Coach learns a valuable lesson about the men in blue
Got an email today from the mom of one of my students about something that happened in a tournament. She wanted to know if I would talk to her daughter’s coach Kevin about it. I was a little concerned at first, but no need. She actually likes the coach, and it turns out he’s a fan of this blog. Of course I said “sure” — I would’ve done that even if he wasn’t a reader — and then waited for the call.
When he called he told me what happened. His team was at a tournament, and during a close game he noticed that the opposing pitcher was starting with one foot behind the rubber instead of both feet touching. Being the sort that believes people should play within the rules, he decided to bring it up to the umpiring crew — average age approximately 20. Yep, you guessed it. Big mistake.
The field and plate umps talked with him, and then the field ump declared the pitcher wasn’t doing anything illegal. Or at least he couldn’t see anything illegal about it. (He said the back foot was pretty obviously off, and I trust him on it, so it was more of a choice than an inability to see it.)
The next half-inning when his team took the field it started. The field umpire waited until the other team had a runner on base, then called his pitcher (my student) for crow hopping. Not once but twice, advancing the runner to third. Guess he showed Kevin!
I know this student very well, and she doesn’t crow hop. She may get a little airborne from time to time, which would be a leap, but you’d have to be looking awfully close to see it, and it’s nothing she does all the time. If the field umpire couldn’t see the other pitcher starting with her foot off the rubber, it’s unlikely he saw whether Kevin’s pitcher was leaping or not.
There was one other part to the story. Kevin told me there was a rather large rut coming off the pitching rubber, thanks to a general lack of field maintenance. So it’s possible that Kevin’s pitcher wasn’t even illegal since a pitcher is allowed to have her foot off the ground (level with where the ground would’ve been) if there’s rut.
The conclusion he came to was he probably shouldn’t have said anything about the other pitcher. It’s likely the umpire took exception to him bringing it up and decided to make him pay for it. (There’s also a possibility he got “homered” although he didn’t have any way of knowing for sure.)
Bummer, but such is life. Good umpires know coaches questioning things is part of the game and let it roll off their backs. After 15 years of coaching and never being successful in getting even an obvious illegal pitch called, I’d say it’s not worth it. If you see it, learn to let it go and hope the folks in blue care enough to keep the game fair and the playing field level. Thanks to Kevin for allowing me to share this story. And Kevin, if you’re reading this and have anything to add, be sure to leave a comment. The rest of you too!
Slappers don’t seem to be getting the advantage they should
Ever since we upgraded our cable package I’ve the opportunity to see a lot more fastpitch softball games on TV. Since most teams have at least a couple if not several slappers, I’ve had the chance to see many of them in action. It has led to an interesting observation.
My understanding of the advantage of slapping is that the hitter starts a couple of steps closer to first and gets a running start toward the bag. Now, the first part is a function of the setup of the field. The left-hand batter’s box is a little closer to first than the right-hand box, so no problem there.
It’s the second part that strikes me as odd. A lot of the slappers I’ve seen sort of walk to the front of the box, take a swing, then start running. As a result, they’re not really getting a running start. In fact, most seems to be pretty much standing in one spot when they make contact. So where’s the advantage. If they’re going to just stand there, why bother with the slapping technique? Might as well just set up in the front of the box and swing away.
Slapping is a difficult technique to pull off well. So if you’re going to go to that effort, might as well get the full advantage out of it. The more you can be at a full (or nearly full) run, the faster you’ll get up the line and the more pressure you’ll put on the defense. So despite what the old song says, run don’t walk when you slap.
I love it when the training takes hold
Had one of those experiences that makes a coach feel good — and guilty at the same time. We had a game today, with me coaching third.
We had runners on first and third, and there was a wild pitch. I sent the runner, who is not exactly fast, home as I could see the ball was slowly rolling back to the screen. I could see it was going to be a close play, so I stood there watching it like everyone else. The runner was safe at home on the toss. I then looked toward third, where I saw the runner who had been on first halfway between second and third, looking like she was not exactly sure if she should keep coming. I motioned for her to come and she was safe with no play.
It was a real heads-up play on the runner on first’s part. We’ve been talking about runners using their heads and making judgments on their own. We’ve also been talking about not settling for one base when you can get two. It was cool to see it actually happen.
