Coach's priorities/obligations for 8th graders

I would let the HS coach determine where the kids play when the time comes. It's not up to you to prepare them for certain HS positions. Between 8th grade a senior year a whole lot of changes are going to take place with these kids. Play them at the spots that best help THE TEAM and let high school take care of itself. You may feel your job is to prepare them for high school; you do this by pounding the fundementals. Get that 2nd basemen hitting like a wild animal and problem solved.

Remember, these kids are smart, when you play kids out of position, they know it. You may not get your best effort from THE TEAM next summer if you do this.

We had a freshman start on our HS varsity team this year. He played right field. It was the first time he had played outfield in his entire life. As a soph he will be moved to the middle infield.

Nothing wrong with moving kids around a little(at that age you need to do it anyway because of pitching) but for me I like them in their primary spot so my defense can gel. Thats my way, I'm sure you will get some other opinions, some contrary to mine and they will be good ones. That's what makes this place so helpful.

will - I like your kids first approach and your emphasis on teaching/development rather than winning. I think I agree with TripleDad also that I wouldn't worry too much about where they play in high school and that kids recognize if they are playing out of position. I think that is mostly a problem if they are playing grossly out of position however such as having a lunking first baseman playing shortstop which I am sure you would not do.

Other than that, the issue may be one of communications with the kids and their parents. For pitchers, you might want to indicate some philosophy of giving them all equal time at different times of the game and that should keep all your pitchers well-motivated.

For hitters, here is what my son's college coach said: "If you can hit, we will find a place in the field for you to play." Thus, to sell the idea of exposure to different positions, you might want to indicate the main thing for fall ball is to get your regular hitting in while learning other positions with less pressure on you. It just might pay off some day. Some kid might find himself behind an all conference performer at his favored positon yet find he can beat some other kid out at another position. The main thing I was concerned about with my son was that he got to play. The fact he has gotten to play several positions while he was younger helped him in high school and in college find his way into the lineup.

I just saw piaa_ump's post below - excellent advice

As an Umpire, I appreciate what you are trying to do...I would welcome some more "all around" ball players on my frosh team (JV/VARSITY) I see way too many "I only play 2nd Base" players...in my HS ball arena......

As an Dad, I can only relate to what my son has experienced...........only 4 of my sons teammates from his PONY league championship team made the starting lineup at the HS Varsity level....sucess at one level is no guarantee of success at a higher level.........

My son was a SS/P all his HS career.......went to college as a SS/2B (note all the college second basemen were shortstops in HS).....then has transitioned into 3b/1b.....this past summer in his wood bat league he played 3B, SS, 2B, 1B and catcher.....oh yes, and he played RF in the second game of a DH .....versatility has kept him in the game and not on the bench..........

unless you are solely a pitcher, I urge everyone in youth ball to have skills that apply to other positions........ especially as you ascend the baseball ladder where opportunity may come at a position you dont expect.....

i think all kids should play every where. when things aren't the right fit you'll both know it. but to often kids can't play the position thats open. if your an athlete you'll play any where but some youngsters aren't there yet. if you were a math teacher, you wouldn't just teach addition would ya? move em around but explain yourself. they'll get it.

Unless you have a good relationship with the hs coaches these players will see next year, preparing them for positions you believe are currently filled or will be available is just a guess. Educated, perhaps, but a guess nonetheless.

I'll echo CD's words --- if their bats are working, there will be a place for them. And bats generally work better in the hands of a confident player. At this stage of their baseball, playing where they know they can contribute assists that overall confidence.

By my reading of your post, you're experimenting with the players on the field but perhaps didn't explain your motivations to the players (or their parents if that's your MO) in advance. If you're going to try something radical with the team, gaining their understanding can smooth the path. Your reasoning here is something many pre-hs players and parents don't consider --- that their favored position is already filled by a good player, perhaps only a year older. Had you let them know your plans in advance, their minds might not be quite so lost .

