Month: March 2017 (Page 2 of 4)

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Practicing in the Garage

I had been a while since I got into my garage and practiced pickleball. Given that I couldn’t play Sunday morning, I pulled our car out and practiced Sunday night. One thing that was markedly improved was my ability to control the ball when dinking. I was able to keep a “dink rally” going against the plywood panel long enough for me to start to get bored. Granted, it was probably only about 20-25 hits, but still, considering 5-10 was a typical rally before, this was a big improvement.

Online Discussions

I asked Mark Renneson—I figured he’d be in the know—about online discussion forums for pickleball since I had no luck finding any. He told me about a group on Facebook called imaginatively enough . . . Pickleball Forum!
Here’s the link:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1340630926008388/
I spent 45 minutes of my bedtime last night watching a “Facebook Live” recording of top player Scott Moore that ended a couple hours before I tuned in to watch it. It was interesting.

USAPBA Rules Test

One of the posts in the FB group mentioned the USAPA online rules test. It’s free to take and I’ll have to take it. One fellow—who I can only assume is a well-versed one—said after a number of attempts, his best score was still missing 12% and he’s the “go to” guy for rules when plays. Of course, I’m thinking, “How many rules can there be? You are hitting a plastic ball over a net with a paddle.” I’ll just have to take it and see what they are talking about.
http://www.usapa.org/rules-tests/

Real Player Ratings

Taking advantage of this discussion group, I asked a question about the published criteria versus the reality found at tournaments.The general consensus was that tournaments are far harder than what self-ratings based on the criteria might suggest. A 5.0 player by-the-book might be either a 4.5 or even a 4.0 player at a tournament. Some posted a link to pickleballtournaments.com where you can look up the player’s tournament history. I was able to learn that local player Terry Long partnered at venue with another local player, Jerry Louis. Terry also played doubles against Scott Moore at one point—Terry lost, but that would have been a major upset had he won!

I have to admit that I’m feeling a little intimidated by all of this, but I think it’s my perfectionist nature. I want to do well at whatever I do. Remember, it’s all for fun!

Rain

If figures that the year that I get into pickleball is a very wet winter after years of drought! We’re at an 80% chance of rain tomorrow morning at 6 a.m., dropping to 50% by court time. But the courts get flooded. Flip a coin, I guess.

[Update. Minutes after posting this, the sky just opened up at a quarter to 11. Deluge. It’ll be a wet night. Playing may have to wait until Sunday!]

Sunday, March 19, 2017

Today, I had some social obligations that prevented me from playing pickleball at Derby Park this morning. To top it off, rain is predicted this week. There’s a 40% to 60% change of rain on Wednesday morning. I may not get to play for another full week.

An Odd One: A Return With No Hit

Last week, while playing at Derby Park, there was an instance of a woman opponent hitting a ball with such backspin that it landed in our kitchen only to bounce back over the net onto her side of the court. This puzzled a number of us—including myself—but my partner in that game knew exactly what the rule was. Coincidentally, this exact rule was brought up in an episode of The Pickleball Show podcast that I listened to that very night! So what is the rule? A ball must be hit by a paddle before returning back over the net to be a legal return. Therefore if a ball bounces back over the net of its own accord, it’s a point for the team that last made contact with the ball. So in our case, the woman who hit that ball with the crazy amount of spin won the point, even though the ball ended up on her side of the court after she was the last one to hit it.

Doubles Tracking

One thing that occurred to me is that I’m doing a much better job tracking the ball during matches. I’ve been moving back and forth along the kitchen line toward the side of the court with the ball. I’m sure I’m not perfect in this, but I know I’m far improved.

What the Pros Do

Speaking of The Pickleball Show, I was listening to Episode 40: How To Prepare For The 2016 USAPA Nationals VIII last night where the host, Chris Allen, interviews Mark Renneson—yes, the Canadian player/coach I emailed last week.

Mark shared that the top players at last year’s Nationals hit very hard on the serves and the return of serves. Lots of speed, spin, depth on those hits. Some people say the first two hits are routine and relatively unimportant—that is, just getting them out of the way so the real action can begin—but Mark said that at the Nationals, the players are seeking to create an advantage beginning right with the serve.

