Doubles Only Tennis Podcast

AMA: 1st Serve %, Net Movement, 2-up, Poaching, Volley Targets, & More

• Will Boucek • Episode 263

Share episode

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 32:52

In this 'Ask Me Anything' episode, I cover a variety of your questions from Instagram, email, and the membership.

Topics include 1st serve percentage, poaching, volley targets, 2-up vs 1-up 1-back, net positioning and movement, and more. In total, I answer seven questions. The first three are free to all, while you'll need to become a member for the last four.

  • My 3-step system to improve first-serve percentage
  • Drills for improving your first serve
  • What to do at the net when there's a fast-paced crosscourt rally
  • Why the triangle pattern at the net is mostly useless
  • Should you poach anyway, even if your partner doesn't like calling plays?
  • Members only: The best volley targets in certain situations
  • Members only: When to hit at net player vs back deep to the baseliner
  • Members only: When it's okay to play 2-up instead of 1-up 1-back
  • Members only: How to handle 4.5 teams who have one player hitting high, heavy lobs, while their partner finishes at the net

Links:

-----

**Join the #1 Doubles Strategy Newsletter for Club Tennis Players** 


**Become a Tennis Tribe Member**
Tennis Tribe Members get access to premium video lessons, a monthly member-only webinar, doubles strategy Ebooks & Courses, exclusive discounts on tennis gear, and more.


