Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[OldschoolPenholder]

Der,

It's clear you love pimpin' Nexy gear, guessing by the placement of the racket case you are trying to hide the boner you have for being decked out in the Sexy Nexy!

Wait, wut?

Carl hacked my account ;-)

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

Good morning TTD Chit Chatters!

Felt in a funk all weekend ... partly cos my droid smartphone is still being repaired... after system software upgrade, it's stuck in a reboot loop. Googled and YouTubed, and couldn't fix it myself. Went to neighborhood shop to have it fixed.

In a funk, also partly due to yesterday's date... having been right there 15 yrs ago. Reflecting on Life and Luck.

Hoping to pick up my phone after work and get some TT in...

One of my mantras:

"Progress, not perfection."
~Denzel Washington as Robert McCall in 2014's The Equalizer

Looking for incremental improvements in my Mind telling my Body to move for 3rd ball looping ... to that end, today, i will only serve side-down.

Have a great day TTDers!!

~osph

 

[Archosaurus]

Today I found out that one of the most effective serves against low level players is just fairly high, fairly fast, heavy and long backspin to their weaker corner, usually backhand.

I'm not talking about quality serves either: just trash but with some spin on it.


Is this actually legit or are the people I'm playing just quite bad? I mean, I did disguise it a little so it might be sudden and hard to read, but c'mon.

 

[NextLevel]

41 seconds. there were a few more like that though. It's a good serve and you'd never get called for it, so I wouldn't worry about it.

Do you have any others? It's not about getting called for it. It's about following the rules. Some of us may not care about such things but I do. I know it is a good serve but that is not the point.

My body orientation on that serve was pretty extreme.

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

Almost all the members of my club are better than me, so i can't speak to serving against low level players... i will tell you, they serve to me and i generally eat their side-top serves - lol at me!

 

[DTopSpirit]

That's a bad toss chased but maybe I should practice that for left handers. But if you are where a right handed receiver is, you will see the ball. What's the time stamp for that serve?

You might not get pinged for hiding the ball on that serve, but you should get pinged for not removing the free arm from the space between the ball and the upward extension of the net.

 

[pgpg]

Today I found out that one of the most effective serves against low level players is just fairly high, fairly fast, heavy and long backspin to their weaker corner, usually backhand.

I'm not talking about quality serves either: just trash but with some spin on it.


Is this actually legit or are the people I'm playing just quite bad? I mean, I did disguise it a little so it might be sudden and hard to read, but c'mon.

A lot of things work against low level players, so at some point it's not worth trying to win a point at serve, since there is no rally to be had.

How do you manage to land high, fast, long, and heavy backspin serve consistently? I would imagine lots of them will go long, the way spin works...

 

[Der_Echte]

Der,

It's clear you love pimpin' Nexy gear, guessing by the placement of the racket case you are trying to hide the boner you have for being decked out in the Sexy Nexy!

Wait, wut?

Carl hacked my account ;-)

It's all about color co-ordination and placement. Note that the case is at the same level as the same color on my CONTRAST Jersey.

When I use a different color bat case, I usually hold it a bit higher to conceal the 25 lb Alien Baby I have been growing since I left service.

 

[NextLevel]

You might not get pinged for hiding the ball on that serve, but you should get pinged for not removing the free arm from the space between the ball and the upward extension of the net.

I disagree but to each his own. If what I am doing has issues, then the pendulum serve is fundamentally illegal.

 

[NextLevel]

A lot of things work against low level players, so at some point it's not worth trying to win a point at serve, since there is no rally to be had.

How do you manage to land high, fast, long, and heavy backspin serve consistently? I would imagine lots of them will go long, the way spin works...

The bigger issue is what happens when this serve stops working at some level. Are you then going to get better at serving it and in what way?

 

[Archosaurus]

A lot of things work against low level players, so at some point it's not worth trying to win a point at serve, since there is no rally to be had.

How do you manage to land high, fast, long, and heavy backspin serve consistently? I would imagine lots of them will go long, the way spin works...

They're probably not as fast as you're envisioning them. For topspin serves, they'd be pretty subpar speed, but they're somewhat fast for backspin serves.

The bigger issue is what happens when this serve stops working at some level. Are you then going to get better at serving it and in what way?

I will just serve my actual good serves. Once they stop working, I will improve my serve. The serve I'm talking about is essentially committing suicide in my eyes, but for some reason, it works pretty well.

 

[DTopSpirit]

I disagree but to each his own. If what I am doing has issues, then the pendulum serve is fundamentally illegal.

You can disagree, but it doesn't change the facts, or the rules.

