My Manhattan Weekend.

http://danielthebabehotujac.podbean.com/e/baseball-podcast-1430105806/

The Big Dogs.

Tuesday we had a game. This game was a test for my guys. We were playing a 14 year old team and my guys are all 13 and below, except for one 14 year old. This team was gigantic! Five players were six foot,  200lbs or more and they threw harder than what any of my guys had seen before.
Shortly after we took a full team infield and my guys did horrible. I called them off, had them run, and hoped for the best.
The game started and it was rough sailing. Each leadoff hitter in the inning for the opposing team hit a double and eventually scored. My team didn't get any offense going until the 4th inning. Then we had a great inning but didn't score any. We left with bases loaded. The next inning we scored eight runs. It was our game at that point. The other team caved in and the better team emerged. It was the best game I've coached.

Parent Meeting.

So this year is a really big change for the parents. We have 11 kids total instead of 10 and we as coaches decided that we would only start 10 and not play the entire lineup. This means that one player will sit during parts of the games. The parents are not too fond of that concept. After most games, I have some sort of confrontation from a parent mad at me for sitting their child and not playing him. Of course, every time I am approached I say the same thing... "It was best for the team as a whole unit to have your chid sit at that time." I'm not sure how long it's going to take until all the parents realize that but the team is currently 9-0 on the season and what I'm doing is going to work.
An advocate parent took it upon himself to organize a parent meeting to try and explain to the parents what the strategy is, why he's (I'm) doing it, and how it will help the players in life and in baseball. I was told that the meeting went well wit of course the minor complaints from parents who believe in the every player gets a ribbon mentality.
Overall I think there will be a positive change in the parent support now that they feel in the loop, whether they support it or not.

New Pitchers

Primarily this year the team has worked off of five main pitchers; three starters and two relievers. We have a big tournament coming up next weekend and we will play at least five games minimum. Last practice I had some amateur pitchers get some work in to hopefully get them ready to pitch in games for the big tournament. It will be a challenge but we shall see what happens with it!

It was a weird feel at practice, the boys showed up as winners, and not as first losers...

First Tournament Day Two.

I started off the morning missing my alarm. I was just a few minutes late to the field but again I just got my players ready on a cold early morning and we were ready to play. I made my lineup and talked to my starting pitchers.

We played a team called the Nitro that has always beaten us apparently (without me). I had my hardest thrower on the mound because I wasn't sure if my defense and offense were awake yet. Well turns out they were. I don't remember much about that game but I know we won on a somewhat lucky call and time limit. Who says you can't have clock management in baseball?

The second game was against a team in a much worse bracket and they were called the Storm. We were playing on a hitters field and my team was stroking the ball so I put on a pitch to contact pitcher because I wanted to save the rest of my guys for the championship game I was pretty sure we would get to. It was a hitters game the first inning with a score of 2-2, only difference was that my pitcher threw 14 pitches and their pitcher threw 34 pitches. The second inning was the same story where we scored a few runs and they didn't score any though. They left their pitcher in throughout the game, even when it was 10-2 (us) and the poor kid threw 150+ pitches... that's terrible to do to a player! We stomped them in that game. Now on to the championship game!

We played the Predators again for a rematch of the first game of the tourney. I noticed right away that they were screwed. They had no life to them, they only had nine players to our eleven, and their fans were quiet as ever. I knew if I got my team up and excited that we would win this game. The first three innings were a defensive showcase. Both teams making great plays and hitters were being robbed of base hits. It was about the 4th inning that we exploded for seven runs. I switched pitchers and we held them that inning. Then we scored another three runs making it 10-0. The fans got loud, my players got a little extra life to them and things were looking up. I had the same approach for my catcher and pitcher and we got the first three hitters we faced out. Thus ending the 5th inning and giving us our first ever tournament win. 

Everybody was excited and quite a few parents congratulated me for teaching this team and molding them in to a championship team. I had a few messages from players thanking me and asking me what the next goal on the season was. Below is the first place trophy picture.

photo cred. Tracy Jepson.

First Tournament Day One.

