As Spring Training's 2022 Fall Ball season enters the proverbial 9th inning, I thought I would share some thoughts on helping your ballplayer improve their defensive skills. I like to think of youth baseball games as a race to 18 outs and while everyone loves hitting at practice, defense too often gets overlooked.

In Minors and Intermediates, the vast majority of balls put in play are groundballs so I think it's smart as a parent/coach to spend most of your time practicing that skill, and today I want to focus on a single drill that will help create aggressive defenders. (And obviously, this drill is very beneficial for Major level players as well).

When a groundball is hit, most Little Leaguers will either wait for it to come to them or worse, back up to field the ball. We want to teach the exact opposite - we want our infielders aggressively attacking groundballs.

To help them to do this, put your ballplayer at a true SS or 2B position and when you hit them a groundball, challenge them to field the ball before it gets to the infield dirt.

This will force their first step to be IN (aka "charge the ball") and help teach them to make an immediate and aggressive move towards ball as soon as it's hit.

Of course, even if they can't get to the ball before it hits the infield dirt, by moving their feet IN towards the ball, they will still have accomplished 4 very important goals.

By attacking groundballs...

1. They will have a much shorter throw to 1st
2. They will have more time to make a good throw
3. They will have time to potentially bobble the ball and still get an out
4. They will get fewer bad hops

1) Especially in Minors when arm strength is still a work in progress for all players, having a shorter throw increases the chances of getting the ball to 1st in the air, therefore making it easier for the 1st baseman to make the catch.

2) By getting to the ball quicker, their throw to beat a batter flying down the line won't be rushed, leading to more accuracy.

3) If they've been aggressive attacking the ball, even if they bobble it, they still might have time to get a runner out.

4) The fewer hops the ball takes, the fewer chances it has to take a "bad hop."

More advanced infielders can start trying to read the bouncing ball and use their footwork to get into a position to almost always field the "long hop" or the "short hop" while avoiding the "in-between hop," but at the Minor and Intermediate levels, I would focus entirely on creating the good habit of aggressively attacking groundballs before worrying about higher level strategies and techniques.

If you incorporate this drill in addition to teaching them to get their gloves down and dirty to avoid the ball going between their legs, you will have made great strides (see what I did there?) in helping them become successful infielders.

Play Hard, Have Fun!