David Zapatka
Dinking is often misunderstood as purely defensive play—a soft, patient exchange while you wait for your opponent to make a mistake. The most effective pickleball players know that dinking can be a powerful offensive weapon. Aggressive dinking transforms you from a passive participant into the player dictating the pace and creating opportunities to win the point.
What Is Aggressive Dinking?
Aggressive dinking means attacking with your dinks while maintaining control. You’re not just keeping the ball in play; you’re applying pressure, moving your opponents and forcing them into uncomfortable positions. The goal is to create a weak return that you can attack with a put-away or to draw an error.
Move Your Opponents Side to Side
The most fundamental aggressive dinking strategy is making your opponents cover the court. Alternate between cross-court dinks and down-the-line shots to pull them wide, then attack the open space. Watch for when they’re leaning or moving in one direction, then go the opposite way. The wider you can push them, the more likely they’ll hit a weak return or leave the middle exposed.
Attack with Depth
Not all dinks should land just over the net. Mixing in deeper dinks that land near the kitchen line forces your opponents to reach and hit upward, making it harder for them to be aggressive themselves. A deep dink gives you more time to move forward and be ready for the next shot. Vary your depth to keep opponents guessing and prevent them from camping at the non-volley-zone line.
Use Topspin to Apply Pressure
Adding topspin to your dinks makes the ball dip quickly after crossing the net and kick up after bouncing, creating a more challenging shot for your opponent. To generate topspin, brush up on the back of the ball with a low-to-high paddle motion. Topspin dinks are particularly effective when going cross-court, as the spin pulls the ball away from your opponent and makes it harder to control.
Target the Feet and Body
One of the most underutilized aggressive dinking targets is your opponent’s feet and body. A dink aimed directly at someone, especially when they’re moving forward, jams them up and limits their options. They can’t take a full swing, and they’re often forced to hit a defensive pop-up. This works especially well against players who like to crowd the kitchen line.
Change the Pace
While most dinks are soft, occasionally hitting a firmer dink catches opponents off guard. This doesn’t mean hitting hard enough to give them an attackable ball—it means using just enough pace to rush them and disrupt their timing. A slightly faster dink can help you when you’re pulled wide and need to recover your position. It gives your opponents less time to attack the open court.
Have a question about pickleball? Want to know more about the sport, the rules, equipment, or have some pickilicious news you would like to share with our pickleball community? Email David Zapatka at dzapatka@wbhsi.net.