At 8 am I awoke and was getting ready to make the drive to Salina, KS. It was a long and boring ride but I had myself some Dunkin Donuts to stay awake and "excited" to be driving. When I got to the field complex I spoke with the other Head Coach and we made a productive lineup and talked to our pitchers.
The first game was against the Predators. This team reminded me of the movie Billy Madison. They had their basketball hype circle, they were screaming and yelling and quite frankly I could see any one of them at any moment saying "O'Doyle Rules!"
The first game was ours but a bad inning of pitching and fielding changed the game. What was 6-1 became 6-6. We had a chance to win the game as we were the home team but a 50/50 coaching call and a bad jump by our baserunner ended the game at 6-6, which was the first tie I have ever experienced in my 13 years of baseball.
The second game was ours from the get-go. We played a team called the Scorpions and they were a joke. We mowed through them and ended the day with a win.
We had a team barbecue and I called it an early night to get well rested for a 9:00 A.M. game the next morning.

photo cred. Tracy Jepson

photo cred. Tracy Jepson.

First Scrimmage.

We had our first scrimmage this past Sunday. We played a lower level single A team and it was quite an experience for me. I made my first lineup card and had my first coaches meeting. It was completely informal but still, it was an experience. We played a team called the Topeka Force. I won't get too in detail about the game but it was easily our game. The final score was 4-4 (we had to quit due to time and sunlight). We had about 10-12 hits as a team and committed no errors in the field. The other team however had no hits and no errors. No hits!? Yep, no hits for their entire team. My 3rd inning pitcher did not do well at all. He gave up about six walks and hit two batters. If it were an actual game and our record were on the line, he would have been pulled much earlier. I had a few coaches in my ear asking why he hadn't been pulled yet but I wanted to test him. He got himself in to that mess so I wanted to see if he could get out. I went out there and had a mound visit with him and he ended up striking out the next batter. Then he fell back in the same routine of walking hitters. Other than that subtle ugliness, the game was ours if it were an actual game. Especially if it were a full seven inning game.

Live Pitching vs. Live Hitting

The second practice of spring break was a day for my hitters to see live pitching for the first time and my pitchers to face a live hitter for the first time. I thought the concept was perfect but maybe it was a little too early... my hitters could hardly hit anything and my pitchers were not throwing strikes. The mound we were using was a little messed up and it was pretty hard to see on the field as a hitter because of the sun but nonetheless that discouraged my team's abilities. We ran out of time fast as the sun went down and we took a long time warming up. Countdown to opening day is 11 days away.

Baseball Swag

The first day of spring break practice had a pretty good turnout. There were 6 of 11 boys there and that was more than I had expected. It was a specialized practice to enhance already learned skills. I felt it was time to teach the boys some baseball "swag." Not in the sense of dressing and apparel, but in the sense of making some web gem type plays. I taught them how to properly field a slow roller and make the off balance throw. (As seen below)

Ferocity & A Concerned Parent

Our Tuesday practice started out phenomenal. We did infielders work and my infielders got a lot of reps (to make up for all the work the outfielders got on Sunday). We were racing against the sun set though and we only had about an hour and a half of practice time. We worked on all in fielding and making good throws to first base. Followed up with double play practice, and in all honesty I am very proud of how they turned the double plays the majority of the time.
The second half of practice was cuts again to refresh. The effort they put in to it was piss poor. After about fifteen minutes I was enraged and ready to explode. I was yelling at kids and saying things I shouldn't have said. I cut practice short and had them run for punishment. While they were running I was screaming out reasons why we won't win if we don't do the little things and the other coaches joined me.
After practice a parent came up to me and talked to me about something I had said to her son. The other Head Coach was with me while we were talking and we spoke to her. It wasn't a big deal but it was another situation that was brand new to me. Everything is cleared up but it certainly caught me off guard.

Cuts & Flys

Last Sunday was our first day outside in quite a while and the kids were ready to go. They did their pre-practice warmups and were ready to hit the field. One of the key components of being a successful baseball team is the ability to consistently perform a perfect and complete cut-off. It's quite an art to make a perfect cut-off routine. Even in the major leagues they still don't have perfect cut-offs every time. The drill went pretty well and they learned quite a bit. Throughout the season we will constantly refresh because, again, to win games, you have to be able to perform a good cut-off.
Throughout the cut-off drills my outfielders got a lot of fly ball practice. They desperately needed that as well.
Practice was basically over after that. We did some running and called it a day.

