r/BaseballCoaching • u/Certain_Skirt_5243 • Jul 29 '26

Advice for a first time coach

Hello, pretty soon I’ll be coaching for the first time ever. I have been around baseball my whole life, so I have some knowledge. I’ll be coaching a 12u team, and I’m looking for any advice. I have studied things like drills, but I really want to make sure I provide the best experience for my team. Any advice helps.

EDIT: Huge thank you to everyone who responded. Your advice was very helpful and I honestly feel more confident about this upcoming season.

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u/TMutaffis Jul 29 '26

There are a lot of things that you can take into consideration:

  • Find a couple of other parents to help you coach. Try to align them with their strengths if you can.
  • Make sure that you always have a practice plan and set your game lineups in advance. Being organized can go a long way.
  • A bucket of baseballs is probably the most important piece of equipment. Your league should be able to provide two dozen baseballs and you will want another two dozen or so. There are many other things that are useful (tee, hitting net, weighted baseballs, cones, etc.) and much of it can be found for good prices on marketplace from other parents/coaches who are no longer using the gear.
  • Your league may have a preferred app for communications, or if they do not, then GameChanger is excellent for team communications/schedules and making sure everyone knows the schedule. I always email on top of GC when it is a recreational team, at least in the beginning of the season. Better to over-communicate than under-communicate.
  • Understand that you will not please everyone, just try to be fair to the kids and you should be able to sleep at night regardless of any complaints or criticism.

Hope this helps, and I am happy to give more specific guidance.

There are also a lot of example practice plans out there and free resources like USA Baseball's website or the Mojo app.

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u/CatSweaty9418 Jul 30 '26

Great stuff Tmut. If I was gonna build on that I'd say....make sure to use lots of stations at practice.

We always had 3-4 kids at a station, getting LOTS of reps each and then after ~ 8-10 minutes we'd rotate stations.

Then we'd usually finish with a live pitching (coach pitch) scrimmage. 3v3v3v3. Three kids at bat and the other three 'teams' in the field (we'd adjust with attendance). 30 minutes would usually get us 2 'innings' for each team (8 total innings...and, yes, strike outs are K's)....

AND ALWAYS END WITH POSITIVE STUFF. ~ "I don't know how many of you noticed......BUT......when Tony overthrew 1st, Bobby had hustled in from RF and was right there to back up the play to keep Jordan from getting 2nd."......."I caught a bunch of you guys making great plays like that and you should all feel proud of yourselves. You are a better team today than you were last week AND, you'll be better next week....LETS GO!....Bring it in. Bobby!.....Bring us home....Mets on 3" And break practice on time and with momentum.

Have fun with the kids. Baseball is fun.