**Other Free Doubles Content**

AMA Setup And Seven Lessons

SPEAKER_00

Hey everyone, welcome to this Ask Me Anything episode. It has been a while since I've done one of these and I always get good feedback on these. I like doing them a lot. So uh I'm excited to do this one and I'm gonna try to do more of these in the future as well. So what I have done is I've aggregated a lot of the questions that y'all have asked me through Instagram, email, uh, and then also a lot of my members as well over the last few months, and I've picked out some of my favorites that I feel like are common questions from club level doubles players, and I'm gonna answer them here on the podcast. So uh we're gonna go through seven different questions that I'm gonna answer. Uh, the first one is going to be on first serve percentage. After that, I will discuss how to position yourself at the net and then how to move at the net when your partner and the opponent at the baseline are rallying with a lot of pace cross-court. After that, we will talk about poaching even when your partner isn't on board. So one member actually uh had a question about when their partner doesn't like to call plays, they're not as into strategy as they are. So should I be poaching anyways? So I'm gonna talk about that and how to handle that. Um, after that, we will discuss volley targets, when you should be going at the net player versus uh a different target. And then I'll talk about two up versus one up, one back. So those two formations. So a lot of doubles teams will have the tactic or the strategy where they want to get both players up to the net, whether it's serving or returning, versus a lot of teams. What is more common is playing one up and one back, or you have a net player and a baseline player. What is optimal in different situations? So I'll talk about that. Uh lesson number five is going to be, or lesson number six, I'm sorry, is going to be on uh bad cross-court matchups. So one member mentioned that she rallies from the dues court, and when she plays someone who hits the ball really hard and has a lot of consistency, what are some of the best options there? And then at the end, lesson number seven is going to be how to face teams who have one player at the baseline who hits high loopy balls or maybe even lobs, and then they have a very strong net player who moves around and really finishes well at the net. How do you face a team like that? What are some of the options? Uh, this is going to be a member episode. So if you're listening to the free version of the podcast, you're going to get the first three lessons for free. If you want the last four lessons, you'll need to become a member and download the member podcast feed. I'll link in the show notes to uh more information on the memberships and where you can sign up. But you're still gonna get a ton out of this as always. These first three questions are really good ones, and I know you will learn a lot. Before we dive into each of the lessons, a couple of quick announcements. So I've had a lot of people reaching out to uh ask me to do some on court training with them. Uh I've started to do these two-day mini doubles camps where you're playing tennis for anywhere from four to maybe six hours a day. Obviously, there's breaks in between. And a few USTA captains have reached out to uh for me to do this with their team. So I've got some coming up in Austin, Texas, and Houston, Texas. Um, and I've had interest in Miami, Washington, DC, uh, and a few other places. So if you're interested in this, either for your USTA team and you want it to be just closed for your team, or if you would would like to attend an open doubles camp, a two-day doubles camp, then shoot me an email if you are interested. My email is will at the tennis tribe.com. You can reach out to me through the website as well. But I'm trying to gauge interest in some of these cities. Um, to be fully transparent with you, the there's two things that make this difficult for me. One is finding the players. So if you have an entire team, that makes it a lot easier. And then two is finding the courts. A lot of clubs, a lot of facilities don't like outside coaches coaching on their courts. So sometimes that can be difficult. So if you have a way to make that easier for me, then it'll make the whole process easier. And then I can either travel to your city or maybe you can come to the Dallas-Fort Worth area and we can do it here. So reach out to me if you're interested in that. Um, one way to uh learn from me on the court is to go to Indian Wells next year and attend the rally trip. I've mentioned this a couple of times already. I'm gonna link to it in the show notes with more information as well. But basically, I have partnered with a company in Dallas who specializes in travel, and we are creating kind of an all-inclusive tennis trip where you get tickets to Indian Wells. You'll get to sit with me and watch ATP and WTA doubles matches, and then you'll also get to play around six to eight hours of tennis over the course of two or three days. Uh, we're gonna be staying at the La Quinta Resort and uh Hotel and Tennis Resort, um, which is a very, very nice luxury hotel where a lot of the players actually stay, a lot of the top players stay at La Quinta. Um, and we're gonna be playing tennis there as well. So you'll have a clinic with me, you'll have a clinic with the La Quinta um tennis coaches where I'll be on court kind of giving personalized advice as well. Um, we'll have a few meals planned. I'm gonna be doing a double strategy presentation there at La Quinta um during brunch one day. So it's gonna be a fun two or three days where we'll get to hang out, talk doubles, watch doubles, play doubles. It's gonna be a ton of fun. So again, I'll link to that um in the show notes. And the early bird pricing, I believe, ends on December 1st. So you want to sign up in November if you are going to sign up and use coupon code Tennis Tribe when you do. And then last, the surf strategy course is delayed a bit, which I feel like I say this every time I release a new course. Um, it's probably going to be in December when I release this. I've just had a lot of travel and things come up the last few weeks where I haven't been able to spend as much time on it as I can, but I am making progress and we'll have more announcements uh through the podcast and newsletter soon. So let's dive into these seven lessons. We're going to start with first serve percentage. Elizabeth from Instagram asks, how do you improve your first serve percentage? Is the main thing to practice the ball toss? I can hit an okay first serve at times, but there are spells in matches when I can't get one in. Then the more I want it to go in, the more I miss. So this is a really important topic. Uh, I recently published on Instagram um all the reasons that you might get broken in doubles. So if you have a game where you lose your serve, one of the main reasons that happens is a low first serve percentage. So if we go back and look at all the games you got broken when you were serving in your last match, I would bet your first serve percentage in those games was 50% or less. So that is a it can be a big issue in your doubles matches. And here's how I would approach it, and then I'll share a few drills to help you improve your first serve percentage as well. So I