January 18, 2021
2 DAYS AGO - I started late again this morning, and almost took the day off for Martin Luther King Day, even Expand
2 DAYS AGO - I started late again this morning, and almost took the day off for Martin Luther King Day, even wrote a note that the blog would go up tomorrow. But I changed my mind and went to work on it. It'll be up by 3:00 PM or I don't get one of Trump's pardons tomorrow and go to prison for my 45-year forehand killing spree. Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Shorten Stroke on Receive. And here's Titus Dubina (74 sec) embarking on his professional table tennis, acting, and endorsement career! Collapse
December 21, 2020
28/12/2020 - I was up late watching movies last night (Pixar's "Soul" was excellent), and so got Expand
28/12/2020 - I was up late watching movies last night (Pixar's "Soul" was excellent), and so got a very late start today. This week's blog will be up by 3 PM or 2021 will be a complete repeat of 2020, but this time the murder hornets will take center stage and we'll all have to wear professional beekeeper outfits. Meanwhile, here's the Tip of the Week, Use Quick, Deep Pushes to Set Up Your Attack. And to help tide you over, here's Funniest Moments 2020 (12:37) from Pongfinity! Collapse
How To Choose Your Table Tennis Rubber
14/12/2020 - What type of table tennis rubbers do you need? What are the differences? Let me help you choose Expand
14/12/2020 - What type of table tennis rubbers do you need? What are the differences? Let me help you choose the right ones for you. Collapse
November 23, 2020
23/11/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 1:30PM (eastern time) or I get to do a recount on every table Expand
23/11/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 1:30PM (eastern time) or I get to do a recount on every table tennis match I've ever lost - they were fixed, I won them all!!! Recount every point!!! Meanwhile, to tide you over, the Tip of the Week is up: The Forehand Down-the Line Block and Counterloop. And why not Test Your Ping Pong IQ (8:49) with Adam Bobrow? Collapse
November 2, 2020
02/11/2020 - I'm running late today, but blog will be up by 3PM eastern time or I have to attend a Trump Expand
02/11/2020 - I'm running late today, but blog will be up by 3PM eastern time or I have to attend a Trump Rally with a Biden for President shirt. Meanwhile, here's the Tip of the Week, Backhand Chopping in an Emergency, plus a hilarious email exchange! Collapse
Men's World Cup 2020 - Table Tennis
14/10/2020 - The Men's World Cup is an invitational event for 20 of the world's top players. See who qualified Expand
14/10/2020 - The Men's World Cup is an invitational event for 20 of the world's top players. See who qualified for this prestigious event in 2020 and get all the results. Collapse
September 28, 2020
28/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
Use Quickness, Ball Placement, and Variation Against Short Serves.
Two Zoom Expand
28/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
Use Quickness, Ball Placement, and Variation Against Short Serves.
Two Zoom Coaches Meetings
I was on two coaches Zoom meetings this past week.
Meet the Coaching Committee (26:57). This was on Wednesday, with USATT COO Mark Thompson interviewing Pieke Franssen (chair), Gao Jun, Dave Fullen, and Larry Hodges (me).
USA Table Tennis Coaches Catch-up (33:48). This is a new bi-weekly meeting for USATT coaches, held every other Friday at noon eastern time. Come join us! Attending this first one were Sean O'Neill (USATT High Performance Director), Doru Gheorghe (USATT High Performance Manager), Jasna Rather (USATT Director of Para Programs), Samson Dubina, Dora Kurimay, and Larry Hodges (me). For this meeting, topics of discussion were Club Status; Group and Private Lessons Status; USATT Thursday Night Challenge Update; USOPC Grants (in particular, robots and software for analysis); USATT Hopes Finals for 2020 (likely in December at Samson Dubina TTC in Akron, Collapse
September 7, 2020
07/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
Tactics Early In a Match: Explorers and Dominators.
My Interview at Expand
07/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
Tactics Early In a Match: Explorers and Dominators.
