I Played the Best Players in the World – Here's What I Learned

Tanner Tomassi is a pickleball pro from New Jersey currently living in Delray Beach, Florida. On Tuesday, after making it through the Mixed Doubles Pro Qualifiers for PPA Tour: CIBC Atlanta, he and his partner Samantha Greenhut played against the number one Mixed Doubles Team of Ben Johns and Anna Leigh Waters.

He shared his thoughts on playing two of the greatest players of all time with us.

Playing Against Ben Johns and Anna Leigh Waters 😳

Before the match, Samantha and I discussed our strategy and decided we wanted to play hyper-aggressive. After all, we were playing the most dominant mixed doubles team on the PPA Tour and knew we had nothing to lose.

We also realized that the longer the points went, the more we were at a disadvantage. So, our best bet was to be aggressive and end points quickly.

Game One ☝️

Welp. That backfired.

We started off way too aggressive and ended up losing the first game, 11-0.

Yes, we were pickled. 🤦

We overestimated the game style and rushed too much, leading to some poor speed-ups and choices.

However, I learned something interesting in that game that I wouldn't have known before playing them.

Ben mostly hits drops on his thirds, while ALW likes to hit powerful, spin-heavy drives.

After realizing that, we decided we were better off returning to Ben because ALW's drives caused us to pop up the ball for easy putaways. While Ben's drops are the best in the game, we felt like if we were going to have any chance at all during game two, that's the route we needed to take.

Game Two ✌️

Going into game two, we felt much more settled and played less frantically.

We stayed in the dink rallies longer and treated it like we were playing any other team instead of the number one team in the world. I focused on being aggressive when the opportunity was right, without forcing it, and even won a couple of hand battles against Ben. 👀 😏

Ultimately, we lost 11-5, and our Mixed Doubles tournament ended. 😢

My Biggest Takeaways

It was amazing to see the two best players in the world up close and personal. Playing them was a thrill, and I'm excited to use this experience to help me grow as a pro.

You never really know how good you are until you face the best and I realized I have a lot of work to do.

However, I also realized it's still just pickleball.

When we loosened up and just played, we faired much better than when we treated the other team like they were untouchable.

If I get the chance to go against them again, I think that second gameplan is the one we'll start with.

You can watch Tanner's match vs Ben Johns and Anna Leigh Waters here:

The biggest difference between the best

The biggest difference (I think) between playing them and any other team I've faced was that whenever we hit a weak dink or made the tiniest mistake, they seized control of the point and never let go.

One bad dink in the middle of the rally was all it took to lose the point.

It made it impossible to recover and put even more pressure on us to be perfect.

Those two are the best for a reason.

It was an incredible experience, and I wouldn’t change a thing – okay, maybe a win would've been nice. But it was a privilege to be exposed to that level of play.

And it just so happened to be my 25th birthday, so it felt extra special. 🥳

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