think the most important thing is to have self-awareness on the court and to be really observant. And this is a muscle that I'm constantly trying to improve. It's a tool that I'm constantly trying to sharpen, and you need to as well. So I'm always asking myself on the doubles court, how did each point end? So how did that last point end? Usually the point ends in an error, right? So we know 70 to 80 percent of points end in an error. So I want to know as much as possible about that error. Typically, I'm trying to study the opponent's errors. So were they hitting it from the deuce or ad court? Was it a forehand or backhand? Was it a high or low ball? Was it how much pace did it have on it? How much spin did it have on it? And if I can really hone in on where the majority of the opponent's errors are coming from, then I can just give them more of those and it will yield more errors. Um, also tied into that is my own positioning on the court or my partner's positioning on the court. Um, but back to first serve percentage, we need to notice as much as possible, as much information as possible about our first serve when we're missing it. So I've got three steps for you to improve your first serve percentage. Step number one is to notice when you've missed two or more first serves in a row. Most people have no clue. So if you get broken and at the end of the game, I walk up to you and say, How many first serves did you make in that game and how many did you attempt? What was your first serve percentage in that game? Most people don't have the self-awareness and they're not thinking about that during the match. So they would have no idea. So I want you to start to try to notice when you've missed two first serves in a row. Step two is to notice where you are missing. So some people might miss in the net, some people might miss long. If you typically hit a slice serve, maybe in the deuce court, you tend to miss wide. Uh, it can be different for everyone. Generally, I find most players miss their first serves in the net if they have a low first serve percentage. It's not true of everyone, but generally that's the first place to look. And then step three, and this is where even if I'm on the court with a player and I notice they've missed two or three first serves in a row, and I notice that they tend to miss them in the net, I'll walk up to them and say, I want you to overcorrect here. I want you to aim long. And they a lot of times they still miss it in the net. So this is the hard part. Right now, let's assume you uh are at love all. You go to the deuce court, you serve, you miss your first serve in the net. You make your second serve, and you win the point. You're up 15 love, but you made a second serve. You go over the ad court, you miss your first serve in the net. You make your second serve, they win the point. Now it's 15 all. So step one, we notice we've just missed two first serves. Step two, where did they miss? They missed in the net. Step three, overcorrect. So we're back in the deuce court, and right now, what most people think is okay, I'm just gonna aim for the middle of the box. But those last two first serves, I imagine you weren't aiming in the net. You were aiming somewhere in the box, right? And you missed them both in the net. So even though your brain thinks you're going to the middle of the box, your body has some technical flaw where it's aiming lower than where your brain wants you to. So what I need you to do is get your brain, I know this is kind of weird, but get your brain to actually aim for no man's land or sometimes even the baseline is good, especially if you're missing in the bottom of the net. And if you aim long, it'll probably land in the middle of the box. Because your brain and what your body are doing are disconnected. And if you miss it long, that's totally fine. Even though you've missed three first serves in a row, you've made a correction and now you can find that balance. The last thing I want you to do after you've missed two first serves in a row in the net is to miss a third first serve in the net. I want you to intentionally try to aim long and try to miss it long. And it'll probably go in. If it misses long, you'll be able to find that balance. So those are the three steps that I think about on the court. Number one, notice when you first missed two first serves in a row or more. Number two, notice where you're missing, wide, long, net. And then number three, overcorrect. Do not miss that third one or fourth one in the same spot. I want you to over-correct and then you'll be able to find that balance. So, what are a few drills we can do to help improve our first serve percentage? Uh, this is pretty straightforward. The the first one I would say is just to measure your first serves when you're practicing. So if you can hit 20 first serves per side, hit first serve, hit second serve, then hit first serve, then hit second serve, and just alternate. And when you do this, start in the deuce court, then shift over to the ad court. Um, there was a podcast, I think it was earlier this year with Nate Lamons, who made the uh US Open five or semifinals a couple of years ago, and he talked about when he uh practices his serve, he shifts from deuce to ad. So he doesn't hit 20 or 50 serves in a row from deuce and then go over to the ad and then hit 20 or 50 in a row, because that's not what actually happens in a match. And that made a lot of sense to me. So how I would probably approach this is start in the deuce court, hit a first serve. If you make it, go over to the ad court, hit a first serve. If you miss it, go ahead and hit a second serve in the ad court, then shift back to the deuce court. So we're kind of simulating a real match situation going back and forth. And I don't want you to worry about second serves as much for the purpose of this drill, but measure your first serve percentage as you're doing this and go 10 on each side or 20 on each side or 50 on each side and see what your first serve percentage is. And you want to be around 65 to 70 percent. So if you hit 20, which is 10 per side, you want to be around 13, maybe 14. You don't want it to be too high because then your first serve is acting like a second serve. If you're making 19 out of 20 first serves, the opponents are probably making all their returns. But you want it to be you don't want it to be too low because you don't want to give them too many second serve looks, right? So we want it to be around 65, maybe 70 percent. Another drill you can do is to play a set against yourself. I've talked about this a little bit before. Um, how this works is basically you'll start in the do scored, it's a love all. You win a point by making a first or a second serve. You can only lose a point by missing two first serves in a row. And if you double fault, it's worth two points. So I've done this in the past with club players, with my high school team, and how this works is you will let's say we start in the deuce court, you serve, you miss your first serve, you serve again, you make your second serve. That counts for you. You're up 15 love. We move over to the ad court. Now we have to make a first serve because we've missed one first serve in a row. If we miss that first serve, we still hit a second serve because if we miss the second serve, it's worth two points. If you make the second