How much is too much and who really cares?

OK. From someone working on a doctorate in education, this may sound a little bit odd, but what is the difference between baseball lessons, travel teams, and math tutors or private
schools? They serve the same purpose, to meet a perceived failing of the current system (wRECk ball or substandard schools). We all want "the best" for our children, regardless of what we perceive "better" to be.

The s****r folks actually have this right--recreational leagues for those that want it, and different levels of "select" ball for those who want more. It's a good thing. These types of leagues breed competition, just as AAU/USSSA/CABA/NABF ball breeds competition. Think about it, whether in education or athletics, kids need and WANT to be challenged.

A downfall of public education, in some case, is that the system slides down to the lowest common denominator (the brigther kids are NOT challenged and their performance falls, while the less academically talented students may rise. Thus, they begin to meet in the middle, in the MEDIOCRITY range).

Same thing with wRECk ball. The more talented players may actually regress. I saw this in three years of part-time travel ball, when we played in just early spring and fall and our players went back to their wRECk leagues in the spring. They got sloppy and didn't have to use all their skills. They moved towards the mediocrity range.

So, why not challenge the players that want to make the most of their ability. Why not allow our sons to compete with, and against, the best our areas or states have to offer. Just as better schools have better teachers that produce better students, so too can travel ball.

JB...

Great topic. Very topical. Very important.

As an instructor of sports those dollars spent go directly into my pocket...I have also seen the baseball development process from the view of coach and parent...

IMO development of players is not just a scientific, monetary, and technical project it is truely an art. Every player is different. Everyone has different needs. Every player develops at a different pace. Some mature early. Some respond very well to lessons others don't. Some will respond to year round, others from the same family will burnout at that pace.

There is no one stop shopping.

IMO parents need to learn to "read" their players and most importantly listen. They are not baseball products they are people...parents need to treat them as such. This is not always easy, burnout and a need for rest can be construed as laziness. Growth can wear players out and make them seem lazy. Hormones can LITERALLY change a player overnight with or without lessons. For example my older thinned incredibly when the hormones kicked in, my younger in the last few weeks has suddenly found
much needed footspeed...yes lessons may have contributed by the amount of improvement cannot be completely attributed to lessons.

JB...you are exactly right....As competition in the baseball world intensifies it is going to become harder and harder to treat kids as individuals and easier to treat them as products and spend and spend to keep up with the family next door. I am currently watching young players burn out at a freightning rate.

In the end I think the most important factor is the ability to listen to and "read" your player.

If a player has input they will feel the power to control their own destinies, to make decisions, to make bad decision, and sometimes even fail...they will grow not only as players but as people.

In the end isn't that the goal?

observer44:

quote:

In the end I think the most important factor is the ability to listen to and "read" your player.

And this ability is not necessarily easy to come by and maintain...the same could be said of coaching...managing all of the variables and intangibles...much hard work and at times mentally exhausting...and if done correctly culminating in a completely solid player in the case of an instuctor or a completely solid team in the case of a coach.

In the end...that is the goal!

Justbaseball,

You sound like Lincoln when he described McClellan ("He has the sloes"). There are some things that can be trained, like pitching mechanics and hitting mechanics, but I have my doubts about sprinting mechanics. It's like trying to teach quickness. Or like trying to train McClellan to cut off Lee before he got back to protect Richmond. Speed, like Grant is born, not taught.

My suggestion: Pay for the pitching and hitting lessons, and forget the speed stuff.

.

quote:

...if done correctly culminating in a completely solid player in the case of an instuctor or a completely solid team in the case of a coach.

And in the case of a family...a completely solid human being and citizen...because...

quote:

In the end...that is the goal!

Yup.

quote:

Originally posted by Glider:


My suggestion: Pay for the pitching and hitting lessons, and forget the speed stuff.

Glider, I think that speed absolutely can be taught. My son did the Frappier Acceleration program for a period of 8 weeks. Reduced his 40 time by over .2 of a second. Teaches form, strength and explosion. Speed is huge in college athletics. It is taught and is extremely important.