My Interview at Butterfly
Here's my PongNow video (30:46) by Steve Hopkins at Butterfly! We covered a lot of material - enjoy!
Weekend Coaching
This was my first full day of coaching at MDTTC in six months. I started at noon and didn't leave until 7:15PM!!!
Because of the pandemic, our elite junior program - the "Talent Development Program" - is now divided into three levels, no more than twelve players at a time. At noon I helped coach the Level 3 group (along with John Hsu), which also is mostly the youngest group. One girl (age 7) has mostly been doing regular forehands and backhands, and lots of footwork, but has barely worked on pushing - so I spent much of the session working with her on both backhand and forehand pushing. She got pretty excited when she would pull off ones that were heavy enough that they'd stop bouncing and even bounce back into the net! Only problem was when she Collapse
August 23, 2020
24/08/2020 - Tip of the Week
On Short Serves to the Forehand, Challenge the Forehand, Often Go to the Expand
24/08/2020 - Tip of the Week
On Short Serves to the Forehand, Challenge the Forehand, Often Go to the Backhand.
This Week's Blog Will Go Up on Wednesday
I was supposed to be return home on Friday night after twelve days in Ohio. However…
I left Akron at about 5:10 PM on Friday. At around 6:25 PM, while near Beaver Falls, PA, while in the far left lane (going about 75 mph, speed limit 70), I had a car accident. I was snacking on a bag of walnuts on my lap, which fell on the floor. I checked to make sure no cars were around and then reached for the walnuts. I inadvertently swerved right. I then swerved left to get back in my lane, but the car spun and hit the left wall. It bounced right, and I thought I'd regained control. But both left tires went flat when they hit the wall, and so I lost control, and my car spun across the highway. (But no cars around.) It hit the right side embankment and flipped in the air at least once and the landed upside down. The car is 100% Collapse
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January 11, 2021
11/01/2021 - Tip of the Week
Should You Experiment If You Have a Big Lead?
Mercy Points and Comebacks
There was Expand
11/01/2021 - Tip of the Week
Should You Experiment If You Have a Big Lead?
Mercy Points and Comebacks
There was quite a lot of discussion on Facebook from my blog last week about whether to give "mercy points." So let's revisit.
The basic rule is that it's up to you if you want to give a mercy point at 10-0. Both Ma Long and Jan-Ove Waldner, generally considered the two main candidates for Greatest of All Time, have given away mercy points or played exhibition at the end of a lopsided match. Other top players are die-hard try to win every point, even at 10-0 against a beginner. Some players might be insulted if you "give" them a point, so it depends on the player and circumstances. As I said, in a non-competitive match, I prefer to put a ball up and let them "earn" the point.
It also depends on the event. A senior focused on winning Over 50 at the Nationals shouldn't take chances there, but might give a point (or go easy) at 10-0 match point in a Collapse
December 21, 2020
21/12/2020 - I'm way behind today. This week's blog will be up by 3PM or I will declare martial law (or Expand
21/12/2020 - I'm way behind today. This week's blog will be up by 3PM or I will declare martial law (or is that Pong Law?), send out the troops (marauding players with deadly ping-pong paddles), declare the recent USA Table Tennis election a let, and take over USATT by storm. Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Proper Strokes Are 1-2-3: Don't Forget the Neutral Position! And to help tide you over, here's Watchin' Sid & Nandan's Guest Appearance on Ryan's Mystery Playdate (2:52)! Collapse
December 7, 2020
07/12/2020 - Tip of the Week
Should You Stick With Your Best Shot If It Is Missing?
Weekend Coaching
On Sunday, Expand
07/12/2020 - Tip of the Week
Should You Stick With Your Best Shot If It Is Missing?
