Little League Coaches Thread

[jefferyepayne]

I just found I was selected to manage a little league team this Spring and was wondering whether there are other little league coaches out there on Net54baseball. I love going to MLB games but there's nothing better than watching kids enjoy playing baseball on a nice sunny day at a little league field.

Looking forward to a fun season with a bunch of great kids.

jeff

[steve B]

Sounds like fun!

The coach I had for little league was both a really good coach and somewhat poor.

The good - No pressure at all. Everyone played and nobody had a problem with it. His whole strategy consisted of reading the lineup and telling us to get out ther and have fun. having two of the three kids in the league who could reliably get the ball over the plate helped. (It became T-ball a year or two after I was out of it) so we all learned to enjoy the game. The only thing we weren't allowed was giving the umpire any lip about anything. That got an immediate benching. Only happened once, and in the middle of an at bat.

The bad? - We had maybe 3-4 practices pre-season, and none during. And little in the way of actual coaching about how to do stuff. Just do it is a great sneaker slogan, but not such a great teaching tool.

We won the league my first year, and were either first or second my second year. Mostly on walks. I think we had one home run over the two years, hit by the catcher who was the typical fat kid. The field was marked as 320 to the snow fencing, and was probably about that far. After being teased the whole game he hit one out. (I'm pretty sure it was the only actual HR there in either season) And as he rounded the bases he stomped on each one looked at the baseman and said "fat". That was a beautiful thing. And more amazing to me as time goes by. He was probably 10? The division had a 13 year age limit, so certainly under 13.

Steve B

[Griffins]

tomorrow starts my last season of coaching. My son is 14 and high school ball starts next year, so this is it.
I've only coached (and never managed, due to time constraints) the last 5 seasons. It's a lot of fun and it's a whole lot easier doing it once they all have a basic grasp of the game.
Last week a kid that just started playing finally had a break thru and started crushing everything- the pride, determination and increasing confidence that showed on his face in the course of 5 minutes is something I'll never forget.
Best of luck on your season.

[39special]

Last year was my first year managing a team.I'm going to do it again this year.It was a blast!I was luckey to have a good group of kids,as well as parents.

[carrigansghost]

Been coaching for 9 years. It has been a learning experience. I've found the best practice is to teach when you can, nod politely when a parent that does nothing more than drop off their child to the game tells you how to coach and above all, let them have some fun. I have a dvd of one of my son's first games at 5 years old, none of the kids on either side are still playing 9 years later which is kind of sad.

Study the rules, because there will be at least one parent or opposing coach that will be an aspiring major league umpire.

Rawn

[jefferyepayne]

This'll be my last year of little league as my youngest is 12. Started coaching him 3 years ago after he had given up the game for 2 years because of a horrible coach he had that made baseball miserable. When he expressed an interest in playing again I jumped in to make sure that didn't happen again. Now he absolutely loves it.

Little league needs to have more structured training available for coaches as there are some REALLY bad coaches out there that ruin the game for the kids. If they aren't having fun, they won't continue to play!

jeff

[DaveW]

It's my last year coaching too as my youngest is 12 also. I've been coaching/managing for 9 years now. Just try not to be too serious about it. Remember that they are just kids and they will make errors. The best piece of coaching advice I ever got was to make sure that at every game and every practice you spend a minute or two with each kid individually and ask them about something outside of baseball. How is school going? How's your new dog? Whatever. Call them by their name and smile. It shows them that you care about them as a person. They will then play hard for you and enjoy the experience more. You'll enjoy it more too. Good luck.

[frankbmd]

While coaching my son's team years ago there was a kid in the other dugout named Brendan Ryan, now known best by St. Louis and Seattle patrons. I think my son struck him out. Does anyone else have Little League experience with future Major Leaguers ?

[matty6]

While never having coached Little League, I did coach American Legion and High School baseball for twenty years. I also took an all-star team of 11's and 12's from Tennessee to the Cooperstown Dream Park tournament.

On the legion teams I coached was Garret Stephenson (won 15 games with the Cards a few years back). The year before I coached Garrett, though, I was his catcher, as I returned as a coach the year after my last year of eligibility.

There are two current minor leaguers who I coached in High School. One is Noel Cuevas who plays centerfield for the single-A Dodger affiliate and the other is shortstop Francisco Lindor who Cleveland made their number one overall pick last year. They project he should be a major leaguer in 3 years or so.

Lastly, on that Cooperstown team was current Tampa ace David Price. He was my number two starter and starting left-fielder at age 12. Off that team, four guys were eventually drafted - very talented team! We placed third out of forty-three teams...David actually lost our last only game of the tournament, a 3-2 semifinal loss, to a team from California. We did, however, manage to beat the eventual champions during pool play, 13-5.