🥒🏓 What To Do When Your Partner Hits A Low 3rd Shot Drop

1️⃣ Move into the transition zone, ahead of your partner to analyze the trajectory of the ball. This allows you to adapt to any ball your partner hits on their 3rd shot to put yourself in the best position for the 5th shot.

2️⃣ Once you read the trajectory of the ball is going to land at your opponents knees or lower, move up a couple of steps further to the kitchen line.

3️⃣ When you are setting your feet before the opponent strikes the 4th shot, keep in mind what your opponent may think and the options they have to prep yourself best.

⭐️ They may try to avoid you at all costs because they see how close you are, so you can then set yourself closer to the middle, looking to intercept any balls they attempt to hit to your partner that you can attack out of the air, as you see in the clip above.

⭐️ They may try to hit the ball behind you. As long as you are set and balanced, you can get behind any dink they hit behind you. If they attack behind you, their ball will be traveling upwards, so as long as you are set, balanced, & watching their paddle face, you should be able to counter this ball effectively. You can even juke middle or shade middle early to bait this attack.

⭐️ Finally, they may just dink the ball to your partner who will either be at the transition zone or the kitchen line, depending where they struck their 3rd shot from, which means the opponent has effectively neutralized your threat as a poacher. At the same time, your threat has led to your partner receiving a ball they can easily hit a 5th shot drop / dink in response to even the rally that was earlier shifted in their favor before the 3rd shot was hit 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 "Miss-Hitting" The "Sweet Spot" On Your 3rd Shot Drops?

1️⃣ Strike the ball when it is falling from it`s apex rather than striking the ball when it`s on its way up. The ball will be traveling slower & our eyes can gain more intel on the trajectory, speed & spin of the ball coming our way.

2️⃣ Consider the height at which you feel most comfortable striking the ball. Then, be sure to always focus on moving your feet, becoming balanced before contact, and situating yourself so you are always striking the ball from the same arm slot. This will allow you to hit the 3rd shot drop on your paddles sweet spot more often while also landing them at a higher rate.

3️⃣ I often see people "miss-hit" their 3rd shot drops when their opponent slice their return of serve. Usually, it`s because players realize there is spin on the ball and instinctively try to take the ball on the short hop. This will usually result in the player hitting the net. Instead, let the ball travel to you, get lower than usual, and apply a more "down-up" motion with your top spin drop. You will instantly notice that your drop will dip more, accelerate more, and become a nightmare for your opponents to handle 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 Missing 3rd Shot Drops Into The Net?

The first challenge I throw to myself or clients is to aim deeper. See what happens.

In this case, when she started aiming deeper with her drop shots, not afraid of hitting the drop too deep, she landed 37 in a row.

Is this always the remedy? No. But if the player continues to hit net with the drop shot, at least they will know it`s not because of where they are aiming after making this mindset shift. Therefore, they can then shift the focus towards their paddle face, footwork, balance, follow through, when they are striking the ball, etc. which are amongst some of the other key variables impacting 3rd shot drop shot execution 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 The Aggressive Half Volley Dink

Some of the toughest dinks to handle are the ones hit with decent pace at our shoe laces.

Do we take it out of the air?
Or step back to take it off of the bounce?
Or do we hit a half volley scoop shortly after the ball has bounced?

If a decision is not made in time, we will pop up the ball or hit the ball into the net.

I tend to look to take these balls out of the air instead of stepping back, unless I know the ball is not hit with much pace, which means I will have enough time to step back.

However, there are times where I anticipate I can take it out of the air, but realize shortly that I cannot reach comfortable. In addition, there are situations, such as the one`s above, which I recognize I`m not set in time to take the ball out of the air. In these situations, we must resort to the emergency dink known as the half volley, which is a dink hit shortly after it has bounced.

Many times I see people hit these balls defensively. However, if we

1️⃣ Keep the paddle head relatively neutral (not pointing up or down)

2️⃣ Maintain stability with our legs and arm

3️⃣ Use the pace of the ball hit to us as a guide to how hard we can this ball without hitting it too deep or short

4️⃣ 🎯 Aim about 1 foot inside the kitchen line from a depth standpoint

We can reverse the balance of power in the rally from going to ourselves being in a tough position to putting our opponents in a tough position by executing this shot 👍🏻
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🥒🏓 Biggest Difference Between 5.5 and 5.0 Pickleball 🥒🏓

Throughout my development as a coach and competitor, the biggest difference I have analyzed between 5.5 & 5.0, on average, is the know-how & ability to set up and execute 2 shot combos. Studying and drilling such combos and testing out in rec play is undoubtedly necessary to take that jump nowadays. As you can see in the tape here, each speed up hit by Tom Romano and Roger Mosteller was designed as a set up for their 2 shot combo. Given that, it is no surprise to me that their DUPR averages out to 5.50 and that they consistently place well in open level 5.0+ tourneys.

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🥒🏓 What To Do When They Dink To Your Shins

1️⃣ Split step, so you have a stable base. Stay 🏋️ down throughout the shot.

