COMPLETED! RL Little League--Coaching the Cardinals

[Dutch]

19 May 07 - Game #6
Devil Rays @ Cardinals

Cardinals 10, Devil Rays 6

Yesterday's game featured Matt "Wildthing" throwing his fastballs pretty much on target for the first two innings. Then Simon came off of SS to pitch three innings to close out the game. They both did a terrific jobs.

The Devil Rays brought in some big corn-fed Iowa pitcher that brought the heat, but because of our aggressive batting policy, just making contact led to good shots that really flustered the Devil Rays fielders. "The faster it comes in, the faster it goes out." was the motto, and the Cardinals responded very well to it. I think the Devil Rays pitcher could pitch fast, but most of it was right down the middle or a bit high.

Simon went to the mound starting in the bootom of the 3rd--started off slow once again--but once he got going he was unhittable. However, while he was hittable, Simon took one to the leg by a line drive off the bat of the big corn-fed kid, and also hurt himself sliding into home and had a mini-collision with the catcher. Made a great catch at SS early in the game and had one huge hit that drove in two runs.

He got our gameball for that kind of play. (He's our most gifted athlete along with our catcher Joseph.)

Our infield in general really recovered nicely from last Saturday's error-fest 10-1 loss. Zack played 3B and knocked a couple of hard linedrives down and kept them in front of him. Didn't make the play at 1st, but once he realized he wasn't going to be the runner to 1st, ate it. Smart baseball.

SS Simon and his backup Nick (my son) both kept everything in front of them all day, nothing got past the SS position today.

2B Taylor let one get by him when he refused to center himself up on the ball and tried to just stab it. It was a tough error because it let a runner get home.

I moved Mike C (my other son) from 3B to LF. Zack played the position a lot better to be honest and Mike tracked down a booming fly ball to make an out. It was nice to have an experienced glove in the outfield instead of the inexperienced kids "hiding" out there. So everybody was happy with that transition I think. Mike C has a good glove. If he puts the glove on the ball, it's a catch, period. His problem is that he won't center himself on the linedrives. So the switch is good for now, until he gets better in practice with the infield work.

2B Taylor, as mentioned before, also doesn't like to center himself on grounders, but in outfield practice, the kid refuses to put his glove above his head. He wants to basket catch everything. Willie Mays he ain't. So 2B is good for him.

Monday's practice will feature stealing and sliding. The umpire warned us that if our kids do not slide into home plate when there is a play at the plate, he reserves the right to just call the runner out for breaking safety rules. Slide if challenged...got it.

[Barkeep49]

Any updates?

[Dutch]

Sorry,

Been way busy.

The stealing and sliding practice paid immediate dividends as we won our next game. It included 3 or 4 PB's at the plate which required our player on 3rd base to slide into home. It was the difference and gave us a 2 game winning streak.

That brought us to Memorial Day Weekend where we submitted our team to play in a German regional tournament. In three games we walked away empty handed (0-3) but we had a lot of fun. The first game was against the local area minor's all-stars (9-10 year olds) and they beat us 7-6. To be fair, neither Simon nor Matt "Wildthing" were available during the tournament, so we had Joseph (P/C), Zak (3B converted P) and Mike B (1B converted P) on the mound for us. We also lost to the local team Red Sox 16-2 and our last game against an out of town team 7-5.

So all in all, with excpetion of our Red Sox debacle, our new pitchers did well. I was proud of all the kids.

-----------

Saturday was our first game out of our home park (5 of the 10 teams in our division play at that home park) and we played at a field not too far away. The local umps and the local team were all good buddies and we did not get a single call go our way. The umpires even inspected all of our equipment and told the other coaches, "Don't worry about it, we know what you have." (Ugh...)

We were cool about it though and just let it ride. No sweat right? We lost 7-5. The umpire returned one of our kids to 3B after stealing home uncontested on a PB because "he left early", which the kid says he didn't...but what can you do? I was watching the pitch. And our opponents were awarded a run on a play at 3B where our 3B (Zak) caught the ball and dropped his glove in front of the sliding runner....but the ball was knocked loose. After initially calling it "OUT!" he changed it to no out. The runner ran home and we protested that our 3B's wasn't challenging the runner because it was a dead ball after he called "OUT".

Anyway, water under the bridge. The kids played great.

That's where we are now. 3-5 on the season. (3-8 if you count the tourney).

[Dutch]

Well.

We have one more game in the regular season. Then it's off to the playoffs. Single Elimination, and random draw for the playoffs (regardless of record). That ended up being huge, because we drew a bye week! Woot!

Cardinals Win/Loss Record: 3-9

Cardinals Player Stats through 12 games.

Name	AB	Hits	Ave.	2B	3B	HR	BB	SO	HBP	Plate App	BB %	OB %
Joseph (P/C)	21	10	0.476	3	3	2	6	8	1	28	0.214	0.607
Aynsley (OF)	15	7	0.467	0	0	0	6	7	0	21	0.286	0.619
Mike B (1B/P)	16	7	0.438	2	0	0	2	5	1	19	0.105	0.526
Brandon (C/OF)	14	6	0.429	1	1	1	7	4	1	22	0.318	0.636
Mike C (3B/LF)	15	6	0.400	0	0	0	4	7	0	19	0.211	0.526
Zack (3B/P)	23	9	0.391	0	1	1	3	9	0	26	0.115	0.462
Simon (P/SS)	17	6	0.353	1	0	0	3	8	0	20	0.150	0.450
Jake (OF)	7	2	0.286	0	0	0	4	5	1	12	0.333	0.583
Matt (P/1B)	12	3	0.250	0	0	0	1	8	0	13	0.077	0.308
Taylor (2B)	20	2	0.100	0	0	1	6	15	1	27	0.222	0.333
Nick (SS)	12	1	0.083	1	0	0	6	9	0	18	0.333	0.389
Andy (OF)	11	0	0.000	0	0	0	8	10	0	19	0.421	0.421
Nathan (OF)	6	0	0.000	0	0	0	9	5	0	15	0.600	0.600
Team Totals	189	59	0.312	8	5	5	65	100	5	259	0.251	0.498
notes: 'reached by error' were recorded as 'hits'; sac flies were not tallied
Yellow shaded stats are recognized as "Top 25%" in the category

