Announcing Scores with ASL

Using American Sign Language to announce the score during a match has several advantages:

• It allows for a more inclusive game by supporting collaboration between deaf and non-deaf players.

• It overcomes the challenges of noisy courts — especially indoors — where echoes make it difficult to hear players announce the current score.

• It is fun to learn a new language!

When I applied to be a be a USA Pickleball Ambassador, I stated that I wanted to help make this great sport more assessable to a wide-variety of peoples. I hope to do that with this series of posts.

This introductory post demonstrates how to count from 0 to 11 with ASL. These gestures are easily performed with one hand. With some repetition and practice, you’l be announcing scores in no time! My next post will cover numbers 11 through 21. This will be helpful for rally scoring or some of those looong matches that never seem to end.

Once the basics are mastered, I’ll recruit some friends to teach a word or phrase of the week. My goal is to learn one new pickleball-related word or phrase each week for six months. That’s 26 new phrases which will certainly increase our on court communication! I hope you join me for this journey.

PROLITE Stealth GS1 Review

I ordered my PROLITE Stealth GS1 on April 1 about 15 minutes before the launch email hit my inbox. As a PROLITE brand ambassador, I knew the paddle was coming and couldn’t wait to give it a “spin” on the court. I have two of these paddles now – a white paddle that I keep in my bags for demos and an orange one which is my personal paddle. I’ve played the Stealth exclusively since it joined my kit except for the few times two people wanted to demo on the same court at the same time. (In those cases, I go back to my trusty PROLITE Titan Pro LX II. Still love that paddle!)

I was asked to write a review of the Stealth for this newsletter. Before I get into the specs and my experiences with the Stealth, let me share my personal tips on picking out a paddle.

First, a paddle is a very personal piece of equipment, perhaps more than other types of sports equipment. Sure, the arm is connected to the wrist which is connected to the hand which grips the handle. Same with golf clubs, baseball bats, racquetball rackets and similar sports. But in those sports, the wrist acts like a hinge. In pickleball, the shoulder is the hinge. The arm, wrist, hand, handle and paddle face act as one continuous unit. That’s why a great cross-court dink feels so good in pickleball. There’s no wrist movement in that graceful dink! Due to that personal nature, what works for me might not work for you.

Second, understand your game and your goals. Many beginner players pick their first paddle based on snazzy paddle graphics. (My first paddle was the rock star paddle that showed up on Amazon.) Beginner plus players may buy what a friend is using. Improving players with disposable income often pick what they see the pros use on TV. Smart players of all levels, though, create game goals and then pick paddles to demo known to help those goals.

• Do you prefer to sustain rallies from the baseline or engage in dink/volley battles at the non-volley zone? (Me: NVZ as much as possible.)

• Do you have or want to develop fast hands or powerful slams? (Me: I’m working on fast hands. Not there yet but I’m working on it.)

• Which is more important to your game, control or power? (Me: Control. For most players, points are won with control and placement not with monster drives.)

• How important is top spin in your game? Sure, slicey, curvy serves are fun to watch and occasionally win points. But it is a deep dropping top spin serve that sets up of winning rallies. Watch the pros, rarely will they score a service ace. Better to gain early control and outlast the opponent on a point. You can start that with a deep top spin serve. (Me: I’m working on that top spin serve. It isn’t consistent yet but I’m getting there with the help of the Stealth.)

• Finally, how often to you hit that sweet spot on the paddle? If you answer rarely, you probably need a larger sweet spot and a more forgiving paddle to keep the ball in play and lots of practice to improve the eye hand coordination. On the other hand, if you typically get the paddle in front of the ball, a smaller sweet may give you even more ability to shape the location of the ball. (Me: Because of many years of ping pong, I’ve got good eye hand coordination. I want a paddle that will help be place the ball on a dime rather than just get it over.)

