3 Tips to Make you a Better Baseball Coach

TIP #1   Use Cones and/or Poly Spots in Practices

So I know exactly what you are thinking, "Seriously, this is Tip #1 to making me a Better Baseball Coach?" The reason this isTip #1 is because this will guaranteed assist you in running an effective, efficient, and safe practice.  I have coached youth players hundreds of hours doing a variety of baseball skills, and each practice I use cones and/or poly spots.  If you are coaching players in grades K-2 they are a MUST, and still very helpful even with older players.  Here is how to effectively use cones and/or poly spots every day in practice.

Space them along the foul line exactly where you want the kids to stand when playing catch.  In my experience it is super irritating to try and space kids out without cones, young kids simply do not know what "spread out" means.  When I set up the cones my players can instantly space themselves out and are lined up perfectly in the outfield and everyone is a safe distance apart. 

Use them to keep kids safe.  Whenever I set up a hitting station,  I set up coned off areas for the kids to wait their turn in, this way they won't get hit by a swinging bat, or a batted ball.   If I have a grounders line, I can use a cone for where the lines starts to keep kids a safe distance when it is not their turn. 

Use them to teach skills.  I use cones all the time to assist me in teaching kids baseball skills.  Here are just a few examples:  Making sure players get a big enough lead, having players go around a cone to properly round first base, putting a cone behind a hitters front leg to prevent them from stepping out, using them as bunting targets, and more! 

In fact, in order to execute some of the drills I implement in practice, I need cones/poly spots.  These drills include:  Agility Grounders, Agility Pop Ups, Quick Toss, Goalie Ball, and Fly Ball Box Drill

Use them to get kids in the right spots.  The majority of the time this applies to developing players, but sometimes I put cones out where each player should position themselves.  This eliminates me showing the kid that I just told to play second base from showing him the 2nd baseman doesn't actually stand on the base.  





TIP #2   Implement Games, Challenges, and Mini Competitions into All Your Practices

Every baseball practice two of my main objectives are to better prepare players for game play, and create an atmosphere that kids love to be in!  When I inject various games, challenges, and mini competitions into my practice plans, I know I will meet these two objectives.

Prepare players for Game Play
When players are in a real game, every ground ball matters, every swing matters, and every pitch matters.  This is exactly why I like to put players in a situation in practice where their performance matters!  I want my players to be able to throw and catch quickly in a game, that is why I have them execute the Rapid Fire Drill and compete against one another.  I want my infielders to practice throwing out runners as they will need to do in a game, and I want my runners to get to first quickly, so I often times have my team execute Fielders vs. Runners.  I want my hitters to be great 2 strike hitters, and when taking batting practice I want them to know that each swing counts, so we often do the 2 Strike Hitting Game and Simulated Game BP.  When players are able to consistently do well in practice when in a competitive situation,  this will carry over to game play!



Create an Experience, not Just a Practice
When players leave practice, I want them to be excited for our next one.   Having had the opportunity to coach over 1,000 players, I know that when players engage in these competitive situations, they have FUN!  I want kids to have a passion for the game just like I do.  I want kids to play as long as possible.  I want to educate and empower kids with fun games they can play in their own backyard as well.

TIP #3  Assess/Measure your Players Skills

With the hopes of providing each player an outstanding experience each season, I also hope they show great skill improvement as the season progresses.  I like to assess my player's skills a the beginning, middle, and end of the season to show kids how much they are improving(and they always do!)  Many skills are difficult to give an exact measurement to, like swing mechanics or ability to field ground balls.  There are however many essential skills in baseball that can be measured exactly. Here are a few recommendations of what skills to measure and how to do it.

Speed and Base Running
In baseball pro scouts will often evaluate a player's speed by having them sprint a 60 yd. dash.  So, with advanced players I time them in a sixty.   To do this I simply measure out the distance and use a stopwatch.  Many times a sixty can be quite a long sprint for younger players, so I don't generally have players do this until 7th grade.  Another speed test I feel is more important than the sixty is Contact to 1st.  This is the time from when the bat hits the ball, until the foot hits the bag at first.  To measure this I simply use a stopwatch and have the kids hit a ball off a batting tee, drop their bat and run to first base as fast as they can.  To properly teach this skill visit my Contact to 1st Drill.  I also time how long it takes for developing players to run all the way around the bases.

Throwing
Kids love to know how hard they throw, so I use a radar gun and find out!  To do this I hold the radar gun with one hand and catch the ball with the other. Now I completely understand, most of you probably do not own a radar gun.  Instead, measure how far your players can throw a baseball.  Make sure the next times you test, the wind factor is the same.

Hitting
One way of assessing hitting skill is by evaluating power.  The easiest way to do this, is to use a radar gun and measure the "exit speed" of the baseball, this is how hard in MPH the ball comes off the bat.  Obviously the faster it comes off the bat the harder and farther the hit will be.  To see this evaluation of power in action, check out the drill Radar Gun Fun.  Again, I understand most coaches do not own a radar gun (I totally recommend buying one), so instead measure how far players can hit a ball off of a tee.  Each time you execute this assessment make sure kids are using the same bat, the tee is the same height, and there is no wind factor.  Usually, if you give a player 10 good swings they will make good contact and will see how far it will travel.



Coaches, I hope you found these 3 Tips Informative.  I am quite confident that if you implement these 3 ideas into your practice plans, you will have a more successful season!  I wish you all the best of luck in your baseball coaching endeavors! 

Tim Thoreson

Do you have a question/comment regarding these 3 Tips, If so E-Mail me, I'd love to hear from you.