Interactive Forum May 2011: Milos Raonic: Serve

[don_budge]

The question still persists...

Besides all of the questions about the idiosyncratic nature of his service motion, I have just one more question...is the motion conducive to him following it into the net? As it looks now the answer to that question is...no. I suggest sending him to the Stan Smith school of serving for some seasoning.

140 mph is impressive...but spin, placement and tactics are equally important elements of the service game. His motion may not be appropriate for those more subtler elements of service technique and tactics. That little idiosyncratic move that he makes at the top of his backswing to compensate for the rather unorthodox starting position of his racquet head and wrist is worrisome to me. Those little moves and compensations in a players swing sometimes are the reason things tend to break down under pressure...when things get a little dicey. It also looks like he tosses the ball very high which can be problematic in the wind.

It would be a shame to waste this young man's obvious strength and not develop the rest of his game around it, while at the same time continuing to develop the serve. If I were his coach I would not be satisfied with this as the final product. Hopefully he has a thoughtful coach, that is mindful of the potential this young man has, that will point him in the right direction.

This player should be developed to serve and volley, to attack the net and to play all court tennis...he is a perfect candidate, designed to offset the advantages of the prototypical modern backcourt player of today.

As it stands now, though, this is the perfect modern day serve. Generally the philosophy is...you cannot argue with velocity. Hit as hard as possible with minimal thought devoted to tactics...then retreat behind the baseline.

I had the chance to see Milos Raonic play in the Stockholm Open this week and I was very impressed...with my comments here at the forum about his serve and his overall game in general.

First of all...no matter what you say about video evidence, there is nothing like seeing the thing in action and under pressure. To watch a single view or even three or four does not give you the total "picture" as watching it over the course of a match or two. That being said...when I made my original comments I had never seen him play. After seeing him play, I stand by my comments and I sort of surprised myself how much I gleaned from a few seconds of video about the big picture.

This young man's serve still looks virtually identical to the video footage here on the thread and it held up in this tournament...up to a point. He lost to Gail Monfils in the semifinals in a match that he was definitely in position to win. He won the first set in a tiebreak...I suspect he will be involved in many tie breaks, but lost the match after being up a break in both the second and third sets. Things tend to get a bit dicey...especially for Raonic having a top ten player on the ropes, the nerves tend to do funny things.

I don't care for the little idiosyncratic moves in his serve and I still believe that in the long run this is going to cost him. One thing that I walked away with, though, is that I was impressed with his potential. He has a very nice service rhythm...his preshot routine has a very aesthetically pleasing bouncey, bouncey aspect to it and I still feel that if he was to iron out this motion a bit and study service tactics ala the Stan Smith video that I posted some time ago, he could improve his standings on the world stage. Certainly his ranking at any rate. I liked the setup on his forehand in particular at times and I feel that this is a shot he could potentially hit moving forward. It's too bad he doesn't hit a one hand backhand because that would enhance the volleying and approach shot aspects of his game. His tactics left something to be desired and I did not feel that he was exploiting the obvious strengths of his game to the fullest.

The thing that concerns me most is this guys incredibly long legs. He appears to be disproportionately long legged. The lateral movement must be extremely tough on his legs and hips...no wonder he had the hip issue. He certainly is not built like a grinder. Serve and volley might be the way to go in his case as perhaps the forward movement would not be so stressful on his body. Another concern is that he looks to be a bit laconic...a bit lethargic. He almost could remind me of a potential Sampras-like player but he is without the fire in his belly like a Pete Sampras...who could very well of served as a model for him. I sort of question whether or not he has the cajones to pull off the pressure on the net tactic...that is the real test of a tennis player. One who is compelled to dominate play at the net, but of course we no longer have the pleasure to see this tactic any longer...regrettably.

In the other semifinal...Jarkko Nieminen (#73 in the world) defeated James Blake (#69 in the world)...another three setter. In a battle of a couple of thirty-year olds, Nieminen prevailed because of his ability to take it up the line aggressively first on the forehand to backhand exchanges with Blake...Nieminen being left-handed. Overall, I would have to say that the action was...how should I put it? Non-compelling.

