Daily Table Tennis Chit Chat

[Ilia Minkin]

I crushed her fives games straight. Well her rating is 750 and mine is about 1500...lol....Yes i was bullying her but it was all in fun and she was laughing through out the games. Now i should go back to play her again and give her 6 or 7 points, then maybe she has a chance then. Sometimes its therapeutic just play to have fun. Maybe i will go again today...

Now wait for a retaliation, should not be a long waiting

 

[42andbackpains]

Yeah, the kids in my club get to about 1800-2000 in about 2 to 3 years if they get weekly coaching. Wish i had a good back to play 2 to 3 times a week. Forever Young (Alphaville) starts playing in the background...lol

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

The table next to me was a little girl taking her daily lesson from one of her coaches. Yes, i said daily lesson and almost for a year now. Recently she has improved in her rythm and is coming along with her basic strokes. Her parents are investing a lot into her. I decided to challenge the 4.5 feet of bubbly happiness. I crushed her fives games straight. Well her rating is 750 and mine is about 1500...lol....Yes i was bullying her but it was all in fun and she was laughing through out the games. Now i should go back to play her again and give her 6 or 7 points, then maybe she has a chance then. Sometimes its therapeutic just play to have fun. Maybe i will go again today...

I'll take 6, 7, 8 or 9 points from you, yes it will be fun! and i'm more of a little girl than that little girl so give me 9!

Good luck on the medical tests!

 

[ttmonster]

OSPH ... .

I'll take 6, 7, 8 or 9 points from you, yes it will be fun! and i'm more of a little girl than that little girl so give me 9!

Good luck on the medical tests!

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

OSPH ... .

Life is a Lie ... Life is a fleeting Dream ...

Maybe these 2 posts will get ttmonster and me our own forum from NL

Yes, the videos you see of 'me' is really me recording my great-grandfather! LOL j/k

 

[suds79]

NL,

Appreciate the insight.

That's completely fair & correct to say you really need a match of me playing these guys. Unfortunately, I missed club last week and the week before they weren't at club. Long story short, I haven't played them in a while or have taped any of my matches. I will try to do so this Sunday, assuming the wife has no problems with me going to club on Mother's Day.

"understand the elements of ball quality and good placement and just play all players that way - stop serving bad long serves, stop putting the ball habitually into strike zones, stop letting people return all your balls while hardly moving etc."

I will try to focus on overall ball quality. That's good advice.

My serve scores me a lot of points vs people who don't know my style. However, Ben has played me a million times and a lot of my go-to serves, he eats up. I suspect it's largely because they're of low quality. Not low enough, not spiny enough or placed right into his wheelhouse (I think that's a big thing for him. Even though I'm almost 10 years older than him, i don't think his movement and/or athleticism is all that great. Just can't hit the ball right to him where he's comfortable). So I will take this into account going forward.

Example:
Vs my serve he stands almost dead center of the table. He knows that if I try my He Zhi Wen style wide serve, he will loop kill that ball with no regard to if it has side/top or side/back on it. And vs anything served to his backhand, which he is giving me wide open, he flips that receive 80% of the time and it pisses me off to no end. I know that a good backspin serve there that's spiny & low should not be able to be flipped like that... at least from an amateur. Not like I'm playing FZD here. So the quality & placement of it is bad. I will work on it.

Thanks... and be on the lookout for some video coming up after a while. Appreciate it.

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

CCers,

I refrained from commenting on suds' vid of his 2 friends ... doubted what I saw and thought ... although it's after the fact after so many posted, i had some of the similar thoughts ... so yay me in a way

 

[Der_Echte]

Monster, beers wont help the serves much if at all. It is so easy for us to not have the entire arm and wrist fingers loose before and during the serve.

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

 

[ttmonster]

I was just kidding around with OSPH ... I realize what you are saying , what I am thinking is is that my timing of firming up of the grip during impact is off , I was getting late to the ball and ending up hitting the edge and shooting it off the table , I have to put some alone time in the table to get it back ...

Monster, beers wont help the serves much if at all. It is so easy for us to not have the entire arm and wrist fingers loose before and during the serve.

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

 

[Der_Echte]

Anyone believing monster's serves suck total rock can face him with chicken and beer at stake.

Be sure to bring plenty of dinner money to the table.

