Why I Prefer the Pinpoint Stance

[don_budge]

We'll agree to totally disagree on your perspective. You're entitled to your opinion but it doesn't make it right....sometimes we need to learn and not think like we have to teach our viewpoints to become better at our trade. The serve is one of the most poorly understood and taught skills in Tennis which is why I became the Serve Doctor to help with that

Agree to totally disagree? Totally unnecessary. Entitled to my opinion? Doesn't make it right? Hmmm...interesting response. Let me put it this way...during my stint here as forum contributor I have very, very rarely ever used the words agree, disagree, right or wrong. These kinds of words strike me as rather inappropriate when discussing nebulous subjects and topics as in tennis or even politics for that matter. It strikes me...that even more important than the sort of sucking up and contentious discussions that can evolve is to express your position as clearly as you can and as eloquently as you can. You can try to win hearts and minds...or you can just call it like you see it. This forum is what it is nowadays. It has evolved or devolved depending upon how you might happen to see it. Point of view is everything. Perspective. In the case of the forum...it became a numbers game.

I read your article and I think that you made some interesting points. Your comment regards the serve being poorly understood is spot on. There is a very, very small fraction of tennis observers nowadays that understand anything beyond "MPH" or "spin rates". The serve is a long, long story. It is well over a hundred years old. There is a tremendous history about it. Many great, great servers over the years. Did I mention that it was Don Budge himself who put the "finishing" touches on my motion? I can honestly say that I had a great serve. Fifty years later players that I knew back in the day always say something about my serve. I did it with a wooden racquet. All the spins. The big flat one. Tactics. Left handed even. I know a lot about serving. I preach the "frictionless" motion. We rarely see the likes of this any longer. Roger Federer was close. I always felt that there was a little bit of his own interpretation in his initiation of the downswing and sometimes wondered if might have had some potential for development in that phase of the motion. That's the way I see it. If it isn't perfect...it's not.

I want to see frictionless motion. Perfectly lubricated motion. No hitches. No glitches. No interruptions or hesitations. I want to see perfection. I was that way with my own serve motion. I tried to grease it all along the way. I tried to let gravity dictate the path of the racquet head. I believe that I had it right. I worked very hard at it. Whenever I see pinpoint stance...I see compensatory moves. Adjustments. Imperfection. I want to fix it. I always tried to change the pinpoint server to platform.

"Federer, Djokovic, Sampras and Dimitrov are all platform servers who used spot placement serving accuracy as a weapon. In addition, they have a great tactical plan of using variety of speeds and spins to set up flat serve opportunities on first serves and set up combinations of serve plus one on both 1st and 2nd serve scenarios. However, they were not known for having the biggest power serves in the game."

I ask the student...what is power? It's rhetorical question...the answer is "control is power". We see this in life and we see it in tennis. What is control? The three elements of control are speed, spin and placement. But you must know this already, even if you haven't actually said it in so many words. Being a good doctor it wouldn't surprise me if you started making this kind of argument from know on. You see the brilliance in it. You used these words accurately enough when describing the serves of "Federer, Djokovic, Sampras and Dimitrov". You first mention "spot placement as a weapon". Excellent observation. You mention the spin and placement and the sum of it these elements define the limitations or the expansion of tactical acumen. Then you conclude that they are not known for "the biggest power serves in the game". I would contend that the Federer and Sampras were the most powerful servers during their respective careers given their ability to control their service games. These two had the biggest control of their respective repertoires in their respective eras. Not to mention the most beautiful motions that seemed to get better given any extra pressure being put on their games. The motion just got better when the chips were down. This is a characteristic that all truly great servers have. By "coincidence" both players served from platform stance...as you noted.

Djokovic is an excellent example of somewhat great serving. His ability to control his service game is done with extra emphasis on extremely good placement with subtle variation of spin. He doesn't serve the fastest ball in the game...but then again, he doesn't seem to need to. Dimitrov is not in the same class I don't believe as he has a very perceptible hitch in his backswing that I have forever wanted to take a grease gun to and iron it out. I believe that a hitch like this can come creeping into the serving psyche at the most inconvenient time...when the chips are down. Or when serving out a nerve wracking match. Not that he has a "bad" serve...but it certainly has room for improvement.