Mark also said that in singles a 3rd shot drop is rare—maybe 5%-10% of the time—since players are driving passing shots with the more open space available in singles. In doubles however, a drop was maybe 50% of the 3rd shots. The other half of the 3rd shots were hard hits down the middle or right at the opponent in order to force a weak return volley that can then be put away for a point. He went on to talk more about this “2-step passing shot”, this 2-hit combination that he saw at that Nationals. He talks about it in this video:

What interesting is that covers exactly what I was talking about yesterday in my post. You can only reliably slam “up” only when you are hitting directly at your opponent. Recently, when I was playing Tom and Ileana, Tom said, “You can’t hit hard up” after I missed such a shot. Later when I hit hard from the net right up into his chest, I said, “See? You can hit hard up!” (I just don’t have the skill yet to do it reliably all the time as Tom was mostly likely pointing out!)

Videoing Myself

One thing that I’ve been meaning to do is bring our old GoPro video camera to the courts and video some of my games so that I can critique myself. It’s one thing to make adjustments on problems that you become aware of during a game. But there are ones that you are going to miss and that your partner may not catch or share a correction with you.

Singles

I do have to say that part of me is intrigued by the idea of playing singles pickleball. I’ve never done it. There’s no communication that has to happen with a partner. It’s not as social and it requires more running, but it would be fun to try. There is definitely different strategies involved so there’d be a learning curve. Maybe I’ll get the opportunity to try it out.

Something that I’m aware that I need to do better is picking a place to put the ball when I hit it. Serving, sure, easy. You have time to strategize and decide. During an active point, not so much. But there were times this week where I did decide mid-point where I wanted to put the ball. There were also many times where I wasn’t thinking, merely reacting. For instance, generally, you want to hit the ball to the opposing player nearer the baseline than to his/her partner at the net—yet, there were times when I hit the ball to the net player only to realize afterward what mistake I had made.

I suppose that the game will continue to mentally slow down the more that I play. NFL quarterbacks talk about this phenomenon. As a rookie, the plays happen so fast. But by the QB’s second year, the game “slows down”. You don’t have to spend time thinking about basic things and can instead concentrate on more advanced aspects of the game.

That said, it’s also just a matter of doing it. Training oneself to think, “Where do I want to put this ball?” Eventually, a player may not even have to do that, it gets automatic. Your arm knows to hit the ball to the player back at the baseline. But there should still be some thinking going on . . . “Are they left handed?” “Is their partner left handed?” “Are they weak on low shots?” “Are they really bad moving up on drop shots?” Any number of things can affect the optimal spot for ball placement.

Slamming Up

It’s often said that you never want to slam any direction other than down. And that’s good advice. But there is an exception. “An exception? What kind of crazy talk is that?” Yes, an exception. The only time can you slam it horizontally or slightly up is if something blocks the ball from going out. What are the two things that can block it? A body or a paddle.

A paddle will block the ball if someone is simply reacting and not thinking thus keeping your hit from straying out. This happening is a gamble and is unreliable. The opponent may get lucky and still manage to return your hit.

But the other, a body—slamming right at his chest—is less of a gamble and he still may be able to return it, but it’s not easy. This week, I had a ball smack me right in the middle of the chest since I couldn’t quite get my paddle into position to block it. Doh. Had it gone out in this instance if I wasn’t there to block it? Probably.

That leads to another piece of advice that a woman gave me one of the first few times that I played. Keep your paddle up and at the ready in front of your chest. It’s easy to get lazy and let the paddle droop down closer to your waist. But those few inches can make a difference when you have less than one second to react.

Aches and Pains

It seems that my body is getting more used to the demands of pickleball action. While I’m still getting sore, it’s less so. My biggest worry is my right hip. I injured it playing Co-Rec softball last summer and was on crutches for a few days. They did X-rays but it all came back negative. They never did quite figure out exactly what I did, but it hurt like heck. There’s a little pain there now after playing on Thursday night, but the hip may be something that I deal with now and then for the rest of my days. Who knows.

Tournament

I wrote to Tom Foladare, the pickleball contact for the May tournament in Palo Alto, with a question. He wrote back that when a team signs up for an age bracket, the correct bracket is determined by the youngest player of the team. If you have a 75-year-old and a 50-year-old, they end up in the 50-54 age bracket.

Tom shared that their club started with just 4 people three years ago and is now up to 180 paying members.

I remember recently reading some guy’s argument that pickleball isn’t a fast growing sport as is often claimed. There sure seems to be mounting evidence that he’s wrong.