Weekend Coaching
On Sunday, I asked one of our junior players what she wanted to work on, and she wanted to do side-to-side footwork drills. We must be doing something right!!! As usual, we focused on fundamental as I was working with our younger kids. I also set up targets on the table for serve practice and they took great joy in knocking them off - though I kept insisting that they weren't really knocking them off, they were just showing me what it would look like if they were to knock them off, so that if they were to actually knock them off, I'd know what it would look like. Did you get all of that?
They played up-down tables the second half of the session. They would hide the ball to see who served first. If the server scored two in a row, he became the receiver, and the goal was to be the receiver. They would play for about five minutes, and then whoever was receiving at that time moved up, the Collapse
November 16, 2020
16/11/2020 - Tip of the Week
Use Both Sides of the Body When Forehand Looping.
ITTF Men's World Expand
16/11/2020 - Tip of the Week
Use Both Sides of the Body When Forehand Looping.
ITTF Men's World Cup
Here's the home page for the event, which finished yesterday in Weihai, China. Here are news articles, videos (or see them directly on Youtube), preliminary RR results (including USA's Kanak Jha's two seven-gamers), and the single eliminations results. The big news - Fan Zhendong won for the fourth time, including his third in a row! Here are some videos, with time between points removed:
Final: Ma Long vs Fan Zhendong (15:48)
Semifinal: Ma Long vs Tomokazu Harimoto (10:41)
Semifinal: Fan Zhendong vs Jang Woojin (7:54)
Fan Zhendong checking balls before the final (1:34)
Here's Men's World Cup coverage from Steve Hopkins at Butterfly:
Fan Tops Final Day
Semifinals
Final Four Are Set
Main Draw Underway
Group Play
Group Draw Revealed
Preview
Kanak Jha at the Men's World Cup and Some Analysis
The results for USA's Kanak Jha (world #27) could be called a well-played Collapse
October 26, 2020
26/10/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 2:30 PM or I will see my shadow and the US election is Expand
26/10/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 2:30 PM or I will see my shadow and the US election is postponed six weeks. But the Tip of the Week is up, Learn To Play Close to the Table, and to help tide you over, here's how to have a Paddle and Ball for Breakfast (19 sec)! Collapse
October 12, 2020
12/10/2020 - Got started very late today, so today's blog will be up by 3PM or I have to be a fly on Expand
12/10/2020 - Got started very late today, so today's blog will be up by 3PM or I have to be a fly on Barrett's head during the Supreme Court hearings. Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Don't Telegraph the Direction of Your Attack. And to help tide you over, here's I Played Against World No. 8 Cheng I-Ching (14:44) from Adam Bobrow! Collapse
September 21, 2020
21/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
Against a Fast Attacker, Make At Least Two Strong Shots.
USA Table Tennis Expand
21/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
Against a Fast Attacker, Make At Least Two Strong Shots.
USA Table Tennis Reschedules US National Table Tennis Championships for July of 2021 . . . and My Recommendation
Here's the USATT news item. Dang! But here is my recommendation.
The problem of moving the 2020 Nationals to 2021 is that you've skipped an entire year (2020), so are the winners of the 2021 Nationals the champions for 2020 or 2021? Or are they going to run the 2020 and 2021 Nationals together or back-to-back? Suppose they run both, running the championship events as they normally do, with lots of round robin events, but only running one set of rating events. This would mean going from five or six days to nine or even ten, and many players can't afford to take that much time off. It could be a logistical nightmare as well. But there's an easier way.
My suggestion is to, this one time, run all the championship events twice, one for 2020, and one for 2021 - but run them all single Collapse
August 31, 2020
31/08/2020 - Tip of the Week
Move Like a Pro.
Saturation Training
I mentioned in my blog last week that I had Expand
31/08/2020 - Tip of the Week
Move Like a Pro.
Saturation Training
I mentioned in my blog last week that I had spent much of the two weeks at the Samson Dubina Mega Camp in Ohio working on my backhand. It was a textbook example of Saturation Training. This is one of the most important principles of table tennis and other sports.
