I bought a brand new Anarchy Awakening bat today and the guy who sold it to me was giving me lots of chat about how to get the most from it.

He mentioned a few times that older balls will crack it, that I can only hit newer 52/300 balls.

Is new tech really that tweaked that I can’t practice with all the old balls in my kit bag?

Can anyone recommend and Hitting and Catching coach in North County San Diego?

I’m a catcher playing 16u B. Sometimes it’s really sunny but mostly I just can’t stand dirt in my eyes all the time. Is it allowed to wear a visor in a catchers helmet, and if so, where to get one?

Does anyone have a winter workout they do at home to help the kids keep in shape? 12U level.

We bought our daughter the evoshield catchers gear and we found a package in the box. What is it for?

My daughter will be starting 12U and needs a new glove. Shes a rec and allstar player that does lots of extra practice. Is a Wilson a2000 too much at that age? If so would an a1000 be more appropriate?

Anyone have any experience using a power drive for pitching? I seen a lot of pitching coaches use them. I'm wondering if they are worth the money. Amazon sells some and the designs differ quite a bet. Which one works best? TIA.

If you don't find the power drive useful; what's the most useful training tool for pitching?

Power Drive Performance - Softball Pitching Trainer (Silver https://a.co/d/7QFeKfk

Batter Up Ind PD-750-SPM Softball Pitching Mound https://a.co/d/fkDBX5t

Does anyone have any experience with the Power Alley pitching machine for softball from Heater Sports? Looking for something to supplement 8u practices.

It's been quite awhile since I played travel, rec, etc. Now my daughter is in and we just started doing tryouts for travel. What is the difference between bracket play and pool play?

A couple of months ago, my DD joined a 12U travel ball team.  It is a solid developmental team and the girls have  been rotating around the field and getting experience.  My daughter is in the middle of the pack, skill wise, and plays catcher, OF, and can play in the field (through rarely does).  She’s marginally the best catcher on the team, plays real hard, and is also on a rec team (she plays a lot of softball).  She, admittedly is in a batting slump right now.   Last weekend, there was a tournament and her playing time was significantly reduced for pool play.  She was out caught 11-3 innings over three games and sat a lot while rotating through the outfield.  In bracket play Sunday, she didn’t see the field or bat at all in two games until the final inning down 20-1.  She was devastated and crying and talked the coach after the game.

This is where it gets crazy… my wife emailed an extremely PC email the next day asking what our daughter could do for more playing time.  She really wanted to know what he was going to do to coach her up.  He went on an absolutely insane rant that shook my wife to the core.  Nothing was about how he was going to coach her, but went on and on about how she needs to take private lessons (in an insane way).  Wife completely checked out.

We were already disappointed in the amount of practice time the team has and had started to look around for teams that practice on a more regular basis.  I’m disappointed with the playing time, because I feel my dd is better than the girl who played.  But, I don’t even care about playing time if it’s clear that my dd behind the starter.  Question, should we

1)      quit now

2)      quit at end of fall “season” (dec)

3)      stick with team (little possibility).

Our league is struggling with this! There is no written rule on it in our local rules and each team has their own opinion which obviously makes lots or problems. We also have the additional struggle that our umpires are teenagers/very young adults and they don’t really care and don’t pay much attention. There are 1 or 2 umps that will call time after the play is made at first but the others don’t and will allow girls to score while the ball is on the process of being thrown back to the pitcher.

The first season we played one team was doing the infielder can raise the ball and call the time thing so other teams started doing that.

The next season someone said get it back to the pitcher, so they were throwing it back to the coach pitcher.

This season they said when you have controlled the lead runner- which I get works for more experienced kids but this is a starter league where more than half the kids have never played before so they are just getting it back to the pitcher.

We are going to get something in writing for our next season so I would like to know what others are doing. Thank you.

I manage a mens team and have been for years.

Recently our city implemented Team Sideline as a mandatory way to manage our rosters and score our games. As expected, no one uses team sideline to communicate because we are all used to the old fashioned way of just texting each other about upcoming games.