serve, you just lose one point. Now it's 15 all. We're back in the deuce court. We still have to make a first serve because we've missed now two first serves in a row. So what this does is it gets you to pay attention to how many first serves you've missed in a row. And that's gonna help just making it a conscious effort is gonna help you improve your first serve percentage. With some of the more advanced players, I'll use targets. So we can divide up the box by um the left and right half or wide body T, or even with pro players, I'll have them divide it in four. So wide body forehand, body backhand, and T and so on. So you can really get advanced with this, but those are a couple a couple of drills that you can do to practice your first serve percentage. So, next let's move on to lesson number two. This question is from Corinne. She asks, How will I find I struggle at the net when two men are hitting with pace and I don't see the opponent on defense, even when the ball is close to me and should be an easy put away volley. I get the ball late where my racket is making contact by my ear rather than in front. And what is supposed to be a compact volley becomes a swinging volley. What would your suggestions be? Stay back a bit closer to the service line or just practice the fast diagonal movements. Thanks for your help. Appreciate all the knowledge you share. So Corinne was talking about uh during a mixed doubles match. So when she's at the net and there's two guys rallying, this doesn't have to be mixed doubles, it could be men's doubles, women's doubles, it doesn't matter. But you're at the net, your partner is back at the baseline, the opponent is back at the baseline cross-court from your partner, and they're rallying cross-court with a lot of pace. What are some of the best options? So one thing I would say is the earlier you move, the better. So because she is getting there late, she's making contact back behind her head instead of out in front. Um, the earlier you move, the better. This is one of my biggest poaching lessons. I think it's the biggest mistake people make when they poach is moving too late. So if the ball is moving with a lot of pace, it's going to be a tough ball to redirect. So I want you to move early and force them down the line and see if they can make it at a high percentage. Odds are they probably can't unless your partner is a much weaker baseline player than the opponent. Um, so I would not wait for them to uh find a ball that they want to redirect on. So you don't want to let them get into the rally, you don't want to let them get into a rhythm, you want to move early, early, early. So that means early in the rally and early during their shot. So as they make their backswing, maybe even before they make their backswing, you go ahead and move across. Okay, and that also means, like I said, early in the rally. So don't wait for the third, fourth, or fifth ball. Move on that first ball, move on the second ball. And that's when you want to be moving. And on that, in that scenario, you're deciding when they have to redirect down the line. If you wait for that fourth, fifth, sixth ball, then they're gonna be looking for that down the line shot. And odds are within one of those three first three, four, five shots, they're gonna get a good clean ball where they want to go down the line. And their odds of making that one down the line are way higher than them redirecting down the line off of a ball that they didn't choose to redirect down the line. So hopefully that makes sense. That I want them redirecting when I decide, not when they decide. So move early and move earlier in the rally. Uh, the second thing I would think about is you have to position yourself a bit closer to the net, and you actually have to move within a smaller area as the pace increases. So at the club level, let's say 3-0 level or even beginner 2-5 level or 2-0 level, the ball's moving really slowly. So we have time to kind of move backwards and forwards. A lot of coaches teach this triangle drill. I think the terms they use are attack, uh, defend, recover, something like that. You've probably seen it on the court. Maybe you've even done this drill before. It's not something I teach because at most levels, you just don't have time to uh expand your movement pattern across the entire service box. It's just too difficult. The ball is way faster than we are. And as the pace increases, the area in which we move around the service box has to get even smaller. So I want you to be closer to the net starting out, and you're not gonna move very much. You're gonna shuffle a step or two backwards as your partner's hitting, and then as the opponent, as the ball is crossing the net, once you know the opposing uh net player is out of the play, you'll shuffle a step or two forward and you'll be right on top of the net. And what's gonna happen is if you move early, if you're closer to the net, the opponent's gonna feel that pressure, and because they're already hitting with pace, they're gonna see in their peripheral vision that you're closer to the net and that you're more towards the middle, and they're gonna either hit the ball wider, they're gonna redirect down the line, or they're simply gonna try to hit the ball harder and they're gonna miss. So you're gonna force a lot of errors this way. I really don't like that triangle drill because at almost every single level, you're not gonna be able to move fast enough to cover all make all three of these movements. So it's it's very, very difficult to be able to do that. So I want you to think about moving within a smaller area and then being closer to the net and then moving earlier as well. Um, generally, closer to the net is going to be better because even if you shank a few volleys, then you're going to still get it over the net a lot of the time and it'll end up being a winner. So that's no issue. I'd prefer that because you're going to force so many errors. Now, if it's not working, let's say the opponent is really good at redirecting down the line. There are going to be exceptions where this happens. Or maybe you're shanking the volley because you've stepped forward so much and they hit with a lot of pace and you just don't have time to react and you're just missing the ball. In that scenario, I think it is okay to step back a bit, but the problem you're going to run into is it makes the volley a lot tougher. So these are going to be more neutral to defensive volleys. So the ball's moving with a lot of pace cross-court. You make your move and you're maybe you're making contact four, five, six feet off the net, that ball is going to be a little bit lower. You're not going to have a lot of angles. So you're probably going to have to play that volley back to the baseline player. So it's going to be a little bit more of a neutral and defensive situation. So if you need to do that to give yourself more time so that you actually make the volley, then that's okay. But I would try those other things that I mentioned first. And then the last thing I would say, and you mentioned this in your question, Corinne, is practice. So have a coach or a ball machine just simulate this and have them feed from at the baseline or inside the baseline and have them ramp up the pace and have them step forward and feed from closer and closer. And you're going to get better at