Norco Girls Softball: Parents

Sunday, April 6
Play Catch! Please!!

You would think that anyone who wants to have their child play sports would automatically know what to do to get them at least started. That's not always the case. I coached a ten and under rec team recently and many of the girls obviously had nobody to play catch with. Not only that, many of the parents do not even know how to play catch with their kids. I had to go away on business and the manager of my girls' team had another father warm up my daughter before she pitched an inning. The result? She ended up with a broken thumb because he threw the ball back to her far too hard. Can you imagine throwing a ball back to a just nine year old hard enough to break her thumb? I have played catch with my daughter maybe 400 times. I have thrown the ball to her more than ten thousand times without breaking her thumb. And this father's kid can neither catch a tossed ball nor throw more than 20 feet. Obviously nobody has ever played catch with her.

Before you even get your daughter involved with softball, make a commitment to play catch with her for at least 15 minutes each week. More is better but at least once a week for 15 minutes will give her a chance to really enjoy the game. I have been astounded by how quickly my girls improved just by having a regular, quick game of catch.

Obviously you are going to want to go out and purchase a glove for your daughter and perhaps you'll need one too but you do not need to have a mitt before you start playing catch. Standing just a few feet apart (5-10) and lightly tossing an appropriate sized ball back and forth with bare hands will teach you daughter to catch very quickly. An 11 inch regular softball is typical but many leagues use a smaller, soft ball which is actually a little bouncy. It is best to get the ball which your child will ultimately be using when she is on a team.

Once you begin playing catch, you will probably find that both you and your daughter get bored with simply throwing the ball back and forth with bare hands from 5 - 10 feet. Another way of catching is to roll the ball to your daughter and have her catch it in the same manner she would with a mitt. If you think she is going to throw right handed, have her field the rolled ball with her left hand while covering it with her right. It is best to emphasize two handed catching right from the very first moment.

A few days after you begin catching, you will probably want to introduce your child to a mitt. That's fine. But make sure the mitt is small enough for her to easily handle it. If it has been a long time since you picked up a softball glove, pick one up and see just how heavy it is. Now consider that your child is very young and not very strong. If you put 3 pounds of awkward sized glove on her hand, you are asking her to lift something very heavy while also trying to learn hand-eye coordination. That is a bad idea. Your child must be able to swing her gloved hand almost as freely as she can her bare hand.

Now that you've begun to play catch and your daughter is acclimated to wearing and using a glove. The best way to improve her skills while not boring her is to do a bunch of purposeful drills without letting her know that is what you are doing. You can throw the ball to her in the air but do not push things. Stay at 10 feet until she is really comfortable and then move it to 15 feet and so on. Rolling the ball to her is nearly as valuable as throwing it in the air and you will be able to begin teaching proper body position as well as throwing technique fairly quickly. Roll the ball right to her while she is standing, feet just wider than shoulder length apart with (assuming she is right-handed) her right foot slightly back from her left, butt down, head up, fielding hand on or near the ground, and throwing hand up near her face. This is frequently referred to as the "alligator method" because your child resembles an alligator gobbling up the ball. Make sure that you do everything you are telling your child to do. If she rolls the ball to you, get it with good alligator-like form. Your child picks up how to play more from what you actually do than from what you tell her to do.

Now try rolling the ball to one side of your child and have her do a little crossover step while retrieving it. You should have her do the steps first and then you roll the ball to where she ends up after a crossover step or two. Show her a crossover step and then pretend you are a mirror doing the step at the same time she does. You can even pretend that what you are doing is a dance step. That will make it more fun. Do this to each side so she gains some practice at moving for the ball.

Once your daughter has is comfortable with regular catch, ground balls straight at her, and crossover stepping, another important skill to teach is the notion of going for the ball. While standing in an athletic position - feet apart, one back of the other, butt down, head up - have her take two steps towards you and then squat down, placing her catching hand near the ground and the other near her face in the alligator position. As soon as she finishes, roll her the ball. You can do this with any number of variations using the crossover step or taking two or four steps forward. The important thing to teach is movement for retrieving the ball while holding a good athletic position.

You will notice that we have not discussed throwing at all. That is perhaps more important than catching but one I would like to give a little more time to. Check back for advice on teaching throwing and remember, if you do not play catch with your daughter, who is going to? Commit just a few minutes of time each week and your child's game will improve. You may find that you look forward to your games of catch more than she does.



Saturday, March 1
Get Out Of Your Lawn Chair!

