[Barkeep49]

Before Practice
ES is the first one to arrive. As he’s playing catch with Steve, I tell him “Congratulations.” He looks at me puzzled. It’s at this point that I tell him he’s now our #2 catcher. You can see he’s surprised. Steve asks him if he likes to catch and he says that he does in house league. Which is a good thing cause if he was unhappy about it and still had to do it, that wouldn’t be a great situation.

As they trickle in, instead of having them play catch we have them roll grounders to each other. It was a nice change of pace and a good way to reinforce a very important skill.

BS1 arrives fairly early on and I pull him aside to work on his pitching mechanics. I did a little internet research and came up with a couple of drills for him to try so as to improve his mechanics. What we did today was when he lifts the leg up, I had him hold it for 3 seconds, and then to follow through. The idea being twofold: 1. Help him practice his balance as it is off while he pitches and 2. Give him a second (well actually 3) to think about what he’s going to do with that front foot when he plants it, as he does all sorts of weird things with it. We did this about 20 times before practice. What I love about BS1 is how eager he is to receive coaching. Sadly, despite his eagerness his mechanics are still very poor. As long as he’s still an eager student he’ll get 1 on 1 time to work on his pitching, but he will not be seeing the mound, except in an emergency, anytime soon.

When TG comes I pull him aside. I had been studying the score book and my recollection. I tell him that he has a deadly strike out pitch. He says “I do?” And I tell him he has a rising fastball, that I have seen him throw both in practice and in games, to great effect. Furthermore, he’s almost always ahead on the count, often with it being 0 and 2. However, if the batter doesn’t bit on the rising fastball he tends to end up with a full count. So I told him he needs a new pitch to go to if the rising fastball doesn’t work. I give him a couple of suggestions, but admit I simply don’t know how well enough as a pitcher to know what that next pitch should try and be. He says he struck out a friend of his with a pitch low and away and thinks he can do either that or do low and inside. He’s going to do a little pitching into a net during the next couple of days to try and figure out what he’d like to do. He is certainly at the point where he can be going for control and aiming the pitch, the exact opposite message we want to send to our weaker pitchers, which is great. I told TG that he, myself and Steve, and JM, who is his catcher, will conference before the game so we all know what to expect.

The Practice
We start the practice missing KS, which we expected as he has tennis on Wednesdays, JF, AK, and BS2. We gather the team around as Steve and I want to talk about the first couple of games for a moment. As we do so JF and AK come in. I take this opportunity to do that education 101 staple “the compliment sandwich”. I start off saying how happy I was with the hustle on the base paths, talk about how embarrassed I was at our fielding execution, and then end with congratulating them on getting up there and swinging at the ball. Steve then sends a bit of a mixed message as he talks about how he hates to lose. I frankly am not a fan of this tact, as discussed earlier, but I wasn’t surprised to hear it.
This seems like as good of a time as any to reflect on the general perceptions of us as coaches. Last year I was listed as the “head coach” because that’s how they made us fill out the forms and so I got 95% of the phone calls and emails about scheduling and general questions/complaints, which was to be expected. I was curious to see how it would play out this year. And so far it seems like I am still going to get the calls and questions. I had, for instance, 1 parent and 1 kid call me today. I have to admit the fact that a player called me surprises me some as Steve is bar far the “cooler” of the two of us. Last year we clearly had different sort of relationships with the kids, and it is shaping up to be so again this year. These relationships, while different, are also complementing so I view it as a good thing that I’m more of the “dad” and he’s more of the “older brother”. Both of us get respect, it’s just in different ways. I really like that we are co-coaches as I don’t feel secure enough about everything we do to be a Head Coach, not to mention I think if I had an Assistant Coach who was a parent without Steve, he would attempt to run all over me. But when things like figuring out what we need to do at practice or creating a lineup, I find that I pretty much say what I want and that’s what ends up happening. On the one hand I like that, on the other I don’t want Steve to feel like I’m bossing him around. So far there has been zero tension about this that I have perceived so I think we’re doing a pretty good job of maintaining the balance.

