Defensive measuring stick

[thecat]

There's a million travel teams. Can't be a million great coaches

 

[BigSkyHi]

There's a million travel teams. Can't be a million great coaches

Hitting 'macho' shots with a fungo to young ones is not a coach. So many don't recognize you need to instruct at the level of the kids.

 

[BigSkyHi]

There was a thread that referred to college coaches changing hitting styles of players they recruited with mostly bad results. The thread seemed to send the message that there are multiple ways to hit well and that actual performance is the measuring stick. This got me to thinking, does this happen with defensive technique also?

I am a HS coach and I’ve spent dozens of hours studying defenders and how they position themselves, react, field, their footwork, and throwing motion. There appears to be a pretty consistent technique once players get to college. However, in HS and TB (with exceptions) defensive technique appears to be an afterthought as long as the defender makes most of the plays. Worse yet the players unknowingly believe that if they made a play, that they must have done it correctly.

When I attend local tournaments (Non-showcase U10-U18) among other things I see players who:

Are unprepared to field a ball hit their way

Don’t get to balls they should

Cannot back hand a ground ball

Don’t turn sideways to throw routine outs

Take 4-6 steps toward where they throw it

Outfielders who have a hard time fielding ground balls

This is all technique which can be taught, yet it appears that it is largely ignored in favor of offense.

At U10-U18 is actual performance the defensive measuring stick or is there none?

 

[BigSkyHi]

DD was yelled at a couple times fielding and she became timid. In OF she stopped being aggressive, nothing was getting behind her. Playing SS she would have got that if she was taller.

I could not get it out of her, coaches moved her from a really good fielder to OK.

It is really annoying.

End of rant.

If she knows why they yelled, can you help her? Going to another team with more positive reinforcement?

 

[NBECoach]

I have found that if you dont spend at least an equal amount of time practicing defense the players won't think it's important.

 

[625ender]

Defense is an area of the game that a coach truly can dictate the eventual outcome of the game. Its far and away the most important aspect of softball or baseball. In close games you can always guarantee and error or bad read coat you the game

Videos and drills will never help a player learn defense. You cant just drum up a defensive strategy. You have to have a coach that understands what they have on the field

 

[_MIA_]

Videos and drills will never help a player learn defense.

"Drills" don't help individual fielding mechanics?

 

[625ender]

"Drills" don't help individual fielding mechanics?

Drills should be scripted to the strengths and weaknesses of a player. Lining up 10 and going through the youtube motions isn't going to do anything remarkable.

4 middle infielders will typically have conflicting skill sets and physical abilities. One size won't fit all

 

[625ender]

You can drill all day and not learn a single thing about defense

 

[Jordan]

DD was yelled at a couple times fielding and she became timid. In OF she stopped being aggressive, nothing was getting behind her. Playing SS she would have got that if she was taller.

I could not get it out of her, coaches moved her from a really good fielder to OK.

It is really annoying.

End of rant.

My youngest DD (16) is a super aggressive center fielder. She snatches balls that are quite obviously in the left or right field. In her defense though the left and right fielders don’t really move to catch balls and you can tell they hate being in the outfield so my DD sorta has to try and field as much of the outfield as she can. The head coach loves her aggression and every time she makes an impossible catch look easy he looks at me and says “don’t ever try to make her any less aggressive”.