Do coaches still spend time on rundowns(pickles)?

[sluggers]

Whether you get 10 outs or 1 out or 100 outs through pickles, it should be practiced. There are just a ton of things that come out of the pickle drill.

1. Awareness of the runner(s) and your teammates.
2. Throwing with accuracy.
3. Catching with intent.
4. Glove to hand transfers.
5. Backups.
6. Strategy

Finally:

PICKLE PRACTICE IS FUN.

 

[JayW]

as kids we did this for fun. called it hotbox.

 

[_MIA_]

as kids we did this for fun. called it hotbox.

we actually called it pickle...lol

 

[Vertigo]

We never did pump fakes as there is always that chance the ball slips out of the player’s hand. I know, highly unlikely, but it happens. Seen balls spiked into the ground a couple of times.

 

[Westwind]

Both DD’s were on teams that practiced this a lot. Drill ran a lot like described above.

They were also coached not to pump fake- however they were coached to run at the runner with the ball up “so they could throw it like a dart”. And while they never pump faked, they were taught to stop the runner with a slow wrist flick type movement. Dd always claimed it worked to stop the runner as she was closing in on them and she could tag them. She was also stupid fast.

The old guys that ran this team did this every practice. I think for all the reasons Sluggers listed above. It has value so many different ways.

 

[PapaBear]

This is an 18u team from my area. Many of the players have been together for 5 years or so. The head coach coaches high school ball too. Are coaches spending time on things like pickles?

good ones do. And they go over before it happens and it looks like a circus.

 

[Cornbread]

Best drill for rundowns as you can have multiple lines going at once.

• Two defensive players 60 feet apart at the "bases".
• Third defensive player, with the ball, at the middle of the baseline 20 ft away.
• The runner starts in the middle of the baseline;
• Blow the whistle to start;
• If one of the above rules gets violated the runner wins. If not the defense wins.

Kill the drill immediately when a rule is violated and restart. It's dead simple and you will never have to worry about your rundowns turning into a circus.

Wear helmets lol. This is what do as a part of our warm up routine. I’ll add that we teach the player that throws the ball to get in the line that they threw the ball to. Teach your runners to run into any play that is obstructing and teach your defenders to get out of the baseline and create good angles

 

[GunnerShotgun]

Wear helmets lol. This is what do as a part of our warm up routine. I’ll add that we teach the player that throws the ball to get in the line that they threw the ball to. Teach your runners to run into any play that is obstructing and teach your defenders to get out of the baseline and create good angles

All great points and we do all of the same.

The "thrower" will be the third and final player involved in the rundown. This goes to the first rule (only 3 players in a pickle, max).

From an offensive perspective, we also teach to look for a defensive player in the lane without the ball.

As someone else also mentioned the one place we do allow a "pump fake" is when the initial thrower is running at the player. If you act like you are going to throw the ball at them (a la kickball) sometimes that runner will freeze.

I have found there are diminishing returns with the drill in that once our "runner" knows our rules they do everything they can to "win". Once we have reached this point I feel that we are all on the same page as a team.

Always wear a helmet!

 

[GunnerShotgun]

 

[CoachJD]

Yes we do and it is a major pain. I bet we spend an hour trying to ingrain how to do the rundown before we do it in situations and players still mess up. It drives me crazy. I saw an MLB team blow a rundown either today or last night. If a team wants to be good at rundowns, it has to be something that they do weekly.

I cannot figure out why this is the case, but it's true. Rundowns are incredibly simple. They should not take that long to figure out (and it's such a simple mental skill that doing it right shouldn't require much practice time). But they do. It's baffling.