OOAK Table Tennis Forum

Another case where I naturally pivot is when I feel like I hit a quality ball with my backhand, especially close to the table. It might be a bad habit I've created, but when I feel like the ball coming off my racket had good quality, it usually means the opponent will return the ball a little more passively to the same location.

This often also applies when I hit a ball wider than it appears my opponent was expecting, which usually means they'll reach for and play a passive shot. I usually pivot really quickly right after I feel a ball like that coming off my racket.

Do you guys also do that or have that feeling after making a quality shot?

Hmmm...BRS, I think I understand what you are saying and I am not sure I 100% agree. I do think that while it isn't always discussed, being side on gives you more placement options for both forehand and backhand strokes and partly for the reasons you mentioned in that you don't have to turn your body to go down the line but doing so can make going down the line easier with a specific technique and you still have the other placement option usually to the middle.

In any case I do find your point on true pivoting vs. what we might call "pseudo-pivoting" or "fake pivoting" interesting. I do think that they both have their place in proper TT, but I guess I have to think through it a bit more since I have never been a true forehand player since I have never had the footwork to support true forehand play. If you serve into my middle and I play a forehand, even if I don't go round the corner, the footwork I tend to use tends to be pivot footwork I think, but like I said, I don't drill or play enough instinctive forehand to have a strong feel for it. I use my cross especially semi cross far far more than I pivot.

But regardless of what the facts are, thanks BRS for the insight. I think that playing a forehand from the backhand side even if you don't go round the side of the table and even if it is a quasi pivot has a place in TT. It is just a quality shot at the higher levels. Then again, look at Mima Ito repeatedly pivot to loop serves vs Wang Yidi. An example of a quasi pivot. She never goes round the corner.

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I did some well practiced pivots vs serves tonight and boy that went poorly.
Was blocked down nearly every time! I don't think my placement was good enough tonight and possibly not enough spin.
Oddly when I used my backhand for the same long returns I was able to move the ball around and they had no idea if I was going down the line or wide.
Of course this is a sample of maybe 12 pivots. I did win some of the points too.

Mima is 4'8". If she went off the side of the table she wouldn't be able to reach to the corner.

Speaking of my favorite player, there is a video from japanese tv on another forum of Mima at age 5 playing tt with sime grownup idiot. And she plays exactly the same game then as now. That reminded me of you saying we always play the same, same strengths and weaknesses, just at a higher level. That Mina video proved you right for sure.

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I think it also depends on how much natural power you have. What are the odds one fh ends the point? If it's 80% then giving up table position is not a big deal. I have no power and often have to hit three or four fhs to win a point. So the ball is coming back and giving up the table is very bad.

When MI turns around the point is over one way or the other.

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Smile in the mirror. Do that every morning and you'll start to see a big difference in your life.

Yoko Ono

Of course it's a bit more complex than that. Some players block well and some do not. It's tough when you blast one and it gets blocked and hits the corner on the white line. Are they good at blocking or just got a little lucky there?

I had most likely my best league night last night but still didn't beat anyone new. That's table tennis - you can improve a good amount and still lose to the same people, just making it closer.

I'm no expert but I think the thread may have gotten a bit bogged down in minutiae. A bit of over analysis going on. A lot of things like foot position happen naturally when things are done correct and are indicators of good technique, but don't produce it themselves and trying to work on this will drive you insane. It seems like putting the cart before the horse. Get the basic overall principle correct and the small stuff falls into place over time. Focusing on micro aspects seems doomed to failure and frustration to me.

The problem with fast movers loop against backspin is that he didn't rotate into the ball with his body and instead to produce the lift required merely started low and finished high with his racquet. It was all arms and vertical extension with little forward component. The same vertical distance would be travelled in much less time with more body rotation but I think to him it would feel totally alien to go forward over the ball like that vs backspin. I'd be interested in seeing some multiball forehands vs backspin for fastmover where he consciously tries to rotate the body and move forward over the top of the ball. His brain will tell him this will never work, don't you know this ball needs to be lifted? But adjustments to the backswing would happen and soon he'd be amazed at the ball flying over the net countering the backspin with what feels like a totally forward motion. Looping backspin with a counter top spin technique. It will be like magic. This was my experience with my bachand vs backspin. I did a big exaggerated fold and lift motion but the timing wasn't right and it was wild and inconsistent. Someone got me to do a small forward backhand vs backspin almost like a flick but from behind the table. After a few shots to adjust it magically went over the net and completely changed my attitude to technique vs backspin. I thought it was a discrete, different technique that needed to be thought of totally separately. Totally distinct from vs no spin or topspin. Nah it's exactly the same with small adjustments that are almost not worth thinking about because conscious you sucks compared to subconscious you at those things.

Fastmover please try this. Get someone to feed you multiball backspin to your forehand. Rotate into the ball over the top of the ball, forward, forward, forward. Don't think about lift at all. Almost like it's a counter top spin. Let your subconscious adjust as you go. If you start the backswing low but then come forward like it's a counter top spin magical things will happen and your attitude to this shot will change. That's what I hope will happen anyway.

Yes. If they are better players they were good at blocking. If they were worse players they got lucky. Which is why

1) pivoting is generally an all-out strategy that will rarely win you the match against better players but which will help you beat weaker players more easily and

2) it is important to have some kind of backhand in modern TT that helps reduce your pivoting demands and helps you either win points or set up your forehand better.

The one exception is an opponent who just doesn't have any answer for powerful shots. If some like Evan was pivoting on me all the time and getting his shots in, and I could not shut that down, it could be a long day. But usually better players have tools for getting round that. They usually don't let you play bad point patterns for them on your terms.

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Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

I need that giraffe gif...

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

I need that giraffe gif... but BRS did say we have jobs...

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

I think pivoting on the serve is a great idea, but only used as part of a overall return strategy that includes backhands. The pivoting probably is best for balls that come at the playing shoulder. The angle at which the serve comes also matters a lot here, to me at least.

Yes pivoting for high and semi high balls is really not optional.

In the end though, it comes down to how you build your game but the quality of opponent does matter (we have discussed this on this thread in the past) or at least their success in handling your forehand. The more forehands they bring back the more work you have to do to set them up.

We have a guy in our club who has a great forehand smash and used to complain when people didn't give him an opportunity to use it. I used to tell him that we weren't idiots for practicing loops and pushes and serves like he thought we were.

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

I had an awesome idea. I'd just watch the best pivoter ever and see what happens https://youtu.be/8z6AyEm8G0s?t=46

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Don't cheat - I am too dumb to timestamp videos on my cellphone...

_________________
Cobra Kai TT Exponent (Mercy effs up your Game)
One-Loop Man: One Loop... Again????
Lumberjack TT Exponent

"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training" - Archilochus

I knew it was going to be Ma Lin!!!!!!