Okay, now we are talking about negating the other teams ability to steal bases on us and we have talked about who covers and now we are going to talk about how you lay the tag, how you get to the base and you lay the tag at second base. We going to have Tanner take his spot as a shortstop to come over, he is going to hold his position as long as he can and now his sprints to the base to cover the bag.
Now, I do not teach that we straddle the bag because I think that when you straddle the bag, put your foot all the way around and straddle the bag that if the throw is up the line, what happens is the runner invariably collides with your shortstop or your second baseman trying to lay the tag. I teach to put that back foot on the back side of the bag and have your front foot up a little further just a little bit more in front to catch the throw, so that now even if you have a bad throw the ball can still be picked and Tanner, what we will do if there is a bad throw, he will go down on the knee, no, no go down on the knee onto the base to get real low to catch that throw , pick up that ball there, catch that throw and lay the tag.
Now the one common error is the throw is here. Tanner is in the right position stand back up, he is the right position and the throw is here. You oftentimes, you see guys reach out to catch the ball. That is the bad thing because the ball is traveling much faster than they are going to reach out and catch it. I make sure we teach our infielders to wait for the ball, catch, lay straight down, do not go reaching. A lot of times you see this, they will for them but the guy is not there yet. Put the glove in front of the bag, wait for him, when he finally comes, you tag, you do not sweep, you tag and then last thing is you sell the tag which is home the ball up to the umpires saying, yes! I got it. Please bang them out.
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