My impressions on the modern game persist...they have not changed since I witnessed the change in the late 1970's. I felt then...immediately that the game was ruined. The action is boring. The subtlety is gone...along with the artistic nature of the game. Philosophically there is a void as well. I am not impressed or entertained by the ball bashing. I can imagine these guys with the old equipment playing beautiful tennis at roughly half the speed. Professional tennis desperately needs to standardize the equipment in order to compensate for the overemphasis on speed...not that it will ever happen.

[Smokey]

Thanks

Thanks Kerry and John for your responses. How true that the complex live arm is the most important. I do think Fed and Sampras have the leg drive down cold, most importantly in an imitatable way.

[kerrymitchell]

leg work

Hi everyone,
Kerry here. Thank you for trying to compare my serve with Raonic's serve. I wish my leg loading and explosion was as good as his. I would have like to be 6' 6" too so my serve would be that much better. In the article, when doing demonstrating videos, often things are more mechanical for the sake of demonstration. My loading onto my front foot (when actually playing) is very similar, without the excessive knee bending. I've always served with a "platform" stance, ala samparas, federer. I don't really like the "pinpoint" stance much for the average player because it adds a complicating element that really doesn't help in the long run. Placement of the back foot when moving it forward has to be exact to make it efficient. Roddick and Monfils eliminate this complication by placing the rear foot already in the correct position. Is this something workable for everyone? No, I don't think so.
As for weight distribution when the knee bend occurs, there is lots of opinions. My feeling is that whichever stance you use the weight is centered over the front leg more than the back. I would say a ratio of about 80-20. This is what makes balancing in the correct trophy position possible. Now on a pinpoint stance is the weight being more equally balance possible, maybe, but I don't believe so. These kinds of things are usually secondary to developing a "live arm" which obviously Raonic has.
Good luck.

[johnyandell]

I thought I asked him...will again. In the future probably best to post in the link refering to the article. Think he was checking that and I am sure he doesn't read every post in the forum...

[Smokey]

Where is the Mitchell response?

Check out his response below!

Where is Mitchell's response to which you refer, John?

[don_budge]

cayagua...

There is always an a**hole on all forums.

Your post about the Raonic serve was an excellent post. It was very insightful...tennis_chiro responded seriously and I know that he doesn't respond unless he is serious. In one respect I am sorry that I made light of it because I offended you. But I do cherish my right to express myself, on the other hand.

I posted about the Raonic serve earlier in the thread and there were some who apparently did not agree with what I wrote. The thing about his serve that I criticized the most was the position of his racquet and you addressed this.

I am a bit of a different animal than tennis_chiro, however, but I was merely joking about "the frying pan grip". I am not offended by your little outburst or the fact that you called me a name...honestly. I think that something I said provoked you and I want to assure you that there are no hard feelings on my part and I sincerely hope that you will continue to post in the future...because I think that you can be a fine contributor here on the forum. Yours was an excellent post and I, for one, would like to see more of them. We need more like you.

There are a lot of diverse opinions on this forum and frankly I think that anybody who doesn't agree with me is a little bit of an....well you get the picture. We tennis coaches, aficionados, connoisseurs are sort of a funny lot. We have our ideas. We think we are so smart. I confess, I know that I do. We get to be a little bit full of ourselves, I think. Too full, I suspect at times. I have learned a bit myself about restraint here and guys like tennis_chiro and bottle and phil and licensed coach and geoffwilliams and llll...and even nabrug and all the rest of you, have taught me a thing or two...but not necessarily about tennis. I know for a fact too...that a couple of them have called me a name or two under their breathes. By the way...WBC where are you? I miss you. I am learning too...about how to behave in a group of people who...basically have their own ideas about things. Everyone here must think to themselves once in a while...what an idiot.

You are probably not alone in your feelings about the things that I write, and we have not even begun to discuss politics, but I didn't see a bunch of others jumping to my defense...you certainly had the nerve to express yourself. Please...don't be a stranger! In the end, maybe we can all have a bit of a laugh at ourselves. Why don't we just come to the net and shake hands...as if we had just bitterly contested a three setter during which we each were eyeballing each other calling each other the worst names we could think of under our breath, look each other in the eye and say "good match" even if we sort of choke on the words. Traditionally speaking, this is how we handle things in the "Kingdom of Tennis". Isn't it? Ok with you? No hard feelings, brother.

[johnyandell]

Cayagua,

Are you joking? I hope so, but I don't get the joke. If not let's refrain from name calling and insults and stick to agreeing or arguing rationally.

