Baseball Practice - How to Prepare for a Successful Season

Baseball Practice - How to Prepare for a Successful Season
By Kenny Buford

The key to successful baseball practice -- and a successful season -- is communication. Coaches, players, and parents should all be on the same page regarding the expectations and philosophy of the team.

Communication is Key

Some important issues that should be communicated at the beginning of the season are:


Schedule: players and parents should receive a practice and game calendar as soon as possible so that they can make family and travel plans around it.
Uniform: communicate to players (and parents, depending on age) what you expect them to wear to practice. Games will most likely require uniforms, but if you have any expectations of what players will wear to practice, you need to let them know early.
Practice plan: coaches and players should know what's expected of them during practice and how long each practice is going to last. Each coach should have a clipboard outlining the practice plan for that day, and it would also be beneficial for the plan to be posted so that players can access it as well.
Having all this information available requires a lot of organization and thinking ahead. By knowing your philosophy and approach ahead of time, you can effectively communicate with your team.

Organizing Baseball Practice

When organizing a practice schedule, you should first consider what your goals are for both the short and long term. This will help you determine what to accomplish over the entire season, and you can then break it down into months, weeks, and single practice sessions. Your plan should be flexible to allow change as needed, but having goals will keep your team focused and provide direction for the season.

Any given practice might go something like this:


Begin with stretching while talking about baseball. Players should get their head in the game as soon as practice starts.
Next have the players run to get warmed up.
After running, pair up the players for catch. More advanced players should be paired based on their positions, and beginning players should be paired based on ability level.
Next players should work on drills based on their positions. When teaching drills, coaches should first demonstrate them so that they know players do them correctly, and then have them repeat the drill until it becomes habit.
After drills on the individual, group, and team level, players should have batting practice.
The final part of practice should be running. Running conditioning is most effective if it is somehow related to game play, like exercises to improve base-running technique or even sprinting on or off the field.
For a successful season, practices should be consistent and progressive. Follow the steps above for each practice, knowing ahead of time which skills you would like to focus on. By being organized and communicating your goals to your team, players will come to practice knowing that their hard work is going to pay off!

To learn more coaching tips, go here to watch a free video:

http://www.baseball-tutorials.com/vid/
Kenny Buford is a youth baseball coach, and the owner and publisher of Baseball-Tutorials.com, the web's #1 resource for baseball practice drills, tips, and ideas for youth and high school coaches.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Kenny_Buford

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Baseball Practice Schedule - How to Stay in Peak Performance Shape

Baseball Practice Schedule - How to Stay in Peak Performance Shape
By Guest Author Jack Perconte

Baseball Practice Schedule - How to Stay in Peak Performance Shape

Adhering to a baseball practice schedule is important for serious baseball players. However, I am a big believer in having young athletes play as many sports as reasonable and affordable. Playing other sports can help players develop the footwork and hand/eye coordination that can enhance players' baseball skills. Additionally, playing other sports can keep players from burning out on baseball at a young age.

Over the past fifteen years or so, travel sports have become so prominent for youth athletes. This movement into travel sports has led to athletes specializing at younger and younger ages. When athletes should specialize is a subject for another day, but the point is that multiple sports can be very beneficial for baseball players being able to stay in peak performance shape and for avoiding burnout.

Having said that, it is also important to have young athletes whose favorite sport is baseball, to practice and play baseball for more months out of the year than just their regular season. I believe a good plan for developing successful baseball players and for staying in peak performance shape is to add one month of baseball play and practice to a players schedule for every year beginning at age 9. For example, nine-year-old players should play an extra month beyond their regular season schedule and ten year olds, who love baseball, should play and /or practice two extra months. By the time a player is a teenager they should be playing and practicing baseball for up to nine months out of the year. A three-month break, when players can totally get away from baseball is always recommended, even for the most serious players.

Other suggestions to develop a complete baseball practice schedule to maintain peak performance shape are:

1. Bigger, stronger and faster is always better so having young athletes perform age-appropriate speed and strengthening programs is beneficial.

2. Learning the correct fundamentals is priceless. Having players receive professional, fundamental instruction is important. Developing correct throwing mechanics is especially important for avoiding arm injury.

3. The best time to build arm strength is a throwing program beginning after the regular season when players' arms are in shape. The exception would be for pitchers who threw a heavy inning load during their season.

4. An off-season baseball program that promotes fun and fundamentals is a good start before preseason baseball practice begins.