The only negative was on me. While the play at home was going on, I stood their like a spectator. All I was missing was a box of popcorn and a Diet Coke. What I SHOULD have been doing was ignoring the play at home and looking to the trailing runner. Luckily, the runner was doing her job, even if I wasn’t.
With the A-Team movie coming up, I only have one thing to say about today’s play: I love it when a plan comes together!
Is Softball a Team Sport?
Guest post by Mike Hanscom
Softball is often a series of 1:1 battles. The pitcher against the batter or the runner against the fielder. I always used to say it was a team sport, because everyone else did too. Then I started coaching and realized it is all about individual match-ups and got away from believing it was a team sport. All you need to do is get a bunch of good individuals on the field at the same time so you can win more of those individual battles and then you will dominate, right? I mean, if you win more of those 1:1 battles, how could you not dominate?
I would watch the opponents warm up and know when their individuals were better than ours, or vice versa. I always knew the outcome of that game long before we played it, until we actually played it and it ended differently than I expected. For those games I would sit there afterwards trying to figure out what happened and why. I could pick out that certain player that made the critical error and privately put the blame on them, or on the #4 batter who struck out 3 times, or our pitcher who didn’t strike anyone out or the runner who got thrown out at the plate. There was always another reason nagging at me but I usually ignored it.
That feeling that I would ignore was the underlying feeling that we outplayed them as a team or vice versa. I wasn’t sure what that meant though – this sport is a bunch of individual battles – not a team effort. Seriously, how many players really get involved on a typical play? The pitcher pitches, the batter hits it, the fielder gloves it and throws to first. Four players on the average play, but it was all sequential. Nothing like football where you have running backs and lineman going one way and blocking just so you peel back and throw the opposite direction to a WR down the field. That’s at least 8-9 of the 11 players all doing things at one time to protect the QB, misdirect the defense, free up the WR – now that is teamwork!
Luckily I was an assistant then and simply helped out where I could, and luckily I had other coaches to help show me what it meant to be a team before I became a head coach. I realized that the feeling I was ignoring was the ability to have each player moving at the same time to accomplish a specific task.
I previously only saw the 4 players in the typical play. Now I was understanding that what I was missing was the right fielder moving to back-up the throw, the left and center fielders running to back-up the SS, the 2nd baseman covering 2nd in case the ball gets away and the runner continues to 2nd, the catcher yelling where to go with the ball, the third baseman staying close to the SS in case the ball caroms off the SS.
That is 8-9 out of 9 players involved on the play. Huh, now that is teamwork! That is what I’ve been feeling! Those good teams, they are the ones who have it all synchronized, their players are on the same page and move on every play – nobody is just standing there. Softball isn’t just about teaching the typical play, it is about teaching the kids how to plan for mistakes and what to do when mistakes happen – because they WILL happen. Sounds like a life-lesson if you can teach them to do that for life too.
It is teamwork that prevents the big innings, the big errors. If your left fielder isn’t backing up SS, how far does that grounder that went through the SS’s legs roll and where does that runner stop? Does she score because of it? With teamwork that runner stops at first.
Teamwork is that sac bunt that moves a runner over to get her closer to home to try to get that winning run in. It is that solid hit off the pitcher that gets the bats going because hitting is contagious. It is the batter who struck out on 3 pitches, who comes back to the dugout with her head held high (as opposed to sulking or crying) and tells the next batter what pitches to expect or how they move so she now has a better chance to get those bats going. It is that 2nd baseman yelling the runner is going so the catcher knows to throw her out. It is that catcher acting as a field general yelling where plays are to go that enable good plays to happen. It is the 1st baseman going out for a cut-off to prevent the tying run from coming in. If your kids are doing these types of things on a regular basis, then you are coaching a team and not a group of individuals.
You can see it in the teams that have good teamwork – there is a flow to them with how they warm up, how they encourage each other, how they huddle, how they communicate with each other on the field, how they know where to be in each situation.
Some say it is good coaching, I say it is teamwork, I say it is attitude. Some kids don’t get it – they are there for themselves and don’t care about the team and you can usually see those attitudes from far away. They are the ones standing there without a role after the play has broken down.
