There is not a single feature your game requires that would necessitate the need for the Android SDK 2.3 (Ginger bread). For instance, the improvements to the phone camera(s) in the 2.3 sdk will do nothing to improve your game of Pong whatsoever.
Do your game with Android SDK 1.6. Test it out with a 2.3 emulator, and you'll see that it works just fine on anything 1.6 and above. If you're doing this game to learn OpenGL (which frankly, your simple 2D game doesn't really need either), then you can use OpenGL ES 1.1 within Android 1.6, or if you'd prefer to learn OpenGL ES 2.0 instead, then target Android 2.1.
My point is: either do 1.6 or 2.1, they will both work as intended on phones and emulators of higher versions, but do not do it on 2.3, there is not only no reason to do so, and the syntax isn't even different, but that needless move would only ensure that your program couldn't run on anything, but the Nexus S (the only phone that runs Ginger bread right now).