Change Mechanics to Fix the Yips?

Pickleball is 100% mental and 50% physical...

Experts who advise on fixing the yips generally discuss 2 things - focus and simplicity. Both are centered on correcting the mental aspect. Increased focus is intended to eliminate all thoughts from the mind except the hitting the ball. Simplifying the motion is also intended to eliminate many of the thoughts that complicate the serve, such as target, speed, spin, etc.

One example of this advice is from Deb Harrison in her video Losing the Serve. Deb discusses getting a rhythm to the serve starting with a consistent pre-shot routine. Then, make it simple - get the ball from point A to point B.

Another example is changing the mechanics of the serve as discussed by Jeff Napier in Recovering From a Serving Problem:

The Illegal Server - One Tactic

Psychology in sports makes people crazy...

Last week I posted a Mark Renneson video about pickleball stereotypes. Readers probably thought that was a fun video but that nothing would come of it. Actually, a lot of discussions can be provoked by the behaviors shown. Today, we will start with a discussion of dealing with an illegal server. Jeff Napier has written about a ploy he successfully used on one occasion in his article A Bit of Psychology.

A Bit of Psychology

Correcting An Opponent’s Problem

Pickleball for me is normally about fun, and building skill, but I’m not above a psychological trick or two when it makes sense. A couple of years ago, I tried something that worked well, so I’ll pass it along:

This is going to cost you a point, but may win many points shortly thereafter.

There was a player who was going way too far with the “Arizona serve.” This is the kind of serve which is much more of a forehand than an underhand serve. As you know, the pickleball rules call for the ball to be hit below the waist, or more specifically, below bellybutton height, with an underhand stroke or at least with the hand below the wrist (if that can be done with anything other than an underhand stroke). In serious competition, a forehand serve would be called a fault, but in much of modern pickleball, it is considered OK. But today, this person was winning points on an aggressive serve. Or at least putting some players in a position where their returns were less than ideal.

So early in a game I purposely served a ball with a too-high forehand stroke, then immediately stopped the play, calling a fault on myself.

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Patience is a Strategy

Everything comes to you at the right moment...

Resetting the point was a key percentage pickleball concept in the articles from both Coach Mo and Sarah Ansboury. But resetting the point requires a couple of mental strengths. One is confidence - the confidence that restarting a rally from a neutral position can be won with more shots. The other is patience - the patience to wait for a better ball or more advantageous position to go for a winner. Jeff Napier has an article discussing how patience is a requirement.

Kitchen Patience

The biggest difference between a 4.5 rated player and a 5.0 is probably patience in kitchen rallies. The lesser player will try to put something away that the 5.0 player will simply dink back defensively. What the 4.5 player doesn’t really understand yet, is that when facing two good opponents, it is like facing an invincible wall. Anything the 4.5 player tries to force out of a quiet and soft kitchen rally will come back twice as fast and hard. Many of the really top players will simply wait, and wait, and wait some more, until the opponent makes a mistake big enough to capitalize on. Or, another way of looking at it is that the lesser player will try to leverage anything that has possibilities, where the more experienced player will wait until s/he has a sure thing.

Revisiting the Dropshot

The last few weeks have included discussions on the serve and the return of serve (in conjunction with groundstrokes). These topics were chosen based on a review of the Sarah Ansboury article 3 Ball Pickleball Drill: 1-2-3 Drill and my follow-up article titles Deep, Deep, Drop, Dink. We will continue the review of the most basic shots in pickleball with an article from Jeff Napier called Pickleball – The Dropshot.

Pickleball – The Dropshot

As you know, the serve must bounce in your court before you can return it. And, your return must bounce in the opponents’ court before they can hit it back. After that, you can do anything you want. Most beginners believe the best response for the third hit is to hit it hard and low to the opponents backcourt. As it turns out, that is seldom the most successful strategy, especially when playing with experts. The approach they usually use, for good reason, is called the “dropshot.” The idea is to drop the ball just over the net, so it ideally lands in the non-volley zone, and does not bounce high. you then follow your shot by coming quickly to the non-volley line.

This initiates a classic quality pickleball rally, in which the ball is hit softly with control back and forth within the non-volley zone until someone makes a mistake. The common mistakes are to hit the ball into the net, or to hit it so it is high enough that the opponet can smash it, or place it where you cannot reach.