Finally, no amount of online reviews or fancy TV ads can replace actual on court demo time. Find a paddle rep or two and ask to demo some paddles. Ask your favorite retail location if they’ll loan or rent paddles. Attend a “demo day” at your local club. Play at least one game with each paddle so that you have a chance to experience on a variety of typical shots.

The PROLITE Stealth GS1 was released to the world on April 1 but it is definitely no joke. In fact, PROLITE is one of the most innovative paddle companies in the sport. Founded in 1984 (yes, almost 40 years ago!) we owe them a great debt of gratitude. Why? They were the first paddle company to introduce a composite paddle not made of wood. If not for PROLITE, we could still be playing with wood paddles. They were also one of the first companies to use carbon graphite in paddle construction. Plus, PROLITE paddles are not only made in the USA but made in Milwaukee. This allows them to ensure top quality during all parts of manufacturing process. (Learn more about PROLITE’s history here and innovation here.) Many other paddle companies outsource the manufacturing process to companies in China. The paddles are essentially commodity shells perhaps with a custom graphic printed on the face but little quality control.

The Stealth GS1 is a premium, oversized paddle made with Toray T700 Raw Carbon Fiber. This is arguably the best material in the industry for paddle surfaces. The Raw Carbon Fiber face provides the “pop” that propels the ball across the court. The GS in GS1 stands for “gritty surface” which creates the tremendous spin imparted by the Stealth. The 8” width creates a larger sweet spot to help create powerful shots while the 14mm width creates a great balance between power found on thinner paddles and control found on thicker paddles. 

When the Stealth was pre-announced to brand ambassadors, I wasn’t looking for a new paddle. I loved the PROLITE Titan Pro LX II that I had been using for six months. Why try to fix something that wasn’t broken? But then I got curious as I read more about Toray T700 Raw Carbon. So, I decided to order a paddle and take it for a spin.

One word came to mind during my first game with the Stealth – confidence. My serves were deep and when desired, had some curve. Volleys were solid and dinks smooth. I thought, “I might actually like to keep playing this paddle.” Turns out, six weeks later it is my primary paddle. Here’s why:

• It has all the power I need to drive from baseline to baseline.

• I can deliver curvy serves and returns to take the offensive early in the point.

• I can shape the ball with spin to place dinks and volleys in hard to return places.

• The 14mm width provides both power and control without compromise.

• I can more easily roll my backhand volleys due to the gritty surface.

• When desired, I can attack from under the top of the net by pulling the ball up and adding top spin to get it over the net and down.

• Overhead slams are solid (assuming I keep my eye on the ball!)

• The large sweet spot allows for solid backhand volleys to help me take control in hands battles.

• I don’t need to worry about delamination as with some other Raw Carbon Fiber paddles. (Learn about delamination in next month’s newsletter.)

So, who would benefit from the Stealth GS1? Frankly, just about anyone at an intermediate level or above and even some beginner plus players looking to add spin to their game. Who’s not a great match for the Stealth GS1? Very new players who haven’t yet developed the ability to position shots. Though, at this price point, it wouldn’t be a mistake to try it. Also, those which very large hands or in need of a big handle for two-handed shots might be better off with the Rebel Pro XLT or waiting for a long handle version of the Stealth.

 Give the Stealth GS1 a try out on the courts. Find a local rep who has a paddle available for demo or check with retail organization. If buying direct, use that rep’s discount code to get the GS1 for under $125. Learn more at https://prolitesports.com/products/stealth-gs1.  

John Michl is a PROLITE brand ambassador, DUPR club director, and Professional Pickleball Registry certified instructor. During the summer he plays at Lake Country Pickleball Club, The Wisconsin Athletic Club, The Grove in Sussex and various locations in Waukesha and Menomonee Falls. Save 25% when buying direct from https://prolitesports.com using his discount code TeamJAM25. John did not receive free product or compensation for this recommendation.

Contact him directly at john@pickleballjam.org.

Taking a Closer Look at Your DUPR Stats

This is the second in a series of articles about the Dynamic Universal Pickleball Rating system (DUPR). See the previous post for an introduction to DUPR and instructions for creating your own DUPR account.

