Hi Coaches!

We got asked a great question other day. A coach said “what do I do at third base, I've never coached baseball before & they asked me to be the third base coach and I don't know what to do.”

We’re going to go through a couple of situations and how to give the correct signs as the 3^rd base coach:

 If you want the runner to stop on the base, you must put your hands up and tell them “On the Bag!”.

If the player is rounding the base and you want them to go back you have to point and yell “Back! Back! Back!

If you want the player to keep coming you have to round your arm in a circle and yell at them to keep coming or yell the number of the base! (3! 3! 3!).

If your player is on the way to third base you can either stop and hold them, you can wave them to go home, or you can tell them to slide. The older they get you can direct their slide. You can get down, point and direct them away from the tag!

If the ball is in the outfield and you want them to round the base hard, you go down the baseline you're bringing them with you, you're seeing if the ball hits the cutoff, maybe the cut off misses it and you let them go. Maybe the cut off gets the ball and all the sudden you want to stop, and you want to get back to the bag.

You may be bringing them and suddenly “stop, stop, stop, or down, down, down” and you want them to slide.

There are several different things that can happen as a 3^rd base coach so we must be prepared!  Go over the signs and signals at practice and make sure your players pick you up early so they know what to do!  Remind them to run hard and always assume they’re going the extra base until you stop them! 

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