Anyhow, back to practice. We had the field first, which wasn’t what Steve and I planned, but I think worked out well in the end. We started with a game of Baseball Knockout. Two lines form, one behind SS, one behind 2B. Steve hit a grounder. The player has to cleanly field the grounder and throw it to me at first. They do that they switch to the other line. Last kind standing wins. To little surprise, ES and JM were our winners with JF finishing a close 3rd. It’s a shame that JM is catching so much as I would love to have his glove in the field more.

Following that we repeated the game we did on the first day where they hit the ball and then have to try and reach as many bases as possible. We had exactly 5 people on each team so there was enough for each of the infield positions plus a catcher, which for this game worked perfectly. I threw some nice lobs in, both so the kids could hit and so they couldn’t hit it too far considering our lack of outfielders. The fielding and throwing was pretty crisp all things considered. JF once again got the best hit and was the only person to get 8 bases, or two full circuits around. I got BS1 some time at first base as I think he would do well there but has told me how he doesn’t want the pressure. Steve and I had planned for him to work with BS2 at this point, but BS2 was not there, and he did not call, which is disappointing.

Our time on the field was over and so we went into the deep outfield. At that point we went over the basics of how to bunt. I was all over this as when I played I sucked at hitting, but I was an unbelievable bunter. In case you are wondering, I decided to keep it simple and teach them simply how to move their hand up on the batting grip, as opposed to actually trying to grasp the bat itself with your hand. A few kids knew how to do this already and I told them that it was fine if they did it, but if a kid did not feel 100% confident doing so they were to do the method I was showing, simply because doing the other way wrong is a recipe for broken hands, something AK was all too happy to ask about. After about 5 minutes of my demonstrating and having them practice the bunting move in a line together, we split into two groups with one group staying with me to bunt and the other going with Steve to hit off the tee. I didn’t really get a report from Steve about how the Tee went. As for what I saw, sadly, our best bunters seem to be ES and TG, the two kids who I am LEAST likely to tell to bunt. ES is a lefty and laid down a couple of great drag bunts, without my even having given instruction, so perhaps if he’s leading off an inning we’ll give him the green light to try a bunt if he wants. Additionally, if TG can hit a deep one early in a game we can have him show bunt next time at bat so as to force the infield not to play him back. BS1 did an excellent job of getting out of the box quickly as perhaps we’ll give him a go. I had thought JF with her softball experience would be an old hat at bunting, but this proved not to be so. She is raw, but should make a good bunter. A big focus of mine during bunting was KS. His batting is not so great, but he’s one of the fastest kids on the team so if we can get him to be an OK bunter he’ll be on base far more then he would otherwise. I made sure he had extra throws during this time and also told him we were going to practice again before the game. He has a lot of work to do, but the payoff would be great especially considering his place in the batting order.

At the conclusion of practice, we brought everyone together and had them name something good they had witnessed in practice or the first two games about another player on the team. Several of the players clearly think it’s corny, BUT I know it does its job of building us together as a team especially as almost every kid had someone point out a positive about him or her and Steve and I were able to fill in a couple of the blanks. A few kids had to pass on the first time through but were able to think of something. Everyone that is except AK. AK simply could not think of anything. Even after I gave him an extra minute by telling them that they needed to be at the games 20 minutes before, no excuses, instead of the 15 we’d previously said, he still couldn’t think of anything. I told him that he would need to have something before our game on Saturday and sent everyone on their way.

After Practice

As TG and I were talking a bit about his practicing low pitches this week, JM asked if he could talk to Steve. After I’m done talking to TG I go over and catch only the end where JM says “I just thought I should tell you” and Steve assuring him that he was doing the right thing. Steve also took the time to comment on JM’s leadership, something I have also done, so hopefully he hears how good it’s been and will keep it up. As Steve and I walk back from the outfield towards our cars he tells me what the conversation was about. It seems several of the players on the team have commented on AK being “rude”. A couple of examples were given. As Steve and I have both experienced this, it comes as no great shock, but was good to know that we needed to take things into hand.