Is there anything as difficult as sitting in your lawn chair ... looking at your daughter's number ... on the back of her jersey ... as she runs away from you ... to retrieve the ball ... which got past her ... and should have been a routine single ... had she not completely missed it?

Why yes!   There is something worse than that!   What's worse is being your daughter ... running away from everyone on the field ... wishing you could crawl into a hole in the ground ... or perhaps get a broken bone trying to catch the linedrive you just missed ... running as fast as you can ... knowing that 50, 100 or more people are staring at the number on your back ... while you run after that ball .. and the girl who hit it, along with her three friends who were on base at the time, circle the bases ... and there is no way you're going to be able to get the ball in time to stop her ... from scoring the opponents fourth run to take the 4 - 3 lead from your team ... in the bottom of the fifth, or sixth or whatever the heck inning it is ... and if only you had a little practice, this might not be happening.

I often proclaim that you are seriously remiss in your duties as parent, if you do not go out and play catch regularly with your softball playing child.   Nothing improves hand-eye coordination better than a little regular game of catch.   The same is true of hitting - regular batting practice is what makes decent hitters into good ones.   But what is often overlooked by parents is the value of outfield practice.

You can teach a girl to catch.   You can teach her to run.   You can even teach her to catch while running.   But in order to learn to judge a hit ball in the outfield, you need to experience a lot of hit balls.   I'm not writing today to discuss the correct mechanics for playing a fly ball, linedrive or outfield groundball.   What I'm writing about is learning judgment in the outfield through experience.   The only way to learn it is to have lots of balls hit to you.   If your daughter is going to be playing some outfield, it behooves you to get yourself a bucket of balls and head out to a local field for some practice.

If you're getting my message and planning on following through, here are some random thoughts about it.   Bring some water - you're gonna need it.   Hitting fly balls is not effortless.   Dress appropriately.   You're gonna break a sweat.   Wear light clothing suitable to athletic exertion.   Wear a baseball or golf cap.   You'll need to shade your eyes.   Put on a little sunblock.   If you go out during the heat of the day for more than a few minutes, you'll likely get burned.

Get yourself a bucket of balls.   If you have to constantly chase balls thrown in from the outfield, you are going to get worn out faster than your daughter will.   Choose your bat wisely.   Don't go for the 33 inch (- 8) bat you bought your young hitter.   You'll thank me for that one when you CAN get out of bed in the morning.   Choose a good light bat.   You ought to be able to do alright with a 31 inch, 21 ounce bat.   For the enterprising, get yourself a softball fungo bat.   SoftballJunk has a number of fungo bats available for purchase at decent prices.   Fungo bats are generally lighter than ordinary ones and make it relatively easy to hit pops, flyballs and linedrives.

When you hit balls to your daughter, you have to be able to judge her ability as well as your own.   Unless you were a minor league ball player, you probably can't hit the ball to the point of danger if your daughter is 11 or 12.   If she's younger than that, I suggest you try starting softly and then hit harder and harder until you feel you are just beneath her abilities.   Let her tell you what she can handle.   If your daughter is 11 or 12 and a decent player, hit away!   She can handle it!

You might wonder where you should hit them.   It really doesn't matter.   You should strive to spray the ball all over the place.   Hit some hard ground balls through the infield.   Hit some linedrives within close range of her in the air.   Hit some over her head.   Much of the value of shagging fly balls is seeing the trajectory.   Knowing that you have to go back on a long fly means having experienced a few over your head.   Similarly, knowing that a linedrive during a game is going to land in front of you involves having experienced a volume of them beforehand.

Every so often take a break to get a drink.   You're getting over-heated and so is your daughter.   While you two are sitting on the bench enjoying a drink, you have a real opportunity to bond with your kid.   Enjoy these moments.   They don't last forever.   While you are sitting around drinking some water, discuss some of those plays.   Let her tell you how she felt chasing that ball.   Teach her to understand that you don't expect her to catch every ball but you do expect her try.   You expect her to learn how to judge them and make an effort to get as close as possible.   Tell her about a fly ball you once missed - didn't we all miss at least one at some time?   Maybe you could explain to her how that one that got past her and cost her team that game was really your fault because you were too dumb to realize she could use a little practice like this.   Maybe tell her about a time you remember this major leaguer completely misjudging a flyball and costing his team the game.   Don't let her believe, for even a moment, that anybody always correctly judges flyballs.

And after you've finished with this outfield practice, plan to do another in the near-term future.   Recognize that you will again be sitting there, watching her number on the back of her jersey as she runs after another game-costing home run one day.   But that's OK because this opportunity to spend time with your daughter was priceless even if she never becomes even a decent outfielder.