these reaction volleys and keeping the racket out in front of you and not making contact by your ear. So I would say practice this. Try to simulate the situation as much as possible if it's something you really, really want to try to figure out and solve. So question number three, let's get to this one from Josh. So Josh is a tennis tribe member. He asks, Hi Will, I'm a 3-0 lefty poacher loving the tribe. I'm working to convince my partners that we should be poaching way more. I like that you've talked about how part of it is accepting that we're going to lose some points in the doubles alley, but part of it is also convincing them to cover the other side after serving and potentially not to serve from their preferred position. At my level, many people aren't usually able/slash interested to do this. How important do you think it is? A lot of the points end by the time I poach with a return error, my winner, return winner, or my error. And sometimes they beat me with a sharp cross-court angle that the server could be running away from because these guys know I poach a lot. Are they uh or they lob me a lot anyway? So then it doesn't matter. You talk about how hard it is to return down the line. So, how about we start by leaving that open and make them beat us there? And you've taught me how smart it is to be unpredictable. How about the server doesn't always go? So the returner doesn't know where to return. You've got to leave something open, right? So there's a lot in there, there's a lot of questions in there, so I'll break it down um kind of one by one here. So the first thing is it sounds like Josh's partner isn't as into strategy. He's not necessarily on board with like calling serve plays and calling poaches. So Josh might be poaching, and his partner who's serving doesn't know that he's poaching. So his partner doesn't know to cover the line while Josh poaches and make that switch. He won't know it until he actually sees Josh make the move. This is not ideal, but I guess the question is, is it still worth poaching, even if they're not interested in uh the strategy or the play calling? I would say yes, because as Josh mentioned, a lot of the points will end in a different way, anyways. So the question is, what are the odds the return gets back down the line in play, and the server is able to get to it if they called the play and the server knew that his partner was going to be poaching at the net? Um, that's not going to happen that often. What's going to happen a lot more often is a return error or Josh is going to get a volley, which he might make, he might miss. It doesn't matter. But in both of those scenarios, the whether the server leaves to cover the line as soon as they serve or not doesn't really matter. So I'm more worried about what happens most often. And what happens most often are return errors, or maybe it's a return winner every now and then. That's probably the least often, or the net player gets a volley. The ball getting by you and going down the line is something that's not going to happen often. So I would say it's still worth poaching, even if your partner's not on board, um, knowing that you're going to get beat some down the line, like he talked about. Uh, one thing that he also mentioned is um he asked about the server not always going to the opposite side so that the returner doesn't know where to return. So I'm going to try to explain this in a different way. So if you're serving to the deuce court, and this happens at the pro level some, I've heard some players or coaches actually teach this. So if you're serving to the deuce court in regular formation and you call a poach, the net player is going to shift to their right to cover a cross-court return. And typically the server would serve and then go to the left to cover the down-the-line return. But I think what Josh is asking is what if the server serves and then stays to the right, anyways? So both players end up covering the same side. And what that might do is confuse the returner so they don't know where to return. Um, this is something I've heard pro players do because sometimes the returner might read the movement of the server after the serve, and then that will determine the location that they return. So hopefully y'all are following me here. I know this is pretty advanced. Um, I don't like it at the club level because I think most club players are not that advanced in their return location or in deciding their return location. So at the pro level, if I'm returning from the deuce court, I see the server shift to uh his or her right after the serve. Then I assume that they're going to stay in regular formation and I'll just return cross court. But sometimes the pro teams will not do that. The net player will move anyways, they'll both cover the same half, and then it's a way to confuse the returner. Again, I just don't like it at the club level. I think it's a little bit too advanced. I think most returners are just returning wherever they can. Um, and they're basing it more off how early the net player is moving. If the net player moves early, they're going to try to redirect down the line. So that is um, that's how I think about that one. Generally, uh you're always going to leave something open. So that's another thing he mentioned. He he's absolutely right about that. You're always leaving something open in double. So this is something that a lot of teams, when I'm on the court with them, will uh turn around after they lose a point and ask me, what do we do wrong? And a lot of the time I will tell them, you didn't do anything wrong. They just hit the lowest percentage shot. You covered all the high percentage shots and they hit the low percentage shot. That's going to happen sometimes by definition. If you're leaving the line open and they make it three out of 10 times, that means you're going to lose three out of 10 points. But I am okay with that. If you ever watched uh Fetter's speech, um, it was at some college several years ago, he talked about how he won 54% or something of the points he played during his career. He's one of the best players of all time. And this is true in doubles as well. Most matches, if you can win 55% of the points, that means you're up 11 to 9 if you play 20 points. It's very close. The margins are thin. But if you win 55% of the points, you're probably going to win the match almost every single time. So just because you lost the point doesn't mean you did something wrong, and you're always going to leave something open. So you might as well leave their lowest percentage shot open. Um, when the last thing I'll mention that he talked about is sometimes they lob anyways, and then it doesn't matter. In that scenario, you can take a few steps back. I'm actually going to talk about that here in a moment a little bit as well. But uh that's a good question from Josh, and that's that's kind of how I think about it. I wouldn't worry too much back to the original question about whether your partner knows you're poaching or not. I would still poach, anyways, because I really think it's worth it to force more of those return errors, get more of those volleys, even if it means they're going to get one or two extra winners uh down the line because your partner's not shifting over. After they serve, that's going to be much less frequent. So it's going to be worth it