What's up guys? Coach Madden, yougoprobaseball.com and I'm here with Doug
Bernier from pro baseball insider also an MLB middle infielder played a little
bit of first base as well played all over all over the place in fact he had a
fielding percentage of 1000 in the major leagues pretty impressive stuff
I was always said I had to do that or if I made an heir I'd probably get sent
down real quick so I had to field everything that was said that's great
and we're going to talk about fielding today we're going to talk about how to
field or pick the ball and the dirt and that happens a lot in baseball can you
talk about it in general for any position and then also maybe more
specifically for first base yeah for sure so picking a ball in the dirt I
mean it doesn't matter if you're gonna if you play third base shortstop second
or first I mean at some point you're gonna have to pick a ball in the dirt
right and the concept is the same regardless of what position you're
playing but there's a couple things to think about and the first one is when
the ball is coming to you the first thing you want to do is get low all
right so when I work on this with especially young infielders what they
want to do that the the first thought is they want to be up here and they want to
wait for it and they stab down for the ball if you happen to watch the backhand
video we talked about working underneath the baseball same thing applies here
when you're picking a ball in the dirt so as the ball is coming this back foot
is going to be pretty much secure right because it's gonna be on the it's gonna
be on the base it doesn't matter if it's 3rd 2nd or 1st what we're doing is I
think I like to think about here is I actually want to put my glove on the
ground and when the ball hits the ground that's when I can start working up it
kind of gives me a visual and a timing device but it helps me work underneath
the baseball if I'm here and then I'm just trying to go and time the ball it
makes it really difficult to pick a ball that's in the dirt so as the ball is
coming you know it's gonna be in the dirt
start with your glove on the ground and then as soon as that ball hits the dirt
then you could work through it and up through the ball a lot of times that
that helped me pick the ball in the dirt tip number 2 get to the side of the ball
so when the ball is gonna hit the dirt and you see it if you if
it's right in front of you like this it's gonna be really hard to pick make
it a backhand or even make it a forehand but get to the side of the baseball it's
gonna make it a whole lot easier and work through that ball be aggressive
with your glove I guess that's the third tip is be aggressive with your glove if
you get too passive and you just try to like I don't know then the ball kind of
takes over we want to be the aggressor on this when that ball hits the dirt be
aggressive really work that glove to the ball that's pretty much the only way
that it's gonna stick so those three tips should help you regardless of the
position you play pick a ball in the dirt a little bit easier let me ask you
this from the first base standpoint when are you trying to pick that ball and
when are you trying to come off the bag and block it up like what situations
well if the ball is gonna take you where obviously you can't keep your foot on
the base then you got to get off and do anything you can just to keep it in
front of you and also there needs to be an internal clock like infielders have
an internal clock where they get the ball they need to know like when they
need to release it to get a runner at first base same thing with the first
baseman though if you feel like the runner is gonna beat the play then you
got to do everything you can to keep the ball in front of you if there's still a
chance that you can get them at first base try to keep that foot on the on the
back and use those tips we talked about and try to pick the ball in the dirt now
let's talk about a little bit from other positions in the field well even first
base but from a fielding perspective playing yourself into that short hop
versus getting stuck in the middle can you talk about that yeah that's that's a
tough one there are some balls that are just really really tough I think when in
doubt you just got to be aggressive with your glove and just really just go
through it just just almost be overly aggressive just throw that hand at the
ball and see what happens because if you get too passive and you get that one
that's the in-betweener and you don't know what to do you're trying to go back
or you don't know if you should go forward it's really really difficult so
just again just really work through that ball that's pretty much the only chance
you have on those really tough ones were you a guy who
did you ever try to create space or were you always coming through the ball no I
did try to create space there are times especially when you're
at the corner in field positions when I know this might be a kind of off topic a
little bit but someone hits a hard line drive
you know topspin line drive it's gonna take a tricky hop on you there's times
when you just have to kind of drop step and try to create as much space as you
can you can do the same thing when you are picking a ball so you know maybe you
know it doesn't matter the position but if the runner is not in your way and you
do have an opportunity to get out of the way and try to create space that's
always an option to that's a little bit more difficult at first base because you
have someone barreling down on you and that could create you know some you know
some contact but at the other positions you might be able to get away with that
last question I got for you in regards to picking a ball and this one might be
the toughest what about when you got a guy stealing and you're taking the throw
from the catcher at second base a lot of those balls sometimes are in the dirt
but you still got to think about the tag is there anything different in that okay
well there's yeah there's there's a couple things the first one is if it's
an easy ball to pick then I'm gonna try to pick it and make a tag but it's also
one of those things where you can't really miss that ball because if you do
and it either kicks off your glove or squirts past you then all of a sudden
that runner can move to third base so you got to really you got to trust
yourself and you got to know what you can and can't handle if that ball if
it's gonna be a tough pick then you just got to almost just you just let the guy
have the base just keep the ball in front and keep it second base but again
that's one of those things you have to gauge yourself and if it's a ball that
you can easily pick then give it a try see if you can do it and just try to
make the tag as well as you can and see what happens
tough play really tough play I mean a lot basically when you're picking a ball
in the dirt it's not a science it's more of an art and just trying to feel what
works for you it's a really difficult play but also we know that us infielders
that are on especially a third and shortstop when you have a first baseman
that can pick the ball it makes you a lot more confident as an infielder
and it's a tough thing to do but when you can pick the ball you just raise the
game of all the other end filters is there anything that you did to work on
picks short hops yeah I would when I was by myself I would throw balls you know
tennis balls off the wall and I would just work on picks or when I was playing
first base I would have a coach hit me fungos I would I would be on the first
base bag and I would just keep it right here and he would just he would stand at
shortstop second base and he would just move around the infield and just hit
fungos at me and I would just be there and just try to work on picking the ball
and so that was that was another drill I did that's awesome that is awesome stuff
thank you so much guys if you like this video go check out Doug at pro baseball
insider he's also got a great newsletter I'll leave the link down below where you
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down there and try to answer them if we can and thank you so much for watching
guys I'll talk to you next one