There are three common ways to play your backhand - blocking, hitting, or looping. Blockers focus on quickness; hitters on aggressive hitting; and loopers on aggressive topspins. You can do a lot of other shots on the backhand, but these are the most common rallying shots that players use. (When I say "rally," that means topspin rallies, not pushing or chopping.) I've always been more or less a blocker and counter-hitter on the backhand, where I focused on consistency and placement. But I was never really that quick with my backhand blocking, and my backhand hitting wasn't that aggressive either. My consistency made up for these weaknesses, but overall, Collapse
August 17, 2020
17/08/2020 - I decided to spend a second week training at the Samson Dubina Mega Camp here in Akron, Ohio. And Expand
17/08/2020 - I decided to spend a second week training at the Samson Dubina Mega Camp here in Akron, Ohio. And so no blog this week. But I'm getting back into playing shape!!! But the Tip if the Week is up, Should You Develop Your Forehand Push? Plus, here's a good video to watch (5 min), highlights of four-time US Men's Singles Champion Jim Butler (1990, 1992, 1993, 2014) vs. US #1 Mini-Cadet Daniel Tran, including short interviews at the end.
Or, if you want something funny but interesting, and you missed or didn't have time to listen to my interview last week, here it is again (40:53) at Kevin Table Tennis! I explain how I signed twelve autographs as Jan-Ove Waldner at the US Open; ate nine quarter-pounders with cheese in five hours in my big breakthrough tournament (winning all four of my events, including the Open, with an agonizing stomachache, and ate only one more hamburger in the forty years since, and that on a lost bet); and how Marty Reisman ruined my life! Collapse
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January 4, 2021
04/01/2021 - Today's blog will be up by 2:30 PM or every player I ever beat in a tournament can contact the Expand
04/01/2021 - Today's blog will be up by 2:30 PM or every player I ever beat in a tournament can contact the umpire or referee for the match and pressure them to find enough points for them to have won against me. I'm going to do the same - I've had some heart-breaking losses, but I'm going to be contacting those umpires and see if we can scrounge up enough points so I win. (I was up late watching movies again and so got another late start.) Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Play Both Weaker and Stronger Players. And to tide you over, here's a Christmas Paddle Video (53 sec) - "This truly is a special moment... boy gets the perfect gift this Christmas." A must watch. Collapse
December 14, 2020
14/12/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 2PM eastern time or I have to go to law school this afternoon, Expand
14/12/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 2PM eastern time or I have to go to law school this afternoon, get my law degree on Tuesday, get appointed to the Supreme Court on Wednesday, and on Thursday rule that yes, in fact, our next president is Grogu ("Baby Yoda"). Vote Baby Yoda!!! Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Use It or Lose It! And to help tide you over, here's World's Longest Ping Pong Shot (8:02) from Pongfinity! Collapse
November 30, 2020
30/11/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 3PM, or I have to turn down my lifetime dream, Biden's Expand
30/11/2020 - This week's blog will be up by 3PM, or I have to turn down my lifetime dream, Biden's invitation for me to be Secretary of Ping-Pong, a cabinet-level position that would allow me to argue for the one thing progressives and conservatives can agree on, a ping-pong table in the Oval Office. (And did you know that it is second in line to the presidency, after the VP?) Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Letting an Opponent Control Play is Risky. And to help tide you over, here's Lego Table Tennis!
