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The Youth Sports Coaching Thread

Well, the hoops season is over. I think this was my 6th time taking on a kid's team and it was the most challenging group of kids and families by miles. The season ended up not being anything I hoped for. That's okay, it's going to be the biggest learning experience of my coaching time. This may sound like complaining but it's not - I would be truly be interested in hearing feedback from others on techniques you use to deal with kids that don't care, kids that have emotional/maturity issues and families that sign their kids up to play a sport but then aren't committed to it fully themselves.
 
I'm looking for a little help. I know a decent amount about baseball / softball in general, but nothing about how to teach a girl to fast pitch underhand. I've started looking at stuff on line but I thought I'd toss it out to this crowd - does anyone have a good system for teaching this?
 
looks like it's year 2 of coaching my oldest daughters soccer team. I was trying to step aside and let others step in bc of my work commitments, but i'm going to have to move things around now.
 
Question for those that have coached. My son is 4 and we signed him up for tee ball this spring. Working with him yesterday on some batting and throwing he seemed to be leaning more towards doing things lefty. He was holding the bat left hand high and trying to swing that way. I had him hit both left and right and throw left and right. He did equally well both ways. Anyway to tell if he is left or right handed? Should I try and steer him one way or the other?
 
bogeyme said:
Question for those that have coached. My son is 4 and we signed him up for tee ball this spring. Working with him yesterday on some batting and throwing he seemed to be leaning more towards doing things lefty. He was holding the bat left hand high and trying to swing that way. I had him hit both left and right and throw left and right. He did equally well both ways. Anyway to tell if he is left or right handed? Should I try and steer him one way or the other?
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Personally I'd say don't sweat it. His body will let you know if he's RH or LH. If he leans more toward doing things lefty sounds like he's a lefty.
 
bogeyme said:
Question for those that have coached. My son is 4 and we signed him up for tee ball this spring. Working with him yesterday on some batting and throwing he seemed to be leaning more towards doing things lefty. He was holding the bat left hand high and trying to swing that way. I had him hit both left and right and throw left and right. He did equally well both ways. Anyway to tell if he is left or right handed? Should I try and steer him one way or the other?
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You happen to notice what hand he used when he draws or what hand he uses to pick up food, cup or silverware?
 
So I'm also "coaching" my youngest daughters 4-5 yr old soccer team... Great!
 
tequila4kapp said:
Personally I'd say don't sweat it. His body will let you know if he's RH or LH. If he leans more toward doing things lefty sounds like he's a lefty.
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I was leaning towards his grip being "backwards" due to him being untrained athleticly and not knowing how to hold the bat properly. I'm all for him being a lefty.
Nate said:
You happen to notice what hand he used when he draws or what hand he uses to pick up food, cup or silverware?
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He does all that with his right hand.

I'm only asking so I don't mess things up and force him to be a righty when he could excel as a lefty. I guess time will tell.
 
bogeyme said:
He does all that with his right hand.

I'm only asking so I don't mess things up and force him to be a righty when he could excel as a lefty. I guess time will tell.
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This is what I looked at from my kids which helped determine.
 
Today was our first Jv baseball game of the season won 11-6. Best part was my special needs def student got his first high school base hit. A double to right field. Place went crazy. I got teared up coaching at third. I have had the pleasure to have some amazing memories and accomplishment in baseball this is by far my proudest moment.
 
I had one of those great moments with the girls on my softball team tonight where they all started showing signs of improving and getting it.
 
So my wife signed me up to coach my kids soccer team. I've never coached, never played soccer(nor do I really care for the sport), so anyone have any suggestions or places to find stuff to do with the kids. They are 5. The practices are 30 mins and the games are 30 mins. So I'm basically just going to try and keep it fun, look for game like drills.


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jspangs said:
So my wife signed me up to coach my kids soccer team. I've never coached, never played soccer(nor do I really care for the sport), so anyone have any suggestions or places to find stuff to do with the kids. They are 5. The practices are 30 mins and the games are 30 mins. So I'm basically just going to try and keep it fun, look for game like drills.

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Welcome to coaching!

You have to keep them constantly busy at that age or you will have mayhem. I strongly recommend you consider using multiple stations where a smaller number of kids can work on a particular skill. Say you have 12 kids on the team, you have 3 groups of 4 kids and rotate them through each station. Because there are only 4 kids per station they are very active and have very little down time. That's a good thing for you. (In case it isn't clear, you need a coach/adult working each station and teaching the skill)

I don't know anything about soccer, but using basketball as an analogy you could have a dribbling station, a passing station and a shooting station. You will need to figure that part out, as well as the drills to use for each station. In my experience it is a good thing to a very small number of drills for these core skills that they do over and over and over again. It will be rough at the beginning but by the end of the season you'll see big improvement thanks to all those repetitions.
 
Groups of two across from each other just passing. Get those cones they are about 3" tall and have them dribble a weave then shoot at the end.

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tequila4kapp said:
Welcome to coaching!

You have to keep them constantly busy at that age or you will have mayhem. I strongly recommend you consider using multiple stations where a smaller number of kids can work on a particular skill. Say you have 12 kids on the team, you have 3 groups of 4 kids and rotate them through each station. Because there are only 4 kids per station they are very active and have very little down time. That's a good thing for you. (In case it isn't clear, you need a coach/adult working each station and teaching the skill)

I don't know anything about soccer, but using basketball as an analogy you could have a dribbling station, a passing station and a shooting station. You will need to figure that part out, as well as the drills to use for each station. In my experience it is a good thing to a very small number of drills for these core skills that they do over and over and over again. It will be rough at the beginning but by the end of the season you'll see big improvement thanks to all those repetitions.
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Thanks. Well I guess another issue is I'm going to be the only coach, but I think there is only 7 kids. I will definitely look up some drills for the kids. As I said I don't know anything about soccer but I guess that's what Google is for.
 
jspangs said:
Thanks. Well I guess another issue is I'm going to be the only coach, but I think there is only 7 kids. I will definitely look up some drills for the kids. As I said I don't know anything about soccer but I guess that's what Google is for.
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I've been wearing Google out learning how to teach underhand softball pitching.

FYI, even with 7 you'll probably be happy to have a parent take 1/2 the group.
 
tequila4kapp said:
I've been wearing Google out learning how to teach underhand softball pitching.

FYI, even with 7 you'll probably be happy to have a parent take 1/2 the group.
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That's good, I'm not the only one. I did recruit my neighbor to help coach and he said he would, though he doesn't have a kid on the team. But he might decide he doesn't want to waste is Saturday's when his kid isn't on the team.
 
Week one is in the books for soccer.

My PreK 4 girls was an "adventure" to say the least, but they had fun.

My 1st/2nd grade girls won 4-0. We built in the defensive alignment we put in place last year and played counter attack. The girls are really growing and good to get that win!
 
The silver eagles went down 10-2 today handing us our first loss. Some of kids did not take it well. And their parents didn't like me scolding them.
 
My girls team lost by a decent amount. I had 3 girls cry. But we kept it together pretty good and they got better as the game went on.

2 girls on the other team made a bunch of plays - they were beginners when I had them last year and it was good to see how far they'd come, even if it did come at our expense today.

It's going to be a great season.


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Freddie & Frank I know what you mean. Win or lose I expect my girls to handle it gracefully. I'll take the crying or not being happy bc it shows they want to be competitive, but I'm teaching them to harness that into positive energy.
 
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