Tallying the stats so far has been eye-opening for me. I didn't realize that Joseph was our best batter. He's the smallest kid on the team! And Nathan hasn't played baseball before, ever, but he sure knows how to get on base. I guess he's figured out the difference between a strike and a ball.

[Barkeep49]

Dutch, was that tongue in cheek about Nathan, because he looks like the kind of player who simply doesn't swing the bat. In his 15 PAs it looks like he's put 1 ball into play.

[Dutch]

Originally Posted by Barkeep49

Dutch, was that tongue in cheek about Nathan, because he looks like the kind of player who simply doesn't swing the bat. In his 15 PAs it looks like he's put 1 ball into play.

You are correct, Nathan and Andy are our statues (never played before) and their numbers are a reflection of the opposing pitchers. But I stressed every at bat...aw hell, I implored them both to 'swing the bat!". I begged, and sometimes they did, but mostly they did not.

Maybe next year they will. Now that they have a season of baseball under the belts.

[Dutch]

End of Season.

Well, we lost our only playoff game to the Yankees 12-4. We tried our best, but we were just no match. I give a lot of credit to the other coaches in our league, they were very knowledgable and got everything out of their kids.

I think our kids had a great time, but I can't help but wonder how dissapointed they are for only winning 3 games. Tonight is the trophy/Pizza Hut end of season party.

I can't tell you how very proud I am of these kids. All of them. They are all such great spirits and their personalities are so unique, I'm really gonna miss them.

I hope they did learn a lot this year (even if in spite of my rookie-ness) and I hope they all look forward to playing again next year. Many of these kids are heading on to the 13-15 year old league, including my son Mike C...but if I coach again next year, I will stick with the 11-12 year old Majors and give it another go.

So this concludes my rookie venture into the world of little league baseball coaching. I learned a ton and will be more prepared than ever for next year.

The most important thing I learned was that winning isn't everything. We went 3-12 this year, but had a blast. Something else I learned-->if you are interested in coaching little league, so long as you show up to every game and every practice with a positive attitude and a little enthusiasm, you will be very successful. And if you don't just compliment the kids, but show them how to improve and go over faults in practice (even subtly)--they will be hungry and eager to learn more about the game of baseball--and they will continue to grow and improve as baseball players.

Thanks for reading.







Final Stats of the Cardinals.

Ramstein Cardinals Team Stats (14 Games Played)
Name	AB	Hits	Ave.	2B	3B	HR	BB	SO	HBP	Plate App	BB %	OB %	TB
Joseph (P/C)	25	12	0.480	3	3	4	8	9	1	34	0.235	0.618	42
Aynsley (OF)	18	8	0.444	0	0	0	7	8	0	25	0.280	0.600	15
Mike B (1B/P)	20	8	0.400	2	0	0	4	7	2	26	0.154	0.538	16
Mike C (3B/LF)	18	7	0.389	2	0	0	5	8	0	23	0.217	0.522	14
Brandon (C/OF)	16	6	0.375	1	1	1	8	6	1	25	0.320	0.600	21
Zack (3B/P)	24	9	0.375	0	1	1	3	9	0	27	0.111	0.444	17
Simon (P/SS)	21	7	0.333	1	1	0	3	9	1	25	0.120	0.440	14
Jake (OF)	7	2	0.286	0	0	0	6	5	1	14	0.429	0.643	9
Matt (P/1B)	14	3	0.214	0	0	0	1	10	0	15	0.067	0.267	4
Nick (SS)	13	2	0.154	1	0	0	7	9	0	20	0.350	0.450	10
Taylor (2B)	21	2	0.095	0	0	1	8	16	1	30	0.267	0.367	14
Nathan (OF)	8	0	0.000	0	0	0	10	7	0	18	0.556	0.556	10
Andy (OF)	12	0	0.000	0	0	0	9	11	0	21	0.429	0.429	9
Team Totals	217	66	0.304	10	6	7	79	114	7	303	0.261	0.502	195
notes: reached by error were recorded as hits; sac flies were not tallied; yellow highlights represent a category in which player was considered "Top 25%"

[Dutch]

THE END.

[Young Drachma]

Really cool dynasty. I still stories about two of the junior teams I coached during a summer league at a camp I worked at, as some of the most fun I'd ever had. So I understand how much fun this can be. Good stuff.

[Dutch]

I'd have to learn a lot more before I could coach Juniors, I think it gets a bit more serious at that point--I bet it was a blast for you though.

Thanks for the compliments, DC.

One more thing--I think it's kind of funny to look at my initial impressions of my players and then look at their final stats. Taylor was "my best hitter" after one look, but ended up batting .095. Oh well, don't judge a book by it's cover.

[MIJB#19]

Originally Posted by Dutch

THE END.

... of episode one?
Any chance you continue doing this next season with the same kids, or whatever there will be at your disposal?

[Dutch]

I may coach again next year. I'm not sure. My oldest son will move up to Juniors and my youngest will stay in Majors...and I'd hate to miss too much.

But if I did coach again, I know I'll try and get some of these kids back on my squad!