"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.