Listening to TV commentators covering a tennis match, you might think the contestants were playing badminton. John McEnroe particularly likes to say that a player sends the ball crosscourt or down the line "with just a flick of the wrist."

Just how much wrist is used in tennis? High speed photography (200 frames per second) of world class players analyzed by John Yandell of www.tennisone.com shows that there is virtually no wrist movement on forehand and backhand groundstrokes. On a forehand the wrist is locked into a laid-back position at the end of the backswing and remains in that locked position until the end of the followthrough, at which point the muscles of the arm and shoulder relax and the wrist returns to its natural position. This occurs long after the ball has crossed the net. On TV and video replays (at 15 frames per second), it might look like a flick of the wrist, but it is usually a slight roll of the forearm with a firm, locked wrist.

Timing the shoulder rotation and the acceleration of the racquet arm through the ball on a good groundstroke is difficult enough; playing with a lot of wrist adds another, troublesome, variable to the mix. If you cock your wrist back as you prepare the backswing with the intention of uncocking your wrist upon ball contact (as a flick of the wrist implies), your timing must be perfect in order to have your racquet face flush to the ball. If your timing is off, you will mis-hit the ball. This is why most good players eliminate wrist movement in their swings. It gives them one less variable to contend with.

So what's up with McEnroe, one of the best players ever, saying that Agassi and others are making these great shots with a "flick of the wrist"? It's probably easier and more dramatic for McEnroe to describe such shots in this way rather than giving a long technical explanation (as above). It might also be a case of Mac not understanding the nature of the modern forehand, particularly those using semi-Western and Western grips. Look at old videos of Mac playing with his continental grip off both sides and you'll see that his strokes look strange compared to the modern forehands of Hewitt, Agassi, Federer, Haas, Ferrero, Roddick, Kuerten, et al. Mac's a genius on the court, but he hits a different groundstroke than the younger players of today. He, too, however, didn't flick his wrist.

Randy Cummings
Match Point Racquet Sports
www.racquetgear.com