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The podcast dedicated to your pickleball improvement. We are here to help you achieve your pickleball goals, with a focus on the mental part of your game. Our mission is to share with you a positive and more healthy way of engaging with pickleball. Together let’s forge a stronger relationship with the sport we all love. With the added benefit of playing better pickleball too. No matter what you are trying to accomplish in your pickleball journey, Pickleball Therapy is here to encourage and support you.
Welcome to the special episode of Pickleball Therapy. In this special episode, we are going to be answering the age old tournament question of serve, receive or side. What should you do when you're playing in a tournament and you're asked this question by the referee or by your opponents? If there's an referee, what do you want to pick? In this episode,
I'm gonna address it for you. We're coming to you both on our YouTube channel, Pickleball Therapy, as well as anywhere that podcasts are available. So like if you had a tournament, you don't have access to YouTube, you want to turn it on the podcast, put it on the podcast, you wanna watch it on YouTube, you're welcome to do that as well.
The reason we're bringing this episode to you as a special episode right now is because we are getting ready to go down to the US Open in about a week and a half down in Naples, Florida. This is our eighth year going to the US Open. We've been fortunate enough to go since its inception in 2016 and felt that this was a really good time to answer this question for you.
So whether you're playing at the US Open or playing in NA tournament, this will help you make the right decision. If you are gonna be at the US Open, please come by and say hello to us. We're gonna be down there, we'll have a tent that have our sign up there, so just look for us and please say hello to us so that we can say hello back.
Alright, let's dive into this serve, receive or side question. So the way it works in a tournament, if you've never played one before, is there'll be a number on the back of a card normally, or a number behind someone's back. It's like the coin flip, right? One or two and then a team gets to pick, or a player gets to pick,
and then whoever wins that. So if you pick correctly, you get it. If you pick incorrectly, the other team gets to go first. You get to choose between serve, receive or selection of side. So let's work through that to find the, the best answer to that question. Generally speaking, if you're playing in an outdoor tournament, if you have the choice of picking either serve or receive or picking side,
you're going to opt to pick side because server receive does have an impact on the game, but it is a much smaller impact just at the beginning, right? It kind of washes out over after a couple of rallies, whereas selecting side will affect the entire game, potentially the entire match, right? Depending on how long it goes. But it definitely affects the game and the match.
So picking side is gonna let you dictate more than picking, serve or receive. So our recommendation is if you have the choice of picking side, go ahead and pick the side. Okay? Now, in terms of what side you pick, that gets a little more complicated because you know, we, we say there's like a science, a science unto itself on picking side,
and I would have to address it in two different ways. If you're playing in a two out of three, so you're gonna play three games to 11, okay? Or potentially three, a minimum of two up to three games to 11, our recommendation is to pick the side that you like best to start on. Now, there are players who will pick the side that they decide that they think they're gonna finish on to be best.
So you're thinking like at the third game, last half of the third game, we don't like that approach or we don't prefer that approach, I should say not like it, but we don't prefer that approach because we want to get the first game under our belt. Get your first game under your belt, you, you feel a little bit of breathing room,
right? You can relax a little bit, play calm, or play looser. Your opponents would be a little more tense, right? Because they can't lose that second game. And so that advantage to us outweighs the benefit of potentially having the better side weigh in the future at the end of game three. So we would pick the better side first in a game in two outta three to 11,
and I'll get into what the better side is in a minute. The, if I'm playing a game to 15, right? Then the dynamic changes because in a game to 15, I can't get the game under my belt on the better side, right? The game doesn't end, right? We're gonna switch sides in the middle at eight. In that case,
I am going to start on the side I prefer least or the worst side if you want to call it that. So I'm gonna start on the other side because I wanna finish that game and the match on the better side, okay? And what I'm trying to do there is I'm trying to keep it within striking distance. If I can switch ahead, great.
If I can switch in within striking distance, I'm gonna go to the better side to finish that game. So that's the, that's the idea. In terms of picking the better side or the worse side, depending on the type of game that you're in now, how do you determine what the better side is that is very specific to you and your team?
Okay? Generally it has to do with, with wind. With sun and potentially with the background like the, you know, the, the visibility of the ball. It does change. You know, like if you're playing on a court that has a court behind it and you're playing on the side, that looks all the way down the, to the,
your court and the other court. That's gonna be different visibility than if you're playing on the side that looks at the windscreen, if there's a windscreen, right? So you'll have to make that decision for yourself in terms of what situation most advantages your team. When you make that decision, then you'll, that'll be the better side and then you can make the other decisions appropriately.