Truly when I think of power...I think of control. This is very true in the golf swing as well. It is great to be able to hit the ball a mile...but there is a very wise saying that goes "the woods are full of big drivers". Great speed comes at a price...a lack of control. In the case of the serve...pinpoint placement. What element of control is the most important? Speed, spin or placement? It's hard to say. But one thing is for certain...it is the combination of those elements in any given situation that saves the day. The variations of the elements that at the command of the given server is based on the motion and the ability of that motion to dictate speed, spin and placement.

It seems to me that over the years the platform servers have been in control of most major championships over time. Not always of course. There are pinpoint servers who have been great champions but coming up with one seems to evade me. Another thing that I wonder about is what percentage of professional players use which stance. You have made examples of Tsitsipas and Sinner in your posts. Tsitsipas has always had a lot of room for improvement in his service motion as he has an even more obvious glitch in his backswing than does Dimitrov. His fiddling around with the pinpoint stance is merely a reflection that he knows and can feel that something is not right with his motion. So he is searching. It is really a shame too because he has such huge potential left in that motion. I don't feel that changing to pinpoint is going to be the thing that will help him realize that potential. He is going to have to address that glitch in his backswing. A little tinkering with his setup and initiation of the backswing is what he needs. Sinner is an interesting example as you note he changed from platform to pinpoint. More accurately...he changed from pinpoint to platform and back to pinpoint. I noticed immediately when he changed to platform and I wrote in detain on the forum here about it. Unfortunately my observations don't get much traction with the brain trust any longer. These contributors are not very sophisticated these days in the subtleties and intricacies of the game. But when I first saw Sinner using platform my immediate thought was that he was going in the right direction and I liked what I saw. Although there was still work to do in ironing out some of the glitches.

So yeah...who cares if we agree or disagree. Who is to say who is right and who is wrong? My philosophy has always been to try and be clear. Paint a picture with words. It makes these types of discussions more interesting and entertaining. Very, very interesting article on a very interesting subject.

[jimlosaltos]

https://youtu.be/T_5osrG-fGI?si=s6s_usy91Yp0miKH

This is a serve lesson with Taylor Fritz. He addresses the stance.

Great video! Thanks stroke, for sharing.

Excellent server boils it down. His view: Pick a stance, any stance, just get to the launch position. That will annoy some.

Curious: No hit up. No kinetic chain (all at once and forward, he says repeatedly. Helps to be 6 ft 4 in? ). No rotation discussion. Obviously he has excellent long-axis rotation. But when Fritz picked key elements to focus on, he didn't include any of that.

I don't know if this is a good way to teach the motion but Fritz has a clear focus that works for him.

[stroke]

https://youtu.be/T_5osrG-fGI?si=s6s_usy91Yp0miKH

This is a serve lesson with Taylor Fritz. He addresses the stance.

[seano]

I'm a big fan of the NFL and my favorite team in the upcoming draft has a chance to pick one of the top 2 quarterbacks. In hearing discussions, comparing which quarterback they should take, the knock on 1 of the 2 possible quarterbacks is that he often has his feet too close together, which can throw off his consistency. He does not have a strong base to start from. I think the same analogy can be used on the serve. I know the serve is more upward and out than a football throw but you still need a strong base to start from and that's the platform stance.

[jimlosaltos]

Munich also offered a contrast with pinpoint Struff vs platform Fritz. Both served great in that one. Stuff and Fritz are about same height as Stef. Fritz' serve motion looks much smoother/natural than Stef's to me. Stef has actually experimented with the moving the back foot up, but in his case, it did not seem to make a difference in the final product.

II don't have a dog in this fight, BUT I'd be reluctant to blame Tsitsipas's technique for current inconsistencies, since he's been, as Stroke noted, switching back and forth. It appears that Stef was switching early this year to step-up to ease rotational stress on his injured back, particularly on his second serve kick. That's just speculation, mine and others. But if we go to Tsitsipas's serve pre-injury, there's no indication it was inconsistent. He was consistently top 8 overall serving, ranked far higher than Ruud, and had no unusual trouble with double faults or serves under pressure.

