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Monday, March 5, 2012

Weekend Wrap-Up | March 2-4, 2012

TCA Field #1 Infield Turf Done
First Use - March 4, 2012
Eleven teams in tournaments, Field #1's Maiden Voyage and High School players workout.

Triple Creek Field Update
Over the last two weeks, there have been many improvements made to the Triple Creek Complex - walkways, bullpens and fields. One of the main projects that has been worked on over the last couple weeks is Field #1. Field #1 was completely skinned (all existing grass from the infield area removed), the infield edge that connects to the outfield was cut deeper into the outfield and then . . . new grass on the infield, pitchers mound and home plate cut perfectly and new grass down the lines. Sunday, March 4, 2012 was the maiden voyage for Field #1 and all teams that played - couldn't stop talking about how great the infield grass and dirt were to play on - the boys felt like professionals - Big League field for a big league feel.

Tournament Summary
The eleven (11) TCA Twins teams played in two tournaments this weekend - Triple Crown Sports North Texas Season Opener (#ntxseasonopener) and Triple Creek Academy Clover All Over (#cloverallover).

Triple Crown Sports North Texas Season Opener (#ntxseasonopener):

  • 9U Benhardt (#9UBenhardt)
  • 10U Varner (#10UVarner)
  • 10U Zarbaugh (#10UZarbaugh)
  • 11U DeButy (#11UDeButy)
  • 12U Findley (#12UFindley)
  • 12U Mitchell (#12UMitchell)
Triple Creek Academy Clover All Over (#cloverallover):

  • 8U Constantine (#8UConstantine)
  • 8U Springer (#8USpringer)
  • 11U Wiesner (#11UWiesner)
  • 13U Thielepape (#13UThielepape)
  • 14U Pierce (#14UPierce)
Across the two tournaments, TCA Twins had two (2) teams play for championships and four (4) teams play in semi-final games.
11U DeButy players
Sitting in the Semi-Finals

The following two teams played in the championship games, but came up short and finished second:

  • 10U Zarbaugh | North Texas Season Opener | 10U D1
  • 14U Pierce | Clover All Over | 14U AA Division
The following teams made it to the semi-finals, but got knocked out:
  • North Texas Season Opener
    • 10U Varner | 10U D2
    • 11U DeButy | 11U D1
    • 12U Mitchell | 12U D1
  • Clover All Over
    • 11U Wiesner | 11U AAA
It is still early in the season and all teams played well and represented TCA Twins with class and respect when winning and losing. Keep up all the hard work boys!

High School Workout
This past Sunday, some of the high school players got together for a light workout - some infield, outfield and situational hitting. We also had some of our 14U-Majors players join the group to get a little extra work in and provide some live pitching. As we progress through the spring and high school players are playing mostly league games, we look forward to seeing more players for light workouts and get closer to ensuring players are slotted for the right teams.

As usual, there was a lot of things going on this weekend and more coming this weekend.

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Plant, Shuffle, Flip & Drop Step

Which zone the pitcher fielding this bunt in?
Plant | Shuffle | Flip | Drop Step
The bunt is back in play. Why? New BBCOR bats is probably the main reason. Colleges and High School baseball has changed and the 'bunt' is now a tool being used more to get runners on base, move runners over, score runs and make the defense antsy and uncomfortable.

So what does - 'Plant, Shuffle, Flip & Drop Step' have to do with bunts?

TCA Twins Coach, Jace Findley, at Monday's Extra Work showed & explained to pitchers four (4) zones for fielding bunts.

The four zones in front of the pitchers mound, yet far enough from the catcher - from third base line to the first base line are as follows:

  1. Plant - When a bunt is fielded in this zone, the pitcher does not have a lot of time to re-shuffle their feet and then throw because the bunt is near the third base foul line. When a ball is bunted in this zone, the pitcher must field the bunt, with their feet in a good position to throw - thus they must field the ball in a 'plant' position. Once they field the fall, they must keep their feet 'planted' and throw.
  2. Shuffle - When a bunt is fielded in this zone, the pitcher has some time, so we want the pitcher to shuffle, get their feet under them and sometimes shuffle to get off the mound. Granted this is not a good bunt by the offense - as this bunt is right back to the pitcher.
  3. Flip - When a bunt is fielded in this zone, the pitcher will be fielding this with some momentum moving towards first base and it is too close to first base to throw the ball. When the pitcher fields this bunt (usually a push-bunt towards the second basemen), the pitcher will field this bunt and use an under-hand flip (or what I like to describe as a toss) to the player covering first base.
  4. Drop Step - When a bunt is fielded in this zone, the pitcher is close to the first base line and needs to create a throwing lane so the throw does not hit the runner running to first base. After the bunt is fielded in this zone, the pitcher will use a drop step towards the pitchers mound and then throw to the player covering first base.
The Plant, Shuffle, Flip and Drop Step zones are primarily used for fielding bunts by the pitcher and making the play to first base.

Thanks to TCA Twins coach Jace (12U Head Coach, 10U Assistant & 15U Co-Head Coach) for providing our TCA Twins players with a method and zones for fielding bunts as a pitcher.