Breathless

I'm sure you've heard of the term "Good Cop, Bad Cop." The boys normally see me being good cop, but Tuesday I was the bad cop. We had an intense conditioning session before practice officially started. I told them, "What you are about to do will not be fun. It will be difficult. I am testing you guys. How hard you can be knocked down and how strong you can stand back up." Then we begun out conditioning which lasted about 25 minutes. They were beat afterwards.
We moved in to throwing and playing catch and I was getting very aggravated how many bad throws were being made and how many people were dropping balls.  So we did our four corners drill, the same one I posted a video for, and they had to go around the horn five times perfectly (per group) and if they dropped the ball, they had ten pushups as a group. This stacked up and some people did over 100 pushups Tuesday. I'm over all the dropped balls. They have pressure now and have punishment if they fail to execute the simplest of tasks for a baseball player to execute.
After that, we only had 45 minutes of practice remaining. I took pitchers in groups of two and had a catcher catch for me. The pitchers had their first time off the pitching mound this season and the catchers caught a real live bullpen session for the first time. I was pleasantly surprised with how well the pitchers did. The catchers need more work but I figure that will come in time.
We will be outside next practice and I look forward to sharing my experience this weekend.

Also, we unveiled our new uniforms. I think they look really nice.

Picture taken by Tracy Jepson

"Forget What He Just Told You & Relax..."

Have you ever been building something up before, making it just the way you like it; or just finished organizing something so perfect it fits your mold perfectly? Well I have, and it's called my team and their hitting. The same dad I wrote about a couple weeks ago made another appearance at practice and insisted on changing things up. One of my players was struggling to do what was asked of him while hitting, and some tempers got a little flared because of lack of listening ability and execution. His hitting round was not very good to say the least. So when I called the next player in to hit, (I was throwing batting practice) I see that the dad called him over to chat. My player was over with him for at least 15 minutes. I could hear most of what was being said but I couldn't say anything because I was tending to the rest of the team. He was telling my player all this nonsense that is not at all right and there's no use for my players to know right now. He was saying stuff like, "Listen here, pitchers are way too good right now for you to go up to bat with just one approach," (WRONG). "You need to always look for a different pitch whenever you're up to bat, after every pitch," (WRONG). "Get in the pitchers head, stare him down, even point your bat at him," (SO WRONG I CAN'T EVEN EXPLAIN POLITELY). So after their little talk, I had the other coach pitch and I called my player over to the other corner of the gym. I told him, "Forget what he just told you and relax. Literally forget every single word he just told you. None of it was right and if you listen to him over me, you will not be playing."

I do like the parent though, I really do. He's a very nice guy. He just doesn't know what I know and he's stepping over his bounds as a parent when it comes to coaching. He can tell his own son stuff, but he shouldn't get in the way of other people.

Basketball...?

We spent an hour of practice playing basketball. I decided to make conditioning a little fun today and what better way to do that then to trick the kids in to running more than they ever knew they could? The second half of practice was spent practicing pitching. One of my catchers forgot their glove at home so we were down a catcher. I separated the kids in to groups of "rarely pitch," "sometimes pitch," and "always pitch." I didn't tell them that but I didn't want my main pitchers to be paired up with somebody as talented at pitching as them. We did that for another hour and thus practice was concluded.

651...

Sunday was all about hitting. As usual, the kids did their warm ups and the ones who haven't been showing up on Sundays still aren't showing up. Last Sunday I wasn't there so the other Head Coach decided to just do mechanics based drills and situational hitting. I decided to have them just swing. Swing as much as their little hearts desire. They enjoyed it, the parents enjoyed it, the other coaches enjoyed and even I enjoyed it; the only thing that did't enjoy it was my arm. I threw a total of 651 pitches that Sunday. My arm was going crazy on the inside. Part of me was excited to throw again and then the other part of me was shaking from the pain. Anyways, successful practice!

"Kill It!"

