Tuesday Tennis Tip: Smaggressive Aggression

As I was writing about the boy's basketball Sectional on Monday, I was reminded of my continuing belief that under pressure, teams that are aggressive are rewarded. It got me thinking, what are the ways to be aggressive in tennis, and where is the line of being too aggressive. Here's what I came up with.

There are three basic ways to be aggressive:
1. Placement
You place the balls in aggressive areas, such as deep into the corners, using angles, drop shots, moving your opponent around and controlling the point.
2. Pace
You hit the ball hard and force your opponent to adjust to the pace of your shots.
3. Coming to the Net
You get forward at every opportunity and force your opponent to have to come up with big shots to win the points from you.

With those three strategies in mind. I thought about this:

Playing One of the Strategies at a Time = Smaggressive
If you use just one of those strategies, you are being smaggressive. Only using one of them at a time is a fairly safe way to play, but it still puts your opponent under pressure. It is also very achievable at a high school level to use one of these aggressive moves at a time without making too many mistakes. So, typically in our matches we would want to play one of these strategies on every point.

You can see this in the way I coach. I typically instruct singles players to focus on placement of the ball, and doubles players to focus on attacking the net. These are the ONE strategies that I want players to use in those situations. There may be times for a singles player to attack the net, and there may be times for a doubles player to blast the ball. Yet, in general, I want them to stick with just one aggressive type play to put pressure on the opponent. Because

Playing Two of the Strategies at a Time = Risky
Think about it. If you play two of these strategies at the same point, you are going to make many more mistakes. Going for power and placement, you are going to miss more. Pounding the ball and coming to the net, it's difficult to get that balance, and you often get ahead of yourself. Same thing with coming to net and placing the ball. Usually the desire to get to the net causes the placement to lack a bit, and then makes it easier to get passed. The double-mindedness can get messy.

That doesn't mean you can't do it. Putting two of these together makes for a really aggressive play. That can throw your opponent off and help you win a point or two. But if you stay with the combination for too long, mistakes begin to pile up, and so does frustration.

Playing All Three at the Same Time = Chaos
If you try to hit for pace, placement and to get to the net; that is too much going on for the average player within the average point. I mean, honestly, that is where most mistakes come from. Players think, "Oh, there's a short ball. I going to blast that deep into the corner and then come to the net to pound down an overhead." Well, that's awesome when it happens, but usually there's so much going on in their mind that they send the approach shot long, or wide, or get to the net and don't get their racket prepared so they beef the overhead.

So, with that in mind, we want to use one of these aggressive strategies at a time. Over time, over practice, our normal shots will contain more pace. We will recognize proper times to come forward, and they will become more natural parts of our games. We just don't want to force it.

Tuesday Tennis Tip: Smaggressive Singles Strategy

TTT #11: Smaggresive Singles Strategy - Playing By Numbers

Seth and I had a good talk Monday morning about singles strategies, so I decided this would be a good place to post. Hopefully this will help us develop a language throughout the Bethany tennis program that we can communicate in when we need to make changes to the type of strategies we are playing within a match.

So here are four singles strategies, laid out by number.

0
"Zero" strategy is a strategy that calls for zero mistakes. It means that your goal with every shot is simply to get the ball in the court. This is a good strategy to use at times when your opponent is having trouble keeping the ball in the court. It is also a good strategy if you have fallen out of rhythm and are making a lot of mistakes, it can allow you to find your rhythm again.

1
"One" strategy is to pick one spot on the court and attempt to hit all shots there. This could be used to pick on an opponent's glaring weakness (usually their backhand) or could be used as a control measure on your own game. One example of using it as a control would be to pick your "spot" as crosscourt, and every shot you would attempt to hit crosscourt. This way you would be choosing to make a safer shot each time.

2
"Two" strategy means you only play two different types of shots: neutral and aggressive. This is a bit more risky and attacking strategy, and it requires that you know when is the proper time to be neutral and stroke the ball back in the court, and when is the time to be aggressive and attack the ball. Obviously, there is no strategy where you are trying to swing as hard as you can, but this strategy is the one that allows for the most pace. If played well, the "two" strategy can really keep an opponent on their heals.

3
"Three" strategy means that you are working your opponent to both sides of the court, but keeping the ball about three feet inside the sideline each time. This is the strategy that is my favorite, and Jared Schwartzentruber played this strategy to perfection when he was at his best last season. He won several moments of beauty just by stroking the ball to each corner of his opponent's court but not getting too close to the lines. After a while, opponent's simply become tired and cannot keep up with the constant movement required of them when playing against this strategy. Also, it is important to realize that with "three" strategy you are controlling the point, but at the same time not taking an unneeded amount of risk to do so. It is the beautiful, smaggressive strategy I love.

The other important thing to note is that these can all be good strategies, and one of them probably fits your game and mentality more than the others. For this team, I've typically tried to identify your characteristics and line you up accordingly. I like to take players who naturally gravitate towards the number "two" strategy and put them in doubles, because aggressiveness is rewarded at a higher rate in doubles than singles. My top of the lineup players in singles (Joel King, Luke Hostetter, Jared Schwartzentruber, Wes Klassen) have typically played their best tennis when they were controlling the match with number "three" strategy, and maybe coming to the net mixed in.