overall. So next, let's dive into the last four lessons. We're going to talk about volley targets. We're going to talk about two up versus one back, what to do in a bad cross-court matchup, and then how to combat a team that has high loopy balls or lobs and a strong net player. That is it for the free version of the podcast. Now I'm going to move on to the member section. Again, if you're listening to the free version, check out Tennis Tribe memberships in the links in the show notes. If you are a member and you're listening to the free version, then be sure to download the member podcast feed inside the membership. So this next lesson is from JW. We had a webinar a couple months ago on this serve plus one, and he sent me this email after he attended the webinar. He said, Great webinar. After I hung up, the following question occurred to me. I'm a strong 3-5 double specialist, and the strength of my game lies in my net play. Can we talk about optimal targets for volleys in general, not just the plus ones? Sometimes I like to steal time from the opponent and volley crisply at or towards the opposing net player. At 3-5, I've had a lot of success with this approach, but recently I've played against another strong player, and almost every shot I volleyed at or towards him came back. Not all were in, but his reflexes were exceptional, even for shots at his feet. This has me questioning what my targets should be. My teaching pro says the court positioning shows you where to hit the volley, but it's not always that clear to me. Can you point me to where you've really broken down the optimal targets of a volley in different circumstances? So I believe I shared with JW a video from the premium lessons. So if you're listening to this, you have access to that. So go to the premium lessons, and then it should be in the net play strategy section of that, or it might be in the recent lessons. But I'll cover volley targets here briefly for you as well. So your position does matter a ton here. So if you're closer to the net, then you're able to probably finish the volley and you can angle it off. And in that scenario, I like to go with the across your body rule. Now, this depends on the grip that you use. If you use more of a forehand grip on your volleys, then it's going to be different for you. You have to figure out what works best for you in terms of angling the ball off the court. If you have something close to a continental grip, then you'll be able to hit your forehand volley if you're right-handed to your left, your backhand volley if you're right-handed to your right. The exception to this rule is on stretch volleys. If you're really stretched out, you're not going to be able to hit your forehand volley to your left, okay, if you're right-handed. If you're really stretched out to your backhand side, you're not going to be able to get around the ball and hit it to your right. So if the ball is kind of near you, maybe inside your shoulders, as it's coming to you, volleying across your body when you're close to the net is going to be the easiest way to angle the ball off the court. Now, if the opponent hits with a lot of pace, if it's a very low volley that's dipping below the net, or if you're a little bit further back, in that scenario, you're probably going to be volleying back to the baseline player. You don't want to hit a defensive or kind of neutral volley at the opposing net player. So in that scenario, you'll probably try to find the uh baseline player's backhand. So if they're back in the deuce court, you're going to try to volley kind of more towards the middle. If they're back in the ad court at the baseline, you're going to try to volley a little bit to the outside. There's of course exceptions to this. If you know your opponent has a terrible forehand and an awesome backhand and they're playing in the ad court, then you might want to volley more towards the middle of the court. But generally, those are my two favorite targets on more defensive volleys. Try to get them deep hitting a backhand. And then as soon as you know you hit a good volley deep to their backhand, move towards the middle net strap and closer. Do not allow them to defend through the middle of the court. Your partner should be back behind you to cover the lob, which is probably their best uh option there. But do not allow them to defend it through the middle after you hit a good volley and get them on defense. On some of the stretch volleys that I talked about earlier. So let's say it's a slower high ball uh coming over the net and you're kind of stretched out. In that scenario, let's let's use an example. So let's go with the deuce court rally, right? You've got your forehand volley in the middle, assuming you're right-handed. They hit a ball that's high over the net. You decide you're gonna go get this, but you're kind of stretched. You can't hit that forehand volley to your left back behind the baseline player, which would be the easiest angle volley. So you're gonna hit this inside out at the opposing net player, like JW mentioned. When you're on the stretch, that is a good option. But if you're not close enough to the net, they do have time to react to that. So it can be difficult to finish those. So that's why being closer to the net is really, really important. So if you are closer to the net, you really want to work on your angle volleys, and then you can go with the net player too. Uh, but again, being closer is going to take time away from them, and they will be able to defend or won't be able to defend quite as easily. So that's how I think about the volley targets. You have to constantly be deciding is this an offensive, kind of neutral or defensive volley? And then based on that, are you able to angle it off the court, go at the net player if you're on offense, or if it's neutral or defense, go back to the baseline player's weakness and try to push them back and then look for a more offensive volley on the next shot? So this question is from Tom. He emailed me and said, a lot of times people say it's good to have a baseliner and a net player in doubles, but I'm curious and jaded by my experience. Why actually do you need a baseliner if you're supposed to play conservative from the baseline and mainly just keep the ball in? Baseliners want to hit winners, and that's usually a bad tactic. I've heard people say they cause errors and create opportunities for the net player, but that's usually the baseliners themselves talking. But given given tennis up to a pretty high level is being a game of errors, and given doubles points are supposed to end at the net, why not two net players? So this is a question of should our strategy be to get both players up to the net? A lot of coaches, especially old school coaches, say you have to get up to the net and doubles, you have to get up to the net and doubles. This is something that changed around the 2000s as string technology and racket technology changed, and the returns became a lot more difficult to pick up on the serve and volley. Uh, if you talk to most high-level doubles coaches today, they do not say you have to both be at the net in doubles. Um, one assumption that Tom makes there is that doubles points are supposed to end at the net. Um that's not necessarily always true, but I think a lot of baseline errors are caused by the person at the net. So, you