Arm Bands and 12U - Great Googily Moogily

[cnardone]

Are coaches doing this at 12U to speed up the games? two weeks ago, we had 2 different teams that must have just started using the arm bands. Maybe the coaches forgot to bring their reading glasses but you could see them scanning their sheet trying to find, "Inside fastball". They had no clue what the numbers were. Frankly neither did the players because we went through the same routine with the players after the coaches called the number.

This weekend, luckily it was only one game and it was 'only' the catcher. She must have put the arm band on upside down because she was contorting her arm and head for every pitch trying to figure out what she was supposed to do. The pitcher was constantly reminding her what "inning' they were in. And the 'inning' had no relation to the actual inning of the game. The pitcher was also allowed to change the call, which was great, but then the catcher had to go back to her arm band. Of course, the pitcher only had a fastball (If she had a change it was the same exact speed as her fastball).

Is this really the best way to do this?

 

[Greatdaytobeawildcat]

Yeah, some teams are more proficient at this than others, but it certainly is not speeding anything up.

Personally I don't think it's that difficult to design hand signals that are hard to steal. Or even better for the catcher to call her game (I did a game last night where every other pitch the catcher would sigh "really, dad? why?"...and frankly, I agreed with her).

But, if you're gonna use the bands, I wish they would practice with them.

 

[Strike2]

Lots of coaches appear to outsmart themselves with this stuff.

 

[uncdrew]

What some coaches do is use the exact armband the girls have on. So they need to scan the grid and find what they want, then figure out what row and column they are in.

Uh dummies... Take 30 minutes at home Friday and make yourself a sheet that says:

Curveball: Orange 2, Blue 5, Yellow 4, Green 1

Fastball: Orange 4, Blue 1, Yellow 2, Green 3

Change: Orange 1, Blue 2, Yellow 3, Green 5

 

[HunterMO]

Our team is 12u and we’ve started using arm bands for offense only. Steal, take, fake bunt, etc. it’s a color and number system but overall very basic and efficient. Coach calls the color and number then both runners and hitter know what to do.

We don’t use it for every single swing. Depending on the game situation we may go an entire inning and not use it. And definitely don’t use it for pitching.

 

[The Man In Blue]

Lots of coaches appear to outsmart themselves with this stuff.

As an umpire, these systems are not hard to decipher and it helps me know what pitch is coming. "323, this one is going to be in the dirt. 126, in the dirt and to the backstop. 489, over my head and to the backstop. 516, in the dirt to the dugout. 297, hit the Bull mascot."

95% of the time this is pointless, but all the cool kids do it. My take as an umpire: you have a set amount of time to pitch. You can do what you want with that time. (See also my comment in another thread about good coaches not doing too much.)

 

[ArmWhip]

At 12U we didn't want to slow the games down by having the batter step out of the box every pitch and look down at the coach for a signal. So we devised a system where, when the coach wanted to give a signal to either the hitter or the runner, he would call out their name and show them the outs with his hand, and how he gave the outs told them what to do.

 

[bmakj]

Our team is 12u and we’ve started using arm bands for offense only. Steal, take, fake bunt, etc. it’s a color and number system but overall very basic and efficient. Coach calls the color and number then both runners and hitter know what to do.

We don’t use it for every single swing. Depending on the game situation we may go an entire inning and not use it. And definitely don’t use it for pitching.

if you only use it in certain situations, opponent will (or at least should) know something is up, call something out every play, have everyone at least glance (even if they know it is dummy). DDs team (14u) had them at one point, I think coach hated using them. have come up with a simplistic 3 number system (honestly do not know how it works) for calling out bunt, 1st and 3rd plays, etc.. pretty certain two of the numbers are simply random dummy, and one is real, and where in sequence they change game to game (or more likely day to day, pretty low chance of playing same team twice in a day).

pitches are all hand signalled in from HC to C, then C to P. DD really wishes HC would let her call pitches, she has done pretty decently before, does nice job keeping batters off balance (probably some of that is having just some experience, calling things no one else might , and like she says, she knows what is working for each pitcher each day within an inning, HC does not always see it.

similarly, hitting and base running are all hand signals, kept pretty simply. if you want to waste energy trying to steal signals, more power to you, since we do not face a great deal of repeat teams in our area (although starting too, as they win and go deeper in tournaments).

and yes, if you are going to use them, probably need and entire practice /scrimmage dedicated to them in preseason, then work some on int every practice until very proficient.

 

[HunterMO]

if you only use it in certain situations, opponent will (or at least should) know something is up, call something out every play, have everyone at least glance (even if they know it is dummy). DDs team (14u) had them at one point, I think coach hated using them. have come up with a simplistic 3 number system (honestly do not know how it works) for calling out bunt, 1st and 3rd plays, etc.. pretty certain two of the numbers are simply random dummy, and one is real, and where in sequence they change game to game (or more likely day to day, pretty low chance of playing same team twice in a day).

pitches are all hand signalled in from HC to C, then C to P. DD really wishes HC would let her call pitches, she has done pretty decently before, does nice job keeping batters off balance (probably some of that is having just some experience, calling things no one else might , and like she says, she knows what is working for each pitcher each day within an inning, HC does not always see it.

similarly, hitting and base running are all hand signals, kept pretty simply. if you want to waste energy trying to steal signals, more power to you, since we do not face a great deal of repeat teams in our area (although starting too, as they win and go deeper in tournaments).

and yes, if you are going to use them, probably need and entire practice /scrimmage dedicated to them in preseason, then work some on int every practice until very proficient.

We do have dummy calls that the coach will utilize....but, to your point, we should use them in more regular cadence. I guess what I meant was if we have a hitter up and no base runners.....there is no play call generally. Swing away is 99% the call at that point. We are a C team so if another C team wants to steal our calls and try to defend it....by all means give it a try. It's more to get the girls used to play calling as they go into Jr High (bulk of our team are going into 7th grade next year).

If we have to use an inexperienced catcher, or someone I'm not familiar with, I will call pitches. Otherwise I prefer our catcher learn how to do it. We do sit down pre-game to discuss strategy and how our pitchers felt during warm ups. What was working, what wasn't. That way the catcher isn't just thrown into the pool without knowing how to swim.

Agreed on making time to practice using them in preseason. Or at least getting the card in front of the girls to start learning what calls are where. It will speed up the process of finding it in game.

 

[Cornbread]

I think it’s helpful for pitching coaches to call pitches to be able to make pitcher adjustments based on misses.