From Hank…
Here’s a baseball play we like to use quite often because it works almost everytime.

With runners on first and second and less than 2 outs we start the runners to commence a double steal.  The batter will square around to bunt but pull back at the last instant.  What usually happens on defense is this:  the 3rd baseman (along with the 1st baseman) will come charging in to field the bunt; 2nd baseman will cover first; in 9 out of 10 times the Shortstop will fail to cover 3rd base leaving it unprotected…thus the catcher cannot throw to third to nail the man coming from second.

Bingo…double steal, and a chance to score 2 runs now on a single and it also eliminates the force play.

Occasionally, we will actually bunt the baseball just to confuse the defense and prevent predictability.

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From Tom…
Here is my very best baseball coaching tip. I was tired of having my players watch the third strike. I noticed that my more aggressive batters never got to the third strike.

Time to change the rules: I told my players at the beginning of the baseball tournament–You can not have a first strike called looking. If a batter did, the entire team would have to run 60′ for each and every called first strike at the end of the game.

The first game we only had 3 batters get caught looking. The entire team led by the baseball coaches sprinted around from home to third. The rest of the tournament we only had 1 called first strike. The players cheered each other on and went up to the plate looking for that first swing (hit) with aggression in their hearts. The baseball pitchers obliged us by throwing 80% first strike pitches. Even a ground ball or a strikeout that wasn’t a first pitch looking was viewed as a success by the team and reinforced positive behavior. The team raised their batting average by 100 points and we made the semi’s.

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From Bert…
Simple and fun strength and coordination exercises to do at home. These two simple exercises, which can be performed at home, help address two of the areas Ted Williams preached were the most important when it comes to making consistent contact: wrist strength (for bat speed) and hand eye coordination. (Williams also preached hip rotation, but that was for power.)

Wrist strength exercise – Have the baseball player grip his favorite bat at the butt end, as he or she normally would when holding the bat. Start the exercise with the bat in the right hand, the arm fully extended, parallel to the ground and in front of the ballplayer, and holding the bat in the vertical position.  Keeping your shoulder and elbow still, slowly rotate the wrist to the right until the bat is horizontal (parallel to the ground) – do not allow the bat to go past horizontal. Now slowly rotate the wrist to the left until the bat is once again parallel to the ground on the other side (the bat movement will resemble that of a mechanical metronome). Start out with 3 sets of 3 (in each direction) with both the right and left hand. Work up to 3 sets of 10 with each hand. Also, increase the bat speed as the ballplayer’s strength allows.

Helpful Hints:
Before starting the exercise, take a few moments to –
Warm up wrists by simply shaking them gently and loosely for about 10-15 seconds. Warm up and stretch the shoulders and elbows. If the ballplayer finds the bat is too heavy to perform the exercise properly, choke up a bit.
After the strength exercise sets are completed, stretch the wrists by doing one more set, but this time, as the ballplayer brings the bat from the vertical position to the horizontal position, allow the bat to slowly pass below the horizontal position thereby gently stretching the wrist. Perform 1 set of 5 reps for both the right and left hand.

Hand-eye coordination exercise – Holding the bat with one hand (the power hand (right for righties, left for lefties) somewhere just below the middle of the barrel, bounce a ball on the sweet spot of the barrel (this baseball drill will also teach the ball player where the sweet spot is). Try to do this ten times without missing. Do three sets of ten (it will take several tries). It may be hard at first, but with practice the ballplayer will be able to do it relatively easily. This also helps discipline the ballplayer to try to watch the ball hit the bat.

Helpful hints:
It may be easier to start out holding the baseball bat with both hands, but eventually work back to one.  It is fun to have a contest at baseball practice to see who can bounce the ball the most times without missing.  Do this drill outside or indoors where you can’t break anything (the balls tend to fly around, especially at first)
You will see the results at batting practice and at the plate – quicker bat speed and more consistent contact.

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From James…
My master baseball tip:  “Fielders keep your head down and follow the baseball all the way to your glove.”

As we all know many fielders will pick their head up and take their eye off the ball when fielding.
To help overcome this I have placed large numbers with a sharpie wide marker on 12 balls.
As we hit a soft ground ball to the fielders they must keep their eye on the ball and try to pick up the number then call it off quickly before throwing to first base. The results have been awesome. With repetition we create skill.

From Larry…
I will make this baseball drill short and sweet–

I put all my infielders on their knees and throw (not hit) the baseball to them like the ball was hit and make them throw the ball to first or what ever base I call out; I even use the catcher. Great to learn the control of the throw with the upper body.

