Drills to Practice During the Corona-virus Quarantine
We are in unprecedented times as baseball coaches. During the Corona-virus pandemic, it is easy to feel sad, depressed, or frustrated. But during these trying times, we must not allow the unfortunate circumstances to make us want to give up. We should be able to look at this quarantine as an opportunity to help our players grow and improve. Today I will go over several drills that players can do in order to stay prepared to play the game of baseball.
Throwing
The first drill that I will go over is the Sock Drill. This drill was created by the current University of Missouri Pitching Coach Fred Corral when he was at Memphis. What the athlete does is to get a long sock. At the end of the sock, you will tie a knot that will stop the baseball. The athlete grabs a baseball and puts the sock on his hand. The player will go through his throwing motion and release the baseball. The athlete can practice his pitching mechanics, throwing mechanics, and get long toss in while doing the Sock Drill. The genius behind this drill is that you can do everything you could do with a partner, but without one. Below is the video of the Sock Drill as Coach Corral goes more in-depth about this drill.
Infield
A simple drill that we all have typically done as kids is to throw a ball off of a wall and field the ball. This drill is simple in nature but can get the athlete a ton of realistic hops and repetitions. To make this drill even more intense, the player can use his imagination in order to field the ball against the wall and throw out the slow, medium, and fast-paced runners. The player can keep an internal clock of four seconds in order to ensure that he gets the batter-runner out. Typically if you can field the ball and throw to the intended base you want to throw the ball to in four seconds or less then you will get the batter-runner out.
Outfield
A drill that is fun and is similar to the wall drill for infielders is a game called Wall Ball. My outfielders at Nitro High absolutely loved this drill whenever we played it. Although we used it as a team drill, it can be played with one person. It is very simple. The outfielder will throw the ball high against a wall and practice getting behind the fly ball and catching the fly ball properly. Then the outfielder will throw himself a ground ball after catching the fly ball and work on fielding a ground ball like an outfielder. Again this is a simple drill that will allow the player to get game-like repetitions while at home.
Catching
Catchers can work on their receiving and blocking while using a wall too. All the catcher needs is someone to throw the ball against the wall. To work on receiving the person throwing the ball will throw it against the wall, and the catcher will react to the thrown ball and receive the ball. To work on blocking, the catcher's partner will throw the ball against the wall and the catcher will block the ball in the dirt. To challenge the catcher, the partner should randomize the throws and allow the catcher to react to the ball by either receiving the pitch or blocking the pitch.
Hitting
The key to hitting is having good vision. This is a drill that the athlete can do at home. All the hitter needs to do is search online an umpire view of Major League pitchers warming up. This drill can be done in phases. The first phase will have the batter focus on calling out fastballs. The hitter will say "yes" to all fastballs and "no" to all non-fastballs. The next phase will have the hitter calling out all strikes. The hitter will say "yes" to all strikes, and "no" to balls. The last phase will have the hitter look for all pitches that he can drive. The hitter will say "yes" to all pitches that the hitter can drive., and "no" on pitches that he can't. There are a ton of videos out there for free that an athlete can use to practice his timing and vision at the plate. Below is a video to use for this drill.
Extra Drill
Yogi Berra once said, "You can observe a lot just by watching." This last drill requires the athlete to do just that. The athlete will search for any baseball game that is on the Internet. All the athlete needs to do is select a game and grab their glove and then they are ready for the drill. The athlete will practice their ready steps or catching mechanics by watching a game. The player will react to the game. For example, if the fielder is practicing being at first base then he will practice his ready step when the ball is hit to the first baseman in the game, the player practicing will field the imaginary ball and work on the proper mechanics to make the play properly. My suggestion for this drill is to do this in the biggest space in your home. This will allow the player to not be restricted when doing this drill. Below is an example of this drill.
In summation, there are plenty of opportunities to get better during this corona-virus pandemic. All that you need is to be creative and have a desire to get better. As coaches, challenge your players to get their practice in every day in order to be prepared to play again when this pandemic is over. I hope these drills are helpful to your team in order for your players to be prepared for the season when life gets back to normal.
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