You know the kids who have the team attitude and give the extra effort. Not in stretching a single into a double, but the ones who help the other players become better players, team players. Those are the ones who help define that group as a team. They are the kids who others listen to and want to learn from, not necessarily in technique, but in how to make the group of kids work together as a synchronized unit, as a team. You need those kids to help the team be the best it can be. They are the ones who in the end can make the difference between winning and losing.
So if you feel you have a good group of individuals on your squad, then you are probably winning games because you win more of those individual battles (or a bunch of those games if you have that untouchable pitcher and you only need to score one run per game). Are you dominating though, or at least winning the ones you should? If not, then take a look at your kids and decide if you have a group of individuals or a team. If you have a group of individuals, then find those kids who can help you make it a team and get them working on it. If you are one of the better clubs in your area, then I bet you already have those team players on your team and are one of the better teams out there.
Coaching and adversity
Once after a loss, my friend and fellow coach Rich Youngman said one of the more profound things I’ve ever heard in relation to coaching, and certainly one of the most profound things he ever said. After there was some tension about the game, and our poor play, he said, “Adversity doesn’t build character. It reveals it.”
With the high school season well under way, and the summer season for younger players getting under way, those are words for all coaches to remember. It can be very frustrating when your team doesn’t play the way you know it can. It’s aggravating when they let balls go between their legs, or drop in front of them instead of catching them. It’s maddening when they’re taking called third strikes or swinging at balls over their heads. And when the losses start piling up it’s not very much fun to be in charge of the mess.
Believe me, I know. I’ve coached those teams. Sooner or later, most of us will no matter how hard we try to avoid it. As difficult as it is, it’s important to keep it together. You may want to yell, scream and disparage your players, especially if it seems like you’re the only one who feels bad about the poor play, but fight the urge and remember that this too shall pass.
Actually, let me amend that. Sometimes a little strategic yelling can work wonders — if it’s done as a “wakeup call.” What doesn’t work is the complaining-type of yelling, with put-downs and insults thrown in anger. You may feel better temporarily, but in the end it just helps you and the team circle the drain faster.
Once again, remember that adversity doesn’t build character, it reveals it. When adversity strikes, what is it revealing about you?
Game for building communications skills
A few weeks ago the team I’m helping coach now played a practice game. I wasn’t able to attend the game due to a prior commitment, but I did get a report from one of the other coaches. He said one thing the girls had trouble with was communication on the field. Hard to believe, but our girls just weren’t talking.
I told him I have an idea how to take care of it, and asked him to tell the girls to bring a long scarf with them to the next practice. It was a game I improvised that would force them to communicate — a lot. We were going to be in a gym that day so it would be perfect.
When the time came I told them all to get their scarves out. Well, all but two players. I had them wrap the scarves around their eyes so they couldn’t see, and we proceeded to have a little soccer game with a beach ball. To score a goal, a player had to kick the ball over the baseline and betwen the lines of the lane.
In reality, it was really more like foosball. The two girls who didn’t have blindfolds — one on each side — had to direct all the other girls what to do. I told them to be sure they called the player’s name, and be specific.
It was something to see. There was a lot of talking and running around. Yes, there were some bumps and falls along the way but nothing serious.We had a couple of different “captains” on each team at different times, so a good 1/3 of our team had the chance to work on their communication skills. The girls had a lot of fun, and they learned a good lesson on the importance of communication — as well as some specifics on how to communicate.
Today I found out that a couple of the girls had told their middle school coaches about the game, and they’re apparently going to do it in their practices. Gotta love when something off the top of your head becomes a big hit!
Catcher learns a lesson about tucking the chin
Sometimes when I am teaching pitching lessons, I also work with catchers. It’s not a paid thing, just a little something I enjoy doing.
One of those catchers is a young lady named Haley. We’ve worked on stances, framing, throws down to second, and of course blocking. We’ve talked a few times about getting into a good position, with the head forward and chin tucked in. She’s worked on it, but has had a tendency to lean back instead of forward when she drops to her knees. When that happens she tends to lift her head instead of tuck her chin.
Tonight she found out the hard way why it’s important to tuck the chin. The ball bounced up and hit her in the throat. Ouch!
It hurt, but she was fine and was able to continue. She told me afterwards she’s pretty sure she’ll remember to get that chin tucked from now on. Pain is a tough way to learn, but it’s a good teacher.