The criticism of Tsitsipas's service has been too few, free points. {Some pinpoint advocates site greater velocity as a purported advantage.} When a Tennis TV announcer brought that up recently, the player/ analyst (sorry I don't recall their names) said, "No, I don't see that as a problem. Tsitsipas is hitting a lot of kick because he's trying to set up his forehand."

I'll also call recency bias, one of my personal favs of the biases . Do the same analysis of their final 2 weeks ago and we'd have quite different conclusions.

Sidebar: This also applies to the newish ATP/ Tennis Insight stats. In this final, Tsitsipas' strokes all came out below ATP average. In particular his forehand went from one of the absolute best on clay to a 71 vs 76 ave for entire ATP. I don't think it got that much worse overnight. Ruud's went in on big points this time.

Now, if we want to criticize Tsitsipas' service return ... I'm all in

[seano]

Agree to disagree, I'll stick with platform. Not saying some people don't hit nice pinpoint serves but platform is my go-to stance.

[stroke]

Yesterday's final in Barcelona was a perfect example of how volatile the platform can be under pressure. Tsitsipas serve was unreliable when he needed it most to back up his win against the same opponent a week ago in Monte Carlo Final. Ruud out served him being a smaller guy with a pinpoint and held much better on his serve. Just sayin....

Munich also offered a contrast with pinpoint Struff vs platform Fritz. Both served great in that one. Stuff and Fritz are about same height as Stef. Fritz' serve motion looks much smoother/natural than Stef's to me. Stef has actually experimented with the moving the back foot up, but in his case, it did not seem to make a difference in the final product.

[patdougherty]

Yesterday's final in Barcelona was a perfect example of how volatile the platform can be under pressure. Tsitsipas serve was unreliable when he needed it most to back up his win against the same opponent a week ago in Monte Carlo Final. Ruud out served him being a smaller guy with a pinpoint and held much better on his serve. Just sayin....

[patdougherty]

To maximize extension height and reach, Pinpoint does that best even for taller players.

[stroke]

We'll agree to totally disagree on your perspective. You're entitled to your opinion but it doesn't make it right....sometimes we need to learn and not think like we have to teach our viewpoints to become better at our trade. The serve is one of the most poorly understood and taught skills in Tennis which is why I became the Serve Doctor to help with that

Yes, someone needs to tell Goran, Wayne Arthurs, Roscoe, Nick, Roddick, Ben Shelton, etc,
to adjust their technique.

[patdougherty]

Finally, a voice of reason. I don't dare to even comment for fear of "the third strike". But suffice it to say, for a multitude of reasons, platform is the way to go. I have never taught one student a pin point motion. I have tried to talk every single student using pinpoint stance...out of it. It makes no sense. To add moving footwork to a motion that is complicated enough is not logical. The serve is much akin to an upside down golf swing...instead of teeing it down, you tee it up. With the toss. I've never seen a golfer using a pinpoint. Although ironically enough, the number one golfer in the world has created a lot of controversy with the "moving" footwork. Scottie Scheffler...current Master's Champion. But the golf swing analogy is a perfect comparison to the tennis serve.

Every single golf swing on the PGA and LIV tour for that matter are so similar. Very little wiggle room for deviation. It comes down to ergonomics. Biomechanics. Conservation of motion. You see little personal quirks and glitches in nearly all of the swings, yet they are all attempts at being fundamentally correct (FC). This used to be the case in most service motions although there have always been pinpoint servers.

The single best argument for the platform stance is the best servers in the last thirty years...or more realistically forever. Roger Federer, "The Living Proof" in the don_budge tennis teaching paradigm, and Pete Sampras. Federer in particular, in his later years, maintained his prestige as the best server in tennis on the basis of his serving motion. It enabled him to consistently win his serve in very quick and efficient manner. He did this with an uncanny ability to CONTROL his service games with the proper and perfect balance of the three elements of control. Speed, spin and placement.

Balance is a huge factor in the motion. The transfer of weight into the ball is no easy feat, even with still feet. Once the feet start to move, all bets are off. You have introduce more motion into a motion that is in dire need of repeatability. Add another factor and you have succeeded in making it even more complicated. Moving feet will only introduce other compensatory moves to the recipe. The service motions on the professional tennis tour when looked at in mass are a hodge podge of different ideas or lack of ideas. Very little continuity of motions these days which sort of reflects the state of coaching these days.

