Another Scott Point, Chain Reactions

 Simone Jardim has some new videos (I think) on YouTube.  I'm watching one now.  It's the third one of them.  It is about advanced attacking strategies.

But we are not here for that discussion.  I think she is going to get quite technical and detailed and it's probably worth more posts later.  Her first point is that the available attacking strategy depends on a lot of things, and those include if you were trying to hit off your heels and what your body position is at that moment.  Her view is that your initial body position will limit your ability to attack the next ball.

I'd like to kick that point around a bit for this post.  Scott and I have had a number of conversations about body position and movement, where your weight is -- heels or toes or flat footed.  I think this is a very important point.  

If you are going to hit the ball well, you need to moving into the ball, which requires a solid position before you hit it.  And that assumes that you have moved to the proper place to hit the ball.  And that requires an initial location on the court and your body being ready to make that initial move to the next shot. Think of all of this as a chain of conditions that rules a point.  Be Ready, Move to the ball, Move into the shot.

One of the most frequent errors I see are people who move prematurely into the court and then have to back up to return a shot.  That puts a lot of folks on their heels, weight is back and there can be no body movement into the swing.  So, out of position and can't get to the next shot and the body position is wrong.

A weak hit that might be in play is about the best that can happen.

I'm guilty of this a bit too.  It is easy to get caught doing it.  There are some exceptions to staying back: if you are playing against folk who never return a deep shot or a strong wind is at your back, then you may need/want to move in a bit.  

But against good players and normal conditions, being back and ready to move forward to where the next shot will be hit with comfort.  Start that chain of events in your favor.