www.bigalbaseball.com/tdc
TOTAL BASES GAME (GAME IT)
Purpose: Once your 7-8 yr old team has had the chance to walk through and practice the basic defensive plays, play this game to practice hitting, running the bases and defense at game-like speed.
Set - up:
• You can either use the min-diamond approach with shorter bases or use the regulation sized diamond. • You could use Bubba Bat and soft hit baseballs or you could use regulation balls and bats. • Divide your team into 4 equally talented hitting teams. (For example; if you have 12 players create 4 teams of 3 players. If you have 11 players create 3 teams of 3 players and 1 team of 2 players.) • 3 teams take the field and fill all of the defensive positions like they would in a ball game. Play the game with the same local league rules you will be using during the season. (for example: your league may not have a catcher position for Tee Ball, if this is the case don’t assign a catcher in the Total Bases Game) • The 3 players on the 4th team of 3 players put on helmets and get ready to hit. • The coach pitches to each team (sitting on a bucket behind an L-screen 21-25 feet from the hitters) • This approach will create lots of hits and chances for the defense to practice all of the game situations
Rules:
• Each team, when it is their turn to hit, gets a total of 6 official at bats (ie. if there are 3 players on a team, each player gets 2 official at bats and if there are only 2 players on a team each player gets 3 official at bats.) • Each time a player gets to any base safely it counts as 1 point. o A single is worth 1 point, a double 2 points, a triple 3 points and a home run 4 points. o A player advancing from 1st to 2nd is 1 point and a player advancing from 2nd to home is 2 points etc. • If a player hits a double he gets 2 points, and he stays on 2nd base just like a ball game and gives his teammate at the plate a chance to hit him around. • If the next hitter gets a single and gets to first base he gets a point for his team and on the same play, if the runner that was on 2nd base scores on the base hit he earns another 2 points for his team. • If a player flies out, grounds out or strikes out he gets 0 points for his team. www.bigalbaseball.com/tdc
TOTAL BASES GAME (GAME IT)
• If a player hits a single but gets thrown out trying to turn it into a double he only gets 1 point for getting to 1st safely. • If the defensive players make errors, drop fly balls, over throw bases, don’t hustle to cover behind team mates, or throw the ball to the wrong bases the hitting team will earn a lot of points by getting
on base and then advancing around the bases to score. • Once the 4 teams each have had 6 officials at bats, the winning team is the one that earned the most points.
Outcome: When the 3 teams are on defense the goal is to limit the total number of bases the hitting team can generate. This is a great way to cause everyone in the field to work together and to focus on executing on the defensive plays. When a team is on offence, the goal is to accumulate as many points (total bases) as possible using their 6 official bats. This is a great way to get your players to focus on hitting, advancing base runners and driving in runs.