Transcription
To go from intermediate to advanced in pickleball, you have to avoid the most common problems in the sport. So, we're going to break down the five biggest problems we see at the intermediate level and exactly how to fix them. And stick around to the end 'cause we'll finish with the most common problems we see with amateurs. Subscribe and let's do this.
The first problem we see is happening on the serve. Too many intermediate players at this level try to do too much with the serve and instead of it being their strength, they turn it into their weakness. Let's show you how to fix that. The number one thing to consider on your serve is that you want to keep it simple. The best evidence for this can be seen at the very top of the sport. When you look at someone like Annalie Waters, she teaches that the serve is just simply well, simple. It looks just like a forehand motion. So, if you can hit a forehand drive, then you can hit a serve. Too often, we try to do too much with the serve and we try to do all these different techniques and crazy slices and spins, but at the end of the day, it's just making us less consistent. So, let's talk about how to get it really consistent.
At the simplest level, the first thing you need to do on your serve is to get below it. So, if you're hitting any sort of forehand shot in pickleball, you're going to want to start below the ball. That way, you can hit up on it. And then, as you hit up on it, that will generate topspin and also send your ball flying forward. So, in your serve, the very first thing is to get below this ball. Too many people start way too high with their paddle and then they hit it more flat, and that leads to inconsistency with where they're putting this ball on the court. So number one, get below it.
So obviously, to get below it, you need to have your knees bent, which is the second thing here. You just want to be in an athletic position pretty much anywhere in pickleball, but especially here on the serve. It helps you get below the ball. And when you're hitting this ball, you want to finish over your shoulder. So don't just do this little poke motion that a lot of people do or these weird kind of like side-spinny stuff. Just hit a natural shot, let your hips come through, and then finish over your shoulder for the most effective and simple serve.
And that takes us to our next point on the serve, which is people try to aim too specifically on their serve. Two really obvious examples of this are when people try to hit the corners. So they could hit this corner because they think for some reason hitting that exact spot will win them a point. Or they might try to go for the T right here and hit it right here because they think that will win them the point. The problem with these two spots is that there's no margin for error. Anything less than the literal perfect serve will be going out of bounds. So we want to avoid these spots. The most consistent place you can aim your serve is in the direct middle of the court. If you're aiming at this exact spot, you have the most margin to miss anywhere in this court and you pretty much have no chance of hitting this ball out of bounds.
Now, obviously, you want to have the serve land deep if you can because the returner has to let the ball bounce before they can hit it. It's better if you can have it land deep, but going for this shot deep every time when you're going from that intermediate to advanced area is just not very consistent. And you'll notice that if you do hit a ball that goes out of bounds, it takes away all your momentum and then you lose the point right away. So, it's much safer to go for a more controlled shot in the middle and then work on hitting a better third shot and then fifth shot and then finally winning the point that way.
There's this misconception in pickleball that when you are the serving team, you have the advantage. And this probably comes from tennis; it's the most likely reason because in tennis, when you have the serve, you are at an advantage. But in pickleball, your partner is already starting up at the line if you're returning. And then you also have to let the ball bounce if you're the serving team. So all those reasons together make the serve a more defensive position. So one of the best things you can do from this serving position is just start the point, make sure you get your serve in, and then work your way up efficiently throughout the point and not try to win it all right here from the serve.
Our next biggest problem we see with intermediate players is bad speed-ups. I know you know that feeling of going for a speed-up and realizing you did it wrong or the ball came back unexpectedly and you're not ready. This is one of the most common problems we see at the amateur level. So, let's address three big problems that we see within speed-ups that we can fix. So, that way the next time you decide to add more pace to the ball, it's better.
The first big problem we see with speed-ups is making it too obvious that you're about to speed up the ball. Often, this is because we go for too big a backswing or we maybe take a big step back. We're showing our opponents one way or another that, hey, we're about to add pace to the ball, so go ahead and brace yourself. This is a problem because we want to catch our opponents off guard for a better chance of winning the point because of the speed-up. So, to fix telegraphing your next move, avoid these giant motions when you're about to finally add some pace to the ball, maybe during a dink rally when something pops up too high. Big motions in general in pickleball are a problem, so we want to avoid that.
Another big way besides just backswing to help disguise your dinks, right before you make contact, make sure that your paddle tip is down. The reason why we do this before we dink when we're up at the kitchen is because one, it gives us nice control. We can maneuver our paddle at any moment, but also when we finally decide to speed up, we can flick the ball at our opponent, kind of catching them off guard. This motion means we're going to be behind the ball brushing it anyways. So this time, we're able to start the brushing short and swing motion when our paddle tip is already down. It really helps disguise that speed-up when you finally decide to go for it.
