Knowing who has the middle ball is one of the harder concepts in Pickleball. When we start teaching this concept we teach it very black and white knowing that in reality there is room for the gray area and creativity. The ” respect the x” concept means that when the ball is cross court from us, then we have middle. We should move our bodies towards the middle to cover the cross court ball if it should go middle (even on our backhands). We know that this means leaving the wide angle open. Our philosophy is to take away the higher percentage shots and make our opponent hit the harder, lower percentage shot.

Here are a few tips to help you cover middle:

1. Move your whole body towards the ball. Your body and feet should follow the ball. If the ball is in front of you, cover down the line. If the ball is cross court, move your body towards the center line (even cross over the line) if necessary to cover the middle.

2. Don’t be afraid to cross over the middle line. The middle line on the pickleball court is only on the court to tell us where the serve is in or out. IT’S NOT THERE TO BOX YOU IN. Be willing to move your body across the middle line to have better access to the middle ball.

3. Make sure your body is there and not just your paddle. We communicate to our partners better if we move our bodies to the middle, then just putting our paddle there. I call it the tea pot stance. We are reaching with our paddle. Move your leg underneath your paddle on a firm foundation. Our body communicates to our partners that we have middle covered.

4. Play the long game. Often we let ten balls go down the middle and we fret over the one ball that beat us wide. If we do the math, we will lose more points down the middle, then the few that beat us wide. Protect the higher percentage shot, and let the few lower percentage shots go.