Can’t wait to hear all the excuses that will be brought forth….

My condolences go out to the entire Djokovic family upon the passing of their Father/Grandfather.

The kid wants to learn how to play tennis so he can get to the finals of the US Open. The athleticism of his mother and father has made him a top soccer and basketball player and he has gotten to the top 200 in world class tennis. He is big on fruits and vegetables. He doesn’t have an ounce of fat.  Although not allergic to gluten like Novak Djokovic, he avoids gluten since most gluten is found in junk food. So what can be done to bump him up into the top-ten of world-class tennis? Here comes the coach.

Coach:  The first thing to do is put your hand on the handle of a tennis racket like one of the top ten players in the world.

The Kid:  Why?

Coach: You’re stuck with a ranking of 200.  What else are you going to do?  Eat more fruits and vegetables?  Most if not all grips of the top ten are lucky mistakes. They are mistakes because they are simply happenstance. They are lucky because they work better than most.  They are in the top ten in the world because they are better stick handlers than most. Their stick-handling is centered in their grips.  The United States Tennis Association (USTA) said that stroke production evolves to accommodate the grip. And Rod Laver said that the grip is everything. Your grip has you locked in a number 200 ranking.  

The Kid:  You don’t teach stroke production?

Coach:  I don’t. Stroke production is everything that happens from the wrist to the end of the toes when a person hits a tennis ball. Since the USTA said stroke production is simply a function of the grip you can forget about stroke production. The problem with the USTA is that they never really said what a grip is.

The Kid:  What’s a grip?

Coach: “A grip is the putting of a hand or two, more or less, on the handle of a tennis racket.” If the USTA had spent more time on “more or less” they could have put you onto the deft touch of John McEnroe. But it doesn’t matter. I’ve decided to teach you how to put your hand on the handle of a racket like Roger Federer.

The Kid: Do you mean you only teach grips? Why?

Coach:  You’ve already forgotten the first lesson from the USTA. Grips are everything. Teaching stroke production is teaching tennis backwards. Besides, I took two tennis lessons once.

The first lesson was from a coach who was married to high speed photography and its kid brother, high speed video. He said that, “High speed photography proves……..” and then he would say what it proves and offer one hundred or more tips based on a hodge-podge of strokes from any number of world class players.  In my second lesson from another coach I said I wanted to hit like John McEnroe. The coach said that he didn’t work that way and wouldn’t do it.

What I learned eventually was that high speed photography proves that regardless of how fast it is, it is not intrusive enough. Tennis gurus don’t know what John McEnroe does with his hand on a racket.  McEnroe’s grip and his deft touch are hidden from the view of high speed photography. The problem with grip gurus is that they can’t talk outside the box of the location of the hand on the racket handle. If a particular grip (eastern, western, or continental) results in different types of stroke production the differences are blamed on unnamed idiosyncrasies.

The Kid: Why pick Roger Federer.?

Coach:  He’s easy. I’ve got his twitch in the bag and also McEnroe’s. McEnroe is easier to learn but his grip can’t stand up to the power tennis of today’s players. There is nothing sacred about Federer except his grip which got him into today’s top ten. It’s necessary to pick one or the other of a top ten players. Their grips are unique. They don’t mix and they don’t match. They have stick-handling systems that are driven by their individual grips. An attempt to mimic the stroke production of several different players is “helter-skelter” tennis. Some players have holes in their stroke production which is a reflection of their grips but it didn’t keep them out of the top ten. Steffi Graf never hit a top-spin backhand gladly. But if you prefer I could give you Venus Williams who could hit top-spin off both sides.

The Kid: How do I know that you know anything about Roger Federer?

Coach:  You don’t. And you won’t until you are convinced that you have found the peculiarity of the Federer grip. There are two things you have to learn about the Federer grip. The first is location and the second is what he does or doesn’t do with his fingers when he gets there. Call it localization and digitization. I prefer calling digitization: The Federer Twitch.

First let me tell what you’re putting your hand on. There are eight sides to the handle of a racket. Call them flats. The top flat is flat #1. The other flats are numbered #2 through #8 going clock-wise around the handle.