The other big issue is not just before we make contact that we see amateurs struggle. It's also during contact; they follow through or make too big of a swing motion. Maybe they do something like that. It's not that swinging in full is necessarily a bad shot. It often means you're adding a lot of power. The issue is when we swing across our body after we make contact, we make it incredibly difficult to snap back to ready position. A pickleball hands battle is incredibly fast, and we need that valuable time. So snapping back to ready position after every single speed-up is incredibly important. That's why again, we want to emphasize those very short strokes. Instead of speeding up across our body or doing wide motions, we want to instead practice punches that allow us to snap right back to ready position and then defend whatever comes back next. The assumption is always that our opponent will get the ball back. We don't ever want to pretend that the point is finished. So, if you get a chance for a big swing, remember to keep it compact and snap back as quick as possible.
And the last problem we see with speed-ups most often is just flat-out impatience or unwillingness to keep the rally going. Speed-ups are an important part of the game, but we have to be hunting for the right ball. As a great rule of thumb to keep in mind, if the ball is not bouncing above the top of the net, it's probably not a good option for you to speed up. The reason why is because once this ball goes higher than the net, it gives us a little bit of margin that we can start to aim towards the court. But whenever the ball is below the net, we now have to hit upwards, which means it's incredibly difficult to also add pace while hitting up. So stay patient, get your dink rallies consistent, and only use speed-ups when you actually have the right target.
One thing we want to note: when a speed-up opportunity comes your way, it likely means you're finally taking the ball out of the air rather than letting it bounce. We generally recommend speed-ups occur as a volley rather than letting it bounce. Because in general, if you're able to volley the ball, then you're also able to hit it back at your opponent with more margin. So, if you're not sure when you should be speeding up, if you feel like you're able to volley at your opponent, that's likely the best time. But if you can't do that, maybe just dink. It's likely the better option. Consistency, above all, is key.
Our next biggest problem is flinching whenever a ball is coming at you. If you're moving before you try to make contact with the ball, you're not going to be hitting it well. So, let's fix that. This isn't so much of a problem in the back of the court, but as you get closer to the kitchen line, it becomes really important. Because we get closer to our opponents, we have less time to react whenever balls are hit at us. And so, at an early level, it feels really natural to want to like, kind of cower away from these balls. But that's going to be a problem for you as you progress.
The trick to responding and not flinching is keeping your paddle up. If your paddle is down at your side and someone hits a ball at you, you don't have a lot of time to get your paddle from your hip up to your shoulder. And so, it's more natural to kind of like move away from the ball or just throw your paddle up and then you just pop the ball up. But if your paddle's already up whenever they're hitting that ball, you're going to have a much easier time responding to the shot that they hit at you. In general, you want to be pointing the tip of your paddle at wherever the ball is on the court. So, if the ball is over there, I want to point my paddle at it here, here, here, here. As you can clearly see, this will help you respond to any sort of shot that is hit at you because you're already pointing where the ball is coming from. And just an honorable mention here: I think a lot of people have fear of getting hit in the face in pickleball. So, if you just have a nice pair of like racquetball glasses, those will definitely suffice and make you a more confident player up here at the kitchen.
The second part to not flinching is a mindset shift. You want to be always thinking that your opponent is about to speed the ball up at you because you don't have a lot of time to react to speed-ups. If you're not already in that speed-up mindset, then when they hit that ball at you, you're going to respond. Well, really, who knows how? Because you're not already thinking about it and you don't have that time. If they hit a dink at you, you have plenty of time to respond, lower your paddle, and hit a dink back. But any shot hit hard, you're just not going to have enough time to respond effectively if you're not ready for it.
And so what does it mean to respond to a speed-up? Well, the number one thing is countering a speed-up. And the best way to do that is by keeping your paddle up like we talked about and then using a really small stroke to hit the ball back. So if they're hitting in my shoulder, I want to be right here already pointing at it and then just hit a really short stroke back at them. It doesn't take a lot, but just enough to make contact in the center of my paddle and then put all their pace right back at them. And then crucially, I want this stroke to be small so that I can hit and then recover ready for the next shot. And again, I'm thinking speed-up, speed-up, speed-up. They hit a dink. I've got plenty of time.
And just one final note here. We've covered this in a lot of videos already, but if you're instinctively moving your paddle to one side before someone hits a ball at you, all the things we just said kind of are going to go out the window. You have to be still and not guessing where someone's going to hit the ball. Just anticipate them hitting it around your shoulder area, but don't automatically go to one side. Because if you move your paddle to your backhand instinctively and they hit to your forehand, well, now you have no time to get over there. So, keep it level. Keep it at the ball and then respond to the ball that's hit to you.
