even off the court and no matter what was going on that day, Perry “was always gonna make you laugh and make you leave in good spirits.”

In the weeks before his death, Manasse described Perry as in “good spirits” and that “he seemed like he was in a really good place and a happy place.”

“I’m just happy that, you know, if anything, he had a lot of fun and pleasure being on a pickleball court around people that he enjoyed, because he gave us so much joy,” Manasse said.

Perry was only 54 when he tragically passed away on Saturday, Oct. 28, following an apparent drowning. Though an autopsy has yet to confirm his cause of death, preliminary reports suggest first responders were called to his Los Angeles-area home on Saturday after a call came in for a potential cardiac arrest.