I agree. My son spent the winter before his 9th grade year working on agility/speed/core training and it was the best $$ we ever spent. Had a great JV season and it set him on course for where he is now.

quote:

Glider, I think that speed absolutely can be taught.

Infielddad,

If you think speed can be taught, go ahead and spend your money on it. I have seen many examples of hitting and pitching lessons work, but I have never seen a slow kid become significantly faster with 'speed' lessons. I have seen a lot of hopes, but without lasting effect.

Justbaseall

As long as he needs some help in any area keep giving it to him, at least within financial reason. Keep good communication going with him and look into his eyes. You'll know if and when it gets to be too much for him. Just make sure it's what he wants to do and not just what you want to do with him.

Anymore it's a group effort to turn an average player into a good player or a good player into a great player.

My wife helps our son with his english and other language classes. I help with algebra and geomerty. His baseball instructor helps with pitching & hitting and his personal trainer helps with physical fitness. Throw in basketball and he's busy 7 days a week. Keep a teenager as busy as possible. It keeps them out of trouble.

Even if the additional instruction or training doesn't turn your son into a D1 ballplayer or beyond, it will help, at least a little, to develop a good work ethic that will be in him throughout his life.

Glider:

I haven't seen any player get significantly faster after taking speed classes...but I've seen them all improve...even the slowest kid in the class.

In baseball even seemingly small gains in speed are important...IMO.

Gotwood,

Give a kid six months of pitching or hitting lessons, and it will stick - his mechanics can, and should, become a permaent thing. Give the same kid six months of speed training and he will improve marginally, but then he will regess to his mean. Fast twitch muscle is not trained - it is born.

Glider:

Can't say that I disagree with you...certainly in regards to hitting and pitching...perhaps ongoing attention* to speed is needed to maintain the gains...and if this is possible it is worth it...IMO.


* not necessarily lessons, rather practicing what was previously learned.

Gotwood,

My father went to Salinas JC (Calif.), when Hal Davis was there. Bud Winter, the great sprint coach for SJ State (previously at Salinas JC) said that Davis and Tommy Smith were the two fastest human beings, at top end, that he had ever seen.

Davis was the bus driver for JC kids in those days (Depression era - no private cars!). My Dad has often told me that Davis had muscles where he thought it was impossible for a human to have places. Davis was just a local farm kid from Gilroy - no speed training; he just had the juice. Yes, he worked at it, but that was just to hone the pitch of the perfect violin.

To the extent that relatively slow kids can get trained up to get marginally faster, it won't really matter. The truly fast kids will just take the same training and get proportionately much faster.

It IS born!

Glider:

I agree...besides it would be hard to argue against those fine examples you offered.

My experience with speed classes involved each of my kids entire team...and my memory is that every kid improved...and this was good for the entire team...especially the improvement of the slowest kids regardless of how small that improvement may have been.

Missouri Dad,

Maybe you didn't know... justbaseball has an older son who plays at Stanford. Whatever he did worked out very well. He shouldn't be asking... He should be TELLING people how to get there. Not sure, but maybe in a round about way he did.

Glider,

We have seen a MINIMUM of two tenths improvement with every single runner who has learned and practiced sound running fundamentals, often more. Not through training, but through proper technique. This has been documented over many years.

Two tenths is the equivilant of one stride. Guess that is only significant each time a runner is thrown out by one full stride or less. Or when he comes one or less stride away from making a play on defense. Most importantly this two tenth improvement mostly involves the first 20 yards. We have seen dramatic improvements of a half second or more over time in the 60.

One (not enough) tip

Think in terms of distance rather than time. If a 7 flat 60 yards is the goal, find out exactly where you're at (distance you can run) in 7 seconds flat. This will give you a good idea of how much difference 2 or 3 tenths can make. I suggest doing this in 10 or 20 yard sprints rather than 60 yards. You can practice a lot more! It's hard to run a lot of 60s.

Even without learning technique, this distance rather than time training is a great way to challenge a runner and develop an internal stopwatch. We used to play music and have players run in short 3 second spurts. The start of the music would start the runner and at the end of the music we would slap down a piece of tape (indoors) marker (outdoors) where ever the runner was at in those 3 seconds. It is amazing how every runner would increase the distance in the allotted time, with practice. Every single runner!!!!

