What's up guys?
Coach Madden, official trainer, YouGoProBaseball.com and today we're going to talk about how to
steal second base and I've got Nick Shaw, former Brewers shortstop with us today.
Nick Shaw provides the walk off tonight.
An RBI double by Nick Shaw.
And 2 runs come in on the RBI base hit by Nick Shaw.
Great base stealer.
He was playing last year in the Brewers organization and he's going to give us some tips on how
to steal second base.
He's also the owner of thebattersbox.co I'll leave a link below where you can check that
out, really cool stuff.
But what do you have for us today Nick?
First things first, first thing you pick up your coach, get the sign, alright.
We're taking our lead off the back corner of the base.
The key is to stay in a straight line as long as we can.
We don't want to take our lead too deep, take our lead too far in front, alright.
Right off the back side of the base.
Your lead needs to be personalized to who you are.
If you're a tall guy, you can take further, if you're a shorter guy, you should probably
shorten up your lead a little bit.
It should be a step and a dive back to the base for everybody.
Unless you're that special guy who's a little quicker, then maybe you can get another half
step.
Let's take our lead off the back corner of the base.
Get out to our lead.
Now, we don't want to be too square because this leg needs to be our first move to second.
If we're square, then the left leg has to clear the right leg and actually we end up
going in front of the base line.
Again, staying in a straight line.
So let's drop this right foot.
1 o'clock on a clock, pointed to 1 o'clock.
This foot is pointed to 2 o'clock on a clock assuming that 12 is straight ahead, alright.
Again, we want the first move to be with the left leg, alright.
As soon as the pitcher lifts up his front leg, we drive this arm and this leg in a straight
line towards second base.
Again, we don't want to be out of the base line, straight line, alright.
The last thing I've got for you, 1 o'clock, 2 o'clock, we don't want to drop step.
Like I said the first step needs to be with the left leg.
A lot of kids now-a-days when they go to take off they drop step with their right and then
go left.
Again, we're losing this much ground and another step.
So make sure we're exploding with this leg in a straight line to second base.
Nick, I've got a question for you, as a pitcher, and I was a pitcher, when should you take
that lead because if I'm coming, sometimes I would be here taking the sign and I would
see the guy come up and I would just pick over, he's already leading off.
So at what point do you start to take your lead.
I'll go ahead and be the pitcher here.
So as soon as the right foot gets on the rubber, I'm taking a little bit of a lead, once he
comes set, then I'm taking more of my lead, but like you said when you're looking over
not set yet, I'm not going to get way out here and get picked off, you know.
So I'm waiting until you come set.
Another thing that I used to do is when you're taking your sign I'm shortened up, I've got
my head down, I'm taking your sign with you, ok I'm looking at the catcher's sign.
If it's a curveball, I know I've got a better chance to steal.
You know, I can't get my full lead and try to pick the sign safe enough to get back here
if you're going to spin and throw me out.
That was a great point with taking the signs with the pitcher.
What about certain counts?
Can you, if you can't see the catcher's signs or for whatever reason, or can you get something
out of the counts that the batter is in as a base runner?
That's a good question.
We're not just running for no reason.
We're not just trying to steal every time we get on base, alright.
Say there's a 1-2 count.
A lot of times the curveball is coming.
Even an 0-2 count curveball's coming, maybe, know what i mean, they're trying to burry
something, they're not putting it over the middle of the plate.
That's a great time for a speedy guy to steal, alright.
The other time is, say 2 outs, we need to get into scoring position and again it's one
of those counts or even 0-0 we want to get there as soon as we can with 2 outs so we
can get a base hit and score.
If a base hit is hit and we're still on first, we maybe get to second, maybe third, we're
still not scoring.
So situations are huge.
Now when our hitter is in a hitter's count, 2-0, 3-0, that's when we want to put the red
light on.
We don't want to steal 3-0 have the hitter take a pitch and us be thrown out by 20 feet.
Be smart with the stealing, be smart.
Again, if there's a catcher that can really throw, we're stealing off the pitcher now
because we know this guy can throw.
The pitcher needs to be a guy with a high leg kick or a guy that loads way back here
and takes a long time.
We don't just want to go on the guys who can really throw because again we're going to
be out.
We just have to be smart with situations, go in the right counts, pick up something
off the pitcher, and go on a catcher we know we can go on.
That's a great point about stealing the bag off of the pitcher.
As a pitcher, you want to be a 1.3 or below from your delivery to the time the catcher
catches the ball because a good catcher is going to be under 2 seconds here.
So that means if the pitcher is a 1.3 or below and the catcher is a 2.0 or below, that means
this guy has to steal this bag in 3.3 seconds or less.
So if the pitcher is longer and he's got a 1.5, 1.6 you know coaches you can time this
with your stop watch while he's pitching earlier in the inning and if you know he's a 1.6,
1.7 and you've got a fast guy here, that might be a good time to get a guy into scoring position.
Hey guys, I hope you liked this video.
Go ahead give Nick, and I, and Coach Gus a thumbs up please if you did.
Don't forget to check out thebattersbox.co that's Nick's website you definitely want
to check it out.
He's also got an instagram account @thebattersbox.co go check it out.
He's got some great stuff over there, always doing a bunch of giveaways and stuff like
that, so check him out.
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Leave us a comment below and let us know what' you're going to do to steal more bases this
season.