so what you just saw there was me attempting to hit a john mcenroe or jimmy connor's forehand and
you're probably thinking nick they look exactly the same yeah probably that's what it looks
like and i'm having a hard time replicating these forehands they're tough to pull off but basically
we're talking about more of a traditional forehand that has a more of a traditional grip it is a
continental grip or close to it it doesn't have a loop this forehand the racket goes straight back
the one difference between a jimmy connor's forehand and a john mcenroe forehand was that john
mcenroe likes to be a little bit more straight up he gets a lot of momentum from the incoming ball
and he gets a lot of momentum from the racket swinging forward and from the torso rotation where
jimmy connors would load a little bit more in his ground stroke he used to bend his upper body and
he would draw a little bit more energy from his body so that is probably the biggest difference
between those two forehands but why am i even talking about jimmy connors and john mcenroe's
forehand when obviously all the modern players hit the forehand completely different they have a
loop on their shot they're using their body in a very violent way they're becoming
airborne why in the heck am i talking about jimmy connors and john mcenroe well i received a very
interesting question in one of my latest forehand videos and the question was nick would you fix
john mcenroe's and jimmy connor's forehand and before i answer that question i want to tell you
a quick story about my college coach mel purcell so for you guys that don't know i played division
one college tennis at murray state university i had the pleasure of being coached by one of the
greatest players ever called mel purcell he was a quarter finalist at wimbledon he was ranked 21
in the world he was such a talented player that many people have told me that mel could have
easily been ranked in the top 10 in the world this is how talented mel purcell was and when
i was in college mel still competed on the senior tour it was called the nuween tour back in those
days and he did really well he was ranked number two in the world behind jimmy connors and we had
the pleasure of watching mel compete against some of the legends of the game and i remember
vividly that at one of these tournaments mel was hitting with somebody at a club where the
tournament was hosted this was just a random person i'm not sure if this was a coach or just
someone who was a player at the club but in any case mel was telling us a story about how
he was taking some valleys and this person that he was hitting with was giving him tips on the volley
and tried to correct his form and mel thought that this was the most hilarious thing ever
and we took it as a very funny thing back in the day so you're probably thinking uh nick what is
wrong with somebody giving tips this is maybe well meant why would you laugh at that and why would
mel laugh and tell this story to his players well the reason why mel thought this was funny
and it is really funny because when you're talking about someone of mel purcell's caliber you're
talking about the elite level something that's is the equivalent to winning the lottery that's how
good of a player mel purcell is you got to put it in the context of what it takes to be good
enough to reach the quarterfinals of wimbledon it is absolutely impossible to reach that level
of the game if you have flaws in your technique now mind you mel purcell was an aggressive player
and he depended on his volleys he would try to come to the net every chance he got so
obviously mel purcell was one of the best volleyers on the whole planet and this person that now was
hitting with had the audacity to try to correct mel's volleys so the way you have to look at this
scenario is mel purcell's volleys are absolutely at the elite level but maybe they don't represent
your idea of what a volley should look like and maybe you're thinking that this volley is wrong
for that reason but the way i look at tennis is in the following way if someone is truly the best in
the world at a specific shot rather than trying to correct this shot i'm going to try to figure out
what makes this shot so great and how i can teach this shot to other players
now the same can be said for john mcenroe's and jimmy connor's forehand but obviously
this forehand doesn't exist anymore there's nobody on the atp or the wta there's even nobody
in division one college that will hit the forehand like this without a loop
and a close to a continental grip and with a very limited amount of body involvement this
type of foreign doesn't exist anymore so it is logical and that's the reason why i
made this video it is a logical question that maybe someone should try to help johnny mac
and jimmy connors and i'm laughing then fix their forehead teach him a modern forehand maybe
johnny max should switch over to a semi-western grip and start building a loop into his swing
and change his forehead accordingly maybe he would be playing a better tennis and i'm going
to explain why i'm laughing because i would pay good money to see someone go up to john mcenroe
and try to teach him the forehand this would be really fun to watch it i would love to see john
mcenroe's reaction so here are my reasons why i don't think that both jimmy connors and john
mcenroe could improve their forehead technique if they adapted the modern forehand and the reason
number one is their overall game style you have to understand that john mcenroe especially is looking
to take the ball early he's not looking to be far behind the baseline he's looking to take the ball
early and get to the net so his technique kind of matches his game style he's always played like
that so in order for him to develop a fuller swing he would probably have to stand a little further
back behind the baseline in order to have time to execute such a swing you got to remember that
modern tennis game is played further behind the baseline than the classic tennis game the classic
tennis game was indeed a game where the vast majority of players of course were excluding
the clay court specialists but the vast majority of players who had success at the top of the game
were serve and volley players or players who like to play close to the baseline take the ball extremely
early this has changed with modern tennis the swings have become bigger the body involvement