Practice is the time you can hit fly balls to everybody; it's not as if that's a skill unique to OFers. Same with cutoff drills. You and the players might discover hidden talents that way, while leaving the team the opportunity to succeed in games.

Keep in mind the mental aspects as well. Fall ball or not, coming off a losing season is a tough way to inspire confidence for the next season...particularly leading up to hs tryouts.

I would play the players at the position that is best for the current team, whatever that may be. Like TripleDad said, things are going to change so much for them over the next few years that their future positions will work themselves out. More important to me would be the things that the players will have to do regardless of position in the future. No matter where they play, they’re going to have to hit, know how to run the bases, etc. This is not to say that creating a bit of versatility is a bad thing, because it’s certainly not as has been alluded to in other posts on this thread. I’m just saying that to me, there’s no real reason to stick your best second baseman in left field just for the sake of sticking him out there.

Additionally (and I may take some grief for saying this) but there are certain position switches that any reasonably athletic player should be able to make. Any player that is athletic enough to play second base should be able to make a pretty easy transition to left field (assuming there are no vision issues) down the road, so to me this is a relatively pointless switch at this time. Of course there are some nuances to each position that will only be learned through experience at that position. In general, any player that can play up the middle of the field should possess the skill set to be able to play a corner position at least adequately (taking handedness into account).

Personally, I think fall ball is the perfect time to take a look at any player willing to try pitching. I would do this in very controlled situations, especially if it’s a player who’s never really pitched before. These boys are at an age when all sorts of things are changing for them and they’re starting to mature physically, so just because a player hasn’t pitched previously doesn’t mean he doesn’t (or won’t eventually) have what it takes to pitch.

Move them and make sure they all can play the outfield. Our moronic high school coach just assumes anyone can play the outfield, it's the infield that are the skill positions, and that cost us many a game when he put one of his precious infielders in the outfield without ever or hardly ever practicing there.

Your obligation to any team / player is to teach the game in practice and then get out of the way during games.

There really isn't a right or wrong answer to this. There is merit to moving them around as long as you are teaching the skills specific to that position while they are there. There is merit to teaching one position and let them excell at it and learn others as they go along. Both have been successful in the past and both will be successful in the future.

Emanski's heroes is right that if a player has athletic ability they can make the transition to another position fairly easily. They need to work at it in practice but shouldn't that long if they can play the game.

Teach the game and everything will fall into place. Just remembet that you might be doing a lot of teaching but that doesn't mean there will be a lot of learning happening. Get it done in practice before you try it in a game - then get out of the way.

There's really no way you can know how the HS coach is going to think. I'd recommend trying to give all the kids opportunities to work at the positions they want to go out for because that is what they are going to tryout for not the positions you think they have the best shot at. Let the HS coaches make the position switches. They can probably tell which kids are the athletes and move them to the appropriate positions.

As an example of how different coaches can be from what one expects, during our last game of winter ball before the freshman season I sat our best hitter most of the game. I told him I was doing it because I expected him to be playing almost every inning once the freshman coach took over and I wanted to give other kids a chance to play. As it turned out, the freshman coach took the worst player on the team, who had the worst attitude, but who happened to be the brother of one of his friends, a second baseman, BTW, made him a team captain and played him almost every inning, had him leadoff almost every game despite his hitting .000 through 2/3 of the season and finishing well under .100 and sat the team's best hitter most of the season before driving him out of the program. Don't make assumptions about what the HS coaches are going to do.

My son's team just bumped up to 15U with fall ball. For the past two years we've taught almost everyone how to play the outfield. We would rotate infielders into the outfield in pool games we knew we would win anyway.

Whatever you do you can't please all the parents. When I was the head coach of the 13U team, one parent accused me of spending more time prepping my son to play high school ball than other players. What I was guilty of was not giving my son a position. He played whatever position the pitcher played when he wasn't pitching. He did this because he was the most versatile on the team. This strategy meant he played second, short, third, center and caught, in addition to pitching.

