After the skills have been mastered; forehand, backhand, drive serve, serve return, conditioning, shot selection, nutrition, and positioning comes that one area that is really hard to teach. That for lack of a better word is creativity.
How do I define creativity? That is hard to do. Examples of creativity
1. Coaching yourself. It is match point. You got some points by serving a conventional serve but you are stuck on match point. You move your area in the service box. That is creating!
2. The tournament director redoes the draw at the last second and that easy cakewalk match is gone and you are playing a top dog. You raise a stink-not creative. You say nothing-creative–then you beat that player–Very creative!
3. You are in a slam bam rally up front. You hit hard and they hit it hard. Not creative. They hit it hard and you hit a drop shot roll out. Creative! They hit it hard and you go to your knees and push the ball softly into the corner. Very creative!
4. They hit a ceiling ball coming off the back wall and you hit a pass wide angle as they move up fast. Creative! You hit a ceiling ball off that same back wall shot and surprise them as they hunker down in center court; Very creative!
5. You buy new kicks for your finals match and they are bright colored. Creative. You buy two pairs of new kicks for your finals match and wear one Yellow and one green to mix the pair–Very creative!
6. You hit a shot behind your back. Creative. You hit a shot airborne at 4 feet behind your back. Very creative!
7. You write a blog about being creative. Creative! You spice it up with stories you have seen on the court. Very creative!