has become more pronounced and therefore players need a little bit more time and they generally
stand further behind the baseline also that results in more power more pace and generally
when there's more pace players need more time and now it's played much further behind the
baseline that it used to so for johnny mac to adapt a new forehand technique he would
not only have to change technique but he would probably have to change his game style and stand
further back and that just doesn't make sense and the type of player that john mcenroe and
jimmy connors is both of these guys are aggressive players and looking to stand close to the baseline
and play aggressive tennis that depends often on the pace of the incoming ball and they're
looking to come to the net as often as possible especially when we're talking about john mcenroe
another reason why connors and mcenroe would have a hard time changing it to a modern forehand is their grip
and there's a lot of muscle memory involved in a grip you got to realize that these guys have
had millions upon millions of repetitions with their grip and now when they change to a modern
grip it's not as easy as changing the grip because what changes with a more modern grip is also the
angle of the wrist at contact so this is something that's a very long process what happens with the
vast majority of players if they for example have a more conventional grip closer to continental
and they change to say let's say a more western grip they will likely be in the same position at
contact in regards to their wrist so when you strike a ball with a continental grip you can
see that my wrist is behind the racket my knuckle base knuckle that is is on top of the racquet so
there's a certain wrist position and this is in your muscle memory because you've hit this way a
million times now that you change it over tomorrow western grip you're likely going to remain in the
same position but unfortunately the racket face is very closed and now you're either going to hit the
ball into the ground or you're going to hit the ball very thin and you're going to lack power so
this is a long process and it would take years to get rid of this muscle memory that's present
because of the grip so for that reason it's going to be very difficult for someone like
john mcenroe and jimmy connors to change their forehand in fact if they did change their grip
they would make their forehands a lot worse and we're talking about the way modern players take
the racket back with a loop i'm sure that mac and roll encounters could do this they could do a loop
but again what i said before is very important because with a bigger backswing you need more time
and they would probably have to change their position in the court and they would overall
have to change the whole game style and this is probably something that wouldn't suit them well
because the way their technique developed is based on their game style which is an
offensive game style that's played close to the baseline so for that reason even
though i do believe that both connors and mcenroe could probably mimic a modern forehand do quite
well i don't think it would be good for the game because they probably need a little bit more time
and they would play further back which defeats the purpose and takes out the best qualities of
their game is which is taking the ball early and finishing the point off closer to the net but the
important question is what about you guys that are watching this video maybe you have a traditional
forehand and maybe you should change to more of a modern forehand and the question that i always
ask is how long have you been playing with this technique and the more time that you have spent
on the court with a certain technique the more difficult it is going to be to change it through
a different technique because muscle memory is something that's very difficult to get rid of
maybe you have played tennis for 30 40 years if that's the case it's going to be very tough
to change the grip it's going to be very tough to add the loop this is going to be a big time
investment maybe a year of training maybe two years of training to have your body memorize these
movements and therefore build this new muscle memory maybe it's not going to be worth it because
it might not necessarily improve your game that much because most likely you have made
different adaptations that you might not be conscious of just like mcenroe and connors where
you're playing tennis a certain way because of your technique maybe your court positioning is
different maybe how you time the ball is different it's all related to the way you execute your
forehand you guys have been playing tennis for only a few years you have not built up that much
muscle memory and you should definitely change to a modern forehand why do i say that because
guys there's no doubt about it as much as i respect connors and mcenroe their forehands
are nothing compared to the modern foreigns if you compare to the big three nadal djokovic and
federer mcenroe connors forehand is not even close to the quality of the forehand of the
big three the modern forehand is much better in all aspects especially when we're talking about
power and control so everybody should try to adapt the modern forehand however i understand
that muscle memory is something that's very difficult to get rid of and for you guys have been
playing tennis your whole life you have to make the hard decision if your forehand is working well
it might not be worth putting in all that effort and change into a modern forehand however at
any stage of the game even if you've been playing tennis for 40 years and your forehand
is not working here's where i would suggest to you that since your forehand is not working you
have big problems you should definitely change it to a modern forehand because you're going to be
recalibrating your forehand so the distinction that i'm making here is players with a classic
forehand who are hitting it well if they make a change they're going to make their forehands worse
immediately because of all the things that i mentioned in this video but for the players
that have trouble on their forehand and have classic characteristics they're going to have to
recalibrate their forehand regardless independent of how much muscle memory they built up so for
you guys when you develop a new forehand you should absolutely develop a modern forehand