Pulverizing short balls into a small court

[mrhalley]

In the pro game, any short ball is hit hard for a winner. Given that there is very little court to hit into, what technique do the pros use? Is this different than their forehand from the backcourt?

[kenknight]

I'm not an expert, period.

But...they need to be able to hit moderately hard for the putaway without hitting it long.

In order to do this, you want topspin. A shorter backswing would also make this easier. I found a sort of windshield-wiper motion works for me (I don't like the term, but oh well). Maybe that's a bad way to describe it.

I take the shorter backswing, and make sure my racquet head is dipped and under the ball. From there I have a moderate low-to-high motion, and make sure I get over the ball for the topspin.

As for it being different from a backcourt forehand, I find it only different from any topspin forehand in the shorter backswing and a little less extension through the ball.

Does this help any?

[mrhalley]

hard forcing shots

Yes, this helps alot. My pro, who was the University of Virginia #1 and later coach, wants us to roll the racket over and finish around the left bicep, rather than over the left shoulder. It seems like all the pros now do this all the time.

[johnyandell]

The key factor is ball height. You could argue the opposite that balls above waist level are hit flatter because there isn't the need for an arc to clear the net. You don't see it on the low balls if I understand the shot you are talking about--those do have more spin. Watch this one by Federer frame by frame however. Notice the incredible extension thru the line of the shot. Any spin is coming from the arm rotation, rather than the plane of the swing. I wouldn't say he'd shortened it up much either. Definitely a full swing.

[ignite]

What John has said here is exactly on the money.

When you put the ball away like Federer has in the video there, really all you need to do is "roll" over the top of the ball. There is very little need for "brushing " up the back of the ball, as you want to produce more forward momentum than vertical momentum.

Anthony

[bottle]

Both Ends of Racket Going Up Together

Sorry, that's not what I see. There appears to be brush from the arm
reinforcing spring from the body. If you click arrows on your keyboard
you should see Roger's racket go up quite parallel to the court before
the tip whips over to his followthrough.

[johnyandell]

If you look at the frame right before and right after contact, check the height of the hand. It somewhat higher in the second frame. This would indicate "brushing", so there is some. I'll modify what I said and agree that some of the spin is coming from this.

Now look again at the same two frames. Compare how much the hand moves up to how far it moves out. Right, it moves out a lot further than it moves up. This is what I mean by extension. The racket is moving forward more than across.

Now look one more time at the same two frames. See where the tip of the racket points. Right, it raises up 30 degrees or so in the second frame. This is the indication the spin is also coming from the rotation.

The original question was, I believe on putting away short balls and the relation to spin. Here we can see that even though there has to be spin, the line or shape of the swing is what seems to distinguish the shot.

[bottle]

Cool.

This deepens my experiment of tomorrow in a couple of different senses.
Thanks.

[kenknight]

On another note, the "Step, step, rip!" article helps a lot on short balls. Worth applying and reading if you don't already.

[bottle]

Step-Step-Rip

Yes, I'm very taken with that article. I was wondering last night though
if maybe Roger doesn't use a different variation: right foot, then left foot, then right foot, ripping. All this is mere surmising by me, stimulated by the film sequence included right in this correspondence. It's a great sequence, which I take very seriously. I don't take my own surmising too seriously, however. I only end up doing something, after exploration, if it really works better than anything else-- and that would be in a singles match where I might become wooden and lose because too conceptual. In three more weeks the same improvement may flow. This has happened before.

[kenknight]

Yup. Actually thinking about things during a match just hurts. It helps to get it into "muscle memory" or just get used to it in practice, and hopefully it'll be ingrained by the next match. Whenever I play competitively, I tend to drop whatever I'm currently learning unless I have a lot of confidence in it.

As for the sequence, the "step, step, rip" article doesn't have any faults. I believe you're seeing the back leg (or right foot, with Federer) kick back under him at the end of the sequence. I think it's been mentioned in a couple posts (not sure which, try the search function) and in another article. Supposedly helps counterbalance some of the motion, and helps a lot with down the line shots.

The back foot kicking back has actually worked for me so far, with good results. It came pretty naturally with the "step, step, rip" motion, and for me I didn't have to focus on it much.