Tuesday's practice went very well. We started off with conditioning instead of jumping in to throwing. I did that for two reasons: firstly, so the kids would pay more attention to the rest of practice having already gotten the running and such out of the way and now they won't be thinking about it. Secondly, because I had a lot planned and I wanted to make sure we got all of it done.
The running lasted about twenty minutes and the players were actually voting towards doing running and such before practice even starts. I have an older infielder named Will who shows leadership and overall solid skill. I frequently use him for examples and he normally is very good at picking up on new drills and staying on his teammates. So I had him lead the infielders with their drills. While he was doing that, I talked to my outfielders and started them off with drills. Keep in mind that we haven't played catch yet so there was not much throwing at all.
Our throwing drills went by rather fast and the boys were much more accurate this time around. I showed them a new drill to work on and made them aware that we would be doing this every practice. It's called the four corners drill. I'll post a link to it at the bottom of the blog to show you what it is. Otherwise noting, I do vary my drills and throw in my own twists, but much like a magician not revealing his secrets, as a coach, I can not reveal my own.
After throwing I had the infielders do rapid fielding. Where they field, throw, and get the hell out of the way or they get hit by the next ball. This keeps them on their toes and keeps them mentally focused. If they weren't mentally focused, then they would get nailed by the ball. My outfielders worked on "killing" the ball on the ground. To explain that, as an outfielder, one of your primary jobs is to not let a ball get by you. As an infielder that's your job too but outfielders don't have another set of fielders behind them if it gets by them. So they worked on stopping the ball at all costs and then worked on rolling balls when there is a play at the plate.

This practice I really wanted to focus on the mental side of the game. As a kid growing up, when it came to base running, I excelled. Not because I was fast though, I was the speed of a broken down tricycle with only one wheel. However, I was very smart on the base paths. To the point where I could physically walk to the next base between pitches and nobody would notice. I want my players to not know just how to play their position, I want them to know why they play their position and to be able to make the necessary adjustments without me or another coach telling them to.

Skip.

I was unable to make it to practice on Sunday. I was stuck in meetings all day and was held up at work. Be on the lookout for my next post!

Cupcakes!

First things first, Happy Valentine's Day to everybody. On our Tuesday practice indoors, we had a parent bring cupcakes for everybody. There were strawberry, vanilla, chocolate, and neapolitan cupcakes available to try. I had one of each... and enjoyed every last bite.

Now that the important stuff has been addressed, time for some baseball talk. I had the boys compete in quite a bit of accuracy games because their accuracy is still rather poor as a whole unit. We did some tee work with tennis balls but instead of hitting the balls in to a net, I let them hit the entire length of the gym so they could truly see where their balls were going. It was a fun drill for them and it also let me know where their tendencies lie. We did quite a bit of running and agility work because we didn't do much running at our outside practice on Saturday. We ended the practice with races and an ab competition of who can hold the plank the longest. 

All in all, the mix of long distance tee work, accuracy drills, races, ab competitions and cupcakes, this was my favorite practice to date.

Photo found on Google.

First Day Outside & First Parent Encounter

We had our first practice outside this Saturday. The practice started off with me arriving an hour early before practice started to get everything set up and for me to finish my lunch.
Right away we had an incident. An incident in the first fifteen minutes of being outside with the team. All the kids were playing catch and one of the balls sailed away from their partner and hit another player in the head. He obviously went down, holding his head and groaning from pain. Coaches and players gathered around to see the potential damage, but he jumped right back up and kept going. Wiping the tears away from his eyes and cheeks, he continued his game of catch.

Next thing on the agenda was to split up in to a fielding and hitting group. Since I was an infielder growing up, I teach infield to the boys. So I took the infielders over to hit first. We had two full outfields to use because the infields were sloshed and full of puddles. I had another "coach" working with me during the hitting and this was were I had my first encounter with the infamous, my kid comes first and what works for my kid will work for everybody else. When I ran over to talk to the other coaches, I came back to him conducting a little team meeting. He was giving hitting "advice" and what was being said was incorrect. I immediately took the boys away and told them to switch fields and begin fielding practice. I went over to the other head coach and told him what had happened and to keep an eye on his outfielders while hitting, to make sure they get proper instruction.

My name is Daniel Hotujac, and welcome to my blog! My blog is about coaching a youth baseball team and building them from the ground up essentially. They are a second place at best team and it's my job to push them to being a threat at first place for every tournament they enter. My blog is best suited for aspiring coaches and baseball players alike. Hope I can please all my readers with the happenings of the Thunderbolts baseball team!

Meeting The Thunderbolts

picture credit via Tracy Jepson.

On the first day of practice, I got a taste of what I would be doing for the rest of my spring and summer. I arrived at a house out on the country and joined the other cars along the long gravel drive. Unsure of where to go exactly, I waited in the car for somebody else to show up and I would just distantly follow them in. After only a minute or so, somebody else showed up and I was able to see where they would go. I walked down around the side of the house to a rather nicely built barn and when I walked in I was pleasantly surprised. There were two rows of nets lined up and about six kids there already. I witnessed the first swing and it was history from there.