At the advanced and pro level, they use one shot that I don't see much at the intermediate level. It's called a half-volley or take it off the rise, off the bounce. There's a couple of ways to describe this, but the key is there are three big areas you need to be applying this simple shot that I don't see a lot of intermediate players use. This is what it looks like. A half-volley or short hop simply looks like this when you take a ball off the bounce rather than either stepping back or buying yourself more space. The reason this is so important is it buys us so much more time in pickleball. And that's precious when we need to get up to the kitchen as fast as possible.
When you go for a half-volley, the key is we are almost always hitting this shot on the defensive. We're trying to simply go for height and loft rather than hitting drives out of our feet. That's because hitting big swings from here is literally impossible. So, the best-case scenario is you hit it out if you try to add too much pace to your half-volleys. So, when you go for them, think of them more as a version of a drop rather than a drive. The simple goal with half-volleys is to get ourselves to the kitchen. And it's really one of the most effective defensive tools that we can have in our arsenal. So, let's talk about some places that we can actually use the half-volley so you can apply it to your game.
The first place you want to be utilizing the half-volley is on the return. The reason why is because our goal when someone hits a serve at us is to make our way up to the kitchen line as quick as possible. Half-volleys buy us more time because we don't have to wait for the ball to bounce and grab a bunch of space. We can just let it bounce and then immediately take it off the rise, allowing us to use that forward momentum and get straight up to the kitchen. This is how almost every pro returns, especially in singles when it's even more important. So, we definitely recommend trying out this method. The key is taking it off the rise requires some better timing and a little bit more control. To make this more effective for you, I suggest instead of doing these big swings that sometimes you're going to be tempted to do on a return to give yourself power. Instead, try half swings in addition. So that way, you're just rolling the ball deep and working your way up to the kitchen. The key here is control. It's not power. That's kind of been the theme of this whole video. So what we want you to do is apply that also on the return.
Another big reason we really emphasize half-volleys on the return is when you start to play the higher-level players, their serves are going to get deeper and faster. Meaning often we literally can't go all the way back to go retrieve the ball and buy ourselves time because there's a fence in the way or some other obstacle. Literally, the only option back here is to take a ball off of the bounce because we don't have enough space to do otherwise.
The second biggest place we want you to be applying your half-volleys is when you're in the transition zone. We just mentioned we're always working our way up to the kitchen. And the key to standing our ground and being able to hold our ground when we're working our way up to the kitchen is not having to step back. If that's the case, our opponents are likely trying to hit our feet when we're in the transition zone. So, we need to be able to take the ball off of the rise and still be able to drop the ball effectively. If we have to step back, that means we've lost more time and space that we're going to have to make up later. Being able to half-volley effectively and hit a drop is one of the most effective tools in the transition zone to allow you to continue your momentum moving forward. In the transition zone, you'll often be tempted to either take volleys as resets, and there are good moments to be doing that. The reason we also want to be half-volleying is it basically allows us to get more time and control as opposed to a volley. The reason why is because the moment the ball makes contact with the ground, it loses a lot of its pace and its spin, giving us a little bit better of a read on the ball and allowing us to control it more effectively and hopefully land it in our opponent's kitchen box. So, instead of just following, practice your drops from the transition zone, simply using half-volleys.
And the final area you could probably guess that we want to be using this simple skill is when we're up at the kitchen line. The main reason we have to do this is because it helps us hold our ground and keep the offensive for longer. If we're forced to step back to hit every dink, then likely we're being pushed off of our offensive area and they can start targeting our feet, meaning we're on the defensive and we're more likely to lose the point. We want to maintain our ground at the kitchen line as long as possible. A lot of that means dinking off of the rise. Most effective dinks are going to be taken off the rise. It also strips away time from your opponent when you don't take a step back and instead roll the ball back at their feet. To keep it short and sweet, half-volley as much as possible. The only other option that's even more effective is if the ball is high enough to actually volley it out of the air. At the moment, you can't simply half-volley and continue the rally.
