The pickleball "drip" shot is becoming more popular, but what is it? Learn more about the pickleball drive/drop combination, how to hit it, and when to hit it. Plus - Barrett and Danea Bass will teach you a drill to practice your pickleball drip shot.
What is the pickleball “drip” shot?
The pickleball drip shot is a combination between a drop shot and a drive. It will have a medium trajectory and will get down at your opponent's feet with topspin, causing a lot of pop-ups and other unforced errors from their side of the court.
The game of pickleball is getting faster and you have to be more creative to create offense, but just trying to get your drop into the kitchen is not a way to be offensive — because it will create a high bounce, giving your opponent a lot of options.
The drip shot is advantageous because the topspin and the lower trajectory is going to cause the ball to get down and then they can't be as offensive with it.
How to hit the drive/drop shot combination
Knowing the correct stance and grip will help transform your drip shot.
Open vs. closed stance
It's important when you're hitting a drip to make sure that you have an open stance: having your hips open towards the opposite side of the court. If you have a closed stance, you're fighting your body. An open stance allows you to hit multiple spots on the court a lot easier.
Grip strength
Think of holding your paddle really tight (a 10 out of 10) — you can see your veins coming out of your arms. If the paddle comes right out of your hand completely, that's 1 out of 10. For the pickleball drip shot, you should have a very loose grip: around a 2 or 3 out of 10.
That loose grip is going to allow you to brush up on the ball and add topspin. Topspin is not easily achievable if your wrist and arm are very tight, so letting the momentum in your arm be really loose is key to creating a lot of spin and brushing up on the ball.
The contact point & swing path for the drip shot
The contact point and swing path in relation to where you are on the court will be the most important tips to learn the pickleball drive/drop combination.
Contact point
When you're hitting a drop shot, if you were to take the ball and cut it in half, you're going to want to hit the bottom equator. When you're hitting a drop shot, you're hitting close to the bottom of the ball, which will allow the ball to have a lot of arc.
But, when you're hitting the drip shot, you will want to hit more of the side of the ball versus the bottom of the ball, which will allow you to create more offense because that ball is going to come on more a horizontal trajectory versus a vertical trajectory.
Swing path
There are two things that you have to take note of when changing your swing path for this shot.
- The closer the ball is to the net, the shorter your swing path (your backswing will be almost non-existent). If you’re further back, you should have a slightly open swing path (with a little more backswing to help you get the ball over the net).
- Depending on how high the ball bounces, you will have a different swing path.
To master the drip shot, you should be focusing on the high-to-low swing path in relation to where you are on the court and how high the ball bounces.
Pickleball drill to help you practice the drip shot
This pickleball drill will help you put all these tips together and learn the pickleball drip shot.
- Your partner should be at their kitchen line.
- You will be in front of them at your baseline.
- Have two cones set up crosscourt on their kitchen line.
- That will be your target area.
- Your partner will feed you the ball.
- You should be working on trying to get your pickleball drip shot into the area of the cones.
To see this drill in action, watch the video above.