5. Protecting the arm is of paramount importance so a strict pitch and inning limit should be placed on pitchers.

6. Hitters should get in the pattern of using a batting tee for warm-ups and for performing good, fundamental hitting drills.

7. Working hard is always advised but having rest periods and off-days is necessary to remain in peak performance shape, too.

8. Baseball is a game of repetition and nowhere is that more important than when performing fielding drills. Players need to work on fielding as much as they do the other parts of the game.

9. Running the bases for correct footwork and timing is important, as well as for conditioning work.

10. Game play is of course necessary for learning game strategy, as long as a limit on games is adhered to for young ballplayers. Burnout can occur in young ballplayers with an overabundance of games mixed in with practice.

Finally, it is always a good idea to analyze players' school and other sport schedule in order to draw up a good yearly baseball practice schedule that suits that individual.

Former major league baseball player, Jack Perconte gives baseball hitting tips and batting practice advice for ballplayers of all ages. His baseball playing lessons, books and advice can be found at http://www.baseballhittinglessons.com/baseball Jack is the author of two books, The Making of a Hitter and Raising an Athlete - his positive parenting advice and books can be found at http://positiveparentinginsports.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jack_Perconte

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Youth Baseball Coaching Practice Schedules and Fields

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Article Title:
Youth Baseball Coaching Practice Schedules and Fields
By John Nowly

Practice is defined as doing or repeating a pattern, or polishing a skill. What we are trying to do is polish the skill. Practice is the tires that make the vehicle go. Practice is the oil that makes the machine run. You will be shaping young minds on your new endeavor. Some of the youngsters you get might be stepping onto the field for the first time in their lives. It is quite possible you will get kids who do not have any ability to make contact with a baseball or have any idea how to judge a fly ball. As a coach, it is important that you provide an informative environment to learn a new skill and develop an effective program for developing that skill.

The informative environment is something we will be covering in lesson seven with baseball drills. Developing these skills happens in the running and planning of practices. In today's high tech, instant satisfaction, high-energy world, everyone is always in a hurry. I suggest setting up a consistent practice schedule. You will find it can be extremely beneficial for everyone involved. Chances are when the season starts you will not have your game times yet but you will have an idea of which nights you will be playing.

One of the advantages of deciding your practice schedule as soon as possible is so you can get the fields locked up. At the beginning of the year before the games start, you will want to get in as much practice as possible. Typically, practices can be for 2 to 6 weeks before your first games are scheduled. I would suggest that you would want to practice at least 1 and a half to 2 hours per session. Any longer than that, depending on the age of the kids, you risk losing their attention. After a week or two of practice, you will get a feel for how long you can practice before the learning curve takes a belly flop into home plate. This is something you need to be in tune with as a coach in order to maximize your time while you have their full attention.

What you want to do is set a practice time that is the same every single non-game day. In the beginning of the year, you should not have problems getting in all your practices. Once the games start, fields and peoples schedules get full. Make sure to print your practice schedule out on a piece of paper and give to the kids. Start with a Monday thru Friday practice schedule. This gives everyone his or her weekends open for now. A start time that is after work is recommended as this time works best for all involved. It gives time for the kids to get their homework done, stay after school as necessary, and gives the parents time to get home from work. Setting practice at 5 to 6:30, 5:30 to 7 or 6 to 7:30 seem to be the best times for parents. It gives them time to get the kids from daycare, and drive your future All Star shortstop to baseball practice. It will also give the parents time to be involved, sit, and watch their child practice. Another benefit is that this time will be consistent with game times after the season starts. Consistency is easier on everybody as it is one less thing to remember. Practice is everyday at the same time.

When the games start, the practice schedule will change. Say your games are on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Practice will then be every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Alternatively, if you play Wednesdays and Fridays, practice is every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday.

Do you notice anything about the above schedule? I will give you a hint. I do not do windows on weekends. Ideally, your league does not schedule games on Saturday. This can vary from city to city and having a Saturday morning game is still quite popular. If that is the case, you might be playing a Thursday, Saturday schedule. Schedule your practices then for Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. My philosophy of practice schedules is that weekends are off days for family. Many people work all week and the weekend should be time for the family to be able to get together and go out of town or spend quality time together.

ProfessorNow.com™ offers free educational courses in an easy to follow format in various subjects. To view a free online course covering the subject of this article, please visit www.professornow.com/coursedescription/coachingyouthbaseball/index.html [http://www.professornow.com/coursedescription/coachingyouthbaseball/index.html]

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=John_Nowly

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