Practice / Drill ideas for a short handed practice (16u)

[tsgfx]

For our next couple outdoor practices, we will be extremely short on girls (3 to 5 total coming) due to other obligations. Our indoor practices, I am able to set up our hitting stations and make it work fine, but does anyone have any tips/drills for outdoor work with such a small group?
Thanks

 

[GunnerShotgun]

By 16u your practices should be tailored to the specific players on your team AND any team-specific concepts (bunting or leadoffs for example).

Your focus should be on improving the players as individuals so I would tailor my practice for the players that are coming to practice and their current deficiencies.

Example practice plan:

• Dynamic team warmup
• Specific team-related concepts/philosophies
• Individual homework
• Team bonding drill/game.

By getting together as a team you want to be doing things they can't do on their own or you want it done a specific way (team way).

Getting a group of 10 players together for practice and then finding drills for 10 players is going about it the wrong way. Your practice plan shouldn't change a whole lot if you have 5 or 13.

Not what you were asking but it's what came to my mind...

 

[tsgfx]

By 16u your practices should be tailored to the specific players on your team AND any team-specific concepts (bunting or leadoffs for example).

Your focus should be on improving the players as individuals so I would tailor my practice for the players that are coming to practice and their current deficiencies.

Example practice plan:

• Dynamic team warmup
• Specific team-related concepts/philosophies
• Individual homework
• Team bonding drill/game.

By getting together as a team you want to be doing things they can't do on their own or you want it done a specific way (team way).

Getting a group of 10 players together for practice and then finding drills for 10 players is going about it the wrong way. Your practice plan shouldn't change a whole lot if you have 5 or 13.

Not what you were asking but it's what came to my mind...

I appreciate it.
Short backstory, I'm new to the fastpitch world. Coached baseball for 6 years, and this year was asked to "help" with my step-daughters 16u team. Due to differences in coaching philosophies, I feel like I haven't really been involved with the practices (other than catching a ball here and there), and I also feel that our team is deeply lacking in fielding fundamentals / softball knowledge. As a baseball coach, we put a huge emphasis on defense, and this coach puts zero emphasis on defense, preferring to "hit 90% of all practice time", and tells the girls that he doesn't care about errors, that if we can't hit we can't compete, which I disagree with to a point. He is now finished with the team (fall season only, which is a big difference from baseball also), and I am wanting to keep the team in tact for winter-spring practices and tournaments, to avoid a 6 month layoff before high school tryouts come around. Just trying to come up with some more "softball specific" type drills to catch them up to where I feel they need to be defensively.

 

[GunnerShotgun]

I appreciate it.
Short backstory, I'm new to the fastpitch world. Coached baseball for 6 years, and this year was asked to "help" with my step-daughters 16u team. Due to differences in coaching philosophies, I feel like I haven't really been involved with the practices (other than catching a ball here and there), and I also feel that our team is deeply lacking in fielding fundamentals / softball knowledge. As a baseball coach, we put a huge emphasis on defense, and this coach puts zero emphasis on defense, preferring to "hit 90% of all practice time", and tells the girls that he doesn't care about errors, that if we can't hit we can't compete, which I disagree with to a point. He is now finished with the team (fall season only, which is a big difference from baseball also), and I am wanting to keep the team in tact for winter-spring practices and tournaments, to avoid a 6 month layoff before high school tryouts come around. Just trying to come up with some more "softball specific" type drills to catch them up to where I feel they need to be defensively.

You need a team defensive (footwork) philosophy. I would go to the link below and learn everything I could. Use these drills and his philosophy. You will never look at defensive footwork the same!

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHe7ccC1-mv5hHNxwsml4Rw/videos