"Out-Thinking Your Opponent Before And In Tennis Matches."

[thomas daniels]

The funny thing about this is that.

If you ask the average tennis junior to go, scout, an opponent he/she will not be able to do it.

Why?

Because they aren't strategic tennis warriors.

Their coaches aren't teaching them how to be strategic either, so please share this post with them.

The first thing you have to do to out-think your opponent before and during the match...

Is to become a strategic tennis warrior, by getting to know your opponent, better than they know themselves.

And you can do this with Warrior Meditation.

First, go watch them play for at least 45 minutes or more and then write down the answers in your tennis journal to the following questions.

How well do they play when facing pressure?

What are their favorite playing patterns?

What type of tempo do they like to play at when they have the lead?

What is their favorite shot when using those patterns?

How mentally strong are they?

After you gather all that information in your scouting research.

Get by yourself and do some serious Warrior Meditation.

"This is when you free your mind from all thoughts by focusing on your breath for 5 minutes and then you meditate on ways to break the rhythm of the future opponent that you will be facing".

This is called the (Broken Rhythm Method) by the way. Labeled by Bruce Lee.

Meditate on coming up with ideas, patterns, and tactics to neutralize and prevent them from executing their favorite patterns against you.

Don't force this to happen either.

Because if you do this WM over and over again before the match.

The ideas and tactics will just flow to you eventually, so trust your intuition and go with that.

There is one thing that you must do to make sure that this will happen though.

You must create a clear picture of yourself in your mind using these tactics and you must get the FEELING that you are actually doing it for REAL.

Reason?

Your subconscious mind doesn't know if what you are picturing is real or unreal, meaning, every time you do this Warrior Meditation with feeling and go through the motion and emotions while doing it.

Your subconscious will think that you are actually doing it for real in the match and this will help you to...

Be able to do it for REAL effortlessly in the match!!!

Or as my coach you to tell me.

"You actually become the player, who you consistently picture and pretend to be during warrior meditation".

 

[Knox]

Without a good foundation in the fundamentals of tennis decisionmaking any strategic visualization approach runs the risk of reinforcing poor decisionmaking.

I enjoy the spirit of the post, however I think it glosses over the importance of first developing a potent heuristic matrix.

 

[thomas daniels]

Without a good foundation in the fundamentals of tennis decisionmaking any strategic visualization approach runs the risk of reinforcing poor decisionmaking.

I enjoy the spirit of the post, however I think it glosses over the importance of first developing a potent heuristic matrix.

The foundation for a consistent matchplay game should be based on a strong mental game...

 

[Knox]

The foundation for a consistent matchplay game should be based on a strong mental game...

Ok... that just pushes the question back one layer deeper...

What do you say is the foundation of a strong mental game?

I'm asserting the the foundation of a strong mental game is rooted in a heuristic matrix that composes a comprehensive decisionmaking system. Such a system would provide players with a grounded point of focus that eliminates distractions by keeping players concentrated on the highest priority objectives while simultaneously enabling constant improvement via self coaching.

Do you agree?

 

[thomas daniels]

True and I agree, but you are also making it too difficult for the player the way you are articulating your philosophy on this... keep it simple, have them develop an all-around solid consistent matchplay game for their matches, then have them spend 80% of their time strengthening their mental game and preparation for matches with WM.

I have taught WM to tons of players here and results have been unreal...

 

[Knox]

True and I agree, but you are also making it too difficult for the player the way you are articulating your philosophy on this... keep it simple, have them develop an all-around solid consistent matchplay game for their matches, then have them spend 80% of their time strengthening their mental game and preparation for matches with WM.

I have taught WM to tons of players here and results have been unreal...

Too difficult how? Nothing I'm talking about here is beyond the reach of your average high schooler.

You're telling me that the way I articulate things when I talk coach to coach makes things too difficult for players... I don't understand how you reached that conclusion given that you have no data on how I articulate things to my players.

I agree that simplicity is important but I think simplicity solely for the sake of simplicity carries anti intellectual sentiments and insults the intelligence of your players.

 

[thomas daniels]

Look we all have our own coaching philosophies and the way we look at things and a way of teaching the game, that's all I am saying...

Actually though, we all need to learn how to teach better and more effectively by saying LESS to our players.

 

[rogerroger917]

Look we all have our own coaching philosophies and the way we look at things and a way of teaching the game, that's all I am saying...

Actually though, we all need to learn how to teach better and more effectively by saying LESS to our players.

Wrong

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[ubercat]

Can't we shortcut this by reading the sticky. Most players fall into one of those categories. As long as you have a counter pattern for each of the categories you're golden.

Unfortunately I find myself in the position where I'm often forcing him to hit shots that are not his favourite and he still produces winners in other words the guy is too damn good for me.

I m talking singles. NFI on dubs tactics.

 

[rogerroger917]

How else can djokovic play like a a freaking machine if there isn't an alien being that sits on his back that is 5 seconds in the future? Directing him. Think about it.

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[Knox]

Can't we shortcut this by reading the sticky. Most players fall into one of those categories. As long as you have a counter pattern for each of the categories you're golden.

