Outfield Depth Perception

[Mudita12]

Are you using cones to give direction on the drop steps/angles and then standing at a decent distance to throw the fly balls so that OFs can work efficiently and get good reps?

Yes! We use a lot of cones. We warm up our hips and flipping our feet for over the shoulder or settling under the ball.

 

[Mudita12]

I stumbled across this by accident when coaching a 10u team. We were throwing fly balls with a pitching machine and did one practice where we had the players concentrate on catching the ball on one bounce. It worked pretty well on improving tracking.

We did this at practice last week. It was a game changer for judging the ball. Most of our girls grasped it. We started with tennis balls. I threw the ball and yelled “right leg, left leg, or front” and they were required to position their body where the ball would hit in that general area. We graduated to catch the tennis balls after one bounce, then moved on to softballs. After doing this one time, it made a huge difference.

 

[Cannonball]

Yes! We use a lot of cones. We warm up our hips and flipping our feet for over the shoulder or settling under the ball.

I've never taught "flipping feet." Instead, we teach driving the opposite shoulder so that the OF never breaks stride to get to the ball. I am assuming you are using the term "flipping feet" to describe what you do on a ball hit over the OF head and the OF has to change their direction to catch the ball.

Watch Trout do this in the Antonelli video.

 

[Mudita12]

I've never taught "flipping feet." Instead, we teach driving the opposite shoulder so that the OF never breaks stride to get to the ball. I am assuming you are using the term "flipping feet" to describe what you do on a ball hit over the OF head and the OF has to change their direction to catch the ball.

Yeah, flipping hips or flipping feet. We want to teach our players to flip their bodies to reduce stress on their knees when “turning” to run to a ball hit over their head or to get to a point of settling under the ball. Something Alabama teaches.