As a coach, when you’re working on the defensive game, the key is to make sure you always go through a progression of drills before you start actual game situation drills. In today’s blog post, we quickly break down how to create a successful softball fielding practice plan.
Softball Coaching: Creating a Softball Fielding Practice Plan
- Begin your practice plan with a pre-practice fundamentals series, really emphasizing the basics and fundamental mechanics of fielding and throwing the ball.
- Then progress to your ground ball/fly ball series. Be sure to include variations such as left, right, over the head, balls that you have to charge, etc.
- From here, move on to position play, which is when you want to cover all of the responsibilities that revolve around the specific base or positions.
- And last, put your positions together, splitting the infield, and end your defensive progression in actual game situation stations.
In the off-season or pre-season, you want to include a high number of individual drills in your practice plan. As you get closer to the season, you lower the number of individual drills and begin including game situation drills so that the team can get used to working together.
Every single time you organize your practice, make sure that you emphasize each phase of your defensive progression. You always want to adjust based on where your team is at that point in the season.
Looking for more awesome softball fielding tutorials, tips and techniques? Then be sure to check out Championship Coach Sue Enquist’s other Softball Coaching Videos! Sue will share some great tips and softball pitching mechanics, hitting and much more! And don’t forget to Like Us on Facebook, where we share more great ideas and suggestions for your practice plan! You can also Follow Us on Twitter and Hangout with us at Google+!