Unfortunately I find myself in the position where I'm often forcing him to hit shots that are not his favourite and he still produces winners in other words the guy is too damn good for me.

I m talking singles. NFI on dubs tactics.

Well,I agree to an extent. Understanding matchup dynamics is definitely important. Having a set of patterns that you can use to counter each matchup would be considered a part of the heuristic set.

But, the thing is, you need more in your heuristic set than just counter patterns for different matchups. Heuristics to help read incoming shots, deciding which shots will most easily handle the incoming shot, deciding where to place your shot, when to attack/defend/rally etc.

So the sticky does provide some shortcuts, but it's not all encompassing.

And credit is due to TD for recommending the visualization practice. Theres been a fair bit of research that has proven visualization to be an effective improvement method. But, like the matchup dynamic stuff, it's not quite a panacea or golden ticket or whatever you wanna call it. Theres still a lot of other stuff you need in your arsenal if you want a complete game.

 

[Knox]

Here's a pretty great article wherein a psych Ph.D. goes into further detail outlining visualization skills and how to get the most out of them

3 Effective Visualization Techniques to Change Your Life

Proper visual imagery techniques can improve how you feel and how you perform.

www.psychologytoday.com

 

[thomas daniels]

Can't we shortcut this by reading the sticky. Most players fall into one of those categories. As long as you have a counter pattern for each of the categories you're golden.

Unfortunately I find myself in the position where I'm often forcing him to hit shots that are not his favourite and he still produces winners in other words the guy is too damn good for me.

I m talking singles. NFI on dubs tactics.

This is what I have been trying to explain to Knox, and then he says I'm trolling... whatever happen to allowing coaches to express themselves and have different philosophies towards teaching the game?

Oh... social media happen... REAL TALK.

 

[Knox]

This is what I have been trying to explain to Knox, and then he says I'm trolling... whatever happen to allowing coaches to express themselves and have different philosophies towards teaching the game?

Oh... social media happen... REAL TALK.

I think you might be misreading my comments.

I never said you were trolling.

 

[Shroud]

The funny thing about this is that.

If you ask the average tennis junior to go, scout, an opponent he/she will not be able to do it.

Why?

Because they aren't strategic tennis warriors.

Their coaches aren't teaching them how to be strategic either, so please share this post with them.

The first thing you have to do to out-think your opponent before and during the match...

Is to become a strategic tennis warrior, by getting to know your opponent, better than they know themselves.

And you can do this with Warrior Meditation.

First, go watch them play for at least 45 minutes or more and then write down the answers in your tennis journal to the following questions.

How well do they play when facing pressure?

What are their favorite playing patterns?

What type of tempo do they like to play at when they have the lead?

What is their favorite shot when using those patterns?

How mentally strong are they?

After you gather all that information in your scouting research.

Get by yourself and do some serious Warrior Meditation.

"This is when you free your mind from all thoughts by focusing on your breath for 5 minutes and then you meditate on ways to break the rhythm of the future opponent that you will be facing".

This is called the (Broken Rhythm Method) by the way. Labeled by Bruce Lee.

Meditate on coming up with ideas, patterns, and tactics to neutralize and prevent them from executing their favorite patterns against you.

Don't force this to happen either.

Because if you do this WM over and over again before the match.

The ideas and tactics will just flow to you eventually, so trust your intuition and go with that.

There is one thing that you must do to make sure that this will happen though.

You must create a clear picture of yourself in your mind using these tactics and you must get the FEELING that you are actually doing it for REAL.

Reason?

Your subconscious mind doesn't know if what you are picturing is real or unreal, meaning, every time you do this Warrior Meditation with feeling and go through the motion and emotions while doing it.

Your subconscious will think that you are actually doing it for real in the match and this will help you to...

Be able to do it for REAL effortlessly in the match!!!

Or as my coach you to tell me.

"You actually become the player, who you consistently picture and pretend to be during warrior meditation".

YOu talk about keeping it simple, but can you explain why you can't just reduce your scouting questions to only these two:

What are their favorite playing patterns?
What is their favorite shot when using those patterns?

That is the only thing you focus on in the meditation right?

And I watched a vid of a recent opponent and well you are assuming there ARE patterns. What if it seems ultra random with no discernible patterns.

 

[Bender]

YOu talk about keeping it simple, but can you explain why you can't just reduce your scouting questions to only these two:

What are their favorite playing patterns?
What is their favorite shot when using those patterns?

That is the only thing you focus on in the meditation right?

And I watched a vid of a recent opponent and well you are assuming there ARE patterns. What if it seems ultra random with no discernible patterns.

This is how I beat people when I meet them for the first time. Since I don't have an established pattern of where I hit, they have no clue which part of their body I will break first with my tennis racquet. Will it be the legs? Arms? Torso?

If I don't know, there's no way they will know either.

 

[Dan Huben]

Let’s have Knox’s best in category coachee play Thomas Daniels’ best and end this muscle flex.

Loser burns their thesaurus


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[Knox]

Let’s have Knox’s best in category coachee play Thomas Daniels’ best and end this muscle flex.

Loser burns their thesaurus


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

Muscle flex?

This is unflexed! I don't even have a pump! Lol