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

 

[ttmonster]

I have lost some of my serves Der , from changing rubbers and not putting enough time on the table , I used to have a money serve where I would do the hook serve to backhand deep , and I mean deep and people could not loop it back , and once they get ready I will put it in their pocket ... even the short hook serve with heavy underspin+ corkscrew ... I think some serves are easier with the mechanical spin from Euro rubbers , and its difficult to get from chinese rubbers unless we boost them , even with H8 ... and all these ball changes haven't helped either ...
... what I tried to learn and execute is the heavy short / half long short serves and the no spin variations ... that NextLevel suggests and it does help people who don't want to move around too much for their third ball attacks , it also kind of shields them from those unfortunate matches in the tourney where you come across a new guy who can handle all your tricky serves and you don't have a stock option to fall back on to get easy third balls ...

so at this point I would like to have those serves back + my new serves ... greedy ... but don't go around telling people about my serves der, already OSPH is asking for too much handicap , and I have seen what he can do with his serve on video ...

Anyone believing monster's serves suck total rock can face him with chicken and beer at stake.

Be sure to bring plenty of dinner money to the table.

Sent from my SM-N920V using Tapatalk

 

[OldschoolPenholder]

I have lost some of my serves Der , from changing rubbers and not putting enough time on the table , I used to have a money serve

...

so at this point I would like to have those serves back + my new serves ... greedy ... but don't go around telling people about my serves der, already OSPH is asking for too much handicap ,

Your jedi mind tricks won't work on me!!

and I have seen what he can do with his serve on video ...

HEH those were highlights! You clearly haven't watched most of the matches I've posted ... Lost all but 1 if memory serves.

Need me to repost my first match with Der? He handled my serves easily or my match with NL? However, in the match with NL i mixed in what Der worked on with me, but still, NL had no challenges in returning my serves. And my 2nd match with Der - was specifically consciously working on what Der worked with me on (serve sidedown and controlled 3rd ball spinny loop - which i'm still not competent yet in executing)

--------------------------


Off to the club, have a great evening CCers!

*chants mantra: "flow with the go, don't think, just feel and do"*

 

[NextLevel]

NL,

Appreciate the insight.

That's completely fair & correct to say you really need a match of me playing these guys. Unfortunately, I missed club last week and the week before they weren't at club. Long story short, I haven't played them in a while or have taped any of my matches. I will try to do so this Sunday, assuming the wife has no problems with me going to club on Mother's Day.

"understand the elements of ball quality and good placement and just play all players that way - stop serving bad long serves, stop putting the ball habitually into strike zones, stop letting people return all your balls while hardly moving etc."

I will try to focus on overall ball quality. That's good advice.

My serve scores me a lot of points vs people who don't know my style. However, Ben has played me a million times and a lot of my go-to serves, he eats up. I suspect it's largely because they're of low quality. Not low enough, not spiny enough or placed right into his wheelhouse (I think that's a big thing for him. Even though I'm almost 10 years older than him, i don't think his movement and/or athleticism is all that great. Just can't hit the ball right to him where he's comfortable). So I will take this into account going forward.

Example:
Vs my serve he stands almost dead center of the table. He knows that if I try my He Zhi Wen style wide serve, he will loop kill that ball with no regard to if it has side/top or side/back on it. And vs anything served to his backhand, which he is giving me wide open, he flips that receive 80% of the time and it pisses me off to no end. I know that a good backspin serve there that's spiny & low should not be able to be flipped like that... at least from an amateur. Not like I'm playing FZD here. So the quality & placement of it is bad. I will work on it.

Thanks... and be on the lookout for some video coming up after a while. Appreciate it.

Aiming at the elbow or hip where the paddle is held is a common spot to aim the ball, but aiming for the other hip is weirdly problematic and more confounding than many players realize. And again, this is a tactic that works against almost anyone.

I remember one day I was playing the best player in my club (15 year old teenager) and after one game we played, he said, "Laj, you put more thought into your serve choices than people give you credit for." I smiled and said, "Yes. People who look at the matches usually think it is always the same thing without knowing how I am trying to contain the opponent."

I will give you a tip. Try to develop three different return placements in response to each of his serve placements. 2 is enough, but 3 is fantastic - since you twiddle, you may even have more. If you can return serves differently and in ways that people don't know where the ball is going, then you get an edge. That is why it is important to attack long serves at the higher levels or to place the ball immaculately, because people have too much time at that level to get into position and play a strong opening off a long return. At lower levels, just make the person move in and out, left and right and half of their shot quality goes down. The thing is that for you with pips, the challenge is really to keep the ball short and low so that he can't play full topspins. If you can do that, then you will be close in a lot of matches. That and blocking all shots from the wide forehand to the backhand side. He will then have to play you straight up and then your consistency will be up against his. But again, these are things that you can do to any good player no matter your style. Your style just determines the ideal setup and execution of the strategy.

