An Informal Blocking Lesson

 As mentioned in an earlier post, I was invited to a drilling/playing session with Gregg Whitfield, the local pro at Cambria, CA.

We were hitting and then played some games with a emphasis of keeping the ball in play.

One of the deficiencies with my game is the tendency to hit the ball, rather than just block it back.  Swinging at a ball from the baseline is fine, but when moving in or at the kitchen line, the block is more controlling and accurate  -- or so I've been told, I've not actually tried it!

The technique is to hit the ball in front of your body, no swing, gentle hand to control power, and use the wrist to change ball direction.  The paddle face has to be open, aka facing the sky a bit, for all shots.  (Gregg mentioned to me was that even on a shot at my ankle, I was starting to roll it.  While a roll is a beautiful thing, it's maybe not proper for all occasions?)  You need to hit the ball very softly here.  The open paddle gets the ball over the net, but if you hit it hard you'll pop it up.  

What this added to my play, there were fewer net balls and fewer popups.  I was hitting dinks that were more difficult to attack, easier to control.  I was very happy with the shots.

I tried hitting blocks as a fifth shot from mid court.  I usually would roll these as deep as the opponents, but I tried to just push the ball back, not much swing and mostly block.  Most of those shots came back, but were not difficult for me to return.  Note that none of these shots went out, which is maybe the entire idea of all of this, keep the ball in play, hit a conservative shot, attack when it's obvious.

As  I read this over, I think the main point here to choose to block rather than to hit out on a lot more shots than I typically would.  The philosophy is to reduce errors of two types.  The first being to avoid hitting an out ball and the second avoiding a long swing that makes it more difficult to return to a ready position.

And second change to my game is to not roll the shots much.  I've played with these changes for three sessions and I've found then quite effective.  I think in the last session I didn't hit any ball hard.  My win rate was as good as I get and didn't lose any game that I shouldn't have.  And if Randy had been on his game...  (Kidding!)

Back at Cambria: As the session proceeded, there were four of us playing and with that style there were some long rallies.  I'd guess one was over 20 shots.  Ah, Gregg could have put a couple of balls away, but that wasn't the point.

Then practice ended and there were a few final games with one of the heavy hitters.  I played with Gregg against an intermediate player and the other advanced player.  I found the game much easier to play when I blocked than with my usual roll shots.  Progress was made!

I appreciate Gregg spending time and knowledge with me.  His YouTube channel is: https://www.youtube.com/@greggwhitfieldpickleballsh8164

His main web site is:

https://www.pickleballshotsandstrategies.com/