Situations/ Relays/ preventing extra bases

Welcome to Discuss Fastpitch

Your FREE Account is waiting to the Best Softball Community on the Web.

Apr 13, 2015
179
28
Okay coaches, trying to find new ideas or ways in practice to work on relays/ preventing extra bases/ moving on to the next play......everyone has those situations......base hit...throw to a base/ hitting cutoff or not...safe ....other runner is taking extra base .........other possible scenarios...thoughts or ideas...thanks
 
May 2, 2018
200
63
Central Virginia
Most of this battle is to get the girls into the mindset that the play is not over, always look for the next play to either hold a runner or make a throw. Safe or no safe, the play goes on.

I try to instill this in all drills, infield drills to first for example, first always comes off the base after each throw “looking” for another play. Get this into their routine. Same for practicing relay/cuts.
 
Oct 14, 2016
77
33
Hope this helps,

So you practice double plays from both sides of second base. Easy, and every coach works on this.

Why not work on off second double plays?

To start with, simple fungo situational hitting for infield and outfield work. If I hit an infield ball, it must go through the first baseman before coming to the catcher and me. If it is an outfield ball, it must go through third base before coming to the catcher and then me. Every throw to the catcher, my catcher is set up to receive and tag a runner coming in.

Now, I occasionally force my first baseman to throw to third for the "second" play, then they throw it to second, first, back to catcher.

Outfield balls coming in go to second, or third, or home, with appropriate cutoffs. Like I do with first, I will, at times, call a new base to send it to while the ball is in the air. i.e. "Cut Two" or "Cut Three" to make them scrabble to cut and relay to the new called base. Then it goes from where it is, back to third, before coming to the catcher and me.

This is all timed with a stopwatch. I set a reasonable time, based on their ability level, to complete two outs and get the ball back to the catcher.

We usually start with seven seconds to complete two plays and return the ball to the catcher. After they are successful a few times, we reduce everything by .3 seconds until we are moving through plays.

Remember: Over celebrate the successes.
 
Sep 29, 2014
2,421
113
As far as relays this is kind of age dependent but as a general rule I only do relays if the girl in the outfield has turned her back and is running down a ball in the gap or over her head, in other words if the play is in front of you (grounder or pop up) the outfielder throws it to the base ahead of the lead runner they can see everything in front of them and should be easy decision. Cutoffs from the outfield for a couple reasons first if the ball is overhead the outfielder can't access where the ball should go if runners are advancing or whatever also if you are chasing down the ball to the fence and there are runners on base a accurate 200ft throw isn't reliable so relay for a play at the plate.

I'm usually not a fan of throwing the ball around with girls dancing around on bases but your team should be able to do a star drill so that any girl from any base can make an accurate throw to any other base, this has just got to be something they have no fear of in any situation but they also have to be smart in a close game why would you throw the ball around just get the out. Getting girls to understand situation and game management a lot of times it is not just CAN you throw the ball where it needs to go to try and get a girl out but SHOULD you throw the ball!
 
Aug 7, 2019
2
3
I found this while digging for some drills last year. I found it to be a great resource and kudos to whoever put it together. It's pretty advanced since it's a college handbook, but jump ahead to page 44. I think it's helpful for girls to see those cuts on paper and to see how everyone has a job on every hit ball. I printed the last 20 pages and passed them out. Often we can say something 30 times and then when they see it visually it clicks.


 
May 7, 2015
842
93
SoCal
Okay coaches, trying to find new ideas or ways in practice to work on relays/ preventing extra bases/ moving on to the next play......everyone has those situations......base hit...throw to a base/ hitting cutoff or not...safe ....other runner is taking extra base .........other possible scenarios...thoughts or ideas...thanks

Ha, OMG my DD's team has practiced small ball defense and ^^^^^THIS non stop for the past 2 months, no games, just practice. I really feel it is underappreciated limiting damage, ie runner on 2B with a single.

It all comes down to giving the catcher and the cut offs enough reps to learn to read the runner and determine if she'll be safe at home or not. Warning, the amount of reps they need is staggering! That being said, it is amazing seeing the catcher yell "Cut 2" to the 1B or 3B after determining that the runner will be safe at home at getting the batter runner out at 2B.

The general rule of thumb for my catcher DD when there is a runner on 2B is this:
  1. If ball is hit directly to OF then play will MOST LIKELY be at home plate.
  2. If ball is hit in either OF gap, then play will MOST LIKELY be at 2B.
The decision always happens on the fly and both scenarios will be set up throw to home. DD evaluates the speed and jump of runner on 2B to determine where final play will take place. There will be lots of mistakes for sure
 
Aug 25, 2019
1,066
113
I found this while digging for some drills last year. I found it to be a great resource and kudos to whoever put it together. It's pretty advanced since it's a college handbook, but jump ahead to page 44. I think it's helpful for girls to see those cuts on paper and to see how everyone has a job on every hit ball. I printed the last 20 pages and passed them out. Often we can say something 30 times and then when they see it visually it clicks.


Really cool handout, I printed it up to give to my daughter, pretty clear on what to do.
 

Forum statistics

Threads
42,830
Messages
679,477
Members
21,445
Latest member
Bmac81802
Top