Your free arm is in the area between the ball and the upward extension of the net, it has not been removed immediately from that area, and it is a fault according to the laws of table tennis. I would ping you if I was umpiring and I noticed it.

Whether umpires will see you do it, and whether they will choose to enforce the rules is another matter of course.

 

[NextLevel]

You can disagree, but it doesn't change the facts, or the rules.

Your free arm is in the area between the ball and the upward extension of the net, it has not been removed immediately from that area, and it is a fault according to the laws of table tennis. I would ping you if I was umpiring and I noticed it.

Whether umpires will see you do it, and whether they will choose to enforce the rules is another matter of course.

You probably wouldn't notice it because in a real match, the recovery that most players use to complete their serves would be part of my motion and that would move the free arm away as the serve is completed. I don't start my serve in a position that impedes the view of the receiver so the ball is visible throughout the serve so the free arm rule for me has never been an issue. I can't remember ever having dealt with an accusation of ball hiding even by mistake. People who play against me can describe my service motion from where they are receiving the ball.

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

The bigger issue is what happens when this serve stops working at some level. Are you then going to get better at serving it and in what way?

I've been mulling this for some time ... at my old club, generally there were players not at my level and I had easy aces off my serve ... when i played some of the players above my level at my old club as well as my new club, i've tried serving shorter as well as trying to 3rd ball loop much more.

We all have to evolve our games and the quality of my partners has necessitated me to force myself out of my old dinosaur game lol

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

When I use a different color bat case, I usually hold it a bit higher to conceal the 25 lb Alien Baby I have been growing since I left service.

LOLOLOL

You are the bestest Der!

 

[DTopSpirit]

You probably wouldn't notice it because in a real match, the recovery that most players use to complete their serves would be part of my motion and that would move the free arm away as the serve is completed. I don't start my serve in a position that impedes the view of the receiver so the ball is visible throughout the serve so the free arm rule for me has never been an issue. I can't remember ever having dealt with an accusation of ball hiding even by mistake. People who play against me can describe my service motion from where they are receiving the ball.

Got it. Makes sense.

Every now and then I manage to hit a serve into my free hand, so I obviously don't always get my arm out the way either, even though I took great pains to learn to do so back in the day. We probably really just need a better service rule really.

 

[Archosaurus]

I'm going to say something outrageous and claim that we should really just relax serve rules. Everyone is gonna hide it anyway, at the higher levels.

 

[NextLevel]

I've been mulling this for some time ... at my old club, generally there were players not at my level and I had easy aces off my serve ... when i played some of the players above my level at my old club as well as my new club, i've tried serving shorter as well as trying to 3rd ball loop much more.

We all have to evolve our games and the quality of my partners has necessitated me to force myself out of my old dinosaur game lol

This is a sensitive game, especially for us part timers. We form habits based on limited practice hours and probably even more on match play. IF you are taking a long term view towards improvement, it's best to do what you want to do better even if it costs you matches. The time spent doing things that don't contribute counts and you end up wondering why that short serve never gets more precise and lower under pressure (it may be technical, but it may also be because you spent the time you could have spent using it to beat players with other serves). Of course, if you are not training and are playing largely for fun, doing whatever you enjoy is best. Long serves do fit some games by the way but playing opponent specific table tennis is not going to get you far unless the plays you use are plays that you can give a basis in your overall growth.

 

[NextLevel]

Got it. Makes sense.

Every now and then I manage to hit a serve into my free hand, so I obviously don't always get my arm out the way either, even though I took great pains to learn to do so back in the day. We probably really just need a better service rule really.

I didn't play in the hidden serve era. I have a love hate relationship with the pendulum serve as well. I took me a long time to start accepting that I should be contacting the ball over my left hip.

 

[UpSideDownCarl]

They're probably not as fast as you're envisioning them. For topspin serves, they'd be pretty subpar speed, but they're somewhat fast for backspin serves.

I've actually got decent fast, long backspin serves. They are low, not high. But every so often they do get away from me and float long. So, that is hard because of the spin.

The do work on certain players for free, easy points. But if I use them against a good player they get looped heavy and I better be good at counterlooping that opening or I am in trouble.

That, by the way is a game strategy for long serves. If you like counterlooping, you serve long and let the opponent open and then you counter their opening. But it is risky unless you are very comfortable countering.

When I play guys lower level then me, a lot of times I serve short and mix between moderate backspin and light backspin and just look to open on their return of serve.

Higher level players, that doesn't work. But with lower level players it is useful to use those games to work on the opening.



Sent from Inside The Chamber of Secrets by Patronus