Zane's Point About Center Coverage

 Zane Navratil has a series of good PB videos on YouTube.  He gets to the point, doesn't cover too much, they're quick, and not very repetitive.

The last post I saw was on covering the middle, which is a topic close to all players' hearts.  

The situation that he covers is one where the ball will be hit from off center.  The player in front of the hitter must move over to cover most of the down the line shot - but not all of it.  More on that in a moment.  and the other player has to shift over to avoid the center coverage gap.

The big point that Zane makes that I had not heard before, is that your team should cover most of the shots that the hitter can hit with a hard shot.  We have most of down the line covered and the middle.  We will allow Paul, oops, the opponent to hit the one in ten shot down the line and reward him for his fine shot.  In exchange for giving up on that shot we take away the other nine shots that are on our alley.

The same for the middle.  Due to the angles involved there may be some double coverage between the defenders, and we are willing to give up a wide shot.  Why that shot?  Because the ball can't be hit hard cross court as the side line comes into play.  If the hitter goes for it, we can watch it go wide and if it's soft we might be able to run it down.

I might suggest that the center defended faces the hitter a bit and might want to take a step backward to get more time to defend.  Zane doesn't mention that, but I think it's a strategy worth trying.  I have no data to back it up, but it seems to provide a better defensive setup.

Here is the link to the post: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC44JwoyudU