You can run a given distance and record the time or you can run a given time and record the distance. In the end, they both result in the same thing… if either improves, the runner is getting faster. Doesn’t have to be music, but sound works best (record a drum beat) of three seconds. The sound really registers quickly to the runner. For whatever reason we found runners improved much more and faster trying to increase distance rather than cut out time.

There is much more involved (proper technique) in both start and running form, but the above works better, with or without proper technique. Add the technique and you ABSOLUTELY will have a faster runner. Add training and physical conditioning and you sometimes end up with those significant improvements.

And just like in other things, there is a mental part of running. Those who are convinced they are slow and always will be… always will be slow! There are ways to train the mind as well! But I’ll save that for another day.

Just remember this… Everyone has heard of super human strength feats (even by small old ladies) in dire situations. Many of these have been well documented. There have also been super human feats in running speed in the most dire situations. People do not run the same speed in every conceivable situation. Baseball players know this to be true because most have experienced themselves running faster than normal and slower than normal at different times in different games and situations.

Sorry, if I seem to have gone off the deep end here.
.

JBB,
Good post. I am not going to comment about lessons for improvement because I have in other threads. I agree with PG, you should be telling, not asking, but I understood your post as well.

I just wanted to let you know that I got a good chuckle about the speed thing, sounded so familiar. Amazing thing was watching one of the fastest players on the team regress to the slowest. but strangely, the one who was developing the best on the mound.

OB44 posted about reading your player, which we did, and we knew his strength was not in speed, not in hitting. Once we established that, he concentrated on the thing that would get him to the next level. He didn't want to be a pitcher , pitching meant bench time, no one wants that. Maybe other parents would have given lessons in hitting or speed, to make their son happier,themselves happier, but we didn't see any reason to make him something he was never going to be.

Son remained a good hitter, but the joke was if he hit a double or a triple, could he make it to the base, not usually , but he did earn a lot of rbi.

PG just recently posted something about players positions and the importance of each tool (ranked 1-5) they need at each position. I assumed it is a scouting guideline. I think it was good for parents to see how important skills are in relation to the position. What to concentrate on. I found it to be very helpful.

Glider, things have changed so much since the days of Tommy Smith and Bud Winter.
Actually, I did spend some money on speed training and very little on hitting, none on pitching. Ours went from a 4.9 to a 4.68 in 8 weeks. Ended up running a 6.78 60 at the Stanford camp. Frappier changes both your form and strength. The ability to run faster can be taught and maintained. The place from which each person starts may be born, but the ability to be faster can be trained.
One of our son's minor league teammates stole 30 bases in the MWL. He also did speed training and agrees it made a huge difference.
Frappier is actually used at a facility in Menlo Park. Be happy to show you sometime. It is as hard as anything our son ever did, by his admission. But it worked.

Infielddad,

"Glider, things have changed so much since the days of Tommy Smith and Bud Winter. "

Not really. Smith was < 19.9 in the 200m in Mexico City. Remember, Bud Winters watched Jesse Owens and Bob Hayes (and many others) when he made his statement. No steroids in play at that time. With respect to Davis, it was cinder tracks and no starting blocks. Just raw speed.

Speed is speed. Speed training is just a fine tuning process. Ask your local pro scout, and he will tell you how he projects the field, in terms of speed. A stop watch is not necessary - one can just see it by one's own eye.

To the extent that training works, if only temporarily, the same training will benefit the truly fast kids even more. I do not believe that the same is true for pitching and hitting lessons -those lessons can have a lasting effect. JMO.

"To the extent that relatively slow kids can get trained up to get marginally faster, it won't really matter. The truly fast kids will just take the same training and get proportionately much faster."

Wouldn't the same reasoning apply to hitting and pitching instruction as well?

My son ran 7.8 60 in Sept of his senior year. After working with a trainer/speed coach for 3 months he was timed at 7.2 in January. Went from 14th to 4th fastest on the team.

quote:

Originally posted by PGStaff:
He should be TELLING people how to get there. Not sure, but maybe in a round about way he did.

