Never Miss An Overhead Again

WEEK 19

Welcome back to the Road to Pro!

Here are the two main things we’ll be looking at this week:

1. Tips for improving your drop shots

2. A deep dive into hitting overheads properly

As always, I’ve answered a question that one of you submitted, and this week, Stacey gets a brand new paddle for her question! If you want the chance to win a paddle, click on the button below to submit your pickleball questions. Anyone whose question is featured in my newsletter will automatically win a new paddle!

Now let’s get to it!

Tip of the Week

Improve your drops

It’s no secret that many players struggle to perfect their drop shots. Here are a few tips that can help you:

Get Low Under the Ball

This may sound simple, but it’s easy to forget and often the reason why players mess up their drops. By getting low to the ground, you’ll be able to get your paddle underneath the ball, achieve the proper lift, and add enough topspin to your shot.

Lock Your Wrist

Make sure that your wrist is locked when making contact with the ball. This means you’ll have more stability, which translates to better control over your shot and less chance of error.

Aim Higher Over the Net

I cannot stress this enough: aim for higher over the net rather than trying to achieve the perfect low drop. What often happens when you’re trying for a perfect drop is the ball will go into the net. Even if your drops are high for your opponents to attack, you still have a chance to reset the ball and get back on offense.

Even the pros often hit high drops because they know that keeping the rally going is far better than hitting their shot into the net. If you give yourself room over the net for error, you have the opportunity to keep dropping and resetting until you reach the kitchen or your opponents make an error.

Try these techniques next time you’re practicing your drops, and you’ll start to notice immediate improvement.

Q&A Spotlight

This week’s question comes from Stacy. Time to win a new paddle!

Answer: Improving your overhead smash involves three key points: pointing at the ball, body positioning, and paddle movement. Let’s break down each one to understand how to do them and why it’s important to know.

1. Pointing at the Ball

   You should be doing this every time you see an opportunity for an overhead. Use your non-paddle hand to point at the ball. Keep pointing and following the trajectory of the ball up until you make contact with your paddle. When you do this, you’ll be more focused on the ball’s location in the sky and more patient to let the ball come to you. This way, it’s less likely you’ll hit the ball too early, which would typically result in it going out of bounds.

2. Body Positioning

Another thing you should be doing is turning your body to the side to set yourself up for the shot. Your front foot should point more towards the net, and your back foot should point to the side of the court (see note). Load your weight on your back foot and push off it when making contact with the ball, pivoting on the ball of your front foot.

By positioning yourself in this way, you’ll be able to shuffle forward or backward in the court to situate yourself under the ball. When you pivot around your front foot, you engage your hips, generating more power than if you were hitting an overhead while facing the net square on.

Important note: Be sure that your front foot is not pointing completely to the side of the court. If you pivot around your foot when it’s completely turned to one side, you could easily injure your knee.

3. Paddle Movement

Arguably, the most important thing you should know when hitting an overhead is the correct paddle movement. When you have the right motion, you’ll have more control and speed on your shot.

Here’s what you do: drop the paddle behind your head, bring it up to make contact with the ball, and finish by bringing your paddle down and across to the other side of your body. You should also be making contact with the ball high and in front of you.

Another thing you should be doing is snapping your wrist when making contact. This will generate more power and create more angles for placement. When your paddle is behind your head, your wrist is flexed back. Snap your wrist in a whipping motion (similar to throwing a baseball) as you make contact with the ball. This will add speed to your shot, and it will affect the direction of the ball depending on how you snap your wrist. The ball always follows the face of your paddle, so if you snap your wrist forward, you’ll send the ball to the right. If you snap to the left, the ball will shoot to the left side of the court.

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Remember all three of these things and you’ll become more consistent in hitting effective overhead shots. For the drill this week, I share my method for teaching players to hit proper overheads. If you follow the process I explain, you’ll learn the right movement, and it’ll start to come more naturally to you.

If you have a question you’d like for me to answer, please click the button below to fill out the question submission form.

If your question is chosen for next week’s newsletter, you’ll win a free paddle!

Drill Highlight

Step-by-step technique

The best way to build the correct technique for hitting overhead shots is to follow a progression of movements to ensure that you are setting yourself up in the correct position.

This is how I teach players to hit better overheads:

Start by pretending a ball is coming to you. Turn your body and point at it as if about to hit it.

Then grab a ball, set your paddle down, and throw the ball high up in the air. Point as it comes back down towards you and let it drop to the ground. Do it again, but this time catch the ball with your pointing hand when it comes back down.

The last step is to throw the ball into the air again, but now catch it with your paddle hand starting with your hand behind your head and finishing with it across your body at your hip, as if you were putting the ball in your pocket.

Once you’ve intentionally practiced the right movement, grab your paddle and start feeding yourself overheads by throwing the ball into the air. Keep in mind your footwork, body position, and paddle movement. After doing this for several reps, have someone else feed overheads to you and put together all the techniques you just learned.

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This gradual process of learning the right movement will level-up your skill and confidence when hitting overheads in a game.

Videos You’ll Enjoy

• If you haven’t seen my most recent video yet, you can check it out by clicking the link below. It’ll give you more detailed tips for hitting your drop shots like a pro!

• Check out this other video I made with my friend Caleb on our channel Cracked Pickleball!

• If you want another chance to win a new paddle, go enter my current giveaway on Instagram!

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