Hey!

Wow! Today's edition is reaching 7,581 subscribers—a significant jump from the 70 people I wrote to during the first 10 weeks of this newsletter. Your support continues to fuel my excitement to write this each week! So thank you!!

QUICK UPDATE

The "For the Pickleball Nerds" section is taking a new turn and will be known as "Details of the Game" for the next 12 weeks.

Why the change?

Recently, I realized the clips I share with close friends—breaking down nuanced moments of the game with voice notes—could benefit more than just them! 

Here’s the plan:

Each week, I'll dive into a specific game clip, slowing it down to narrate and analyze the intricacies of that moment. Pickleball points are fast, and it's easy to miss the subtle strategies that make good players great! I'll highlight details and offer actionable insights you can use in your game.

Before we keep going, welcome back to another edition of the blog. If you’re new to the blog and want to go back and check out past editions, go here!

Today’s edition has two parts:

1. Details of The Game – Dropshot Video Breakdown.

2. My Journey Playing Pro – Lefty Learnings.

Details of The Game (Video):

I’ve been back hitting (wrist injury) for about 5 days now. Mostly dinking, drops, and resets. I’m working my way back to hard counters, drives, and flicks over the coming days. With that said, I've learned A LOT playing lefty the last 3 months. In fact, here are 3 of my biggest takeaways.

(1) If you want a better two handed backhand, play with (just) your weak hand more.

Even if it's just for a few minutes during casual play, start to understand what that “weak hand” contact feels like. By doing this (because I had to), I’ve developed a two handed, off the bounce dink. The main benefit with this type of dink is the ability to generate topspin vs. always using backspin like I have for the last two years.

Topspin is good on dinks because the topspin tends to bounce up off paddles which leads to more pop ups by your opponents. Now, with that said, I’m not moving exclusively to the “two-ey,” but I'm definitely adding it into my repertoire of shots.

(2) IQ matters more when you're skill deficient.

I believe I’m now a 5.0 player with my left. But I have the strokes of probably a 4.0 player. My drive is average. My dinks are a floaty, and my overhead is non - existent. However, I quickly grasped that a deep understanding of court positioning and shot selection significantly compensates for my technical shortcomings.

Which is why, my belief that understanding the strategic aspects of the game is FAR more important than perfecting a specific shot like the 3rd shot drive. Don’t misunderstand. Technique is vital. But, the value of Pickleball IQ is underestimated. And putting more focus into that will get you better faster than repping out 1000 drops tomorrow.

(3) I will start using both hands on court.

Even in the last 5 days, I’ve been experimenting with switching hands mid point when I think I can gain an advantage. I expect this to be a 6 month process for it to become automatic and actually useful.

In the short term, I’ll probably switch at the wrong times and lose points because of it. But that’s okay. Because I believe in the long term, this will be a new weapon that gives me an edge. One specific area I’m especially excited for is the ability to ERNE on both sides of the court now with both hands. Stay tuned, because that is definitely going to be a part of my game.

Until next week,

Kyle

PS: If you enjoyed this blog and you want to subscribe to the newsletter, you can do that by clicking here!