This is combination podcast/blog post, so you get choose your medium for consumption!  As you will see in this episode/post, we are all about choices!!!
 

 

 

We've seen it in every aspect of the game, your players dominate practice!

 

They are great mechanically. They can field forehands, backhands, make routine plays, make double plays, field slow rollers, and their arm looks great.

 

Then game time comes.  Their "mechanics" still look good, but they make errors. Lots of errors. They seem unsure and hesitant. They don't know where the ball needs to go.  They seem surprised the ball is hit to them.

 

Then they look like they don't want the ball hit to them.

 

What's going on?

 
Let's look at the top 4 reasons infielders don't translate practice performance into games.
1.) A lack of understanding of what a "good fielder" at your level is - Here's the bottom line, we aren't dealing with professional infielders.  I went back and looked at how our shortstops have fielded since 2011.

 

In that group, we had a Division 3 player, two Division 1 players (including one playing for a top 10 team), one professional player, and an NCAA Gold Glove winner for the best shortstop in the country his senior year in college.   Their fielding percentages at the high school level were ALL between .890 and .931.

 

Again, these are not professionals. We play on some questionable fields, that give them some questionable hops.  That means good high school shortstop will probably make 1-2 errors every 20 chances or so.  Making errors is not unusual, and should not be treated as the plague.

 

It is reasonable to believe that fielding percentages will be even lower at the younger levels, so don't think your infielders are the only ones making errors.  They aren't.

 

We just need to know how to minimize them.

 

Check out our Developing Athletic, Consistent, Extraordinary (A.C.E.) Infielders online course and start developing game-ready infielders.

 

2.) An overemphasis on mechanics - When infielders make errors, many of them, and their coaches, want to immediately turn to mechanics.  If they aren't having success there must be something mechanically wrong.

 

The reality is, the mechanics of fielding a ground ball are not too difficult.  Once a player's mechanics are reasonably good, they probably aren't making errors because of mechanics.

 

Our baseball society is turing into a "fix me coach" society.  When a player doesn't have success, they turn to a coach to tell them what they are doing wrong.  I challenge you to not always look for a mechanical fix to every problem.

 

3.) They are picking the wrong hops - Bad infielders "get" hops.  Good infielders "pick" their hops.  Imagine how easy fielding would be if your infielders always got that long hop or "Sunday hop."

 

Pretty easy right?  That .920 fielding % would look at more like .950 wouldn't it?

 

Good infielders get more of those long hops and fewer of the dreaded "up hops" by moving their feet in good tempo and rhythm and learning the path of the ball on the ground.

 

It is easy for a coach to tell an infielder to charge the ball to get better hops.  This is what the player wants to hear, a quick easy fix that will make everything better.  What they don't want to hear is that THEY need to learn when to charge the ball to get the correct hop.

 

If you're looking for a great fielding game to help develop this skill check out our "Picking your hop" game.

 

3.) They don't see game-like reps in practice - This one is on us! How often do your infielders take ground balls in practice with a runner sprinting down the line?

 

This occurred to me as our future D1 short stop was fielding about .880 half way through his senior year.  Everything was good during practice, then nothing was good during the game.

 

It was my fault.