Is a 3rd Shot Drop Offensive?

By Mark Renneson.

Text for the video is below:

In order to understand whether or not a drop is an offensive shot, it’s helpful to think about what that term — offensive — actually means. As far as I’m concerned, an offensive shot is one that causes trouble for your opponents — that is a shot that either wins you the point outright, or puts them in a difficult position and gives you an upper hand. Are there other definitions out there? Probably. But I think this one works pretty well. Let’s look at a few examples of causing trouble — or going on offence — in pickleball. 

One of the most common ways to cause trouble on the court is by taking away time. You can do this by hitting the ball earlier as well as by hitting a ball fast, so your opponents don’t have as long to prepare for it. We commonly see examples of this when players hit fast serves, volleys, flicks and drives.

A shot could also be considered offensive because of how much it moves the opponents. By making them chase the ball you put make it harder for them to hit precisely. You also increase the likelihood that they are out of position for the next shot. For both of these reasons we can consider moving an opponent to be offensive in nature.

 Ok. So that’s my working definition. Offensive shots are meant to cause trouble. Now let’s turn to the drop and see if it passes this test. Do these shots appear to be causing trouble for the opponents?  [No. No.No. No]

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Let’s think about he tactics behind the drop for a second. When it gets hit, one team (usually the returning team) is at the net and the player or team hitting the drop is not. The net team is threatening to pounce on anything that is high, so the dropping team is under considerable pressure.

If a team elects to play a drop it’s likely because they have assessed that a drive won’t work — that it will either fly long or be attacked by the net team. Same goes for lobs. So the drop really is the last option, that the net team has forced upon the hitting team because of their position at the net.

So even before the drop gets hit, we could reasonably assess that the hitting team is in a weaker position than the non-hitting team. 

Ok. let move on and assume the drop gets hit. Well, if it is too low or too slow, it’s in the net and the hitting team loses the rally right away. And if it is too high or too fast, it is likely to get pounded. The drop really has to be precisely hit if it won’t end in disaster. Again, the pressure the hitting team is under suggests that in this dynamic, drops come from a defensive place.

But what if the drop is perfectly hit? What if it sent at the ideal speed and height? Maybe that makes it offensive? 

A drop, by definition, is a low and relatively slow shot. It has to be if it is going to do its job of forcing an upward swing from the players at the net. But the fact that it is a slow shot means the opponents have a fair bit of time to set up and prepare for the ball. Even if the ball is hit near a sideline or between the players, it usually takes so long to arrive that the net team has all the time they need to get in position for it. The necessary slowness of the drop pushes back against the idea that it is an offensive shot. 

So what can make the case for a drop being a shot meant to cause trouble? One argument is that good drops are low. If a person receiving this low ball gets too excited or doesn’t give it the respect it deserves, they are likely to send it back with too much speed and pop it up. And we see this pretty regularly at the intermediate level. Someone gets a ball near their feet, panics a little and sends up a sitter. 

But as you go up in level, players are less likely to get flustered just because a ball is low. In high level pickleball, most of the balls are low. Players spend all day hitting balls that are landing near their feet. And because it is so commonplace, it becomes less tricky to deal with. 

Another factor we might consider in the argument for the offensiveness of a drop is spin. As paddle technology evolves, we’re seeing players use more and more spin on their drops. Sometimes it is backspin, but it is also topspin and sidespin too.

Hitting drops with spin can make handling the rebound a little tougher, since the spin can create a different bounce compared to a flat ball. In the case of topspin especially, not only does the ball rebound a bit faster to the opponent, the spin also helps the ball dip down sooner, allowing players to hit with a little more speed and still force that ever-important upward hit. 

And if players aren’t attentive to the spin, it can indeed cause them to misfire when playing their next shot. I think that when spin is present on a good drop it moves it closer to the idea of being an offensive shot, but I’m not convinced it takes it all the way across the finish line. 

Kyle Yates hitting a textbook backhand drop.

Finally, we can address what a good drop allows to happen next. Remember at the start of this video I argued that the droppers are in a weak position because they are at the back of the court and their opponents at the net are applying pressure? 

A good drop typically leads to a relatively slow next shot from the net team. And the fact that this next ball will probably be slow allows the droppers to advance to the net without too much fear. And this is the moment — this transition from the back of the court up toward the net — that the scales can started to be tipped. This is the moment when the dropping team can leave their weak backcourt position and move to somewhere they can start to apply pressure themselves. 

I would argue that this forward transition to the net doesn’t on its own qualify as an offensive moment — going forward doesn’t necessarily cause trouble for your opponents — but it does add some pressure. While the good drop the net team is receiving is not, on its own, a very difficult shot to handle, any mistake in playing it now becomes more critical. So what’s the final verdict? Is a drop an offensive shot? I’d argue no, not really. There are too many reasons to classify it as a defensive or neutralising shot — one trying to avoid trouble rather than cause it. 

But when a drop is well executed and the recovery is on point, it can definitely move things in a  direction that is more offensive. I might go so far as calling a drop a pre-offensive shot since when used adeptly — in combination with forward movement to the net — it can lead to an opportunity to turn the tables. But generally speaking, when a drop wins a team the point or leads to a put away, it is typically the result of the receiving team handling a relatively easy ball poorly, rather than the shot itself doing a lot of offensive work. 

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