As we get to the parking lot who should be there, but AK. It was destiny. After insisting AK call his parents to find out where they were, despite his clearly not wanting to, we sit him down. As I call him over to sit on a bench with us he goes “am I in trouble”. Of course the answer is “Yes”, but I do the good thing and just say “We just want to talk”. I start off by trying to find out if he is an optimist or pessimist, without being able to use those words considering he’s in 5th grade. In the end I resort to the glass half-full or half empty example and ask him which he thinks it is. Now I know, without a doubt, that the kid is a pessimist and his inability to find a positive about a player on the team just confirms it. In other words, what he says makes it clear. However, he choose to say that the glass was “half-full”. So Steve and I used that as a building block to explain that it’s important to talk that way with the team and to think that way about yourself. He asked for an example of a time when he had been negative and we tell him. As we are talking we give him the chance to say if he’s been having problems with anyone and he sort of names JM. So clearly we are going to have to watch it carefully as Steve and I don’t want JM to stop what he’s doing from what we hear, but also want to make sure JM isn’t getting frustrated with AK and causing him to be outcast. AK has mentioned numerous times about his desire to pitch and during the conversation asked why TG was getting so many opportunities. I was quite blunt and told him flat out that TG has good arm strength, good velocity and nice control, and that makes him our best pitcher. I did take the chance to complement him on his previous pitching, tell him he was going to pitch int the first 3 innings on Saturday and if he does well at pitching he’ll get plenty of chances. AK is very hard to read but I think he heard our message in a good way. What he’s going to chose to do with it, and how he presents it to his parents, I don’t know, but there you have it.

One final note from practice. As I am pulling out ES and another kid who I know are standing in the parking lot As I pull by, after pretending like I was going to hit them in slow motion, ES’s friend informs me that ES said that our team stinks. I try and get a confirmation about this from ES and he doesn’t really say anything, but is saved by his friend’s mother, who I also casually know, who assures me that the kid was just trying to stir up trouble. Likely true, but at the same time I think it’s likely true ES had said it, which is also good to know. I hope we win a game soon.

Previewing Saturday’s game

We play the White Sox, who from what I’ve heard from the grapevine are not a very good team and are 0-2 like us. Hopefully this is true and we’ll have a shot. Before the game Steve and I set our pitchers and catchers, though not in any order. This was useful as during warm-ups EG asked if he could catch on Saturday. I said “No” and explained that we already had our catchers setup for the game. EG then asked if he would ever be able to catch. Steve and I gave each other a look that said “no bloody hell” before I delivered our standard line that every kid would have a chance to play every position they wanted to at least once this season. What was more interesting was that PW also expressed some interest in catching. Frankly I don’t know if he has the skills, as we haven’t really seen him do that, so I think if we get a chance before the game I would like to see him try and catch.

So anyway our tentative catchers are: JM and ES for 2 innings and FO and TG for 1 each. It’s possible that FO’s inning will get swallowed by JM depending on how we end up deciding to pitch our pitchers. While FO hasn’t had a chance to catch in a game, everything I’ve seen at practice tells me he’d not going to work out. I think giving Steve time to work with kids at catching will likely be a focal point of next Tuesday’s practice.

On the pitching side of the equation will be TG for 2 innings, AK for 1, JF for 1, JS for 1 and ES for 1. I threw out two possibilities on how to use TG. I said we could either pitch him the 1st and 2nd OR have him be scheduled to pitch the 5th and 6th with us understanding that he would likely pitch before then and giving us the chance to use him if we have to yank a kid and it looks, as we expect, that the game will not go the full 6 innings. We didn’t really get a chance to reach a decision before the kids started arriving. Besides TG I don’t think any of our kids have the arm strength to pitch 2 and I said to Steve that if we need another pitcher besides those 5 we would have to pitch either BS1 or PW. In reality it would likely be PW as I really want to hold BS1 until we’ve had more chances to work together. But the thought of having to use PW after his performance yesterday is not confidence inspiring.

I’m sort of surprised our practice here has produced the longest post yet, but there you have it. Thanks again for reading along and I really appreciate all of the comments that have been made.