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From Ralph…
Baseball Hitting Drill: ADVANCE THE RUNNER

Move runner from 2nd base to 3rd base to home plate by hitting behind them on the right side.

1. Hitter steps into the batters box and stands a little further away from the plate than normal.

2. After the pitch is thrown the hitter will wait and hit the baseball in the back of the strike zone so that they can drive the ball to the right side.

3. The base runner will determine whether to continue to third or not.

4. If the ball is hit behind them to the right side they can run, if not they need to hurry back towards 2nd base.

From Terrill…
When I want to go over baseball defense, I shrink the diamond so everyone is real close. This way we can go over everything with the boys still standing in their positions and walk through everything. This also helps save your voice, by allowing to to talk normal instead of yelling direction and baseball coaching tips to all the boys spread out far away on the normal size field.

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From Doug…
Skill tip:  FAST Runner on third (less than two outs) and a HIGH and SHALLOW fly ball is put into play.  The outfielder (or shortstop/second basemen) has plenty of time to get positioned under the baseball.  With a fast runner tagging up to score, the full “back-cross-step and crow-hop” before throwing takes too much time to get a fast runner at the plate.  In this situation the fielder needs only to lift their throwing-side leg (thigh parallel to the ground) as they catch the ball.  Once caught, they drop that leg and throw – try it, it significantly shortens the release time.  The trade off is that you can’t throw as far, so that it why it’s only advisable on shallow balls.

Bunting game:  Split your squad into two teams.  One team takes the field (infield only – I use a baseball coach to pitch, but have a pitcher player standing next to him).  The other team is bunting.  The bunting team gets one point for safely reaching first base, a second point for reaching second base, and a third for reaching third.  That team is up until three outs are recorded.  The fielding team must use the proper bunt defense based on where the runners are (i.e. if there is a runner on second the third baseman needs to hold).  The bunting team is pressured to make good bunt to advance runners.  This baseball drill/game has been a player favorite for the last two seasons.

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From Wayne…
This baseball drill worked for my team last year when we were struggling with fly balls.

-Team run with their gloves on. Players had a difficult time chasing down baseballs running with arm and glove extended. Run taught them to tuck the glove and extend only when going to catch the ball.

-Tennis balls hit with a tennis racket and bounce the ball off of their heads (helmets on of course). When they became proficient we added a level of difficulty. Bounce the ball off their head and catch the ball. This taught them to get under the ball.

-We also found playing catch with a football, to the left and right and over their shoulders taught them the proper form to chase down baseballs.

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From Robert…
This is the best baseball batting tip ever! This batting order idea worked on a house league team in winning a championship and our tournament team to the mid atlantic regionals at 10 yrs old.

Tell your baseball team the batting order will be arranged by how well they learn a specific baseball hitting drill.

If we are working on stance, hip turn, etc…The kids that worked the baseball drill the best in practice were 1-2-3-4 etc in the order. My hardest hitters may be at the bottom of the order, if they didn’t use correct form. It got the attention of the entire team. Our good hitters became very good, and the kids that struggled all hit the baseball.

From Michael…
When Batting: To improve tracking the ball and “Keeping Your Eye On The Ball” we tell our players to point their “EYES, NOSE and CHIN” at the contact point when they hit the ball.

It seems to work much better than saying “Watch the ball!”

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From Jeff…
What a great idea! The baseball drill that I use is a warm-up drill that reinforces proper throwing technique. It is called the Arm Swing drill.

Players start in circle. They are in proper throwing position facing the baseball coach who is in the middle of the circle.
The coach has three commands: Thumb to Thigh, Crack in the Elbow and Talk to the Hand.

On Thumb to Thigh, the players simulate the throwing motion making sure that their thumb goes down to their thigh. They continue the throwing motion until they get to the top. Make sure their elbow is slightly bent. (Crack in the Elbow). Make sure the ball is facing away from them. (Talk to the Hand).

Very simple yet very effective to create muscle memory and get baseball players to understand the proper arm path to throw the ball.

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From Valara…
I have two baseball coaching tips for you.

1.  For pitchers to work on pivoting and stepping correctly I line them up and have them pretend they have a ball.  They start in their pitching stance and work on the pitching step and pivot from home plate to the fence and back.  If they are doing it correctly it will look like a snake in the ground.  If not it will be straight lines.  It is repetition for them and helpful to me as a baseball coach.

2.  Runner on 1st and 3rd.  If they catch on to us doing the fake throw to 2nd base, I have the short stop come up a little.  Then I have the catcher throw to short stop and then they can look at 3rd or throw back home to get the out there.  This works amazingly.  They think it is going to the pitcher because of shorter throw….sometimes we even get the out from home to 2nd as well.

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