If you're not sure, ask your teammate, you know, what side do you most comfortable with? You feel more comfortable playing on this side or on this side? And whatever your teammate says, just pick that one and that that'll be your be that'll be the better side, I should say. Don't pick that because in the 15 you may pick the other side,
so, but you'll determine that that'll be your better side for your team. So that's how you're gonna pick side. Now if the other team pick side or you're in a situation where you have to pick, serve or receive, what do you do in that situation? You are going to pick two. You're gonna select to receive. And the reason you're gonna select to receive,
and I'm gonna move over to the court board here on the, if you're on the video, you'll see it on the video is basically in the first rally, right? So you're gonna pick, you're gonna be the yellow team by pick and receive. What happens there is the serve the return that third's probably gonna get missed. You know, more often than not,
and I gotta give credit here to a fellow professional player and friend Kyle Yates, who was gracious enough to share this thought process with me during the 2019 French Open that we happened to, we were able to play together at, or play against each other. We played in the same tournament. But the, the idea is that the pressures at the beginning of the match,
everybody's all tight, right? So let that one rally work itself out. You get a side out, now the serve comes over to you, you'll get two chances. You're in a little more rhythm. So generally speaking, you're gonna want to pick, receive on the serve versus receive. So side number one, and then serve, receive number two.
Now, here's what's interesting, and I've seen this happen many times in tournaments. Players who have not been coached by us will, if you pick side, they'll pick serve. So you, you end up with like a win-win, right? So you pick your side and then it goes to the other team and they get to pick, serve, or receive,
they'll snap call serve 'cause that's what everybody does. And so you'll get received and side, which is awesome, and another curve ball you can throw but be, I'm gonna tell you a curve ball in a second, but before I tell you the curve ball, I did wanna let you know also that we're having our, we have a let's get ready to tournament class coming out on April 10th.
That's live. After that, there'll be a recorded class that'll be available at some point, but in, in getting ready for the open or just getting ready for tournament, if you want to come to our live class, it's a really nice 90 minute class. We're gonna cover things like this, but a lot more than this, right? We're gonna cover all sorts of pre tournament during tournament tips that'll help you gain that edge while you're playing a tournament.
I'll put a link down below in the show notes on the podcast and, and the video. I'll put a link up top and down below so that you can check that out and decide if it's right for you. Our recommendation is if you're going all the way to a tournament, registering for a tournament, doing all that work, you might as well go in there with the best set of skills in order to navigate the tournament landscape to get the best out of it.
Alright, so one last little bonus tip here for you that's kind of sort of funny I guess, but sort of, you know, if you want to throw like a curve ball at the other team is if you get the first choice and you're not really sure what to do, you can defer, right? So you can say, we, you know,
defer to you, you pick, and then they, they might go like, what? I don't know, you know, what's going on? So again, that's kind of on the, on the, on the outside there, but you can always throw that in there as a, just, you know, we, we'll, we'll pick second. You guys pick first and then make them pick the,
pick the first choice. So side first, receive second. That'll give you an edge. And in tournament play, oftentimes, especially in those close matches, right? Those little edges or would make the difference between you having 11 and your opponents having 11 first. So hopefully that'll help you with your tournament play. Again, if you're coming down to the US open,
please come say hi to us. Whether you're coming to the open or playing in a tournament in your area in the near future. Remember to have fun at the tournament. Enjoy the experience. It's a wonderful experience where you get to compete with other players who just like you, come to the tournament, right? Looking to give their best test themselves, right?
See what's going on, see how other players are playing, who Are playing at a more competitive level. And so just, you know, it's a wonderful experience and I hope you have the best, the best experience there. And if we can help you, help you get that edge or help you feel more comfortable right in the tournament setting so that you,
you feel more comfortable when you're walking around knowing what's going on, happy to do that for you in our tournament class. As always, if you enjoyed the podcast, please consider rating and reviewing it and share with your friends. If you enjoyed the podcast, they probably will too. Hope to see somebody at Thes Open. And if not, I'll see you on Friday at our next regularly scheduled podcast.
Be well be.