If you’ve watched any of the professional pickleball matches on TV or YouTube, you’ve probably seen one of several DUPR ads. In one ad, Brookfield native Zane Navratil has his DUPR rating tattooed on his arm only to learn that DUPR ratings change after every match. Oops! If you look closely at the 0:09 mark, it appears Zane’s rating in the video is 6.67. (Zane is on the left.) Well, as of this writing, Zane is #4 in the world of men’s singles with a DUPR score of 6.98. Nice work Zane! Next time use erasable ink!! Check it out at the top 50 DUPR pros here. Keep in mind…the ratings change after every match!

In this article, I’ll cover three things you can explore with the DUPR app and one bonus item that only requires your DUPR ID and a web browser. Assuming you’ve recorded a few DUPR matches in the app, open it up on your phone or log in at https://mydupr.com so you can follow along with your stats.

OVERALL RATING

First up, is the Overall Rating on the dashboard.

As you see in the picture, I’m currently rated 3.72 in doubles and NR in singles. NR means not rated since I don’t have any singles matches in the system. I do have 100 doubles matches in the system, however. If you’ve just started with DUPR, you might have a big asterisk (*) next to your rating. This indicates a provisional rating. Essentially, it means that you haven’t played enough ratings against other DUPR rated players for the rating to be reliable. It usually disappears after 7-10 matches or sooner if you’ve played against players with established DUPR ratings. The graphic shows I win more matches than I lose. This is an improvement since last year though without DUPR I probably wouldn’t know that.

I don’t have any pending matches. Matches that you enter are pending until one opponent approves the score of that match. Matches entered by a club or tournament don’t require approval. Note that all matches show up in the app but may not count towards your rating right away. Ratings are typically updated on Tuesdays. Scroll down a little and you’ll see some other stats including average points won, half-life, and the average DUPR rating of your partners and opponents. More on those in a future article.

PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS

Let’s look at my favorite part of the app, Performance Analysis. Scroll down a bit to find the chart.

This chart is a scatter plot. It shows individual match results over time. The line splitting the chart in half is your current DUPR rating. Since DUPR uses your last 60 doubles matches to calculate the rating, it is helpful to compare those matches to the current rating. Based on the current ratings of the four people involved in the match, DUPR predicts match performance. The light blue dots indicated matches where my partner and I were the favorite to win. Dark blue diamonds are matches where we were the underdogs. Tap on dot in your app and you’ll see the results for that specific match. (That’s easier to do on a computer or tablet than on the small phone but it can be done!)

For instance, that lone light blue dot at the bottom of the chart was a sad match for my partner and me. We were expected to win that game by a large margin but we lost 11-0. Ouch! The dot is way below the line because it pulled down my DUPR rating. On that same day, though, I had several matches that pulled up the rating. See the dark blue diamond matches that are close the 4.0 level. My partner and I performed better than the projection, so my DUPR score improved as a result. In fact, I lost the match represented by the second diamond from the right side of the chart. We lost but beat the projection so our DUPR scores went up! (Note: Some matches aren’t included in the analysis if there’s a large gap in rating between the teams or some other reason. Tap the “i” next to “Performance Analysis” for details.)

PLAYER SEARCH

Be sure to explore the other things you can do on this screen. For instance, you can view past matches, enter new matches, and sign up for DUPR clubs and Events. The player search feature is handy for find future partners.

First tap the player search button at the bottom of the screen, next slide the Find players near me slider, then scroll away! You can also search by name and use filters to find players at certain skill levels.

BONUS – FOR THE SUPER DUPR GEEKY:

This final tip requires a web browser since it isn’t available in the app. On a tablet, laptop or desktop computer, head over to https://dupr.shinyapps.io/Chart/. For just a minute, we’ll pretend we’re Zane, one of the top players in the world. His stats will be preloaded for this demonstration. (To view your own stats, you’ll need your DUPR ID. You can find that in the app. Tap your photo at the top of the app, tap Edit Profile, the scroll to DUPR ID.)

