Telling a Player to Relax

[Lozza]

Deep breath works much better for most kids than 'relax!' That is of course yelling from the sidelines. I only ever use relax if I can say it to the player when I'm standing in front of them. Usually it's with a joke so they laugh and it's much more effective.

 

[shockcoach]

Back about 7-8 yrs ago in 10U, I would have a certain pitcher take a deep breath and let it out. Then make a full spin one way. Then back the other way. Now smile, focus and have fun! It worked well.

 

[chinamigarden]

I was an assistant on a boys LL baseball team and with one particular pitcher the HC would occasionally yell out to him on the mound. " Hey Bryce, you been fishing lately?" The kid would break out into a huge smile and visibly calm down. Sometimes you just have to figure it out one kid at a time, what works for one won't work for another.

 

[SoftSocDad]

I might be wrong, I might be right, but I think the best thing to do with any young child is to raise them not to stress out over small things. I don't believe that everyone is necessarily born with the personality they are destined to have. I think they're bred. My wife's family members tend about little things. My family doesn't. So our DD is exposed to both. Of course she is allowed to stress out over whatever she wants to, but when I talk to her as a dad, I talk about how it can be more beneficial to her to let certain things go. I talk to her a lot about having a short memory in sports, but a long memory in business. The more she hears that, the more likely she is to benefit from that counsel as she gets older. We'll see.

 

[chinamigarden]

I might be wrong, I might be right, but I think the best thing to do with any young child is to raise them not to stress out over small things. I don't believe that everyone is necessarily born with the personality they are destined to have. I think they're bred. My wife's family members tend about little things. My family doesn't. So our DD is exposed to both. Of course she is allowed to stress out over whatever she wants to, but when I talk to her as a dad, I talk about how it can be more beneficial to her to let certain things go. I talk to her a lot about having a short memory in sports, but a long memory in business. The more she hears that, the more likely she is to benefit from that counsel as she gets older. We'll see.

Funny because some people would teach that business is like sports and you can't take a failure at one sale into the next call. Like sports, in business you want to learn from your mistakes and not repeat them, but you certainly wouldn't dwell on them in the moment.

 

[BB875]

There is no substitute for experience. The more times a kid is put in a "pressure" situation, the easier they will handle it in the future. I also think a coach’s attitude in the pressure moments helps or hurts the kid’s chance of success. I always remain calm and keep the same message going to my players. I may have a huge knot building in my stomach, but i never let the kids see the pressure I feel. The kids feed off of it!

I actually love this part of the game. The times when we are behind late in the game and the pressure is building are the most insightful. Those are the times when you see (as a coach) what kind of a team you really have. Seriously, it exposes everything, good or bad. Do we have class & character when we are losing? Do the players rally around each other with encouragement? Winning is easy and everyone embraces the team spirit when you are killing your opponent. How do they react when the chips are down?

 

[SnocatzDad]

There is no substitute for experience. The more times a kid is put in a "pressure" situation, the easier they will handle it in the future. I also think a coach’s attitude in the pressure moments helps or hurts the kid’s chance of success. I always remain calm and keep the same message going to my players. I may have a huge knot building in my stomach, but i never let the kids see the pressure I feel. The kids feed off of it!

I totally agree, a good coach has to be at a decent actor. If you don't have the emotional control to act around your players in a way that helps them succeed then you aren't a very good coach. That doesn't mean you have to be a Zen Master all the time, sometimes what they need from you is a little fire. If you tend to rant and rave because you get upset and have no emotional control that's different then acting upset in order to spur a reaction in your players.

 

[Coach-n-Dad]

I don't say anything directly to DD from the stands (any more). Now it's up to the coach and her team mates to see that she needs calming. Any time that me or DW has said anything from outside the fence it just made it worse. It took me a few years to hear that from DD, to understand what she was telling me and to apply the knowledge. Now we both have a lot more fun

 

[tghorley]

What ever works. This weekend in a game we were up by 1 in the last inning. Pitcher strikes the first batter out and gets the second batter to ground to first. Then pitcher loses it (whatever it is) and walks the next two batters with pitches not even close. You can see her tighten up. Second baseman goes to talk to her. Two pitches and batter grounds back to pitcher who throws batter out at first. I asked the second baseman what she had told the pitcher. She said she asked her if she liked chocolate cake. The pitcher said yes and the catcher told her she did too and she had some waiting on her after the ball game. She told the pitcher she would share it with her if she would just calm down and throw strikes. I asked her if she was going to share and she said sure, but she would have to come by her house to get it.

PS: Second baseman is the same girl that left a 3AM wake up call for my room on one of our out of town tournaments. Gotta love her!

 

[rydog73]

I always like when the coach tells a pitcher not to think and just throw. Next pitch then involves a bunch of instructions on what needs to be done.