PG, et al...just throwing something out there for discussion.

But I WILL take all the advice and help I can get. The world is a changin' a little too fast for me and I'm not too sure I have too many answers these days.

quote:

Wouldn't the same reasoning apply to hitting and pitching instruction as well?

Moc1,

I don't think so. Pitching and hitting have mechanical aspects that are more important, compared to sprinting. It is not a pure distinction, but it is a real distinction - and it is a difference.

Moc1:

quote:

Originally posted by Moc1:
Went from 14th to 4th fastest on the team.

Hey, hey...way to go son!

justbaseball:

quote:

The world is a changin' a little too fast for me and I'm not too sure I have too many answers these days.

Been feeling that way also...for a long time...not sure if all the change is good or bad...certainly happening at an ever increasing rate...we're all in the same boat...pass me an oar...you take the rudder for awhile!

Justbaseball,
As usual you’ve started a VERY GOOD topic. I’ve asked myself many times if private lessons are worth the money you spend on them. While I didn’t spend a great deal of money on private instructions, I did spend more that the average baseball parent. Let me say this. It think is very easy to go overboard and waste money on private instructors but that’s not really arguable because most people say we baseball parents are wasting money when we put our sons on travel teams, send them to showcases and buy them expensive baseball gloves and bats? In my opinion private lessons are just one small piece of the puzzle of becoming the best you can be. There has to some undeveloped talent or a good foundation before you can form him into a good ball player. The player has to really work in order to adjust his mechanics to maximize his talent. He has to be dedicated to go home and practice and practice and develop the muscle memory that allows him to deliver in a ball game.
At thirteen my son had a teammate that most would call a power hitter ... very similar to my son. I’ll call him Tommy. They both went to the same private instructor for lessons. My son started to gain on Tommy so Tommy’s father decided he would invest more money into his son’s hitting and “make” him a great power hitter. He took Tommy to private lessons three days a week at $150.00 per week all winter long. He probably spent $2,000.00 or more just on hitting. My son went 2 days a month and each lesson was divided between pitching and hitting. I probably spent $150.00 on hitting during that time. Tommy played all through high school and was an average hitter at best with no speed. He had a strong arm but couldn’t compete against college hitting. His career ended when he graduated high school. What was the difference? I think it had to do with raw talent and what happened between lessons. My son would hit in the basement pounding a ball into a net until his hands bled while Tommy went to lessons. I spent hours talking to my son about dedication and commitment and being the best he could be. I probably told him that Tommy would end up being a better hitter if he didn’t “work” at his game. While I was doing all this motivation, Tommy was taking lessons. I think any person that succeeds not only has to have the proper training or education, but they also have to have the ability to grow, the desire to learn, and that inner drive that pushes them to reach a goal.
Too often I see parents assume the bulk of the responsibility for their son’s improvement by throwing money at the challenge. The parent needs to slow down and allow the player to assume the role of the leader. This is HIS game and his challenge. The PLAYER makes the greatest sacrifice and the parent is his supporter.
Fungo

ON SPEED TRAINING? If he’s fast I’d spend a few bucks to make him a little faster. In my son’s case I wasn’t going to waste my money on speed training because I don’t believe you can purchase miracles!

Fungo:

Nice post...thought provoking ...as usual! We've have four kids that play...and they all take lessons...some more regularly than others...keeps us rich with enjoyment of watching them grow and progress at their game...but also keeps us broke in the pocketbook! No regrets.

Just had to comment on your last sentence of your post...

quote:

I don’t believe you can purchase miracles!

Has anyone told Steinbrenner this?

I guess no one knows how much is enough. You try to gauge it individually. As mentioned, some pick things up quicker, and/or more naturally than others. Mine has had this problem with a low elbow. All my rantings about same seemed to fall on deaf ears, but not the encouragement of the pitching instructor. Great progress after just 3 sessions. The key is just as Fungo said, the individual has to want it, or all the instruction in the world can be like water on a duck's back.

Is life the path to baseball, or is baseball a path in life.

IMHO, anything we as parents can do to help our kids challenge themselves, push themselves, expect more of themselves, realize success and cope with/overcome failure, is a good thing.

