Trouble fielding grounders

Have you checked his eye sight?

You don't panic and you show patience to your son.  Yes this kind of stuff happens.

 

Those balls are being hit harder than he's ever seen them and there might be an intimidation factor involved.  It might be better to have him play age appropriate levels and let him get used to the "new" speed of the game as he progresses each year.  The other thing is just keep encouraging him and let him know that his hand-eye coordination will improve.  One drill I used to do with my son at the younger ages was hit him really hard grounders using soft rubber balls or tennis balls.  Did that over and over again at close ranges and let him develop hand-eye coordination on hard-hit balls without fear of injury.  My son loved doing it.  The key is never over-react or show concern.  Tell him that everything can be improved as time goes by.  Even big leaguers still make errors.  Always, always, encourage him and most importantly have fun! 

Reps, Reps, and more Reps.  And make sure his is attacking the ball.  Since the ball his being hit harder, he may be backing off a bit.  Good luck. 

Eddie Rodriguez is the 3rd base coach for the Royals and I had a chance to listen to him speak.  There are 2 drills he shared with us.....1) Have your son count the hops.  This will aide him in focusing to the ball.  2)Have his stand sideways, so that his throwing shoulder is facing home plate.  This will allow him to visually see the hops better since he is off to the side.  This will allow him to decide when to field and get a short hop or a long hop.

cavtrooper, I don't know that your son is in a "slump" with the fielding, but don't know that he isn't either. A "fielding slump" would be my last thought, and not near the top.

In my perspective, fielding is a combination of solid mechanics and fundamentals, confidence and repetition. 

One thing which happens any time a player moves up is the possibility, as CD noted, that the game is too fast for your son and he needs to make that adjustment. In other words, he has to take ground balls over and over and over again until he adjusts to the speed of the game and the game slows down for him.  He needs to take ground balls before and after practice but at game speed for the 14-18 level and do them over, and over, and over.

What isn't clear from your post is what feedback/instruction he is receiving from his coaches, since he seems to be making the errors in practice. What are they coaching him on the errors?  Have they talked with your son and identified anything mechanical/fundamental including footwork and or not receiving the ball in front, glove positioning, etc?

There is little doubt that baseball is mental.  That is where the concept of repetition becomes important but only if your son's approach and mechanics are sound. In my view, your son should get the answers he needs from the coaches who are watching and should be seeing the same things you are seeing.

 

The type of errors has not been specified, but it seems the ball isn't getting into his glove, or if it is, it is popping out.

 

Sight unseen, which is a big disadvantage to message board seers, I'd venture to say the move up in age group is affecting his mental clock. It may be more the speed of the runners than the speed of the ball. Maybe have a look to check if he is trying to make the transfer before he has control of the ball, or if he is moving his head or shifting his feet with the transfer in mind before he has secured the ball.

 

Kids moving up often try to emulate their new teammates. Is there a new teammate with slick hands who has a lightning fast transfer he is trying to copy? He needs to stay within himself and use that kid as a goal to reach....in due course, not today.

Thanks for your reply everyone.

 

ClevelandDad - Good advice-thanks.  I agree about the intimidation with the speed of the game right now, but in practice the coach doesn't hit the ball nearly as hard as a game situation and he's still struggling to field it.  The soft rubber ball drill sounds like a great idea and I think I'll give that a try.  

 

Golfman25 - I think you're correct, he does seem to be backing off a bit rather than attacking the ball. 

 

infielddad - The one comment I've heard a couple of times from the coaches is that he needs to attack the ball/run through it.  I think he's waiting for the ball and it's eating him up by doing that. 

 

Green Light - I think he is trying to emulate some of the other infielders.  This Fall Ball team is made up of kids who were on the High School teams this past season.  They're a very talented bunch and I think this is getting into his head a bit.

 

 

 

I too have a 2017 MIF and went through the same last fall when he moved to a 16U team.  Biggest issue occurred at SS where he booted 50% of the balls hit his way.

 

After watching and accessing all fall, his hands were just as good as previous seasons, but his footwork was different (he refused to attack the ball and sat back waiting for the ball to play him).  We chalked it up to intimidation and speed of play as the others have mentioned.  We spent the winter inside working on footwork and aggressively attacking every ball.  I used lots of positive reinforcement to build his confidence back.  When spring rolled around, we immediately moved those sessions to the field and stayed aggressive.  The result was....other than his catchers, he led his team in fielding % this past spring.

 

The advice you received from others was exactly how I solved the problem.  Reps, reps, reps, then more reps.  All along the way filling his ear with positive criticism and challenging him to improve his play.  My cousin, a 25 year HS coach said he see's it every spring season with young INF's and its always the same....footwork.