There are four tabs available here – two charts and two tables. These are highlighted in the image below. First up is Doubles Performance Chart. This is what we saw in the app earlier but on a bigger screen. Here you can hover over the dots to view specific matches. Cool, though I think the real gold is in the Results Table tab.

Click or tap on Doubles Results Table to see the details for all of Zane’s matches. It may take a few moments to load as it retrieves the information. Note the date of the match, the players, and various metrics. The DUPR Diffis the difference between the average DUPR ratings of the two teams. (Note to Data Nerds: There’s some rounding going on so if you pulled out a calculator, the DUPR Diff might be a little off. Who would do such a thing? 😳Ok, ok. I did.)

For the Feb 18 match, Zane and Rafa played Federico and Pablo. The DUPR differential is only 0.04 which means these two teams were very evenly matched. Zane and Rafa won the match but Zane’s DUPR rating only went up a smidge since he was expected to win and the game was close.

Check out the match against the Johns brothers on that same day. Ben Johns and brother Collin were rated #1 and #4 in men’s doubles when I wrote this article. Collin’s DUPR rating is similar to Zane’s and Rafa’s. Ben’s, however, was over 7 so his team was expected to win. Zane and Rafa put up a good fight but in the end lost 7-11 and 8-11. Since they were underdogs but played well, Zane’s DUPR rating barely changed.

Try this with your stats. What will you learn about your play? Are there certain partners with whom you consistently lose but are predicted win? Maybe you need to work on partner communication? Or, are there times that you seem to sneak out a victory when you are the underdog? What can you learn about those matches that can be applied to your overall strategy?

Next time, I’ll answer your top DUPR questions. If you have a question, send it to DUPR@johnmichl.com. If I don’t know the answer, I’ll ask the DUPR folks.

I hope you learned a little more about your game by examining your DUPR performance.

A version of this article appeared in the Greater Waukesha Area Pickleball eNewsletter. Subscribe here.

Establishing a DUPR rating

“Welcome to Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.”

— Garrison Keillor

Many pickleball players of my generation remember hearing that sentence each week on the Prairie Home Companion radio show. As a business statistics professor, I still chuckle at that last phrase. Think about it. If all the children are above some measure, that point simply can’t be the average. And, if all those children have been playing pickleball in PE for a school year or two (lucky kids!), there’s a good chance that all of them have improved at least a bit from day one.

Experts agree that one of the most important aspects of developing a skill is setting a baseline of performance and measuring progress against that baseline. As you develop new skills, your “average” performance changes and a new baseline becomes your “new normal.” This applies equally to players who want to “go pro” and those of us who’s next goal is consistently land a dink in friendly games. Measuring that performance, though, can be tricky and is often subjective.

• At what point am I no longer a beginner? Is it time-based? Can someone who’s played for two years still play at a beginner level?

• If I’ve played for a while but still miss two out of five serves or service returns can I be considered intermediate?

• How does my inability to consistently land a third-shot drop impact my ability to progress on the court? Isn’t just hitting the ball hard enough? (Answer: NO!)

• If I win almost all my games in my rec league, am I advanced compared to the others?

Self-ratings are a start. USA Pickleball has a great tool for self-rating. Though, it is still somewhat subjective since it relies on our memory of our past play. And, if we are honest with ourselves, we tend to be a bit forgiving when recalling past performance.

For instance, a golfer working on improving her game might keep track of drives in the fairway, greens hit in regulation, and number of putts on each hole. This is easy to track during the round with an app or on the score. With pickleball, though, we typically don’t write down number of accurate serves, number of dinks that stayed low, or number of sustained and accurately placed volleys. So, when we self-rate we tend to over-estimate our actual performance on those items. Plus, a self-rating is just a point-in-time evaluation. That can be helpful for determining if you should be playing in the beginner plus league or the intermediate league, but not very helpful in measuring improvement overtime.