Once again, the dreaded tunnel
It’s been a while since I’ve written about this, and quite frankly I thought it was gone for good. But a couple of weekends ago I was out at a game, watching, not participating in any way, and at the end something horrible reared its ugly head for the first time in a long time (at least that I know of). It was the dreaded “tunnel.”
For those not familiar with it, it’s something the winning team does after the game. The players divide themselves into two lines facing each other, and raise their arms above their heads. They then start banging hands with the person across from them, all the while chanting “We are proud of you, we are proud of you.”
That in and of itself doesn’t sound so bad. But it’s where they do it. They stand at the entrance of their opponent’s dugout, and force the losing team to walk through this tunnel of arms and bodies to get back to their stuff.
Coaches who do it like to claim it’s a tribute to their opponents. But everyone (including them) knows it’s really not. In fact, it’s a way of celebrating your own victory while rubbing it in the noses of the team that just lost. They may be chanting “We are proud of you” but what they’re really saying is “We just kicked your butts, we just kicked your butts.”
I have no problem with a team celebrating its victory. But you don’t do it on your opponent’s side of the field. You do it on your own side, and leave your opponents completely out of it. To hold your celebration on the other side is a direct insult. If you don’t believe that, imagine if the University of Washington had run to Arizona’s dugout a couple of weeks ago, made a tunnel, and started chanting how proud they were of their defeated opponents. Likely you would’ve seen a full-on fistfight break out.
If I am the losing coach (and again I had nothing to do with this particular game), I don’t really care if you are proud of me. Your opinion means nothing to me. My team and I want to clean up the dugout, leave the area, and go do whatever it is we do after a game. To have to walk through your outstreteched arms is not on my list of things to do.
When my son Eric was in soccer, there was a tunnel there too. But in that case it was created by his team’s parents, and our own players would run under it. It was created in front of his team’s bench. I have no problem with that, and had no problem with it when other teams did the same thing. That was a self-contained celebration instead of an “in-your-face” show of superiority. Again, the boys probably knew better than to try doing that on someone else’s side.
Getting back to softball, I’ve always hated the tunnel. We didn’t do it, and quite frankly when it was more popular I told my girls to walk around it rather than go through it. Some of the parents on our team thought it was poor sportsmanship on my part at first until I explained about celebrating on your own side of the field. They got it, and supported the decision going forward.
One year at a meeting of the weekday travel league we played in I made it clear to the other coaches I didn’t want to see it and wouldn’t let my players go through it, so don’t bother. They all agreed it really wasn’t a good thing, and I thought it had finally disappeared. Until last weekend.
You can try to justify it all you want. But it’s just not sportsmanlike to rub your opponent’s face in a loss — which is what you’re really doing. If you’re doing it, stop. If you’re faced with it, you can make your own decision. But I recommend walking around/ignoring it. It’s the only way to make it stop for good.
Theory on why it’s so hard to move from the cage to the field
Every fastpitch player and coach knows this experience. You’ve been working hard in the batting cage all season. You’ve hit thousands of balls off the tee, and thousands more off a machine, front toss or even full-out pitching. You’ve been ripping the ball every time. Then you get into a game and it’s nothing but pop-ups, weak dribblers to the pitcher, and whiffs.
Yes, it’s certainly frustrating, especially because you were expecting to do so well. But somehow the swing you had in the cage didn’t quite translate to the field.
There can be a lot of contributing factors, many of which have been discussed before. Certainly there’s an element of nervousness in a game situation that you don’t have in practice. You have lots of chances to hit in practice situations, and if you mess one up you just take another. But in a game if you mess up, that’s it. Your time at bat is over.
There’s also worrying about consequences instead of focusing on the process. There’s the pressure of parents, friends, coaches, teammates. In fact, there are all kinds of things that might be the cause.
Yet it even happens to otherwise mentally tough players for reasons no one has ever been able to explain. But I have a theory.
Think about the environment in a batting cage. It’s very closed and very tight. You can see the top/ceiling, sides, and usually even a back wall. If the cage is 70 feet long and eight feet wide, it’s still a pretty narrow space, as shown in the first photo.
