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| SOFTBALL LINKS |
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Easy But Neglected Skill
by Dave
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Among the several skills coaches often neglect is the ordinary backhand play. Often folks act as if it is a difficult skill requiring more athletic ability than other plays but that's just not the case. Backhanding is as easy as any other skill but the fundamentals must be taught, reinforced through proper simple, repetitive drilling followed by sufficient iterations of live hit balls.
All too often when coaches hit grounders to players, they either hit them directly at them or hit too many to their glove hand side. If a coach has been properly emphasizing to their players to get in front of the ball and make plays between their legs, it is natural for girls to do this in a ground ball line, thereby getting no practice on backhands. I very seldom see coaches hitting backhand plays over and over again whether in practice or as a warm-up before games. l; the one exception is the short hop drill in which coaches hit balls sharply to girls stationed close in. That's a good drill but it only involves a limited piece of potential backhand plays. And usually no instruction on fundamentals has preceded it.
Generally, players learn backhanding of balls at their waists and above via normal everyday games of catch. Watch a bunch of players throwing a ball around for any length of time and sooner or later someone will make a bad throw requiring a backhand catch. After a couple years of warm-up tossing, most girls can handle any throw that requires a backhand catch. Often players learn to catch very well using backhand because it places a player in better position to make ensuing throws. If you want to be in position to make a quick throw, you move your body so as to catch the ball using a backhand because it is easier, most of the time - excluding outfield to infield cutoff throws. So backhand becomes the preferred way to receive a throw most of the time. Yet, on grounders, receiving the ball either to the glove hand side, beyond the leg while on the move or fielding it between the legs are the most reinforced skills. We do not automatically teach the backhand. We do not make sure our infielders and outfielders get enough drilling and practice at this very important skill.
If you can honestly say that your players do get adequate instruction and practice reps with backhand, OK. Today's column is not for you. If you're not sure or know that you have not addressed it, read on.
The first item to address is the teaching of the fundamental skill. Every infielder in a good ready position should be low. When they field balls, they should remain low. That is as true for other skills as it is for backhand. But for whatever reason, one of the most common mistakes in the backhand is a tendency to stand up or slightly erect when making a play on the ball. Ideally, the backhanding player should be very low. Ideally, her eyes should be just slightly above the level she gets the ball at. If a player's head is several feet above the track of the ball, she will probably misjudge it and end up with the ball bouncing off her glove or going under it.
Secondly, in every other instance of fielding a ball, the glove is held in front of the body. If a player places her glove at the same depth as her body relative to the ball, we correct her by saying, "get those out in front of you." It is always better to get a ball closer towards the direction it is coming from whether fielding a grounder, a fly, or thrown ball. The same is true for backhand. The glove must be placed towards the direction of the ball. You should not be attempting to make a backhand play parallel to the depth of your foot or head. I suppose it is often difficult for coaches to see how deep tor shallow the glove is relative to the player but this needs to be corrected just like it is on ordinary grounders hit directly at players.
The next most common error in backhanding occurs at the point at which the ball has struck the glove. Just as with other plays, the glove hand should squeeze the ball. Most often girls try to cradle the ball by cocking their wrists and pulling the hand in out towards the outside of the elbow. This is not only a poor way of catching the ball, it tends to put the player off balance and the glove in a bad position from which to remove the ball. Many beginning players working on backhands will do this to make sure they get the ball. Even experienced girls who have poor backhand skills will do this for the same reason. But when you catch a thrown ball above your waist in a backhand position, you don't do this. Instead, you squeeze the ball in your catching hand while holding your wrist loose and allowing the force of the ball to carry your hand backwards. This is what we call having soft hands.
The reason catching with soft hands is better is because when you cock your wrist towards the outside of your elbow, you are in a position which takes away from your hand strength. The connective tissue in the hands is stretched to a weaker position from which to grip anything and you tend to use weaker muscles in your forearm in a position from which their strength is diminished. Your grip is stronger when your hand is slightly cocked towards the inside of your elbow which is what occurs when you use soft hands. You are also in a better position to deal with the impact of the ball when your wrist is slightly loose and you catch the ball in front of you. Your body acts as a shock absorber.
The last fu tndamental mistake we want to deal with today occurs after the ball has been successfully caught and a throw needs to be made. The girls I have coached tend to stand upright at this point. They want to gather themselves and then make a strong throw. But usually you can make a stronger, quicker throw if you stay low, plant the correct foot while turning your body and removing the ball from the glove simultaneously. If you are a righty, that means you stride with your left leg, get the ball, and as your glove comes back towards your body, you step with the right leg, plant the right foot while turning your body so that your left shoulder faces the target and then make the throw. Staying low and planting your throwing hand foot beyond your glove hand foot is the key to making a strong, quick throw.
I would begin my backhand practice but talking about the points I have just gone over. Then I would demonstrate the correct way to make a backhand play. After that, I would use a few very simple drills in a progression which gradually goes over the skill.
The first item should be merely retrieving the ball using a backhand. All that is needed is for each girl to get in a good ready position and a coach to bounce balls at them. The player and coach can be just ten feet apart with the coach to the glove side of the player. Have her take a single step with the glove side foot, across her body while staying low and fielding the bounced or rolled ball. The coach can roll several reps and then bounce several more or mix it up anyway he or she wants.
After this drills, you want to increase the difficulty slightly. From the same basic position but two additional strides away from the player, the coach again rolls or bounces balls but this time the player must take three strides to retrieve the ball. The player strides with her glove side leg once, then again with the throwing side leg, then finally with her glove hand leg. Stay low! Then she fields the bounced or rolled ball.
If players do not take the right steps, I suggest having them walk through it once or twice, as needed. if she still struggles, stand in front of her with your back facing her. Then each of you do it as she watches you and makes sure she is doing the same thing as you. In the case of a three step drill, which is usually where the footwork first gets mixed up, I would make the demonstration while calling out 1, 2, 3. The turn around and watch her walk through it while you call 1, 2, 3.
You want to get as many reps as timne permits doing these drills. Once you have a reasonable number in, you can add to either or both drills by making players get into throwing position after fielding the balls. Again, a slow numbered walk through should teach the steps if anyone struggles.
If you only have time to do the first two drills, with no throw maneuver, because your time runs out, that's OK. Thge next time you get together, run through the basic drills quickly and go into the throwing maneuver next. Each time you work on backhands, begin with the basic drills for a couple warm-up iterations. Then go into the throwing maneuver. Next run these two drills with more than a mere throwing maneuver by having the girls make an actual throw to a point on a diagnonal from where they field the ball.
After this, assuming you have sufficient space, I would perform the same two basic drills but have girls make throws to each of the various bases from all the potential points on the field from which they would have to make such a play. After these drills have been run and only after they have been run, you can start to hit live balls for the purpose of reinforcing the fundamental skills in more realistic circumstances. At each of your practices in which you do the old normal ground ball drills, you should make a couple minutes freed to do some bakhand practice both from close points requiring a single step and from further out requiring more of a run. Obviously, with respect to your outfielders, the run should be much further. But your middle infielders need to learn to take several strides and then make a backhand play.
After you have done these things, you can get into more complex drills using backhands like diving for balls, getting up and making the throw. But for now, these very fundamental skills which are almost always neglected, should vastly improve your infielders' and outfielders' play.Labels: coaching, defense
 
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