Grooming a student assistant/manager

Never done it and never heard of it.  My biggest question / concern would be is how do the guys on the team regard / treat him?  If he has "coaching" responsibilities then what happens if the guys on the team tell him to go "do things" to himself?  What if he's in the locker room with them and hears / sees something that violates team / school rules?  What if the kid starts getting full or himself and bossing the players around?

I can't see myself ever doing this to be honest.  Keeping scorebook / stats is one thing but to take on actual coaching duties is a little too far.

I would not classify or give the title of coach to the kid. In this case it was clearly a player on the team, a student. Thats how i would keep it. But, it would be clear to him that he has more of a manager/team assistant type of role. I was quite surprised to see this guy calling pitches. But, in our area good help is hard to find and a kid who loves the game, is savy, and can help rally the troops but doesnt quite have the physical talent is worth keeping around/involved in sports.  I just happened to see it working and im always looking to get more from my bench any way i can. 

Was this guy calling pitches or relaying signals to what was called?  If he's calling pitches then he's the one who is deciding what pitch should be thrown - that's the duty of a coach.  If he's being told by a coach to throw a certain pitch then relay the sign to the catcher then it's a little different.  Still pretty big responsibility because what if he calls the wrong pitch by mistake and it gets sent over the fence?  I've done that myself on accident.  I wouldn't want that feeling on a HS kid just helping out.  

I have no idea what to tell you in how to groom this kid but if you go with it then I wish you luck.  Make sure to come back and tell us how it goes.  I would love to hear your thoughts on it after it's over.

Yeah, im still very much on the fence about whether or not its appropriate, or at least, what things would and wouldnt be appropriate. i was really surprised to see this kids level of inolvement. Id never seen it before, but it seemed to work well for them. Maybe there was something really special about him, im not sure. Im thinking at this point to have it be more of a manager/player situation. Have a non-team member manager just keeping book, and then this kid coaching base, keeping some other stats like spray charts, pitch count etc. you bring up some good points coach. it seemed to me like he was calling the pitches himself as well as having a more than normal level of involvement as base coach. at the very least, and definitely writing some stats and such while others were doing book.

im going to send you a dialog shortly 2709 with somewhat of a loaded question if you wouldnt mind lending some wisdom. thanks!

I was thinking there must be something special about this kid as well in order for him to have this much responsibility.  Why not contact the coach of that team and ask him what the deal is?  I would be surprised if he wouldn't say something about what's going on if you asked.

Shoot me the dialog and I'll do my best on the wisdom part.  I've been known to shoot more brown stuff than actual wisdom  LOL 

yeah, we have a coaches meeting to select an all star team later this week and i was planning on asking him. Really nice guy. im sure he will fill me in.

It could be something as simple as being a starting catcher who got hurt and is calling from the sidelines. however, the catcher they had was quite good. i would hate to think that it was their #2 guy haha!

How do you know this kid was player/HS student?  Any chance he could have been a recent grad who was helping out as an assistant? 

he was in full uniform and in and out of the dugout with the rest of the team. once your out of high school, in order to be in the dugout at all, you must be fingerprinted and on record with the school and state. I have a parent who is a great guy and long time LL coach who keeps book from time to time, but he is not fingerprinted so he must be not be on the field. Im not sure if this is just a Maine rule or a NFHS rule.