If baseball is the goal, then sometimes the efforts can seem wasted or futile. If, however, baseball is the strategy to a larger goal, then there is opportunity for larger success than we can possibly foresee, even in the face of apparent failure.

That being said, we have paid for hitting instruction for our son, on and off, for five or six years. He's learned lots of good lessons there about the importance of proper setup, preparation, anticipation, observation, reaction, improvisation, balance, yada, yada, yada. Along the way, he even developed good muscle memory, and has grown in his ability to adjust on the fly.

Good for baseball.

Better for life.

Well, one thing I've done to maximize the gains from the time and $ spent on lessons is : Going to all the lessons and paying attention and taking notes so I can help out when my son works on his game at home. He's not going to remember every little thing covered in every lesson and be able to recall it at home every time. That's where I can help out. Some of his team-mates' parents just drop them off and take off, then give up on lessons because they think it should be some sort of overnight transformation. I've gone to every lesson and learned a ton myself in the process.

As regards speed improvement I will again suggest what my son did---work out with his buddies on the track team---they taught how to get out of the blocks and yes improvement can be made--you cannot make a 8.0 guy a 7.0 guy but you can take a 7.0 guy and make him 6.7/6.8

quote:

Fungo posted: ON SPEED TRAINING? If he’s fast I’d spend a few bucks to make him a little faster. In my son’s case I wasn’t going to waste my money on speed training because I don’t believe you can purchase miracles!

Pretty much in the same boat, but he can beat the fastest kid to first from the mound. I guess that's fast enough.

quote:

I spent hours talking to my son about dedication and commitment and being the best he could be.

Fungo

How long have you been talking to your son about these things? I've been in this mode with my son for about a year now since he first entered high school. I see it starting to sink in but of course I would like to see a faster transformation. How long before he "saw" the light"?

My eldest son (20 yrs old) has been able to improve his speed primarily through weight training.

Despite putting on over 25 pounds the last 2 years, he has improved his 60 times from about 6.9 to a 6.7. Recently, he just broke the 6.7 barrier - and he attributes all of it to weight training for his legs.

During the kids developing years - I would never suggest that they stop trying to improve in any area of the game.

Missouri-BB-Dad

Make sure the light he sees is not TOO BRIGHT--it can turn him off to the game

,
JB...

Thanks so much...this is simply a GREAT thread..maybe GOLDEN (Listening Mn-mom?)...so much solid and important information...

Key points I think..

- While lessons are great and important they have to be backed up with some solid work ethic...

- While players will get better with some solid instruction they can only reach genetic maximums...

- Work ethic and a few lessons can overcome many lessons alone...

- Work ethic is often passion driven...

- Passion has to be player driven not parent driven...

- Parents must "read" or know their players, players must know themselves...

- In the end there is a bigger picture, it is all about human development not just baseball development...

Missouri BB Dad...

I'm going to respond your Fungo question...It's too important to pass up...

It's a blind faith kind of thing....there may be no direct,linear relationship between talk of comittment and dedication and work ethic and it may not even show up in baseball it may show up in other areas years later instead...the key is to never stop bringing it up, not beat them over the head with it, but to keep it top of the mind, front and center. And the key is to live it. Kids are not fools. Kid will take more from what you do then what you say. Show them work ethic and discpline in your life.

It's just like what you teach them about hitting a baseball, you work your tail off...And then you wait...then you work some more...and wait...and wait and then just about the time you figure it is never going to show up you start to see little bits and pieces.

And frankly at that point tears come to your eyes...

10-4 TR. It's just a dull flashlight right now but getting brighter.

44

I understand exactly what you're saying. The great thing is that I can see the mental growth occuring just like it did with his classroom work about a year ago. It's slow but it is happening. The neat thing about it is that his mother and I recognize it now and won't have to look back 10 years from now and say we didn't realize it. Does that make sense?

Don't know if it will get him to the next level in baseball but the life lessons are immeasurable.

Missouri..

Makes sense to any good parent...

Baseball? Some literally take the ball and run with it, others do not, it is their option their passion that will drive them through the tough times...but I KNOW it makes them better people...