Beginners and some intermediate players will assume that the drop shot is not important. They may even assume that it is guaranteed to fail because they do not yet have the skill to place drop shots well. This assumption is actually OK when you’re playing a game with non-skilled players, although even for them, the drop shots will generally confound them. But with advanced players, you really need a good drop shot. Otherwise, they’ll be able to come to the non-volley line while keeping you in the backcourt, and that’s not a successful place to be.

One of the best ways to learn the drop shot is to purposely practice it. During warmup, or with someone who is willing to help, try rallying with you in the backcourt, and the other person at the non-volley line, where you try to execute drop shots continuously, and the other person returns the balls to your backcourt.

If you find the opponent has an overwhelming response to your drop shots, either smashing them or placing the ball strategically, your drop shots are going too high over the net, or too fast. Slow them down so they’ll drop soon enough, and keep them low over the top of the net, so they won’t bounce too high.

If you often hit your drop shots into the net, you might notice what’s happening when you make the shots. Most people with this problem are moving forward at the time they hit the ball. Instead, make your move forward, if necessary, as early as possible, so you can come to a stop, and focus on a good hit. You might also try watching your paddle strike the ball.

The Return - Deep and High

A couple of weeks ago I did a series on drills. The last drills I discussed included the serve, the return of serve, the 3rd-shot drop, and the dink. Over the next several weeks, we will refocus on these basic shots. Today we will continue with the second shot - the return of serve.

A lot of information on the return of serve has already been included in previous articles. These are archived in Chapter 3: The Groundstroke & Return of Serve, the second chapter of the "book" from A Pickleball Life. It can be found along the left side of the blog. But there is now a constant stream of new materials available. We will examine some of those materials and add them to the archive. Today's first article is called Return Serves Deep and it comes from Jeff Napier.

Return Serves Deep

With practice, you can learn to return serves with some control. So where should you put the returns? In most cases, you should return deep – as close to the opponents’ baseline as you can.

There are three main reasons:

It is hard for the opponent to do anything offensive with a deep return. Their best bet is a drop shot into your non-volley zone, but it is difficult to do that accurately from the backcourt.

Serve Deep

A couple of weeks ago I did a series on drills. The last drills I discussed included the serve, the return of serve, the 3rd-shot drop, and the dink. Over the next several weeks, we will refocus on these basic shots. Today we will start with the serve.

A lot of information on the serve has already been included in previous articles. These are archived in Chapter 2: The Serve, the second chapter of the "book" from A Pickleball Life. It can be found along the left side of the blog. But there is now a constant stream of new materials available. We will examine some of those materials and add them to the archive. Today's article is called Serve Deep and it comes from Jeff Napier.

Serve Deep

The beginning pickleball player feels lucky to get the serve anywhere within legal bounds. With experience, the player can start to serve to specific places. So, once you have the skill to serve the ball where you want it, where is the best place to serve?

Sometimes you can serve very short, and the beginner and intermediate players will not run to the net in time to return the ball. But the advanced players are all over short serves. With an especially short serve, they can often win on the return shot – no more volleying needed, since they’ll put it soft and diagonally into the kitchen, where you can’t return it.

Offbeat Sunday: New Pickleball Terms

A clever post from Jeff Napier at Pickleball Strategy.

Some New Terminology

I posted a query about terminology in the forum section of usapa.org, and got some interesting responses. I don’t know how legitimate or ‘universal’ these terms may be, but thought you’d enjoy them in any case.

Wrong Garage – A serve that goes into wrong service box

Erne Shot – Normally, you can’t be closer than seven feet from the net when hitting a ball unless it has bounced. However, if you have a ball that’s coming well to one side, you can step right up to the net, as long as you are outside the sideline, and hit the ball without it needing to bounce first. Here’s a video.

Pantry – The area outside the sideline near the center line very close to the net, but outside the kitchen. The area where the Erne shot takes place.

Where to Serve

We've been highlighting the serve this week and that will continue with an article from a new expert whose website I've recently discovered. Jeff Napier has had videos on line for some time but I was unaware that he had a blog until I stumbled across Pickleball Strategy. This article, called Where to Serve, comes from that blog.

Where to Serve

At the beginning stages, most of us are happy just to get the ball in the court. With practice, you can place your serves with a degree of accuracy. Since you have the opportunity to place serves where you want, you might as well know where the recipients will have the most trouble.

First, almost all good serves land far back, close to the baseline. If your serve is short, the opponents can approach the kitchen right away, and in many cases, return a diagonal ball into your kitchen that you’re not ready for. Instead, you want to keep them away from the kitchen as long as possible.

