If a fielder drop steps the wrong way and has to correct himself/herself and change direction on a ball hit over their head should they pivot inside ( never taking eyes off the ball) or turn outside as to not give up ground but taking eye off the ball.
So my 13y DD has learned to read the ball off of the bat and we did this with lots of fly balls.
Neither are wrong, and both should be practiced. It really depends on the time the fielder has to make the play.
^^^^ This.... As a young baseball player, I was trained to take my eyes off the ball. My coach at the time considered that the harder method, so he wanted us to learn that way. However, when possible, he did want us to keep our eyes on the ball.
Off topic but FP26, I am always impressed with your memory of such things . I know people (in particular my father) must have taught me stuff but for the life of me I cannot remember anybody telling me anything (including HS coaches) with the exception of 1 thing my college coach mentioned regarding fielding ground balls (fast,slow,fast). Not sure if I purposely repressed all baseball memories or what but I know how do various things and can physically demonstrate, and most of the time I can recognize when somebody is doing something incorrectly, but I have no memory of how I know any of it LOL!! I also have no memory of most games I played, with the exception of maybe 3 or 4 specific plays in HS,Legion and College. Very strange. I can remember the details of a technical paper I read in graduate school 15+ years ago so I don't think my memory is that bad..
Neither are wrong, and both should be practiced. It really depends on the time the fielder has to make the play.