Women's World Cup Final: Chen Meng VS Sun Yingsha (4:09)
Men's World Cup Final: Ma Long vs Fan Zhendong (3:27) Collapse
November 9, 2020
09/11/2020 - Today's blog will be up by 2PM (eastern time) or the networks have to call Alaska and North Expand
09/11/2020 - Today's blog will be up by 2PM (eastern time) or the networks have to call Alaska and North Carolina for Trump, Arizona and Georgia for Biden. Meanwhile, here's the Tip of the Week, Think Tactics, Then Let the Shots Happen. To help tide you over, here's The Craziest Table Tennis Jump Shot You Will Ever See (43 sec)! Collapse
October 19, 2020
19/10/2020 - Today's blog will be up by 2PM or I have to hold a town hall meeting where I'm asked why Expand
19/10/2020 - Today's blog will be up by 2PM or I have to hold a town hall meeting where I'm asked why my strokes are too stiff, why I can't cover the wide forehand anymore, and who the heck am I anyway. Meanwhile, the Tip of the Week is up, Sometimes Hit Twice to the Same Spot, and to help tide you over, here's Grunt Pong (19 sec)! Collapse
October 5, 2020
05/10/2020 - Tip of the Week
Exaggerate Serving Follow-Through in "Wrong" Direction.
This is B.E.S.T. Expand
05/10/2020 - Tip of the Week
Exaggerate Serving Follow-Through in "Wrong" Direction.
This is B.E.S.T. Week - Buy Every Seemiller Tome!
Here's the new Dan Seemiller page, where you can buy both of the books by USA's greatest modern player. (It's a relatively simple page I put together.) One teaches you how to play table tennis; the other is about his table tennis life.
Here's Dan's very short resume:
Dan Seemiller's USATT Hall of Fame Profile (by Tim Boggan)
5-time U.S. Men's Singles Champion: 1976, 1977, 1980, 1982, 1983
12-time U.S. Men's Doubles Champion: 1976-1983, 1990-1991, 1994, 2009
7-time U.S. Mixed Doubles Champion: 1976-1978, 1981-1983, 1988
U.S. Men's National Team Coach, 1999-2009
U.S. Men's Olympic Coach, 2000 Sydney, 2004 Athens
3-time USOC Coach of the Year for Table Tennis
South Bend Table Tennis Club Head Coach 1996-present
President of USA Table Tennis, 1990-1995
Hall of Fame Inductee, 1995, Lifetime Achievement Award 2008 Collapse
September 14, 2020
14/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
A Trick to Beat a Tricky Pusher.
Weekend Coaching
On Sunday, I worked with Group 3 Expand
14/09/2020 - Tip of the Week
A Trick to Beat a Tricky Pusher.
Weekend Coaching
On Sunday, I worked with Group 3 of our Junior program. Most of the group did a practice tournament. However, two of the players weren't really ready for matches, and so I worked with those two the entire session. Focus was on fundamentals.
I came up with what will now go down in history as the greatest table tennis joke, to be retold through the ages. (But you have to pay me $1 every time you use it.) I asked one of the kids how many hands he has. He said two and held them up. I said I have four hands. He didn't believe me, so I shadow-practiced my forehand and said, "See, these are my four hands." (Here's the reaction.)
On Saturday, as usual I did a one-hour session with Navin Kumar. (I'm retired from private coaching, but made the one exception for "The Bionic Man." He has Parkinson's Disease and Congenital Heart Disease - his heart is mostly artificial - and he won two medals Collapse
August 26, 2020
26/08/2020 - Tip of the Week
On Short Serves to the Forehand, Challenge the Forehand, Often Go to the Expand
26/08/2020 - Tip of the Week
On Short Serves to the Forehand, Challenge the Forehand, Often Go to the Backhand.
Two Weeks Training at the Samson Dubina Mega Camp in Ohio
So what was I, at age 60 and out of shape, doing training with players one-fifth to one-half my age, including numerous footwork drills that left me gasping for air and my body screaming at me to have common sense and go home and watch TV?
Like many others, I was stuck at home for five months because of the pandemic, where I got way out of shape and gained weight. So I decided to do something about it. (My club, MDTTC, where I coach, was partly open, but all group sessions, including training camps, had been cancelled.) So I contacted Samson and arranged that I'd come as a player in the mornings, a practice partner in the afternoons. That would mean five hours of intense play each day, Aug. 10-14 and 17-21.
Then I hopped in my car and drove the five hours from Maryland to Akron, Ohio and the Samson Dubina TT Academy. It was a Collapse
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