Make ‘Em Pay Or Make ‘Em Play

Yesterday we talked about how points are won and lost at various levels of volleyball. There’s a “flippening” that happens for developing volleyball teams when they start earning more points than their opponents make errors. It’s the first indication that they are on the way to playing something that we might call, “good volleyball,” at the youth levels. Unskilled 8th or 9th-grade teams often play games where the winner is simply the team that makes the fewest errors. But strong teams at that age level need to earn points to win. Of course, it’s hard to earn points when you are making errors.

At the higher levels, the criteria for earned vs unearned points becomes higher. We saw that high-level NCAA teams are generally earning more than three times as many points as they give the opponent in errors. For example, in the two NCAA semifinals that we’ve profiled in past weeks, the four teams combined for 255 “earned points” (Aces, Kills, Blocks) and 64, “unearned,” or unforced errors, about a 4:1 ratio. Good high school teams might not be at 4:1, but they can be at 2:1.

Talking And Tracking

A concept that I talk to teams about is to, “know when to make ‘em pay, and know when to make ‘em play.” When you get a freeball, when you’re in-system, when the setter keeps you in rhythm, that’s the time to terminate the ball. When we’re in a tough situation, it’s okay to just make the other team play. Ideally, we still produce an attack and some pressure on the opponent, but we don’t want to give away points when we have a low probability to earn it.

So, at times in practice we play, “MEP,” which could mean, “Make ‘Em Play,” or, “Make ‘Em Pay,” depending on how you want to view it. All this means is that we’re going to play volleyball and track earned and unearned points. Or earned points and errors. You can use my standard definitions:

Aces, Kills, and Blocks are Earned Points

Serving Errors, Setting/General Errors, and Unforced Hitting Errors are Unearned Points

Just tracking this at practice often earns you some insight. In a recent National Team training block, we were generally in the 3:1 range. That’s a higher-error environment than we’d like to see in the match, but it’s natural to see more errors in practice as servers are trying to dial in a new serve or hitters are working on timing with setters. But if we ever dipped down toward 2:1, I’d know things were getting too sloppy. Most high school teams will generally not play consistently above 2:1 at practice, but tracking this a little will help you find what your level is.

You can also use other definitions for errors. For example, with younger juniors teams (for example, in the 13-15 age range), I highlight an error, “out the back,” differently than an error, “in the net.” For me, with a beginner middle school team, I’m not going to see a hard swing a few feet past the endline as a bad error. That player will learn to find the court. But an error in the net is never good. So you can also adapt the, “good errors,” and, “bad errors,” to your team and what you’re trying to teach.

Putting It In A Drill

MEP is more of a scoring system than a drill in and of itself. I often play MEP as scoring for a straight 15-point game as a way to finish practice. One of the best ways to play it is if you have the time to play two 15-point games (so, about 30 minutes) back-to-back. How this looks is that you play the first game, then bring it to the whiteboard and review your scores. There will often be something that jumps out- maybe too many errors in one area of the game. This is a chance for your team to talk about making a couple of quick fixes before getting back out, playing another MEP game, and hopefully improving in that area.

Playing 2-Way

Playing 2-way, with the serve alternating back and forth between teams, as in, “normal,” volleyball, is usually the best way to play MEP. It also integrates well if you are using position tournaments, or other competitions between players. For example, split into even teams and play a 15-point MEP game. Then, swap setters between the two teams and play again.

This sort of positional game is great for the players who are in the direct competition, but sometimes the rest of the team doesn’t feel as included. Keeping the MEP scoring is a great way for the rest of the players to challenge themselves, while the setters (who whoever) are competing more directly. It’s also a way for the setters to understand how they can help win the next competition. By helping their teams play smart and, “make them play,” they will often be successful in this sort of competition.

Playing 1-Way

MEP can be used if you’re going to play 1-way and/or if you are short-handed and don’t have 12 players to play a full 6v6 game. If you do this, you can play with the coach entering some, “next balls,” to create situations for the receiving team to transition out of. For example, a 3-ball sequence where they receive a serve, get a last-ball bounce, and get a second-ball bounce. The nature of a 3-ball sequence like that is that some of the first touches are going to be more controlled, and a chance to, “make them pay,” and some of the first touches are going to be less controlled, and a chance to, “make them play.”

If I play 1-way like this, I would typically only keep MEP points for the receiving team.      

When To Use MEP

Many teams now are in the push for the playoffs. MEP is great for some of your final practices before important competitions, because it tunes you in to playing clean and putting the pressure on the opponent, rather than letting them off the hook with needless mistakes.

For high school teams, I also like using MEP when you do pre-season scrimmages. You’ll keep the score quietly by yourself, but it gives an extra focus to these unofficial competitions and helps you gauge what you’ll need to work on in the next few weeks as your season officially gets underway.