There is one opponent I play who goes out of his way to vary his returns. He will push into the forehand short, push long to the forehand, flick the ball, push into the backhand, come round the ball with sidespin... anything just to keep you hesitating to respond to the attack. You rarely get that kind of annoying variation below the 2000 level. Below the 2000 level, I just play the first game. Even if I lose game 1, I have usually seen everything to use for the next three games. At higher levels, there often more unless my shot quality is limiting the options.

 

[ttmonster]

Excellent post NL ... learnt a lot to do consciously do some of the things I already do but haven't much this much thought into ...

Aiming at the elbow or hip where the paddle is held is a common spot to aim the ball, but aiming for the other hip is weirdly problematic and more confounding than many players realize. And again, this is a tactic that works against almost anyone.

I remember one day I was playing the best player in my club (15 year old teenager) and after one game we played, he said, "Laj, you put more thought into your serve choices than people give you credit for." I smiled and said, "Yes. People who look at the matches usually think it is always the same thing without knowing how I am trying to contain the opponent."

I will give you a tip. Try to develop three different return placements in response to each of his serve placements. 2 is enough, but 3 is fantastic - since you twiddle, you may even have more. If you can return serves differently and in ways that people don't know where the ball is going, then you get an edge. That is why it is important to attack long serves at the higher levels or to place the ball immaculately, because people have too much time at that level to get into position and play a strong opening off a long return. At lower levels, just make the person move in and out, left and right and half of their shot quality goes down. The thing is that for you with pips, the challenge is really to keep the ball short and low so that he can't play full topspins. If you can do that, then you will be close in a lot of matches. That and blocking all shots from the wide forehand to the backhand side. He will then have to play you straight up and then your consistency will be up against his. But again, these are things that you can do to any good player no matter your style. Your style just determines the ideal setup and execution of the strategy.

There is one opponent I play who goes out of his way to vary his returns. He will push into the forehand short, push long to the forehand, flick the ball, push into the backhand, come round the ball with sidespin... anything just to keep you hesitating to respond to the attack. You rarely get that kind of annoying variation below the 2000 level. Below the 2000 level, I just play the first game. Even if I lose game 1, I have usually seen everything to use for the next three games. At higher levels, there often more unless my shot quality is limiting the options.

 

[ttmonster]

you can ask Der , in doubles he only missed two or three of my serves , the very first underspin one and then later one he pushed a no spin out .. thats all ... I admit I have given Der some problems earlier with my reverse pendulum in singles and that is because Der backs up his strength, his backhand and gets into the table a little bit slower .. but once he figured out what I was doing he started flicking them over the table ...

Your jedi mind tricks won't work on me!!



HEH those were highlights! You clearly haven't watched most of the matches I've posted ... Lost all but 1 if memory serves.

Need me to repost my first match with Der? He handled my serves easily or my match with NL? However, in the match with NL i mixed in what Der worked on with me, but still, NL had no challenges in returning my serves. And my 2nd match with Der - was specifically consciously working on what Der worked with me on (serve sidedown and controlled 3rd ball spinny loop - which i'm still not competent yet in executing)

--------------------------


Off to the club, have a great evening CCers!

*chants mantra: "flow with the go, don't think, just feel and do"*

 

[NextLevel]

Excellent post NL ... learnt a lot to do consciously do some of the things I already do but haven't much this much thought into ...

Ideally, you do them unconsciously with your training. Or most ideally, you select a strategy before the point starts as a general guide, but just subconsciously adapt to whatever the opponent throws at you.

It's not as easy as it sounds, and its why the people who start young and put in lots of hours have advantages, but you can put a little of it into your game. Stop serving into the opponent's paddle, try to find the zone where they have to make a return they don't want to make, somewhere short of the elbow or when the ball curves into the elbow unless they have impeccable footwork, but even then, a ball/serve curling away from your shot often gives you problems, which is why people serve pendulum into backhand, reverse pendulum into forehand. Sometimes, you sequence your deceptive serves. Larry Hodges had a great list, but sometimes, I serve fast pendulum backspin and based on how the person returns it, I then decide whether to follow with short pendulum topspin or fast pendulum topspin or just do something different.

This is why when I tell people I don't train enough, they probably laugh, but I am dead serious, my body can't support the kind of training I want to do. The thing that makes footwork extra important is that you need to get into position to ideally have multiple placement options, and you need to be there on time to be able to adjust to the face of the incoming ball. When you get there late, it is harder to redirect the ball optimally.