John Yandell

[cayagua]

A**hole

There is always an a**hole on all forums.

[don_budge]

I tried it...

The racket face parallel to the ground is taught by many south american coaches. They use the expression of feeling the racket as you are holding a frying pan by the handle. Try it and you will experience that having the racket face open at the beginning of the serve gives you that feeling of holding a frying pan by the handle.

The idea behind it is to help students having problems with pronation. Having the racket with an open face at the beginning of the serve effectively suppinates the arm and wrist allowing for greater pronation at the time you strike the ball.

It is the same principle mentioned in one of the articles here in tennisplayer about the Roddick serve. In that article I believe a college coach mentions that he discovered a hidden jewel in the Roddick serve because Roddick suppinates his arm when he reaches the pro drop.

The open racket face of the Raonic serve is the same principle but instead of suppinating at the pro drop, you suppinate at the beginning of the serve.

Ernest Gulbis also begins his serve with an open racket face.

The long follow thru, in my opinion, is just a consequence that Raonic has extremelly long arms.

I can't say that it helped my serve at all...but my Mexican omelettes have stepped up to another level.

[tennis_chiro]

Great explanation

The racket face parallel to the ground is taught by many south american coaches. They use the expression of feeling the racket as you are holding a frying pan by the handle. Try it and you will experience that having the racket face open at the beginning of the serve gives you that feeling of holding a frying pan by the handle.

The idea behind it is to help students having problems with pronation. Having the racket with an open face at the beginning of the serve effectively suppinates the arm and wrist allowing for greater pronation at the time you strike the ball.

It is the same principle mentioned in one of the articles here in tennisplayer about the Roddick serve. In that article I believe a college coach mentions that he discovered a hidden jewel in the Roddick serve because Roddick suppinates his arm when he reaches the pro drop.

The open racket face of the Raonic serve is the same principle but instead of suppinating at the pro drop, you suppinate at the beginning of the serve.

Ernest Gulbis also begins his serve with an open racket face.

The long follow thru, in my opinion, is just a consequence that Raonic has extremelly long arms.

That was really helpful. I didn't understand where that backswing came from.

But I question the validity of the underlying theory, or at least that this backswing leads you to the greater degree of supination at the pro drop. Once Raonic gets to the trophy position, his motion is pretty classical.

Check this Fawcette video. You may be able to see it a little easier.

http://www.fawcette.net/2011/02/milos-raonics-serve-close-up-in-video.html

When you look at the high speed footage on tennisplayer of Roddick's serve, you can see he still has some of that supination as his motion comes out of the pro drop position. I'm not positive, but I don't think it is there for Raonic.

I wonder what the rest of you think,
don

[cayagua]

Racket Face Open Beginning Of Serve

The racket face parallel to the ground is taught by many south american coaches. They use the expression of feeling the racket as you are holding a frying pan by the handle. Try it and you will experience that having the racket face open at the beginning of the serve gives you that feeling of holding a frying pan by the handle.

The idea behind it is to help students having problems with pronation. Having the racket with an open face at the beginning of the serve effectively suppinates the arm and wrist allowing for greater pronation at the time you strike the ball.

It is the same principle mentioned in one of the articles here in tennisplayer about the Roddick serve. In that article I believe a college coach mentions that he discovered a hidden jewel in the Roddick serve because Roddick suppinates his arm when he reaches the pro drop.

The open racket face of the Raonic serve is the same principle but instead of suppinating at the pro drop, you suppinate at the beginning of the serve.

Ernest Gulbis also begins his serve with an open racket face.

The long follow thru, in my opinion, is just a consequence that Raonic has extremelly long arms.

[johnyandell]

Check out his response below!

[Smokey]

Yes, Kerry Mitchell

Know you mean Kerry Mitchell... But I'll ask him to respond.

I did mean Mitchell, sorry Kerry, and I'd like to hear what he has to say. Thanks John.

[johnyandell]

Be amazing to see Richard serve under the new rule with the new rackets. But yeah something about watching him is very pleasing.

[gzhpcu]

OK... we are in 2011, and tennis has changed, but, for me, I'll take the Gonzales serve: lazy windup, elegant, poised, no excessive body movement...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyhFo3hvGPI

The Roddicks, Raonics, Karlovics just don't do it for me. Fast? Yes. Elegant? No.