Another issue which could be causing all of this - not attacking, being slower - is he has went through a growth spurt.  I've seen it many times over my years coaching - a kid comes back from last season and you notice how much he's grown.  He's got to get used to the new body, the bigger feet and it makes them slower.  They keep working at it they will catch up to their body. 

 

Maybe it's not the case but I've seen it happen.

Spot on, coach. Oddly enough, this is a fairly well discussed topic in some other sports, but for some reason is discounted/ignored in baseball.

Youth tennis coaches have known, discussed, dissected, ad nauseum is that young players have to deal with the changes in relative distances - hand/eye, hand/ground, eye/ground, etc. The (relative) consensus is that it doesn't take much - an inch in growth plus additional wingspan can play havoc with a good stroke (or any other physical activity), so the medicine is to simplify back to fundamental moves, and reinforce with constant repetition - that is, keep it simple and lots of it. FWIW, I noticed the same w/my kids, and heard from my dad that I had done the same at their age. There's a reason we often think of pre/teens as "awkward" physically.

 

Good luck!

Even though 13u is usually played on a full size field it tends to be slow.motion baseball. Its a big jump to play with 18yos versus 13yos. The older kids are much stronger. As others noted the game is much faster. Give your son time, patience and lots of reps.

Jess1, my son has grown 3 inches in the past 5 months, an inch in the past month alone.  I didn't think this would make that big a difference, but from what I'm reading here I'm starting to realize this may be a big deal for him right now. 

 

RJM, I think you make a really good point.  This past season on a 13U team my son only played a handful of games on the full sized big field.  All of the others were on the 54/80 fields.  Now that he's in Fall Ball as a 14U he's playing with kids up to 18 years old and on the full sized field.  This must be pretty intimidating with these kids being so much stronger, faster, etc.  We'll just keep working and getting in as many reps as we can before winter hits.

When the size of the field changes, the game changes for every player. For some it is an easy transition. For others, they are never able again to compete at the same higher level. It is the speed of the game, but it is more than that -- almost like hockey when players begin checking. Sometimes it just takes time to adjust. Best of luck to your son.

There"s another point to be made. The kid in the original post is entering high school out of 13u. I believe kids should play at least grade appropriate rather than age eligible once in 7th grade. Its only two years from high school. With a late spring birthday my son played 13u in 7th grade when he could have played one more year of LL.

RJM, my son started his Freshman year last week.  He just turned 14, and is one of the youngest Freshman, but it is what it is.  Our choices were limited for Fall Ball - put him in this league (14-18) that's very competitive with most players being top tier for our area and play for the local high schools, or play in the city Fall Ball league (13-15) which is not very competitive and has a lot of kids who either haven't played at very competitive levels or in some case played at all.  We felt the city league would do him no good.

Cave ... I'm not qnestioning your fall choice. I believe you should have had him in 14u the summer after 8th grade. 13u is a transitional year. The game tends to be slow. 13u to 18u is a huge jump.

RJM we didn't feel we really had a choice except for 13U. It was his first year off the small field.  I don't agree that his grade should dictate his level of play.  He was a young 8th grader both in age and maturity so basically making him skip 13U wouldn't have helped him advance.  I actually think it may have put him behind.  13U was his league age and was really our only option.  Just different opinions I guess but I appreciate your input greatly.

My son didn't skip 13u. It's an important transitional year. He chose to skip his 12yo year of LL. In 13u he was 5'2". In 14u he started the year at 5'4". He was a late physical bloomer with a late May birthday. Kids can handle more than you think if you let them.

IMO, the "first year off the small field" is hypercritical - but often (at least here) seemingly overlooked.

Frankly, I'm puzzled by a seeming emphasis on what might be called "theory" or "strategy" by coaches at this level - it's as if there's some sort of 90' field differentiation that must be emphasized at the expense of basics and repetitions.

It's taken a few years of coaching, watching kids grow into roles & bodies, travelling with teams, and comparing Baseball w/my original sports background (basketball), but I'm becoming convinced that a real tendency to shift focus away from what most might call "the basics" as players 1) grow, and 2) move to the 90' field exists, and that is one of the key determining factors of players' success on the big field.

My $.03 (heh) is that when any player's situation changes, the best step is the simplest - return to a heavy emphasis on the basics, only moving on when the player demonstrates some capability...

 

(sorry for the longish post. Need more coffee)

get a bucket a balls and a fungo hit him grounders till he does it right!!!

I just had a flashback. When my son played 14u his elimination game was followed by an 18u consolation game. These were all college bound players. Some bailed on consolation game. My son was asked to play. He was a shortstop. They put him at third. The first batter crushed a ball that exploded at my son's feet. He knocked it down and threw him out. He placed his glove over his face, looked towards me in the stands and mouthed, "holy s***!" He survived the game making all his plays.