Enter DUPR. Yes, DUPR. It rhymes with super as in Super DUPR!

DUPR is the Dynamic Universal Pickleball Rating system. It useful for all players including those just starting out. With DUPR, you simply record you matches in an app and over time a rating is established. Since DUPR uses your last 60 doubles matches or last 30 singles matches, it is great for tracking how your skill level changes over time.

Plus, tracking all or most of your matches removes the impact of one great match or a day where you just couldn’t hit those serves.

Think of that for a second.

Say you are counting calories and hoping to lose some weight, you wouldn’t just count the calories for salads. Nope. To be fair to yourself, you’d also count the Culver’s turtle sundae you had after that night of pickleball! (Go ahead! You deserve it.) Track all or most of those calories and you’ll have a better picture of how you’re progressing towards your goal.

How does DUPR determine the rating?

There is some cool data science behind the DUPR system. (OK, I’m a data geek so I think it is cool.) For now, know there are three factors that go into the calculation of a DUPR rating:

• Points won – number of points each team won in a match and the player’s percent of points won over time.

• Victories – number of games and matches won. Note that points are just as important, possibly more important, than wins. Close matches impact the ratings differently than blow outs.

• Type of Result – Self-posted recreation matches carry less weight than, say, a sanctioned tournament or official league play. But, they all count!

What about unevenly matched matches? For a match to count in DUPR, players or teams must have DUPR ratings within 1.5 points of each other. So, if my partner is also 3.83, our opponents must average between 2.38 and 5.33 for the match to impact future ratings. Matches with players without established ratings will eventually count once they’ve played a few matches with other rated players. The DUPR FAQ page does a great job of explaining these details.

GETTING STARTED

Getting started is super DUPR easy:

• Download the DUPR app for your phone and create an account. (Search for DUPR on the Apple App Store or Google Play. You can use DUPR on a laptop/desk top without a smart phone but recording your matches while at the court is a lot easier with a smart phone.

• Have your playing partners create DUPR accounts, too. Since you’ll enter the players and scores for a match. EVERYONE playing a DUPR game will need to have a DUPR account.

Note: if you’ve played a tournament, you might already have a DUPR account. Head over to https://mydupr.com and search for your name. If you are in the system but don’t have a login, you should be able to claim the account. Contact support@mydupr.com if you need help.

RECORDING RECREATIONAL GAMES:

• After a game or match, enter all four players and the score — then submit.

• One of your opponents will need to confirm the score of the match.

• Matches confirmed before Monday will impact the ratings typically updated on Tuesday each week.

You’ll need to get at least 10 matches before the ratings start to make sense so get out there, play, and record.

CLINICS, LEAGUES, and TOURNAMENTS:

Many leagues and clubs are now using DUPR to direct players to certain courts appropriate for their skill level. Having an established DUPR rating will ensure you don’t accidentally end up on the advanced court when your skill level is around the beginner plus level.

DUPR Flex and Waterfall leagues are popping up around the country so could be a good option for your play.

DUPR clinics are a great way to establish an initial rating since everyone playing will have an account and you’ll get a few hours of concentrated DUPR play. Check with your pickleball or athletic club for DUPR clinics. You can also find DUPR “clubs” in the DUPR app. Those DUPR club directors may be available to conduct private DUPR clinics for 4 to 12 players. Be sure to have an established DUPR account before attending your first clinic. Otherwise, the scores can’t be entered.

Since DUPR is now the generally excepted international rating system, it is used for most tournaments in the United States. If you’ve played in a USA Pickleball sanctioned tournament, or many unsanctioned tournaments, there’s a good chance you have some DUPR matches already in the system.

In future posts, we’ll explore the information available. It will make more sense if you have a few DUPR matches under your belt. So, get the app, create an account, and record some recreational matches! You, too, will be super DUPR!!

A version of this article appeared in the Greater Waukesha Area Pickleball eNewsletter. Subscribe here.