[bottle]

Pro Shot (short angle). All Confidence.

Okay, Irish dancers: Left foot first! Carioca with right. Very subtle (slow!) turn of the hips from the wound up positioning caused by the carioca-ing.

The third step (slide and jab) puts only enough weight on left foot
(pushing backward) to accelerate the already twisting hips.

Left, right, left-and-left-foot-flies as you kick backward with your right foot.

Wanted: A set piece (which is a theatrical term), something with ritual or repeating mechanism. The weight never to get down early on the front foot
as in the Peter Burwash model for a conventional ground shot. This repeating mechanics is exception to the rule that footwork is better taught by principle than "blocking" (another theatrical term for set piece footwork for bad actors).

So, if we're fanatic enough to groove this footwork (or some other), we can
maybe transcend our blockheadedness. The trick is to ease the racket
(move it separate from the body) into perfect position during the slow hips turn. Which means in my case that I must have let the racket fall during the carioca.

The rhythm is different than previously supposed: More like step-step and step-Yandell (see his letter above for state of the art racket work).

The choreography might not stop here: Racket up to the outside for left foot step-out and completion of the shoulders turn; racket down and to the outside for right foot step-out (carioca); racket butt smoothing to the front of the stomach during first gear of the hip turn. Carioca, as suggested in the article we discussed, is just one possible version of the sequence.
Certainly a person has to step more, finally, with left foot this way. With more subdued movement all the way around, one can perhaps use a hitting step that is no more than two or three inches and blend it with the slow hip turn and sliding of the racket. Sharapova certainly demonstrates minimalist
step-out on her neutral shots from the baseline. She skips away on the path of the incoming ball and then just barely changes direction at the last moment.

All the idealized descriptions of a short angle one can read, designed something like this, sound wonderful of course. The question is whether one can hit the thing ninety-six times out of a hundred.

I watched a geezer with a dependable version put away the best player in the county. Interestingly, the geezer's points were not due to unforced errors by his better opposition (with a few significant exceptions). His stock- in-trade was a firm forehand to the short T (my brother used to say it should then hit the nearby fence on the first bounce). His only strategy was to set this shot up for a clean winner. That's the geezer I'd like to be.

[bottle]

Blink, Don't Think

I tell you, Bottle, you're not Roger, and therefore need to get your left foot down sooner. I am talking about the second time you put your left foot
down in the above model. That step needs to come earlier in the total
stroke cycle since you, like a lot of people, need more stability.

Also, Bottle, you should remember that somebody might read the above
description and believe it, not understanding that one can't really learn anything in tennis from a template. Well yes, you maybe can begin with it.

You're a 4.0 player, right? And you were playing a 5.0 player on Wednesday?
And you never hit one of your Pro Shots as described or even set up for it nor did you hit your next model either, which was to forget loop or takeback altogether, rebel against accepted tennis wisdom to get round early
before starting the arm back. You wanted to just paw at a spot on the court
with your left foot then do the turn to take weight back on the right foot
as the left heel went up--while extending the arm, still out front, DOWN.
Backward hips would get you there, forward hips would flatten the left
foot again and you would drive backward with left leg spinning the hips into second gear as you used Yandell's racket work (see above) and contracted your gut-- and if it was all robust enough you would fly. Whatever anyone could say about that shot (maybe, "wonder if he could get proper position and keep his head still enough?" or "what about the difference in rhythm from normal ground strokes?"), the shot would be pure economy. Life will be amusing if this shot shows up someday in a match.

The reality, Bottle, is what Carrie's mother told her in the Stephen King
book and movie: "They're all going to laugh at you!"

Look, the guy was a 5.0, right? And your best shot, same as always, was
a crosscourt passing shot when he was right in your face with you having enough time to delay getting it off.

So there's the answer. Click and drag your opponent right in front of you.
Hallucinate the dude to a different place! Make it seem like a passing
shot even if it isn't, delaying, delaying, then hitting hard with spin. The ball might go a tad deeper than you want but that seems like good trade-off
for extra pace, focus and adrenalin.

Thanks for the free advice.

Sincerely,
Bottle

[johnyandell]

Well, it's always nice to talk to someone who you know is gonna listen...