12u question about holding/checking runner

[leftyscoach]

12u.....girl on 2nd with no outs......next batter hits a small short pop to left of the pitcher......3rd makes the play on the ball......do you hold the girl on second and give up first.....or do you fire to 1st and hope she gets it back to 3rd for a double play.......

 

[grcsftbll]

I'd like to see them go for the out but I like things on the aggressive side. It's more fun.

 

[dadofadirtlover]

How's the team batting? How's the team playing on defense?

 

[leftyscoach]

to me....if you go for the out at first and the girl on 2nd leaves for 3rd....then if 1st don't make a good throw...or a over throw...then she gets 3rd for free.....now....if you hold her and give up 1st then you have 2 girls on.....so......your next play will be forced at 3rd.....because 1st/2nd has to go when the batters hits....just curious how other coaches make that call

 

[Top_Notch]

Definitely a game situation. If it's a tight game or going to be a low scoring game, it may benefit to try to hold the lead runner.
If we were up a couple runs I'll concede the base for the out.

 

[leftyscoach]

agree.....score plays a big part in that call......just trying to teach decision making when you have the ball.....wrong decisions add up at the end of the game

 

[leftyscoach]

I have my pitcher and catcher and 3rd covering the bunt......I leave my 1st baseman at first.....works great to.....shes there waiting on the throw......if I have girl on 2nd the I let short grab 3rd if 3rd has to field bunt.....I never bring 1st in on bunt

 

[marriard]

12u.....girl on 2nd with no outs......next batter hits a small short pop to left of the pitcher......3rd makes the play on the ball......do you hold the girl on second and give up first.....or do you fire to 1st and hope she gets it back to 3rd for a double play.......

Game situation call.

If it is early in the game and we are winning we take the out almost every time and look to make a double play at 3rd. In 12U a lot of runners from second break too late so you have a pretty good chance of making this play especially if you practice it (which we do).

Low scoring tight game in late innings, we are likely to make a fake throw to first to see if we can get the lead runner one way or another and deal with the two runners on base if it doesn't work (works more often than not we found). Even then it depends on where we are in the order and whether we think we can get the next couple of batters.

What we NEVER do is just give up any base without some sort of play to try to get an out.

 

[Rocketech1]

You need to get an out somewhere. In general, the runner should not be advancing to 3rd on a ball hit in front of them. With a ball hit to the left side, the 2nd baseman should be moving to cover second base. The 3rd baseman should glance to see if the runner has a big lead and if so, fire the throw to second. Short stop will have been moving to 3rd base in case the runner takes off to 3rd. However, of the runner did not have a big lead, you get the out at 1st and quickly fire the throw to 3rd base if runner is advancing.

You can't let the offense scare you into not getting outs. You might make some mistakes on defense but that is how you learn and get better.

 

[Rocketech1]

to me....if you go for the out at first and the girl on 2nd leaves for 3rd....then if 1st don't make a good throw...or a over throw...then she gets 3rd for free.....now....if you hold her and give up 1st then you have 2 girls on.....so......your next play will be forced at 3rd.....because 1st/2nd has to go when the batters hits....just curious how other coaches make that call

This strategy is flawed because with a runner on 1st and 2nd with no outs most teams will bunt the runners over to 2nd anf 3rd base. So now you have 1 out with runners on 2nd and 3rd. Using your logic, what do you do now with the next batter hits a ground ball? Eat it and have bases loaded and 1 out? See the problem with playing very conservatively. You just went from 1 out and runner on 3rd to 1 out with bases loaded. Not a winning strategy IMO.