So who are you? Where are you comfortable? Just five months left to find out before the season begins!

Tuesday Tennis Tip: Smaggressive Attacks

TTT #3: Smaggressive Attacks

First off, let me say there are two parts to this article. One for singles and one for doubles. Secondly, let me define my terms. Smaggressive is smart and aggressive combined into one word of rolled up fun, attack means coming forward to the net looking to end points with volleys and overheads.

Let's start with doubles...

Doubles is all about attacking the net and being the aggressive team. In 95% of the matches, the doubles team that is more aggressive wins. Of course, that is assuming that they aren't completely without skill. In doubles, you also have a partner to help cover you when you do attack. So all in all, you take more chances.

The proper time to attack the net in doubles is this: If you hit the ball to the back partner on the other team, then you attack the net.

I know that makes it sort of simple, and there are some instances in which you wouldn't attack then. But as a rule of thumb, if they have one person back, and you hit it to that person, then you should "Attack! Attack!"

Depending on your court position at the time of your approach shot, you may need to split step just inside the T and prepare for the next shot before continuing all the way to the net. But there is no need in doubles to wait for a short ball to approach on. Make sure you hit a good shot, then hustle yourself to the net. Take some chances, have fun, be aggressive. That's doubles. I love it!

Let's talk about singles...

The key to singles is timing. And knowing your own game. Yes, you want to get forward and put pressure on your opponent to hit passing shots. But too many times we think that we need to rush to the net. In singles, you've got no one to cover your back, so the key is the approach shot.

The approach shot is a shot that doesn't really get practiced enough, at least by us. It's a hard shot to practice really, because the most important part of the shot can't be practiced. That important part is the "feel." What I mean by that, again having to define my terms, is that there is a certain target to hit the approach at and there is a certain way to hit the approach. But approach shots need to be excellent in order to attack behind them, and the most important and difficult part is learning to naturally evaluate your approach and make adjustments.

But let's start with where to aim. Backhand corner. Okay, that's not a set rule, but usually you want to take advantage of your opponent's weakest shot. For most high school players, the backhand is their weakest shot. Apart from aiming solely for the backhand, the other rule of thumb is that you want to make your opponent move. Hitting an approach shot on the move is very difficult, especially if you are having to reach. So this means looking for the open court, giving them a low slicing shot that they have to reach down for, dropping a shot short and coming behind that...anything that makes them move and reach.

Once you've accomplished that then you come. But when attacking, you have to have the mindset of being excited about putting the ball away. You can't be defensive and come to the net. So try to relax and have fun and stay on your toes as you come in, anxious to turn your great approach into a winning volley.

Okay, stay smaggressive kids!

Tuesday Tennis Tip: Smaggressive Strategy

TTT #2: Smaggressive Strategy
It's the third set against Fairfield, and you have the 5-4 lead. It's your serve and you lead the game 40-30. You have one point to seal the match, and in so doing an epic victory for the Bruins! (I love upping the corniness.) You serve and the rally begins. How do you play this point?

a. Keep the ball back to the middle of the court, hope they make a mistake.
b. Fire for the lines, win with a powerful forehand winner with the hardest swing you've taken all match long.
c. Bloop the ball back over because you're too nervous to swing through.
d. Swing aggressively and be prepared to attack, while minimizing risks by playing high percentage shots.

If your answer was "d," then you've picked the smaggressive play. And the correct play according to this coach.

Smaggressive was a word that the team made up two years ago to describe one of the four core values of Bethany Christian tennis play. It is a smashed together form of smart and aggressive. Through the past two years, this value has defined what we strive for on the court. In our best moments and matches we achieved it, in our worst moments we often found that we were either lacking the smart or the aggressive.

In all the talking though, we've really only given a general sense to this strategy. We say that we want to play this way and then I never really go into detail on what types of shots and skills are needed to play this way. Over the course of the winter, I want to "unpack" some of the shots and strategies that make a smaggressive game.

The first strategy that is crucial to smaggression is the crosscourt shot. Either the crosscourt forehand or the crosscourt backhand. When you talk about a high percentage shot, the crosscourt shot is always the highest percentage shot available. First of all, to hit a crosscourt shot the path of the ball will travel over the center of the net. The center of the net is the lowest part of the net, therefore you are less likely to hit the ball in the net. Also, the ball can travel a greater distance in the air when hit crosscourt. See the diagram below:

Cool graphics aside, it's easy to see that crosscourt is a safer shot in several ways.

But it is not inherently aggressive. In fact, it is often considered the safe play. But the type of shot that you hit can make it more aggressive. All season long, here at Bethany we practiced a crosscourt drill where I would say, "Go for more!" What this meant is that we attempted to increase the velocity of our shots by 10% and hit a more biting, more pacey, in short, a bigger shot. We tried to hit the ball hard.

This harder shot gives your opponent less time to react, less time to think, more room to make an error. It also puts you in an attacking mindset, hopefully ready to move forward on any weak return provided.

Getting control of this pounded crosscourt shot can provide us with a go-to shot for pressure situations. It takes a high percentage shot and goes after it with no fear, ready to follow it up with more smaggressive shots if needed. This is one of the biggest priorities for Bethany tennis this offseason, to continue to work on our smaggressive tennis. Here's a shot to start with.