know, indirectly it ends at the net, but um not necessarily directly. Uh, but he's right that it is a game of errors, and uh the baseline player is supposed to just keep the ball in play and and play a bit more conservatively and not go for winners. Um, but really this comes down to one question when we're asking, you know, should our strategy be two up or one up, one back? The the question it comes down to is their lob versus your ability to cover the lob. So most club players don't have very good overheads from the service line and behind. So if I were to go out with you on the court and feed you ten overheads from just behind the service line, I would bet you'll probably miss five of them. And a few of them you'll probably hit pretty weak and give the opponent an offensive shot. You might even miss more than five. It's not an easy shot to hit an overhead from no man's land or from near the service line, especially if you're starting in the middle of the service box and then I feed it, and then you're backing up, hitting off your back foot from the service line, it's just not a very easy shot. So in that scenario, we probably should have somebody back at the baseline. But if the opponents never lob, for example, absolutely, two up is a great strategy against that. Or if you and your partner both have great overheads and you're very agile and you can get back very quickly for that overhead, and you can hit good overheads off your back foot from the service line and behind, then by all means continue to go two up. But if the opponents are good lobbers and you're not great with that overhead around the service line area or no man's land, then you're gonna end up with a lot of those shots and you're probably not gonna win the match. You're probably gonna have a lot of trouble. So you need somebody back at the baseline to cover the lob and to return that lob a lot of times with another lob. So again, this comes down to their lob versus your ability to cover it when you have both players up. When you watch the pros, the ATP men can hit overheads from anywhere on the court. So two up is the play for the double specialist. This doesn't include a lot of the singles guys who stay back regardless, but for the double specialist on the ATP side, I would say maybe 80% of the time they're serving and balling and trying to get both players up to the net when they are the serve team. So in that scenario, it's a good play because even if you hit your absolute best lob with both of them up, they're very tall, they're very fast, they're explosive to move backwards for that lob, and they can hit a great overhead even from near the baseline. But when you watch the WTA, most of them are using a one-up one back formation. They're not quite as tall, they're not quite as explosive, the cord is the exact same size, and their overheads aren't quite as powerful. They don't get through the cord as quickly. So even at that level, they're typically playing one up one back. So at the club level, I can't imagine most scenarios where one up one back is not a better option. The exception that I mentioned earlier is if the opponents aren't great at lobbing. Or again, if you and your partner just have awesome overheads and you're able to get back quickly, or one of you maybe plays a little bit staggered, I think that can be okay. Um, but if the opponents are good at lobbing and you're both getting up to the net, it's gonna be it's gonna put you in a very difficult situation. So to summarize, I'll go back to the the kind of beginning of this this mini lesson is you have to calculate what is better, their lob or your ability to cover the lob when you're both at the net. If your ability to cover it is better, then by all means go up. If their lob is better than your ability to cover it, then you need to play one up, one back. So that's how I would think about that question. Let's go to the next lesson or the next question from Diane. Diane says, uh, I play the deuce side when someone is a really hard hitter with good consistency, and we're both back. What can I do? I try to lob, but it's hard because they are so low. Do I come in? I just hate it. So I imagine she's talking about she's returning the server, serves from the deuce court, and she gets in a cross-court rally. So, what can you do as the returner? Uh honestly, the first instinct I had when I read this question is I don't want you necessarily to do anything. So you're a doubles team, and I want you to problem solve this as a team. And I think the first option, the best option, is for your partner to poach earlier. So you don't need to do anything. You return cross-court, and if they hit the ball really hard and really consistent cross-court, then I'm gonna take away that cross-court shot with my net player, and I'm gonna have my net player poach and see if they can hit hard and consistent down the line off of my return. And if they can, then we'll think of something else. But I bet most players will not be able to redirect that ball down the line. So your partner needs to help you by moving early. So the next thing I would think about, let's assume they can redirect that down the line, and you can't run that play necessarily every time. Um, think about what side they like to rally from. So in this situation, they like to rally from the deuce side, assuming they're right-handed, they love their forehand cross court. They probably take lessons a couple times a week and just rally cross court, and they just rip that forehand cross court. So why don't we lob down the line and shift them over to the ad court and see if they can hit that forehand down the line from the ad court? I bet we get a lot more errors that way. Another option is to try to use some different serve formations against this player. So if you're returning and she's in the deuce court out rallying you, I imagine she returns from the deuce court as well. So we might use a serve formation to try to take away, again, that cross-court forehand return that she likes so much. So think about using serve formations, return tactics that can get you in a down the line rally. Generally, people who hit the ball hard and consistent are hitting cross-court. The net is lower, the court is longer, so they have tons of room to miss and hit the ball hard with a lot of pace. If you switch and get them into a down-the-line rally, they have to take a little pace off it because the net's higher, they have to hit it higher, but then they have to get it to dip quicker because the court is shorter. So think about getting them into a down-the-line rally as well. The other thing is use variety. If they hit the ball consistently with pace, really hard, cross-court, they probably don't like variety. So never give them more than one of the same type of ball. If you watch the US Open this year, uh Gabby Dobrowski and Aaron Ratliff won the tournament, and they are really good at this against certain teams. A lot of the time they're facing two players who are pretty good at singles, probably better at singles than Gabby and Aaron are. So they will hit a maybe top spin return, and then on the next ball, they'll just chip the ball and hit a really hard slice, and then on the next one, they'll lob it down the line. And then on the next one, they might lob it cross court, and then they'll rip it again. So they give tons of