Lesson Learned

[tghorley]

While coaching a machine pitch team, I learned a valuable lesson. I had a player named Bo who was red-headed, freckles, wore glasses, bubbly personality and stocky. Not athletic but a kid you just had to love. Well in about the eighth game of the season Bo got on first base for the first time.

And as the league rules stated the last batter ran until he was out or the ball was tossed to home plate and the plate touched for an out.

I explained to Bo (who had a great big smile and big eyes - he got a hit, he was on first base) that Matt was the last batter and he needed to run to first base, second base, third base and to home as fast as he could. Sure enough Matt hit the ball to the fence. I was looking at Matt and hollering at him to run, run, run. I turned my attention to Bo and he was only three feet away from the base, standing. By this time Matt passed him and was out home by a foot.

I set my defense and went over to talk to Bo on the bench. Bo still had that big smile on his face, he had been on first base. I stood in front of Bo, my mistake as I must have looked like a giant to him. I said in a fatherly manner, "Bo, great hit but what did I tell you to do when you were on first base? His head bowed down as if praying. Still wanting an answer, "Bo, what did I tell you to do?" Head still bowed, he never looked up. "Bo, didn't I tell you to run to first base, second base, third base, and home fast as you could."

He looked up, smile no longer there replaced with glassy eyes, and asked "Which one is second base?"

I picked Bo up and hugged him as tight as I could without crushing him. I said, "Great hit and thanks for teaching the coach a great lesson!".

 

[Sparky Guy]

I have been coaching young kids for the last 7 years and what I have found is to NEVER assume they know something. What I will do is sit them down and then make grunts and other unintelligible noises like I'm talking to them. I'll stop and ask them if they understood any of that. They all say no. Then I tell them if I'm explaining something to them and they don't fully understand it to stop me and tell me so. I tell them I will NOT make fun of them and try and re-explain it so they do understand it. I always make it known to the kids that I use the old axiom, there are no stupid questions. Over the years I've received some strange questions and they've helped me understand some of the thought processes of young athletes. They've helped make me a better coach with their questions.

 

[Coachmom]

I was coaching a 12U rec ball team last year. At one of our first practices, I was teaching them how to warm up in between each inning.
I had the outfielders and bench players playing catch along the right field line while the pitcher does her warmup pitches and the infield does their warm up grounders. After catcher calls balls in-coming down the outfield runs to their spot. Simple enough?

We did this several times and moved on to the next drill. Come game time, we are home team, so we are in the third base dugout.
After the game gets started I notice that my entire outfield and bench players are running all the way over to the right field line to do their warm up throws instead of staying on our (left field) side!! The other team must have thought what the heck?? I laughed my butt of for a minute and sent my assistant coach over to explain that we warm up on what ever side our dugout is on.

Lesson learned, even when you think you are covering everything, you aren't!