Starting with early in the season, prepare your players and coaching staff with the essentials from name tags, to rapport building exercises, rules and expectation. Lay out your guidelines from day one and stick to them throughout the season. Be sure to hold your players accountable. When they know there are consequences for their actions, they will learn from one another and you will earn their trust and respect.  Explain the importance of having fun, but also paying attention to the rules and working hard.

To keep your team engaged and focused, create stations and keep them moving. Use our enclosed Field Utilization Guides for examples of what the field might look like with four stations set up, designed to utilize the entire field. You’ll learn how to create game-like situations for your players to work through. We want our players to communicate with one another. We want to put pressure on them in practice so that it is less difficult when they play in a game – their high level of preparation will make the real game feel “easy” and more fun.

Find out how to effectively use props including Wiffle balls, Incrediballs, and squishy balls for all skill sets. These exercises help your players to start to play with confidence, which will make it easier to teach them the proper mechanics of each skill set. Each week, you can move onto harder drills and more realistic game speed movements. Before you know it, they will be using real baseballs and ready to compete in game situations. This is especially useful for younger plays who are more prone to accidents during practice that might erode their confidence.