Five More Things Youth Baseball Coaches Should Practice But Don’t
Website design By BotEap.comIn my first book Baseball Chronicles, one of my most popular articles in terms of feedback was “Four Things Coaches Should Practice But Don’t.”
Website design By BotEap.comThe four things I mentioned were: pitchers who don’t practice fielding off the mound, catching a foul ball near a fence, players who don’t slide and practice fielding wild pitches or passes. Reading through some of the comments I received, a lot of the readers misunderstood my point a bit. There must be hundreds of things that coaches should practice, but we don’t. I have just chosen four of them that I see coming up year after year. So in the spirit of practicing instead of just telling your players, here are five more things that come up time and time again that most coaches don’t practice or go over.
Website design By BotEap.com1) Call waiting time. About once every two years I see a runner slip into second and get up without calling a timeout or call a timeout and the umpire doesn’t recognize it. A smart infielder will put his glove with the ball on the baserunner when he gets up from his slide. And they call him when he wanders off base even for a moment or assumes he has time. We need to teach our young players that calling time-outs in organized sports is very different from calling time-outs in your own backyard. Coaches should practice having their players slide toward a base, then call “time out” with the coach playing umpire. The coach must intentionally not recognize the timeout immediately by keeping the runner on the ground. Each and every player should go through this at least once.
It is the same situation when the batter calls time. Coaches should also practice this by teaching players not to get out of the batter’s box until given time by the umpire. Website design By BotEap.com2) Rundowns with too many pitches. I am obsessed with this. We practice races almost once a week. Many youth baseball coaches teach running back to the base where they came from. I take the proactive approach that runs are a gift to the defensive team and you have to get out. The ideal number of pitches is none. And after that, I teach my players that the ball shouldn’t be thrown more than once. I use the term “sprint mode” and teach my players that once you put the runner in this sprint mode, it’s hard for him to stop and change direction and that’s when we take our one shot. This has to be practiced. Website design By BotEap.com3) Base runners stopping on first. We see it all the time. A player will hit a slow ground ball and run to first base only to stop right at the base as if the base was a wall so he will slow down and get called out when if he had run through the base he would have hit him for a base hit. We tell our team to run to first base, but how many of us take the time to practice this? This is one of the easiest things to do and when you practice it, it will stick in the player’s head. Set up a cone ten feet past first base and have your team line up. On the command to go, they run one at a time, sprinting through the base to the cone. Simple but it works and should be practiced even with your best runners. Website design By BotEap.com4) Covering 1st In Grounder To The Right Side. Another one of my obsessions. Have you ever seen a youth baseball game when the ball is hit to the right side of the infield and the pitcher remains frozen on the mound? This can cause a manager to turn gray over the course of the day. We practice this by giving every pitcher a chance off the mound. He fakes a pitch and I throw a ground ball to him between first and second base. The pitcher has to run off the mound to cover first. One key here is to make sure the pitcher hits the first base line about 6-10 feet short of the base and then swings it toward the base. Whoever fields the baseball must guide the first baseman with the baseball. This should be practiced with a base runner simulating game conditions. Website design By BotEap.com5) Flags on high pitches. All the players who play for me in our league know that we play a lot. Each and every player must become a proficient bunter over the course of the season. We even practice bunting with two strikes, a strategy most baseball purists will frown upon. We are always changing our touch signals to make sure the opponents don’t take it. Even with all this practice, it drives me nuts when a player is given the bunt signal and on the next pitch, he’s over his shoulders and offered anyway. So now the batter gets in the hole with a strike on a ball outside the strike zone and the other team knows we’re bunting. Coaches need to tell these young ballplayers that when they are given the bunt signal, it doesn’t mean they have to bunt at all costs. We want them to touch the balls in the strike zone. This must be told to the players and practiced. We practice bunting a lot in batting practice and whatever coach is throwing, I tell them to throw balls out of the strike zone. So we’re practicing for my players to recognize palmed balls and pull their bats back if the ball is out of the strike zone. Coaches need to practice this. Website design By BotEap.comI mentioned in my early Baseball Chronicles that practices are the place to teach and games are the place to reinforce what is taught. I know of no other formula that is more effective for most young ballplayers. Even with the practice of many of these mistakes that come up over and over again, we have to keep reminding ourselves that these players are still kids twelve and under.
It is the same situation when the batter calls time. Coaches should also practice this by teaching players not to get out of the batter’s box until given time by the umpire. Website design By BotEap.com2) Rundowns with too many pitches. I am obsessed with this. We practice races almost once a week. Many youth baseball coaches teach running back to the base where they came from. I take the proactive approach that runs are a gift to the defensive team and you have to get out. The ideal number of pitches is none. And after that, I teach my players that the ball shouldn’t be thrown more than once. I use the term “sprint mode” and teach my players that once you put the runner in this sprint mode, it’s hard for him to stop and change direction and that’s when we take our one shot. This has to be practiced. Website design By BotEap.com3) Base runners stopping on first. We see it all the time. A player will hit a slow ground ball and run to first base only to stop right at the base as if the base was a wall so he will slow down and get called out when if he had run through the base he would have hit him for a base hit. We tell our team to run to first base, but how many of us take the time to practice this? This is one of the easiest things to do and when you practice it, it will stick in the player’s head. Set up a cone ten feet past first base and have your team line up. On the command to go, they run one at a time, sprinting through the base to the cone. Simple but it works and should be practiced even with your best runners. Website design By BotEap.com4) Covering 1st In Grounder To The Right Side. Another one of my obsessions. Have you ever seen a youth baseball game when the ball is hit to the right side of the infield and the pitcher remains frozen on the mound? This can cause a manager to turn gray over the course of the day. We practice this by giving every pitcher a chance off the mound. He fakes a pitch and I throw a ground ball to him between first and second base. The pitcher has to run off the mound to cover first. One key here is to make sure the pitcher hits the first base line about 6-10 feet short of the base and then swings it toward the base. Whoever fields the baseball must guide the first baseman with the baseball. This should be practiced with a base runner simulating game conditions. Website design By BotEap.com5) Flags on high pitches. All the players who play for me in our league know that we play a lot. Each and every player must become a proficient bunter over the course of the season. We even practice bunting with two strikes, a strategy most baseball purists will frown upon. We are always changing our touch signals to make sure the opponents don’t take it. Even with all this practice, it drives me nuts when a player is given the bunt signal and on the next pitch, he’s over his shoulders and offered anyway. So now the batter gets in the hole with a strike on a ball outside the strike zone and the other team knows we’re bunting. Coaches need to tell these young ballplayers that when they are given the bunt signal, it doesn’t mean they have to bunt at all costs. We want them to touch the balls in the strike zone. This must be told to the players and practiced. We practice bunting a lot in batting practice and whatever coach is throwing, I tell them to throw balls out of the strike zone. So we’re practicing for my players to recognize palmed balls and pull their bats back if the ball is out of the strike zone. Coaches need to practice this. Website design By BotEap.comI mentioned in my early Baseball Chronicles that practices are the place to teach and games are the place to reinforce what is taught. I know of no other formula that is more effective for most young ballplayers. Even with the practice of many of these mistakes that come up over and over again, we have to keep reminding ourselves that these players are still kids twelve and under.