Base Running Leads and Steals at Practice

We're doing a review real quick on what we just talked about. So how far is our lead when we're at first base? Approximately 12 feet. So that's 12 feet right there. So I know for me 12 feet is one, two, three. And I'm at 12 feet. Everybody see that? So my left foot's right line with that. And that's for me. I saw some of you guys up there shuffling. It was one, two, three. Is that 12 feet? No it's not 12 feet. So that's why we say 12 feet and we don't say three shuffles. Okay? So we'll have the cone out there for practice now. From 12 feet, I should be able to cross over with my right foot, dive with my right hand. If you're only here and you go cross over and dive back, where am I going? You can see guys dive and you're way on this side of the basket. Yeah, I should say last year. Right? Guys do that. If you dive and you are landing on top of the base, just too short. Yeah, exactly. So you've got to get more. Okay? Like I said too, if you're a super quick guy, you should be able to get the 12 feet and get back to the extremely slow feet. You might be able to get the 13 feet. We might have a guy on the super quick feet and you're not. No, we should shorten up. So it's dependent on the pitcher a little bit. If you steal, I give you the steal sign. There you are. You're at 12 feet. He pitches. I go like this. What do I do? I just shut it down. So all I do is I just turn it into a secondary lead. Just one shuffle and stop. I'm never going like this and then going, oh, I got a bad read. I'm going to turn and run because you're going to get thrown out by how many feet? About 30 feet. Exactly. So if you don't get a good jump, you don't have to run. Okay? But we're going to practice so you can get good jumps. When you're watching the pitcher, what are we looking at? When we look at the pitcher. Yeah, we're looking at his feet. You got to be good at being able to see. Left heel picks up. What am I doing? You're stealing because the pitcher's pitching. If the back heel picks up, what are you doing? You're back to the back because I'm pitching, right? And you've got to practice that. That doesn't just happen just magically. Some guys are really good at watching feet and seeing what heel picks up. And then other guys, they sit there, the left foot picks up and their brain goes, okay, left foot picked up. Okay, that means I got to think, run. Okay, now let's run. That's too late. You're going to get thrown out. You've got to be so good at it that the second you see that heel starting to come out, I'm off and I got it. Or the second you see the right heel come off, you're back. Those guys can steal bases really well. All right? So we'll practice this. You can practice this on your own. You can have your buddy do it. You can have Carolla do it. Literally, just do your stretch. Pick up one foot or the other. Okay? There's two ways to steal the lead off first base, right? We talked about this. Easiest way is you just shuffle off the base. Because if it picks, you can get back. Now, I know some guys said that you go left foot first. Just stay square and shuffle. If you're going to be a left foot off first, it's got to be left foot. Where do I know where my feet are. I look at the picture. So that's why we're going to put the cone down so you know. For you, it might be. But if you're going to be a five shuffle guy, take it forever. Because this guy ain't going to wait for us to get out of the lead. I got to get out there quick. You can't take all day long. Because there's been guys, there's been guys that don't get out there on time and then the pitch is made and we never get the steal because you're still getting into your lead Okay. All right. So that's like real quick. We're going to add stuff on every single week to that. We're talking about how to get back. We haven't even talked about how to get back to the bag yet. But that'll be the next step. 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