Becoming quite the common play in the pro’s ⬇️

Controlling the kitchen without speedups 🧏‍♂️

A common “phase” I’ve started to observe at the rec level is one where players are starting to look more comfortable dinking - where rallies are starting to extend and pop ups are less frequent. This is an exciting time for your game and one where I imagine pickleball is getting even more fun. When you’re in this stage, the next phase for your game is to start thinking about how to take advantage of opportunities you create, even beyond thinking about speedups. Here are a few specific situations I think everyone below a 5.0 could be better at in this regard:

1. Dinking out of the air. Remember, just because you’re leaning in to take a dink out of the air, does not mean you have to be ultra aggressive. Way too many players try to do too much when dinking out of the air. Remember, when you take a ball out of the air, your opponent is likely leaning back (or at least not forward) so you have an opportunity to stay on offense by hitting it at their feet. Keep leaning in to take time away, but still be selective on speedup attempts

2. One of my biggest pet peeves is when someone has a great crosscourt dink, but fails to recover to towards the middle after each one. The goal of this dink is basically to get a pop up in the middle, and you’re responsible for covering the middle anyway. Get in there and be aggressive in the middle after you hit a good crosscourt dink, even if your backhand is in the middle. Practice the middle dink itself from this position - a lot of people miss this one.

3. Erne: The threat of an Erne goes a long way in creating tension on the other side of the line. It funnels the ball to the middle for your partner to (hopefully) take control of the dink rally with their forehand in most cases. I’ve been playing this game for awhile, and I really can’t think of any reason to not go for the Erne over and over again. My squad and I will get better at this in 2025.

Aggressive mindset on the backhand flick 💪

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5 Common Mistakes to Avoid on the Serve 👌

1. Tossing the ball too close to you: I see this one a lot. Give yourself more space to swing through and extend your arm!

2. Popping your head up: Popping up your head is a great idea if you want to hit a really bad serve at a crucial moment.

3. Bailing with the left arm: Too many people swing their left arm around before they make contact with the ball. Your arms should be moving together with one unit turn from both shoulders.

4. Static feet: Even if you don’t want to finish in the court like I advise, at least release your back foot from the ground so both feet aren’t planted the entire time.

5. Stopping the swing: If your scared of missing long, the worst thing you can do it stop your swing short or decelerate. The extra extension is how you create that extra topspin that will bring the ball back down.