My friend Jeremy asked how I was enjoying our new ping-pong
table.
Seemingly, a simple question. My response? Anything but.
After telling him how well Xiaoli and Liam were playing,
I dived into the most important part – a detailed breakdown of my own game,
specifically my unique playing style. By the time I stopped talking, he must
have thought he had played a five-set tennis match.
Critical Ping Pong
Context
Growing up, we had a table for several years. At the risk of
bragging, I was pretty good. My quirk was that I served with my right hand and
played the rest of the point with my left. You have to love the way Bobproof’s
brain is wired, huh?
I do everything with my left hand, except for hitting a baseball,
playing tennis and serving in ping pong. It is quite rare to throw left and bat
right in baseball. According to a 2015 ESPN.com article, only five nonpitchers
since 1900 have played 1,000 games batting right-handed and throwing
left-handed. There were so many examples of players that threw right and
battled left that they didn’t even calculate the number. Disappointingly, no
stats seem to exist on professional ping-pong players that serve with their
right hand and play the point out with their left.
Of course, in baseball, though, one of those throw left
bat right guys was Rickey Henderson. Clearly, Rickey and I have a lot of
common. Both of us stole a lot of bases (mine mostly came in freshman baseball,
but details). Rickey lapses into the third person more than I do, but I already
went third person earlier in this blog and, frankly, it was quite freeing.
Ping Pong Present
During this go around with ping-pong, I started questioning the wisdom of
serving with my right hand and then playing with my left hand. I decided to
experiment.
I tried playing the whole point right-handed. That played
to the strength of my forehand, which, candidly, is pretty robust. Interestingly,
and as you may have heard, even though it’s ping-pong and not tennis, I’ve
actually shared some tips with a famous Spanish tennis player about how I load
my shots with topspin. Kind of surprising he reached out since his topspin is universally lauded,
but I guess the great ones are never satisfied. Similar, I guess, to the way I
play and approach ping-pong.
The main problem with playing right-handed is that while
the forehand is natural, the backhand is difficult. It feels awkward and leads to
erratic shots.
I’ve also tried serving left-handed and playing the
entire point with that hand. My serve is a work in progress this way, but I’m
starting to “see the ball” well from my forehand and backhand side.
The final option is admittedly a bit out there. I serve
with my right hand and then switch hands based on where the shot goes. This
allows me to strike forehands from both wings. I’ve taken some grief for this
approach online, on Twitter and in “ping-pong circles,” but as Steve Jobs once
said, “have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.”
The only flaw so far is that I’m executing a forehand
dominant approach against an 8-year-old. So would this really work
against adults?
Ping-Pong Future
So as I told Jeremy, I’m still searching, still grinding. And, I’m not going to lie, there’s some pondering and reflecting going on as
well.
It’s not easy to try and find a style I can live with;
one that melds efficiency with creativity and allows for artistic flourishes.
When I finally stopped talking, Jeremy looked at me with
a glazed expression.
“I didn’t know that asking if you were enjoying ping-pong
was such a loaded question?” he said.
Jeremy, I’ll be much briefer with this response.
Touché.
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