Another parent complained because I didn't give his son a chance to play shortstop. He was about the eighth best shortstop on the team. He had played short in LL, so of course he should play short in USSSA Majors.

When kids get to high school the upperclassmen typically have a lock on the infield. If a kid can hit as a freshman or sophomore he can start in right or left if he can handle the position. It's a benefit to have played outfield before getting to high school.

But regardless of anything I've posted or anyone else has posted, you're in charge, not the parents.

Our team is only playing .500 ball this fall after finishing high in the rankings for 06/07. Why are we only playing .500 ball? We're playing up a year or two to get the kids ready for high school ball.

Challenge your players. Development at fourteen years old is way more important than winning.

quote:

friends, a second baseman, BTW, made him a team captain and played him almost every inning, had him leadoff almost every game despite his hitting .000 through 2/3 of the season and finishing well under .100 and sat the team's best hitter most of the season before driving him out of the program.

Tho ole "hit until he gets hot philosophy" jeeeze, that is so bad.

Wow, terrific posts from everyone. I really appreciate it.

I should probably clarify a couple things. First, we are 13u playing up against 14u and 15u teams (our first time on full size fields). Second, I am using fall ball to pitch at least 5 different kids each game while the other teams pitch their 1-2 best pitchers the entire game. I think of fall as instructional and I want every kid to get a taste of pitching from 60.6. So, for those reasons, I'm not too concerned about losing in fall ball though I don't want to get too used to it.

Having a chance to read through the posts, I've concluded that I'm probably trying to do too much in a short fall ball season. I only took over this team at the end of summer and felt an obligation to do whatever I could to get the kids ready for freshman tryouts in January/February. But now I think I should just let the freshman season roll through and see how it comes out....see what positions they play, how they pitch and hit, and then when summer ball rolls around next year, use that information to get each of them good experience at the positions they will need for the following year of school ball.

The other issue I have is that there were 2-3 kids playing out of position all year (discretion of the previous head coach) and in particular, our SS was terrible but his dad and our coach are close friends. (I know you've all been there.) I've moved the one kid on our team that can play SS next year into the SS position for nearly every inning of fall ball so I can see if it will work for next year. He played LF all this year and was pretty good, but he just looks like a natural shortstop. That's just one example. I'm not moving everyone into new positions, just trying to get kids in spots where they can be productive and in a couple cases, put them in spots where they can gain some versatility.

I'm feeling much better now that I've heard from you all. If you have further thoughts please don't hesitate to jump back in.

Jon

Another thing you can do is schedule doubleheaders on some weekends rather than play tournaments. Parents don't freak out when coaches experiment in non tournament games. I used a doubleheader to prove to a PITA mom her son can't play short. He didn't make an error so she didn't get it. I had to point out all the balls he didn't reach other players would have made a play on.

It didn't get better. The mother would point out errors the regular shortstop and my son would make. I'd point out her son wouldn't have got his glove on it. She couldn't be happy he was a very good third baseman.

When we merged our team with another team he wasn't invited along. It had nothing to do with talent. It was all about the mother being a PITA. Some parents can't be pleased.

Want to know what will help them the most? Spend alot of time on teaching throwing , hitting , fielding and catching mechanics. Bring in some guys to teach with and for you that have experience.

Put them on a long toss , core strength , agility and speed program. Teach them about the need for proper nutrition for athletes as well.

Alot of kids play baseball alot. Very few learn to work on the things that will make them capable of becoming a better player. Most kids coming into HS programs are too slow, too weak, lack arm strength and are way behind at the plate.

Play some. Train alot. Teach all the time. My new motto!!! Good luck coach. Thanks for caring about the boys.

Oh as far as playing different posistions I think thats great. Move them around and let them learn to be as versatile as possible. The only two posistions I never made a kid play were catcher and pitcher. JMHO

The biggest difference between incoming freshmen and upperclassmen is upper body strength and speed in the field. Those 14U line drives are now high school flares.