Forcing Attacks vs the Baseline Rally

Anton, you did a nice job of highlighting several of the challenging aspects navigating the "Rally vs Attacking" decision making. That is a great lead into the overarching ideas we are looking to share in the article on how to start down a strong decision path for these point ending solutions.

you mentioned several good situations and I'll start addressing some of them. Maybe others will chime in as well. You mention to blay a short, uncomfortable low ball, but in a rally....I'd suggest you save that shot for when you have move up from the rally area and to use it as a type of attack from the attack area.

As to when to be forcing early in the point ....it would go by similar rules. For returns where you can step inside the baseline for the return, it can be a green light to go on the attack. Ideally all serves should be attacking on some level since you are getting a prime look at an overhead inside the baseline. If you are wondering how a serve is inside the baseline, it is expected that your toss should be inside the baseline, thus you would make contact and land inside baseline where attacking is optimal. If your serve is weak compared to the returner you face, then you would have to consider your serve more of a rally shot than attacking in that instance.