Now think about what you see when you stand at home plate. The world is a lot bigger on the field. Instead of a 12 foot ceiling you have infinite space above — the sky. Instead of a back wall you have 180 feet or more to the end — way too far to be of concern. There is a ton of space, plus a ton of distractions. The second photo shows an empty field, but in a real game you’ll have eight players from the other team in front of you, plus a couple of coaches. And baserunners if you’re lucky. You have an opponent and an umpire behind you. And the always “helpful” fans in the stands.
With all that going on, the ball looks pretty small — certainly a lot smaller than it does in a closed cage. It’s the same phenomenon that makes the moon look bigger when it’s low in the sky. When you see the moon near trees or buildings your mind gets the idea of proportion. When it’s overhead, there is no reference point to measure it against so it gets lost against the background of the night sky. In the case of a softball, your reference points to the ball in a cage are a lot closer so it seems bigger, or more important in the space. On the field, the ball takes up a very tiny portion of your field of vision and thus is much tougher to pick out.
Think about how you hit in a cage too. Because it’s a long tunnel, hitters tend to try to hit the ball up the middle. After all, if you hit a screaming line drive down the first or third base line in a cage, it goes about 10 feet, hits a side net and dies. That isn’t much fun. But if you drive it to center, the ball goes the length of the cage. That feels good, so you focus on driving it down the center. On a field, though, there’s a lot of space ot hit the ball, so it tends to go all over.
Anyway, that’s my theory about the problem. So what’s the cure? You have to visualize the cage on the field, as shown in the third photo. Essentially you have to create a small space in your mind where the ball is bigger relative to the backg
round so you can see it better, and you can stay focused on driving it into a gap.
If you can “see” the cage in your mind, it should help you look where you ought to be looking, and see better than if you’re taking in the entire field plus sidelines.
Give it a try, and give me your feedback on how it worked. If you’re a coach, feel free to copy the photos and show them to your team. I’ll be interested in hearing if this theory proves itself to be true.
The 43 ft. HS distance appears to be having the desired effect
Back when the National Federation announced it was moving the high school pitching distance to 43 ft., the main reason cited by most pundits was they wanted to get more offense in the game. At 40 ft. the pitchers were dominating, and it was believed that moving the pitching rubber back three feet might change that. While the change doesn’t go into effect officially until the 2011 season, many states adopted it immediately, including Illinois, where I live.
Now that we’re a couple of weeks into the season it looks like the move is having the desired effect. Where normally pitchers are ahead of the hitters in the early part of the season, I’ve been seeing a lot of double-digit scores in games in the Chicago suburbs. Certainly a lot more than in the past.
What’s really been interesting is it seems to have had the most profound effect on the “power” pitchers — the girls who relied primarily on their speed to get them by. It doesn’t seem to have affected the ones who can top 60 mph regularly, but they are few and far between. For those in the mid-to-upper 50s, however, it’s made a big difference.
I can think of one in particular. She has been a stud on varsity since she was a freshman. She was highly touted in the newspapers, and always racked up great numbers for strikeouts and ERA. I never quite understood how, since I saw little movement on her ball and while she threw hard she didn’t throw that hard. Apparently, though, she threw hard enough to dominate at 40 ft.
Now, maybe she has something else going on too and this is just a coincidence. But as I look in the box scores and summaries in the local paper, her numbers have inflated considerably. She is giving up 10-12 runs per game, and maybe striking out one or two hitters most of the time. It’s not all errors either. I see double-digit hits and maybe a couple of errors in the box score. She just doesn’t seem to be as effective now that she’s a senior.
That seems odd to me. If anything, you’d think she’d be better now than her freshman year. Again, maybe there’s an injury or something going on. But my guess is it’s the distance. She just can’t blow it by the hitters as easily as she used to.
What’s really unfortunate for the team is they have one of those coaches who never bothered to develop anyone else. If her team played 250 innings, she pitched 250 innings. Now, when she could use a little help, there’s no one there to help her. If the other team catches on to her, she has to stand there and take the beating. You would figure a change of pace of any sort ought to at least slow things down for a bit. But they don’t have that option, so there have been a lot of lopsided scores.
This seems pretty consistent throughout our area. Scores are rising, ERAs are rising, and strikeout numbers are falling. The fans are definitely seeing more offense (except from the really poor hitting teams), and more players are involved throughout the game. Time will tell if this is a good thing. In the meantime, pitchers start working more on your movement. You’re going to need it.
Life in the Fastpitch Lane 