The worst part of this app is that rosters have to be manually entered and each player is expected to open an email from the app to accept the roster invitation. This just adds more frustration for the manager to have to follow up with everyone and babysit them to get them to do the next steps.

The city sets a time frame for everyone to be added and the the roster "submitted" to the city. The purpose is to make sure teams aren't loading up their roster with subs during tournament, and they are ID checking everyone the day of the tournament.

2 things:

1. the manager had to manually submit the roster (minimum 8 players) to the city before the due date.
2. the players have to accept the invitiation on time in order for the manager to submit the roster.

If the roster submission is not sent by the deadline, you can no longer submit a roster. Essentially the team forfeits the rest of the season because of a technicality with the app.

To top it all off, the city can fine the manager and charge their credit card they used to pay for the registration for every forfeited game.

In the end, most of my guys didn't check their emails and accept the invitation on time and I'm liable for forfeits.

Fuck team sideline. And fuck the city for implementing it.

My daughter is currently pitching at a 10U level but next fall will be moving up to 12U. She currently is playing on a travel team that will be practicing this winter and resuming tournaments in the spring. My question is when I should introduce the 12” ball. I’ve had her pitch from 40 ft and she’s already fine with the distance. I just don’t want to potentially throw her off introducing the bigger ball during tournament time but also want her comfortable with it in the fall.

Curious to see what you all think. I have a 9 year old. Very advanced but on the smaller side. She doesn’t like her floppy glove, at times it will pop off. She can’t “stick” a catch with it….its hard for me to even do that. I let her try my Rawlings HOH and she likes it a lot. It’s newer and not really broke in broke in. Like I said she wants a little stiffer glove that holds up better. Any suggestions? She plays all over but mostly middle infield and some 3rd. My idea with the rev1x is it seems to fit very tight, which is a definite need! TIA

Interesting topic of discussion regarding this play . . . Bases loaded walk. R3 acts confused for a moment and gets late start to home. Meanwhile, R2 heads to third, starts picking up steam, and is at a full sprint as she reaches third and heads home. R3 has traveled about half way to home and has now picked up her pace. The runners end up +/- 8 ft from each other as they approach home.

Our discussion centered around the obligation of R3 to get out of the way of any attempted play on R2.

This happened twice on Saturday pool play. Both times the throw home was bad and there was no play, but it got me thinking about all the bad stuff that could occur on this play.

I would like some help with the batters interference rule. I coach a 12U softball team and this happened in a tournament recently. 1 out, runner at 3. Wild pitch, R3 makes an attempt to steal home. Batter backs out of the box in an attempt to get out of the way at home plate. She backed out of the box, as she was backing up out of the box, this now put her in the path of the catcher running from the backstop with the ball trying to make the out at home. Runner was called out to batter interference. My understanding was that the batter had to make an attempt to get out of the way, which she did. Is it still interference even though the batter was trying to get out of the way? If so, what do you coach your batters to do in this situation. My understanding is if they stay in the box during a play at home plate they can be called for batters interference as well.

Hello, all! My daughter's softball team is dissolving, and I was looking for some answers since I can't find any!

My daughter was born in 2015. She was on a 10u team. She was one of the youngest. Would she be able to play 8u in the Spring? We are USABL. The coach is refusing to give up the team even though everyone quit/is playing up, and someone suggested creating an 8u team with the remaining younger players.

Thank you!

I played varsity softball last year as a catcher, but haven't practiced in a few months and I'm trying to get back in the swing of things, so that I can hopefully join a team. I was wondering if I could get any recommendations for workouts to do in order to increase speed and pop up time while catching, recommendations for new catching gear, some recommendations to help me improve my throwing distance, and things of that nature. Thank you, any help y'all can offer is greatly appreciated :)

So right now I mainly watch Catching Made Simple and just any other videos I happen to see pop up. Right now I definitely struggle with blocking the ball in terms of form and blocking to the side. I also struggle a bit with framing low pitches. Are there any channels you recommend for catchers? (Or just overall playing in the field or batting?)