2️⃣ Hit the bottom right side of the ball with a slightly open 🏓 paddle face

3️⃣ Consider like you are turning the 📻 audio / radio down in your car - the forearm rotation for this stroke is tiny, as you are using the pace of the ball dinked / dropped to you. If you try to do more, you will hit the ball into the net or out.

4️⃣ 🎯 Aim about 1 foot inside the corner of the crosscourt kitchen. This will cause your opponent to abruptly stop their momentum going towards the middle to shift their weight towards the sideline to return your shot. Your shot may cause

✅ Missed dinks
✅ Flat, dead dinks, as your opponent may be off balanced attempting to return your shot
✅ Your opponents to be on ⛸️ ice skates, as this shot should open up a plethora of options for what you want to do with the next ball if they return this shot back to you 👍🏻

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When you get the perfect lob. #pickleball #pickleballislife #pickleballers #pickleballaddict #picklenparsmithtown #fail ...

🥒🏓 Tip To Stop Hitting Your Backhand Rolls & Flicks Out Of Bounds

⭐️Strike the ball from a steeper "down-up" incline. This will 👇🏻

✅ Allow you to lift the ball over the net
✅ While providing more topspin to prevent the ball from going out of bounds

🚨The backhand roll and flick are strokes that takes much practice and trial & error with. Discover the little tweaks that work best for you. I find for myself that thinking "down-up" more than forward helps me improve my consistency with those shots 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 Tips For 2 Hand Backhand Dink Consistency

1️⃣ Cup your right wrist, so that the paddle tip is at 1 ⏰. Keep that right wrist stable throughout contact. Maintaining the paddle face`s angle will
allow the ball to slide off the paddle face consistently.

2️⃣ Develop rhythm & balance by doing a shuffle step, aligning your feet with the angle the ball is coming from, and squat down with the ball.

3️⃣ Hit the bottom left of the ball & follow through with the top of your left thumb hitting your right shoulder at the end. This will provide spin and fluency with your stroke

🚨 I would first practice hitting this shot cross court to the opponents backhand, as you have more space to work with. Once you become fluent, you should practice hitting this dink to the middle 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 Lethal 2-Shot Speed Up Combo

1️⃣ Shuffle your feet to get behind the ball early, so you can move down with the ball, & hold your launching point for a split second.

2️⃣ Deceive your opponents that you will be speeding up down the line with your head, eyes, arms & paddle. This will increase your chances that your opponent is late with their counter, setting yourself up best for your 2nd shot.

3️⃣ Hit a 2 hand backhand topspin speed up, brushing up the bottom left of the ball. I would 🎯 aim just outside their left hip, so they have to reach outside of their left hip with a backhand while not hitting it too wide of their left hip, as that will be your cross court`s opponent`s forehand.

4️⃣ This speed up will lead to the ball being countered most likely to your forehand, which you will attack as your 2nd of the combo, aiming down the middle or at the cross court opponent. Practicing this combo, so you can synchronize your movements, balance, anticipation, and consistency with that forehand you hit the 2nd ball with is key, as that is the shot you will need to win rallies off of speed ups against 5.5+ opponents.

🚨 To clarify, Mikael hit this attack right inside the opponents right hip, not outside their left hip. Because the opponent was fooled and opened up their right side to hit a forehand counter initially before switching to their backhand, Mikael`s attack generated a similar🔻triangle pattern

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🥒🏓 How To Hit A Forehand Topspin Dink

1️⃣ Slightly rotate your forearm & elbow with your wrist serving as an axis. A lot of time I see people attempt this shot by rotating the wrist forward like they are flipping over their 🍳 egg omelette with a spatula. The problem with that is the paddle face then turns, which does not allow the ball to slide off the paddle face. Thus, maintaining the same paddle face angle throughout any shot involving spin is necessary.

2️⃣ 🎯 Aim for the right side of the ball. This will cause more spin, many time even a bit of side spin included, which will allow the ball to spin down and away from your opponents.

3️⃣ Always make micro adjustments with your feet to set yourself in a balanced position behind the ball before going for this shot. Too often I see people attempt this without moving their feet, thus causing them to be unbalanced when striking the ball leading to misses. I like to think of it as if someone rolled a ground ball to me in baseball. Because baseball infielders need to not only field the ball, but also throw the ball to first base. They must align their feet & balance to direct their momentum to first base or else they won`t be able to set themselves up to make a solid throw. Think of dinking like that. Yes, you can get a paddle on the ball without moving your feet many times on a sink, but you won`t be able to land it effectively if you do not align your feet and balance 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 Pickleball Tips To Dink Consistently With Your Forehand

1️⃣ Keep your paddle face slightly open, so when you hit the ball, the trajectory will go up over the net while not going too high over the net.

2️⃣ Keep your wrist locked, so the trajectory set by your paddle face being slightly opened doesn`t alter. If you unlock your wrist and fling it up, the ball will fly up.

3️⃣ Face your palm towards you target, as your palm is your compass. Where your palm faces is where the ball will head toward.

4️⃣ Absorb / Use the pace of the incoming ball to control the depth of your dink. As you practice, you will develop an intuitive feel for how to handle various paces 👍🏻

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