 

[NextLevel]

you can ask Der , in doubles he only missed two or three of my serves , the very first underspin one and then later one he pushed a no spin out .. thats all ... I admit I have given Der some problems earlier with my reverse pendulum in singles and that is because Der backs up his strength, his backhand and gets into the table a little bit slower .. but once he figured out what I was doing he started flicking them over the table ...

You can't contain people with serves if you play them all the time, eventually they figure out what you do, so you have to keep innovating or else you will lose your serve edge. To me, if you can limit the return of the opponent and get somethimg predictably attackable because of the quality of your serve, that is enough. The thing about doubles is that a lot really depends on what your partner wants, the person knows where the ball is going, so you are really limited to what your partner is willing to handle as even if you get a pop up, your partner can miss the ball outright if you put too much spin on the ball.

 

[ttmonster]

Thanks NL , could not agree more with you on your last post. I have a regular partner and right now I don't really try to win points outright. He still has holes in his return game that I can exploit , mostly because he is a JPEN, but still I can't exploit them too much or he just adapts to it , I try to keep guessing.

I have been playing doubles a lot of late and I have clearly understood what you are saying above from experience. Two important things I have learnt is :
1. You have to setup balls for your partner and not try to win them outright all the time .
2. Even if your partner is having an off day and is missing his setups , you should not go batshit crazy and try to win them all.... you can still talk to your partner and ask them to instead make a smart play so that the rally goes on and you get a chance on an easy ball..

These days , I rarely serve sidespin in doubles , unless there are no options left of if somebody is compromising their position on the ball by making a choice to receive all serves with backhand etc. then I try to exploit the weakness , even then if you don't have a regular partner , any ball with complex spin , side under or corkscrew tends to mess up your own partner as much as your opponent ...

However there are still some golden rules that makes the game easy , like hit back to the guy who hit last , this is especially true because its a universal strategy in doubles irrespective of whether you have a right-right or a left-right combination on the other side .... the other thing I noticed is very effective is to not give the opponents any angles , that is serve down the tee , hit to their pocket , instead of trying to serve or receive with too much angle ....
another one is that half long serves are more effective in doubles than outright short serves unless you have exceptional short serve quality ... its about giving your partner to adjust to an incoming ball... .

 

[ttmonster]

Golden stuff NL .. .

Ideally, you do them unconsciously with your training. Or most ideally, you select a strategy before the point starts as a general guide, but just subconsciously adapt to whatever the opponent throws at you.

It's not as easy as it sounds, and its why the people who start young and put in lots of hours have advantages, but you can put a little of it into your game. Stop serving into the opponent's paddle, try to find the zone where they have to make a return they don't want to make, somewhere short of the elbow or when the ball curves into the elbow unless they have impeccable footwork, but even then, a ball/serve curling away from your shot often gives you problems, which is why people serve pendulum into backhand, reverse pendulum into forehand. Sometimes, you sequence your deceptive serves. Larry Hodges had a great list, but sometimes, I serve fast pendulum backspin and based on how the person returns it, I then decide whether to follow with short pendulum topspin or fast pendulum topspin or just do something different.

This is why when I tell people I don't train enough, they probably laugh, but I am dead serious, my body can't support the kind of training I want to do. The thing that makes footwork extra important is that you need to get into position to ideally have multiple placement options, and you need to be there on time to be able to adjust to the face of the incoming ball. When you get there late, it is harder to redirect the ball optimally.

 

[Der_Echte]

On that Trouble Causing day, in doubles vs Monster, I could anticipate when Monster was serving short. He had good quality serves short, but I was stepping in, planting, and letting go with the BH. I was just trying to make life hard for his doubles partner.

I got testy with my doubles partner for a certain situation where I would serve, stay at table on FH corner to give him full room to open FH, but he would push... right to the opponent's BH corner... trapping me in the FH corner until he step back, which was real late, even a push return would be a good chance fo a winner. I advocated for him to change up placement, primarily pushing down FH line if he had to push, so I could cover the table easily and not be trapped.

I could have avoided it all by stepping back after serve, then one fast step to the FH corner, but he wasn't playing close to the table and I would be bumping into him.

Still, that guy was steady enough when he had to be and we won vs a good Monster doubles team. Moster players better doubles than his club players credit him.

Me, I LOVE doubles, it is one of the best ways to cause trouble. Carl and the NYC/East Coast crew know all about my trouble making ways. (Getting people involved and laughing)