Now don’t get me wrong I know how ridiculous that sounds. But hear me out. My 4 year old played for the first time this fall. And did surprisingly well. She hit off the coach consistently in games and enjoys playing.

Her great grandfather is asking what kind of Christmas present she should get. I am considering suggesting a couple of hitting lessons. We are in south Alabama.

I didn’t grow up in the USA and never played softball. So I have no wisdom to impart to her. I ran track and can teach her but running but that’s it.

I completely understand that the impact and importance of lessons at 4 (she will turn 5 end of April 2025) is probably not as great as when she is a little older but I also realize that great fundamentals are a good start.

Thoughts?

Hey all, it's election season (ugh) and I've noticed one league in particular had a banner posted in right field for a local candidate running for election.

This same league also sold water bottles this year with a local candidate's logo. For context, the candidate donated this water to the concession stand with proceeds going back towards the league.

If I understand correctly,the LL website prohibits political signs. But I'm wanting to see what the opinion is about the water bottles as they were donated but still sold through the league. The wording is a bit vague:

https://www.littleleague.org/playing-rules/position-policy-statements/use-little-league-support-political-office-seekers-legislation/

Also, it's probably right in front of me, but how do you report a violation?

So I played softball since I was 9yrs old. I was quite good in high school, winning district awards every year. However I tore my ACL my senior year and decided to hold off on surgery so I could finish out my season. My doctor advised me to not play my first year of college due to surgery, but I was going through a very difficult time and decided to give up on my dream to play in college all together. I instead went to a community college for a couple years.

I am now 21yrs old and began attending the university I planned on playing softball at. It’s a D2 college. I became friends with a girl on the softball team and she told me I might be able to try out for the team next year.

Are there any specific requirements that could keep me from playing? I’m also afraid I will be too busy due to my major in nursing. I will be a sophomore next spring semester. But I’ve been missing softball so much, as it was a big part of my life.

Been with NCSA a little over a year now but im curious, has anyone used NCSA for softball and what was their experience? Particularly curious about how the rating system they use works and Emailing from their software in lieu of a personal email. My daughter will be a junior next year.

I am looking at an Oxbow and an Acadia. The Oxbow is $50 more, but I can't find one thing really different as far as materials... any insight?

Looking for recs for a 32” alloy bat for a 14 year old, not a power hitter but loves her Louisville Meta composite…but weather limits us in the late fall and early spring, so what are your best non composite bats that won’t break the bank since it will only get game action for about 6 games a year?

Thanks

Hey all. I’ve been coaching fastpitch for about 14 years, but am coming off a 2-year hiatus. The team I’m working with is 16U and almost every time we have hitting practice the girls ask me if they should “use their practice bats.” I never know how to answer them- I’ve never had players ask this before. I usually explain to them the practice plan and let them decide. I’m trying to encourage independence in practice settings and get them thinking for themselves. Finally this week I got a little impatient and said “I don’t know- what drills required one?” And they didn’t have a good answer for me beyond “I don’t know- ones that could damage my bat” which in my mind, every hitting drill is taking away life from a bat.

Long story short- when would you recommend or tell kids to use practice bats? Some of them also have bats that are not the same length/weight as their game bats so I don’t think “always” is the right answer.

Secondary question- is this normal or did I just grow up poor and not able to afford or think about having two bats?

What are your daughters (or you) using for batting practice out of the machine with a dimple ball? My 14U daughter has a new Ghost Advanced. Should I buy a banged up Ghost Advanced to be used for dimple balls? Will those balls quickly destroy even an old Ghost?

Hello Im John from logan wv I was posting to see if there was anyone out there that was interested in forming an adult coed softball league or had any information on any leagues in the area for the spring or fall. I have a whole team ready and raring to start an actual season rather than just picking up and jumping in random tournaments. Anyone with any answers feel free to point me in the directions and help would be appreciated.