I've written a few hitting blogs lately so thought I'd spend a little time talking about defense today.
As coaches, in addition to trying to get our kids as many reps as possible (groundballs, flyballs, 1st base footwork, flips at 2nd base, etc), we also want to make sure we're teaching live scenarios in practice so that all that hard work on the skills gets put to good use on game day!
The easiest way to teach defensive movement is to start with the "3 B's." Ball. Base. Backup.
At the Rookie/Farm/Minor level, focus on the following concepts:
- In the infield, it's easiest for your players to start to understand their responsibilities by dividing the field in half by drawing an imaginary line from home plate straight through the pitchers mound to 2nd Base. Any time a ground ball is hit to the left side of the infield, the Shortstop and 3rd Baseman's first instinct should be to go get the BALL, while the 2nd Basemen and 1st Baseman's first move should be to go cover their base.
2. The exact opposite is true for when the ball is hit to the right side of the infield. 2nd and 1st should react towards the ball while 3rd and SS should go cover their base.
This will help make it very clear when a player should go get the ball and when a player should go cover a base and will eventually eliminate the situations where a ground ball is hit towards the 2nd baseman, for example, and his first reaction is to cover the base, rather than to go get the ball.
After the players on the side of the infield where the ball is hit make their first move towards the ball, if they don't get the ball, they should immediately start thinking about going to cover a base. Players can do more than 1 "B" on a single play!
With some practice, your infielders will start making better decisions about what their responsibilities are when the ball is hit and the correct order of those responsibilities.
For outfielders at this level, a good first goal is to get them to start to react to the hit immediately. Many young outfielders, including at the Minor Level, don't move until the ball gets past the infielders and then they're late getting involved in the play. They should learn to start moving towards the ball as soon as it's hit so that if it does get through the infield, they're already in a position to pick it up and throw it back into the infield.
Dividing the field into half works for outfielders as well and if the ball is not hit towards them, they can skip to the 3rd B, which is Backup. We can confidently tell outfielders that they'll basically never find themselves in a situation where they are supposed to be covering a base.
If you can get your outfielders to quickly react to the batted ball, that's a huge win at this level. If they react AND then go to move to backup a base, that's absolutely incredible as backing up bases consistently is definitely a work in progress all the way through Little League.
The most important thing we do as coaches is encourage every single player to move somewhere the instant the ball is hit. Give them permission to be wrong! Let them know that covering or backing up the wrong base is 100 times better than standing around and doing nothing. As they start moving more, they'll start making the right decision of where to move more often - kids learn by doing and mistakes at this level (and ALL levels of Little League) are not only OK but should be supported as part of the learning process.
And finally, be patient with them as they learn. You and I have been playing/watching baseball for decades; what seems extremely obvious and second-nature to us will NOT seem obvious and second-nature to most kids. Encourage and support them as they start learning the intricacies of team defense.
At the Intermediate and Major levels, infielders should be pretty dialed in with their reactions and responsibilities, but outfielders will likely still need work on predicting the action and moving to back-up a base ahead of the play.
For example, on a groundball to 3rd with nobody on, the RF should immediately sprint from his position to get into a backup position behind 1st base in case of an overthrow. At the same time, an advanced CF will realize that if the throw from 3rd gets past the 1st baseman and the runner tries to go to 2nd that the next throw will be coming from 1st to 2nd and he should get into a backup position behind 2nd.
While at the younger ages we are working to get players to react correctly to the action, at the older ages we are working to get players to react correctly while ALSO preparing for the rest of potential action in advance.
Teams with a very active defense with players who communicate non-stop throughout the play are usually tough to beat!
PLAY HARD, HAVE FUN!