I received several email responses to my most recent TIPS FROM THE COACH. They felt I had not made sufficient mention of FUN. I always refer to success/fun.

The beauty of baseball is that there is nothing intrinsically FUN about playing baseball. If you were to stand in your office and swing a bat after about 30 seconds you'd think, 'this isn't any fun.' It is fun to hit the ball. It is not fun to swing and miss all the time. It is not fun to miss the ball on defense and have it bite you in the nose. It is fun to make defensive plays. You can bet the guy that is batting .500 is having more fun than the guy batting .150. But, if the .150 hitter is well coached (because his coach has studied the BASEBALL SKILLS AND DRILLS videos ), does his Tee work on the StayBack Tee , hits Pickleballs in his front yard, he will improve and have more success/fun. Isn't that a great lesson in life to learn from a little boys game, that if you are educated, diligent, disciplined, and have a good work ethic, you will enjoy more success/fun in life!

Players in baseball must EARN the right to have fun. No one just walks out onto the field the first time and can perform all the skills of baseball. They must be taught. They must work to master the skills necessary to enjoy success. That is where you coaches and interested parents come in. You must not only know how the skills of the game must be performed but must be able to communicate to the ball player in such a manner that he can understand and implement those skills. When we made the BASEBALL SKILLS AND DRILLS video series , we recognized that kids don't necessarily learn very well from words. You know that from lecturing your son about doing his chores. After about 15 seconds his eyes roll back in his head and he is hearing 'words,words,words'. So we came up with numerous visual aids to allow the ballplayer to understand and be able to implement the necessary skills into his ability to play the game.

As a coach, you'll want to implement as many learning experiences and reps into practices as possible. So we crammed as many drills as we could think of into the BASEBALL SKILLS AND DRILLS video series. All the drills are applicable to a home training program. It doesn't matter how good a coach you are, ballplayers just can not possibly master all the skills necessary to have the maximum amount of success/fun in a couple of two hour practice, twice a week. So all the drills in the BASEBALL SKILLS AND DRILLS series are applicable to a home training program. Give each player 'individualized homework' after each practice and game, to be performed before the next time the team gets together. These can be as simple as throwing the ball onto the roof and practicing catching flyballs or might even require old dad to drag up off the couch actually play ball with his son.

There was a player that played with my son his first year of pro ball. If Central Casting had sent over a prospect baseball player, this was it. 6'4 220lbs, run like the wind, cannon for an arm, and blast them into the trees. BUT, he told my son that to him baseball was "2 HOURS OF ANGER MANGEMENT". He was cut the next year. He forgot that baseball was supposed to be FUN but is a game of failure. He never learned that it is how you handle the failures not the success that determine how long you get to play.

So it is a two pronged task. Work to EARN the maximum amount of success/fun possible BUT learn to deal with the failure.

Yours in Baseball

THE COACH