The ring finger and the thumb are the gripping fingers (the twitch). The same fingers (twitch) dominate the grip at three different locations (on the forehand, the backhand volley/the forehand volley, the serve and the backhand drive). The forehand drive is at one location, the backhand drive is at another location and the serve/backhand volley/forehand volley are at another location.  The other fingers block/brace or index on the handle. The different grip locations have the same twitch (ring-finger and thumb) but at three different locations. The idea of a finger or two dominating a grip is not new. Neale Fraser, an Australian, who won three slams, gave a name to the dominant use of his little finger. He called it the Australian grip. About 50 years later Venus Williams came along and won seven Slams with her little finger off the racket beneath the butt cap. Except for the seven slams that Venus Williams won, Neale Fraser might have been horrified by how Venus won seven slams without the use of her little finger.

The Kid: Let’s start.

The forehand drive is grooved first. Place the middle pad (middle phalanx) of the ring finger on flat #7 and the base knuckle of the thumb on flat #1. Pull the middle pad of the ring finger on flat #7 into the handle while the base knuckle of the thumb pushes into flat #1. The base knuckle of the index finger will block on the lower half of flat #3 during stroke production. This will give some comfort to grip gurus who say that Federer has an extreme eastern forehand but who miss the importance of the twitch.  The top pads of the index finger and middle finger index on flats #6 and #7 respectively. It is essential to let the ring finger and the thumb dominate the grip.

Once the forehand has been grooved the twitch (the middle pad of the ring finger and the base knuckle of the thumb) is simply moved one flat clockwise for the serve, backhand volley and forehand volley. (flats #6 and #8). On the backhand drive the twitch (ring finger and thumb) is moved another flat clockwise to flats #5 and #7.  It is essential on the backhand drive that the middle pad of the ring finger locates on flat #5 (bottom flat) and the base knuckle of the thumb on flat #7.  The ring finger and thumb must unconditionally dominate the grip for the backhand drive. There may be some difficulty in getting the middle pad of the ring finger to locate on flat #5. The base knuckle of the thumb must locate and brace against flat #7. Federer has exceptionally long fingers and a small grip size in relation to his hand size.

Once Federer’s twitch (idiosyncrasy) has been grooved the mechanics of Federer’s stroke production will follow.

Do this. Go to a tennis court but don’t play tennis. Groove the forehand by dropping a ball and hitting over the net from the baseline using the location and twitch of the forehand. Once the  twitch has been grooved at the forehand location you are almost home free. Then move on to the volleys/serve and backhand drive using the same twitch but at different locations.

If you would rather hit like Rafael Nadal, the guy with all tape on four of the fingers of his dominant hand, come back tomorrow. But if you prefer Nadal, you can kiss Federer goodbye.

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Scoop was also kind enough to send me a digital copy of Marcelo Rios: The Man We Barely Knew and even though I don’t have all that much time for extra reading I decided to give this book a whirl.

I’m glad I did and so will you!

Anyone remembering the extremely talented southpaw from Chile will usually recall two things about him; he was widely respected and admired for his on court brilliance and for the most part abhorred for his aloof and erratic behavior off the court. Both the on court as well as the off court personalities play a dominant role in Malinowski’s book.

Malinowski examines Rios’ entire professional tennis career through the lens of those who seem to have known Rios best: competitors, fans, ball persons, photographers, former coaches, tennis insiders and legends of the game shared their personal firsthand stories and experiences of this much misunderstood man.

One of the interesting aspects of this book was the section of matches being analyzed by Eurosport commentators. I remember many of those matches Rios played and at times while reading the commentary I could visualize the brilliance of Rios. That made the book come alive for me which made me enjoy it all the more.

I was very disappointed that Rios’ former coach Larry Stefanki refused to discuss Rios with Malinowski. While I do understand the sensitive nature in a relationship with a former student he could have at least said something about someone he at one time was very close with and who arguably had the most impact on Rios career. This wasn’t Malinowski’s fault and the book is still a keeper without Stefanki’s imput.

Malinowski spent five years putting this book together and I think it was time well spent. While my opinion of Rios hasn’t changed at least this book showed that there is a human side to Rios that rarely, or barely was known.

Until now that is.

You can buy the book here.

To listen to the program from the site please click the link provided below. To save this program to your portable listening device please right click the link below and select “save as”.

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Hat Tip to Dan Moses….

Now what did those racquets ever do to him?

Don’t believe me? Here it is….

To listen to the program from the site please click the link provided below. To save this program to your portable listening device please right click the link below and select “save as”.

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