Therefore, you may be amused to discover that when you’re serving from the right half, a serve that’s as diagonal as you can manage, into your opponent’s forward right corner, just behind the kitchen line is ridiculously difficult to return. This serve violates the notion that all serves should be close to the baseline. The recipients have to stand behind the baseline in case you serve deep and direct, so serving into the front right corner will make them run forward, putting them at a disadvantage. You don’t generally want a high, slow serve into the front right corner, because that will give the opponent time to respond with a diagonal into your kitchen or maybe even a dink that will put your team on the defensive. The interesting thing about this serve is that it is to the forehand of right-handed players – 89.9% of the population, and so you’d think it is not hard to return. Oddly, serving from the left court to the very diagonal left corner does not have the same effect on a right-hander. They are more easily able to return that as a backhand.

Off beat Sunday: A Short Work of Pickleball Fiction

A short story from Jeff Napier's blog.

The $78 Million Man

Our pastor, although a very nice, and well-educated guy, isn’t very good at counseling, and he knows it, so I have taken over most of the lay counseling that happens at our church. One day I had an appointment with Jeremy, a 21-year-old fellow who according to rumors, had recently inherited 78 million dollars.

On a Tuesday at 3pm on the dot, he walked into the little church office, and I met him for the first time. He was huge. I mean, he was around 6″ 3′ tall, and big-boned. Well, fat, actually.

His pale skin, short blond hair, whispy beard, and goofy sweater made him look even larger. He greeted me with a somewhat unsteady, high-pitched voice.

We started off with small talk. I always like to make my clients feel comfortable as soon as I can. He started slowly and hesitantly, but fairly quickly steered the conversation to his problems, evidently comfortable enough with me already to let go of some of his inner secrets.

Offbeat Sunday: How to Pick up Balls (The Heel Kick-up)

Last week's Off beat Sunday post was an easy way to pick up balls. This one is a little harder, but is much more impressive. It also comes from Jeff Napier and is called Pickleball Heel Kick-Up.

Offbeat Sunday: How to Pick up Balls

I used to play tennis long before I discovered pickleball. Other than some basic racquet skills, I didn't bring much of my tennis game with me when I switched sports. But one thing I would like to learn is an easy way to pick up balls and tennis might have an answer.

Tennis players don't like to pick up balls. Instead, they get creative in developing methods to get them from the court into their hands. A tricky technique is to use the springiness of the tennis ball to the player's advantage and bounce it up.

Answers to Rules Quiz - More Serve

1. Margy recently added pickleball to her recreational activities in addition to tennis, which she has played for 20 years. In her pickleball games, she occasionally slips into tennis mode and once even tried to serve overhead! A routine she learned in tennis to help calm her nerves is to bounce the ball before her serve. At a crucial point in a recent pickleball game, she bounced the ball and served to Jimmy. Rather than hitting the serve back, Jimmy caught the ball and claimed that Margy faulted by bouncing the ball. Margy said that the bounce was before the point was initiated and Jimmy faulted by not returning the serve. Who is right?

Answer: Margy is right and wins the point. Jimmy confused Margy's legal bouncing with the rule against hitting the serve off a bounce.

Rules Quiz - More Serve

1. Margy recently added pickleball to her recreational activities in addition to tennis, which she has played for 20 years. In her pickleball games, she occasionally slips into tennis mode and once even tried to serve overhead! A routine she learned in tennis to help calm her nerves is to bounce the ball before her serve. At a crucial point in a recent pickleball game, she bounced the ball and served to Jimmy. Rather than hitting the serve back, Jimmy caught the ball and claimed that Margy faulted by bouncing the ball. Margy said that the bounce was before the point was initiated and Jimmy faulted by not returning the serve. Who is right?

Dink Game Strategies

In my last post about dinking, I described the dinking technique as similar to sitting in a chair. For many players, that description also applies to their attitude about the dink game. They think dinking is a passive game of patience where the strategy is just to keep the ball in play until their opponent makes a mistake. That certainly works for some players – those with amazing patience and skill. Others need to use different strategies with the dink game.

First, let’s discuss when to dink. A dink should be an option only when both opponents are at their kitchen line. If one or both opponents are back, a better shot is to keep them back by hitting a ball to or just behind their feet. If both opponents are at the kitchen and you have to hit a ball from below net level, then you should hit a dink. Otherwise, your return will be upward and give your opponents a chance to smash it downward and win the rally. This same thought process works in reverse. If your partner is caught away from the kitchen line, a soft shot - like a dink - will give him an opportunity to regain position.