DALLAS, TX - Players have always faced a choice on the third shot: should I drop or should I drive? While the amateur rec games have always had their share of “bangers”; i.e., players hitting a lot of drives, the pro game over the years has been dominated by the drop. Indeed, it was not at all uncommon for coaches to talk about the third shot drop as the most important shot in pickleball.

 

But, as balls and paddles have changed, as players get bigger, stronger, and more athletic, the third shot drive is starting to grow, if not dominate. Is the third shot drop on its way to extinction?

 

The dominance of the drive has been a topic for most of the last year in pro pickleball. It has come to a head with the gold medal triumph of Quang Duong and Christian Alshon at the recent IHG Hotels & Resorts Bristol Open. Duong/Alshon played a power game and used it defeat Ben Johns and Collin Johns in three straight games.

 

 

A quick look at some statistics from that recent match confirms the prevalence of the drive. As you would expect, Duong drove the most third shots, 27 of 32. Alshon drove it 12 of 25. That’s 39/57 for their side, or 68%. But what is surprising is how often Ben and Collin drove the ball. For Collin it was 15 of 26, and for Ben it was 19 of 26. That is a total of 34/52, or 65%! In summary, the drive predominated over the drop by a 2-1 margin in this match.

 

If you are wondering how this looks historically, it is a huge change from 2023 and before. For example, Alshon paired with Riley Newman in the 2023 Nationals, and faced JW Johnson and Dylan Frazier in the semis. Alshon and Newman exclusively dropped on thirds. At the 2023 PPA Championships, Alshon paired in mixed with Tyra Black and faced Newman and Jesse Irvine, and again Alshon dropped exclusively. Alshon has perhaps the best topspin forehand drop in pro pickleball. Yet, he has gone from 100% drops to 50-50 in less than one year.

 

For a player like Duong, who has such a good drive, we see him use the drive almost exclusively. Collin has, for a pro, a fairly mediocre drive, but even he sometimes drives 50% or more of the time, as we saw from this recent match v Duong/Alshon. It is very easy to find matches to replay from 2023 and before of Collin where he used the third shot drop either 100% of the time or close to it.

 

 

The courts at the IHG Hotels & Reorts Bristol Open were notably fast. I am sure that contributed to the use of the drive. But, the new Vulcan ball can be spun with topspin making a good drive more effective. Paddles made in 2024 hit harder than in years past. Players such as Jack Sock have brought a new size and athleticism to the sport. All of these factors contribute to making third shot drives more effective.

 

Will the trend continue of players driving and not dropping? A definite yes. Is the third shot drop a dinosaur, soon to disappear? Doubtful, but it is not out of the realm of possibility. We have seen huge changes in tennis. Watch Wimbledon in the 1970s or 1980s, and you will see players using serve and volley tactics with great frequency. Even the great Bjorn Borg, as good a baseliner as ever existed in tennis, would frequently come to the net on the grass courts of Wimbledon. While the serve and volley was never used as much at the US Open as it was at Wimbledon, it was a still a very frequent tactic in the 1970s and 1980s. Fast forward to today, and you can watch Wimbledon and the US Open and often see entire matches without a single serve and volley sequence.

 

For pickleball, the third shot drop is definitely being used less in the pro game. In singles play, we increasingly see players who do not employ cat and mouse tactics. While Ben Johns and Federico Staksrud will drop to the backhand in singles, and start a cat and mouse sequence, there are many top players who only drive in singles. Newer players who drop in singles are a rare breed, with Noe Khlif being one of those rare exceptions. Grayson Goldin called his use of 100% power in singles, “new pickleball”. I don’t think it is particularly new as a strategy, but the large number of players going to pure power is definitely new.

 

Tennis players transitioning to pickleball enjoy more early success at singles than doubles. They usually have to develop a good soft game to be able to make strides in pickleball doubles (see for example, Jaume Martinez Vich, who has done so). But, in the future, will power players from singles enjoy doubles success without changing their style? For now, I will say no. While Duong drives the ball almost 90% of the time on his thirds, he still has also learned to hit effective dinks, especially off the twoey. The soft game and dinking will always have its place in pickleball. But, to get to the dink game, the drive is going to increasingly be the starting point.

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