Unbeaten No More🤷‍♀️😬!!️ PPA Las Vegas

PPA Las Vegas is one of the more fun events of the year. Last year we played at the Fontainebleu, and this year we were in a convention center. It’s always crazy playing in these indoor venues that get literally no light. You’re there all day, and you walk outside and it’s like “…whoa.” All of the Vegas strip is kind of like that, imo. If you have read the Percy Jackson & The Olympians books, I often think of when the kids get trapped in a casino and lose time. Random, probably revealing my age with that comment, but oh well! Those books were bomb.

The biggest result of the weekend is definitely Jorja Johnson and Tyra Black taking home 🥇 in WD, beating Parris Todd and Catherine Parenteau in the final and myself and Anna Leigh Waters in the semifinal.

This was Jorja’s second women’s doubles title and Tyra’s third (all this year!👏👏). In all honesty, I wasn’t too upset about our loss to them. Jorja and Tyra are both the kind of players that are capable of kind of taking the paddle out of your hands. AL and I gutted out a tough game 1 and were having a lot of success with drives, and we were actually putting the ball away. In games 2 and 3 I felt like we couldn’t finish a point to save our lives. I’ve yet to watch back the match, but I’m unsure what changed at the start of game 2 that gave them the momentum. Once they had it, they ran with it and never really let it go. Props to them.

I don’t think Anna Leigh and I played our best, but I also don’t think we played poorly. There’s a lot to work on, and I left the match feeling motivated and creating a mental laundry list of all the things I/we could’ve done differently and of all the things I need to add and improve. Sometimes you need to be kicked in the face. It’s like I wrote in my last article - you have to keep getting better to avoid getting worse. This match was a reminder that I have a lot to get better at and can’t be complacent.

All this rhetoric around Anna Leigh and I going unbeaten, not going to lose a game, etc etc I have always found ridiculous. I even proved myself right this week, as you can see in this rather hilarious interaction on twitter I had before the tournament started. Maybe I jinxed myself😂😂😂

Excited to bounce back in Cincinnati and, hopefully, finish on top of the podium again. You can bet we will be hungry!

Hopefully some of you know what song I’m referencing. I don’t know what bug I caught on Friday, but it was something special. I was a woman possessed. I have long thought my lob was my best source of offense in mixed, but it was also just about the only form of offense I had on Friday, but my success rate was a joke. I consider success to be basically if you were ahead in the point after the lob, not necessarily that the point was won. In my quarterfinal vs Meghan and Andrei, I lobbed 8 times. 5 were successful, 1 was neutral, and 2 were bad. That’s pretty good. Against Ben and AL, I lobbed 23 times. 13 successful, 4 neutral, 6 bad. They definitely adjusted as the match went on, but they were still net positive in games 2 and 3. Should’ve lobbed more. Oh well. (Kidding).

For a few reasons, it’s harder to lob in women’s doubles, but I’ve got to figure out how to do it more. I think I am often just looking for other things and forget about it. I felt like we saw more lobbing than usual this weekend, and I’d attribute that to perfect indoor conditions (no wind) and pros realizing how effective it can be. Callan Dawson and AJ Koller would be proud.

I had a blast and a half playing with Federico this weekend. He’s actually objectively hilarious and one of the funnier guys on tour. We compete hard, and as you guys saw, are more than content to grind out some very long points. We were the bronze baddies of the weekend, both walking away as the grandstand champions. I am looking to have a more steady mixed partner next year, but playing with so many different partners has definitely been great for my mixed development. Just need to find Mr. Right!

Federico as a player is very interesting to me. What would you, Dear Reader, consider to be his best event?

Last year, everyone would have said singles without a doubt. His dominance was insane in a field that was otherwise insanely variable. Medaled at what, every single tournament? Almost exclusively lost to Ben in finals? He is still obviously an incredible singles player, but doesn’t seem to have much separation, if any, from “the pack” of contenders that could all win on any given weekend. Additionally, I have to shout out Hunter Johnson for claiming the #1 ranking in singles and John Lucian Goins for not only besting Hunter in the final this weekend, but winning back-to-back titles! Bravo to both👏🏆.

I’m unsure what his best event is at the moment. Perhaps Men’s Doubles? Him and Hayden have found themselves on a lot of podiums this year, but never atop it, though they’ve been close. Of note, this week in the bronze medal match, Fed and H actually switched sides when they were losing big and turned the match around, and won, with Federico making his first right side appearance in quite some time. Here is a funny video I took of him not knowing what to do with the first server band😂

As a huge fan of this men’s team, I was glad to see that they are more than competent playing this way, as I honestly think Hayden is too good on the left to be pigeonholed into only being a right-side player. It will be very interesting to see this team potentially play with more flexibility in the future.

In all honesty, while this tournament is a lot of fun, this venue was not the best. The surface is hard on our bodies, there’s the occasional questionable bounce, and the lighting was… well… dim. I wonder if the lighting gave some players a touch of seasonal depression (SAD) because man, did we have some drama & crashouts!

There seems to be drama between the Ranchers women, Julian was telling a couple of kids with his chest that he is “making a million dollars”, Hayden launched a ball for a point penalty, Federico had an all-time paddle smash, and, for me, the highlight of the weekend in regards to crash outs was undoubtedly Christian in the last match of the entire tournament, amateur or professional, against Federico and I. Even at the APP there were fireworks! (shoutout @koopynation for always keeping us up to date on everything crash-out related).

This was the second consecutive bronze match I’ve played against Catherine and Christian, and again, it came down to the wire. Fed and I were up 9-2 in the third, but Christian got hot and got their score to 7. At 9-7 1 when we got the ball back, a phone rang as Christian was supposed to return, and he stopped play. Here’s the sequence of events:

When Christian started appealing to Fed and I “for the sake of professionalism,” I almost started laughing. The only thing that could have made the exchange funnier is if they had issued him a technical warning for delay of game. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping for it just for the comedy. An unfortunate end to an otherwise very good match, and I’m sure Christian will not be stopping play again. Tough break for him and CP, with this just bizarre sequence of events in bronze and losing their semifinal with 3 net cords in the last 5 points. I’m sure their luck will turn soon.

And that’s that everyone! PPA Vegas was a fun one, I have a lot to improve and not a lot of time to make such improvement, but that’s life! Also, I also left Vegas up $150 gambling, no big deal! I’ll be in Orlando at the JOOLA Celebration the next few days which will be a nice change of pace and will hopefully also give me the chance to practice with some people I otherwise wouldn’t be able to. See everyone Thursday for the next edition!