We'll agree to totally disagree on your perspective. You're entitled to your opinion but it doesn't make it right....sometimes we need to learn and not think like we have to teach our viewpoints to become better at our trade. The serve is one of the most poorly understood and taught skills in Tennis which is why I became the Serve Doctor to help with that

[don_budge]

There are certainly plenty of examples of quality pinpoint and platform serves. What scares me about the pinpoint is 1) balance - if the feet are spread 6 - 8 inches apart, you will have better balance to then explode up. 2) making sure the weight starts behind the center of gravity (which is usually slightly below the belly button) so that you can have a forward rotation (shoulder over shoulder) in junction with the twisting of lower and upper torso. In a pinpoint, there's a greater chance of the weight being in front of the center of gravity. The platform stance has a better chance of weight starting behind the center of gravity.

Finally, a voice of reason. I don't dare to even comment for fear of "the third strike". But suffice it to say, for a multitude of reasons, platform is the way to go. I have never taught one student a pin point motion. I have tried to talk every single student using pinpoint stance...out of it. It makes no sense. To add moving footwork to a motion that is complicated enough is not logical. The serve is much akin to an upside down golf swing...instead of teeing it down, you tee it up. With the toss. I've never seen a golfer using a pinpoint. Although ironically enough, the number one golfer in the world has created a lot of controversy with the "moving" footwork. Scottie Scheffler...current Master's Champion. But the golf swing analogy is a perfect comparison to the tennis serve.

Every single golf swing on the PGA and LIV tour for that matter are so similar. Very little wiggle room for deviation. It comes down to ergonomics. Biomechanics. Conservation of motion. You see little personal quirks and glitches in nearly all of the swings, yet they are all attempts at being fundamentally correct (FC). This used to be the case in most service motions although there have always been pinpoint servers.

The single best argument for the platform stance is the best servers in the last thirty years...or more realistically forever. Roger Federer, "The Living Proof" in the don_budge tennis teaching paradigm, and Pete Sampras. Federer in particular, in his later years, maintained his prestige as the best server in tennis on the basis of his serving motion. It enabled him to consistently win his serve in very quick and efficient manner. He did this with an uncanny ability to CONTROL his service games with the proper and perfect balance of the three elements of control. Speed, spin and placement.

Balance is a huge factor in the motion. The transfer of weight into the ball is no easy feat, even with still feet. Once the feet start to move, all bets are off. You have introduce more motion into a motion that is in dire need of repeatability. Add another factor and you have succeeded in making it even more complicated. Moving feet will only introduce other compensatory moves to the recipe. The service motions on the professional tennis tour when looked at in mass are a hodge podge of different ideas or lack of ideas. Very little continuity of motions these days which sort of reflects the state of coaching these days.

[seano]

There are certainly plenty of examples of quality pinpoint and platform serves. What scares me about the pinpoint is 1) balance - if the feet are spread 6 - 8 inches apart, you will have better balance to then explode up. 2) making sure the weight starts behind the center of gravity (which is usually slightly below the belly button) so that you can have a forward rotation (shoulder over shoulder) in junction with the twisting of lower and upper torso. In a pinpoint, there's a greater chance of the weight being in front of the center of gravity. The platform stance has a better chance of weight starting behind the center of gravity.

[stroke]

It takes out the need for the back foot to slide up, and abbreviates the wind-up. Narrow base + abbreviated wind-up work really well together as per Doug Eng's article on 'associated techniques'.

I agree completely.

[stotty]

I really like Pat's thought on the serve, the pinpoint, the limbo, winding the spring, and using the ball of the front foot as the base on the serve stance(toe of the foot pointing toward the netpost). He addresses all of this throughly in his outstanding Instructional Video "Serve MPH", which I bought years ago. I have one quick question for Pat. He points out how he likes sliding the back foot up to form the pinpoint. How about these players like Roddick and Monfils who basicly just start with a very narrow platform(pretty much a pinpoint) and just stay there? It seems to simplify the technique just taking out the back foot sliding up.

It takes out the need for the back foot to slide up, and abbreviates the wind-up. Narrow base + abbreviated wind-up work really well together as per Doug Eng's article on 'associated techniques'.