Before we move on to the final and biggest problem that we see in intermediate players, I want to mention that your paddle can also be holding you back substantially. In the current state of pickleball, you need a paddle with enough spin and power to execute the shots that we're showing to you. And we'd be lying to say that your paddle doesn't make a huge difference. Our friends at Enhance just launched their new Duo foam paddle, and it's one of the best that we've tried for maximum power and tons of spin. Plus, it's cheaper than almost any other foam paddle on the market. So, I highly recommend it. I've been playing with it a bunch lately. It's super durable. Every single touch feels consistent, which is key for me. And I also feel like, of course, I can get a ton of power off of every single drive that I hit with this paddle specifically. The usual price for this paddle is $199, but they're doing a Black Friday sale that's going to drop it down to $174.99. And if you use our discount code, Cracked, you will also get an additional $20 off, which puts this all the way at $154.99, which is like the cheapest Gen 4 paddle on the market. I think this thing is 100% worth it. I'm going to link it down below for you so you can check it out for yourself. Don't miss out on this offer before it expires.
Now, let's get back to the biggest problem that we see in intermediate players. The most common problem we see is positioning. At the end of the day, if you want to become a better pickleball player, you're going to have to be putting yourself in the right position on the court so that you can be best prepared for the shot that's going to come next. Intermediate players are surprised by the shots that advanced players hit, and they leave gaps on the court that other players are able to exploit. So to help, we're going to break down the three most common areas that we see gaps on the court and show you how to fix them.
Our first scenario is on the return. So let's say that Caleb and I are on the same team and he's currently returning and I'm up here at the line. Whenever our opponent serves a ball, I need to be watching and seeing how aggressive that serve is and how easily Caleb is able to respond to that. An intermediate player will stay right here no matter what happens with their partner. But the problem is if they hit a really good serve and maybe it pulls Caleb out wide or he has to stay back, there's now this big gap right here that nobody is covering. So it makes the opposing team have an easy entry up to the net. So to fix this, the number one thing you must be doing is watching the server hit the ball to your partner. And then if they're staying back or they're hitting the ball way out wide, you need to be stepping across this middle line and covering the empty space. We mainly see people not moving over to cover the middle when their backhand is in the middle because we've had it ingrained in our head since we started playing that the forehand always takes the middle. Well, then why would I ever step across and hit with my backhand? But in this scenario, when our partner is back, it is paramount that we step over even with our backhand and cover this space. On the forehand side, it's really natural to just step across and take a ball. But you also need to develop this on the backhand side as well. Coming across, hitting this, communicating with your partner, and working together as a team. It also helps if your partner's able to hit straight ahead. That way, the player over there is less likely to hit a really good shot crosscourt. If your partner is hitting like that direction, it's probably best to cover your side, which is what we're going to talk about as our second most common gap.
The second most common gap is what we call the alley. So, this usually happens whenever your opposing team gets a dink out wide and then you leave this space close to the sideline open. Once again, it comes from the idea that you're supposed to cover your side of the court and your partner covers their side of the court. But the problem with that is when you have that mentality, you're going to leave gaps. So, anytime that you have a ball hit out wide to your opponent, it's really important that you step across to cover this sideline because you have to be ready for any ball that comes down the line or else you're just going to allow free points to go past you and your partner's going to be really upset at you. Another reason why this might be happening to you is because it's not always available. So, what I mean by that is if I hit a dink to my opponent and it's somewhere like in this area of the court, they don't really have an alleyway to work with. But whenever I or my partner hits a wide dink to them, now you're going to see that opens up this entire side of the court. So you may not even be aware that it's available, but you have to be aware that no matter who hits the ball over to that side or that side, you're going to have to deal with this alley. So always make sure you step over and cover it. And you have to trust your partner to also cover your middle, which is our third biggest area where we see gaps.
There's a couple different ways this could happen. The first way is what we just talked about. There's a wide dink. You step over to cover your alley. Now there's a gap in the middle. The second way is if someone hits you out wide and you have to move over here. Now there's a gap in the middle. So now Caleb is here and he's a smart partner. So whenever I step over here to the side, being a smart player, he's going to also come across and go across that middle line. And now we both have this gap covered. If he were to stay over on his side of the court because that's what he's been taught, well, then now there's this entirely way too big gap in the middle of us, that's going to be exploited for the entirety of this match. So, this will really take you from that intermediate to the advanced level is just knowing where to be on the court. And up here at the kitchen line is one of the best places to work on that.
One of the biggest misconceptions that we see at the intermediate level is that this center line directly divides your partner's court and your court. And to ever step over this line would be invading your partner's space and stealing their balls. At the advanced level, that's just not true anymore. The middle of this court is dynamic. And this line is meant to be crossed over depending on the scenario that is happening.
Now you know the five most common problems we see at the intermediate level and what it takes to get to advanced. If you like this video, check out our other one that we're going to have linked right here. And uh, maybe subscribe at the same time. Do do both. Why not? What else are you going to do to learn pickleball?