variety to the opponent to never let them get into a rhythm. So we're using variety with our movement, especially at our net player, and then variety in terms of the type of ball we're hitting to them. Another good option that this depends on a lot of different factors, like we've talked about, um, is to come forward. So you can return and then come forward, or return, hit your return plus one higher over the net and then come in. And just by moving forward, especially against players who like to hit the ball hard, what they'll probably do is feel you moving forward. They'll see you in their peripheral vision and they'll try to hit the ball harder. They want to hit a passing shot. And people for some reason think they have to hit the ball harder to hit a passing shot, and they'll probably miss. So that if they have a good lob, that's going to be put you in a tough situation, like we just talked about. But that is an option to try to get forward. You can also lob down the line and then try to get forward. That's another good option. But again, my first best favorite option that I think will work the best is just take away that crossword shot with your partner and have your partner move as soon as you hit the return and see if they can make it. So let's move to the very last question. This one is from Kathy. Kathy asked, Hi Will, I'm really enjoying being a member. I've always listened to your podcast. This is how I found you, but have now gone back to the beginning and I'm listening to them in order. Currently in 2022, I have a long way to go. Um, that is very impressive, Kathy. Uh, I noticed that you ask listeners to write in questions. I have one for you. Myself and my tennis partner are relatively new but solid 4-0 doubles players. We recently moved up one division in our leagues, so we are seeing opponents who are much more solid. In the last several matches, our opponents were both 4-5s. So we've got a 4-0 versus a 4-5 matchup. Uh, she says they used the strategy of having one player at the baseline hitting high, heavy, loopy groundstrokes or lobs, and one at the net waiting to clean up with a volley winner. I like the net and I like to apply pressure and get tight, but their strategy makes that this positioning useless. To combat this, we've tried a few different things. Taking the baseliner's ball out of the air so they cannot push us both back, both closing the net, but not too tight, so the staggered back person can take the overhead if the opponents lob, trying to give them short or slice balls that they cannot hit from the baseline. Wondering if you have any advice on how to effectively play against this formation. Thank you, Kathy. Um, so Kathy, there are a lot of options against this. You highlighted a few of them already. Um, the first one I would think about, honestly, is to use directions. So we just talked about this in the last lesson, but if the opponent likes to hit high, heavy, loopy balls or lobs, they probably are better at hitting those balls from either the deuce court or the ad court, and from either their forehand side or backhand side. So figure out which side is weaker, and you can use the lob to get them on that weaker side. So a lot of players like their backhand lob better, and maybe they like to hit it from the ad court. So in that scenario, I'm gonna lob them over the deuce court and just give them as many forehands as possible. And then from there, that forehand lob might be landing a lot shorter. And then I can move forward, take it out of the air, or my partner at the net can back up a little bit, take the overhead. If we can get those lobs to land a little bit shorter, it makes everything else a lot easier. So that's the first step. And I think that opens up a wide variety of options for you. Taking out of the air out of the air, that is a good idea. The key with that is to um, if you're hitting a swinging volley, especially, I want you to go back at the baseline player and just go for a big target. This is a transition shot. I don't I don't want you to try to finish this shot. I just want you to make this shot. Okay, and then you're gonna get forward, and then at that point, maybe you or your partner uh is able to finish a volley. But go big to a deep target, uh, typically at the baseline player. Occasionally, if the net player is playing really close, if you feel like they're a very weak net player, um you can go at them. Um again, it depends on the situation. Uh, but taking it out of the air can work, it can be a good idea. Um, you can also back up a step or two when you're at the net. So, Kathy, you mentioned that you like to play very close to the net, but that it's useless against these type of players. So definitely if you're not effective at the net and your partner's not winning from the baseline, then go ahead and take a step or two back to cover any weak lobs. But again, this is tied in with the first mention or the first thing I mentioned, which is use direction to figure out which side is weaker for them. And then you take a step or two back, and then you're able to hit those overheads. Um, you mentioned using a slice to bring them forward. This isn't my primary option. This would be a secondary option, but it can be effective, um, especially if you have a player who is only comfortable at the baseline. And this does happen at the club level. There's some players who are just really terrible at the net. You'll be able to tell this after the first several service games. You can tell which player is kind of more timid and plays a little bit further off the net. They're more comfortable back at the baseline. In that scenario, sure, you can try to hit a short slice shot or chip shot, bring them forward. And if they're kind of a pusher and they're not able to play offense, then they're going to really struggle with that. But again, I would try to use this as more of a secondary kind of changeup option uh for them. Um, you might also tie in some of the stuff I just mentioned earlier by taking their rhythm away. So if they like to hit these high loopy balls, they might like it against a deep ball or a ball with pace or a ball that doesn't have a lot of slice on it. So um this might be effective against that. It doesn't even have to be a short slice. You might be able to hit a deep slice and they'll struggle with that a little bit. Um, two up is can be effective. It can be tough uh because, again, like we talked about earlier, you need to have good overheads. Um so you can have that staggered back person cover those with overheads. This will all be matchup dependent, right? Um, but the thing you didn't mention is the first thing I said is using direction to figure out what side of the court uh they're struggling or they're weaker on, and then which side forehand or backhand they're a bit weaker on as well. And that'll open up everything else for you. Um so that's it for this Ask Me Anything episode. Uh if you found this helpful, shoot me a message. That helps me. Um, A, it helps just encourage me to continue to create these, and then B, it gives me good feedback on what kind of content uh y'all are looking for. Um but, anyways, you you always have that ask will uh section of the membership. So if you have any questions, you can submit them there or you can email me. Uh and thank you all for your support. And I will talk to you all soon.