Attempts to clone myself have failed!

[Coach Al]

This is my first year coaching my DGD in 9u rec ball. She is progressing quite well, but she has grandpa to correct her when she makes bad mistakes in form. The team I am coaching on has a husband and wife that are running the team, they had it the year before and I couldn't have my own team because we didn't have the numbers at registration we needed. They are a very nice couple and had a few parents ask to have the daughters return to the team this year.
However, they know very little about coaching and even less about softball. I have given them info on drills, videos and web sites, but either they aren't looking at them or are ignoring them. We decided that I would work with drills with 1/3 of the girls at a time at practice. I have been working on batting. Just with this alone I don't have enough time at practice. I have a group of beginners mostly and it is time consuming enough to teach properly, let alone correct all the bad habits taught to all the returning players and we have all the other skills to teach. I am also working on pitching after practice.
Here's the plan. As soon as I have the majority of the girls to a point were I feel they can handle soft toss I am going to switch with one of the other coaches and try working a a fielding station and work out from there. These girls really need work and I can say that from all the years I have coached, and I have coached some very bad teams over the years, this team is the biggest challenge. They were 0-14 last year and the majority of innings the other teams went through the order. I can't clone myself or be in 2 places at once. I'll take any suggestions.

 

[stephanie]

How many times a week do they practice? My bet would be once.
Try to set up another practice where it is just batting, and stagger the times, so that only three girls are there for every 30 minutes. The parents will appreciate the fact that they only have to committ to a 30 minute time frame, rather than 2 hours...
Then, the regularly scheduled practice is fielding and throwing, if that is all that is scheduled for...
At 9, they need repitition, repitition, repitition....
and they need it with games. Make it fun, and they will want to be there more often...
Good luck!

 

[SnocatzDad]

Make sure your coaching 100%, not helping kid perform repetitions, inexperienced people can pitch front toss, set a ball on a tee, hit grounders etc... Maximize your ability to relay information by not getting stuck doing something menial when you could be coaching. I know personally I've fallen into the trap on occasion of getting too involved in maximizing reps and keeping as many kids active as possible, versus stopping and working with a specific kid on a specific skill that they need help on. i agree with the staggered practice, have some kids show up 30 minutes early to work with you, some stay 30 minutes after and have team practice in the middle.

 

[Jojo]

I agree with SnocatzDad--when they are beginners you really need to get more parental help.
The parents can perform soft toss, and even just basic throwing back and forth when they warm up.

There was a local 6u team that won all their games and then state.
They dominate with 3 things--Husband and wife coach that had no child on the team, #2Husband and wife were knowledgeable of softball.
#3 Got almost every parent to be involved with their owns child's development at home and during practice.

This was just a rec team so the next season they got a new crop of kids, didn't matter, they still won.
Everyone wanted on their team, the fact they had to actually be a part of the team was a small price to pay for being on such a great team.

 

[Coach JV]

I agree as well. In the younger ages, I always asked for 2-3 parents to
help on the field. Most importantly, they are in small groups and stay focused.
At that age, if you try to run drills with 6 or more, they are distracted and someone will be hurt