How To Turn A Double Play - Underhand Flip

Hey what's going on everyone. Today we're here at our new facility in Middleton, Massachusetts and we're talking about the three ways to turn double plays as a shortstop. This works for both baseball and softball. So the technique does not change depending on which sport you're playing. I'm going to put the softball down for a second. In this video we're going to talk about the underhand toss. This is the first way to turn a double play to your second baseman. So this happens on any ball that's hit at you or to your left. So at you or towards the bag. Now if you're in a shift there's a possibility that this could turn into a sidearm feed but in almost every case in normal positioning if the ball's hit at you or to your left this is going to be the technique that you use. So the first thing that you're going to want to do is you're going to want to get to the right of the ball. We want to get to the right of the ball so that we can get a momentum going towards our target where we're flipping. So as the ball is hit my first step is going to be with my right foot. So if the ball's there I'm going to take my right foot I'm going to get past the ball. I usually talk about getting the ball on my left ear. Now that I have the ball on my left ear I keep it on my left ear as I approach it so that when I get down to field and I go right left field now I have my momentum going towards my target for the flip. Now I want to time this catch up again to my left foot. So as I go right and start to spread my left foot the ball should be going into my glove just as my left toes are touching the ground. So this is the timing of the play right here. This ensures that my momentum is going towards my target. Now I feel the ball just over my left eye. Once I feel the ball I take the ball out of the glove immediately. I do not bring the ball to the center. So we talk a lot about bringing the ball to the center when we're fielding ground balls but on a double play underhand feed we do not take the ball to our center. We flip the ball where we feel it from. That's the verbiage that we use. So we immediately take the ball out of the glove. Now once we take the ball out of the glove we're going to start to drive with our lower body. So we need this to be a full body toss. We don't want to just rely on our arm. So I'm going to drive with my lower body as I take the ball out of my glove. I start to push off towards my target. Now when I flip the ball I do not want a big arm swing. So I take it out. I drive towards my target and all I'm going to do is I'm going to finish with my hand high and I'm going to take my glove and I'm going to clear it and I'm going to drive my glove hand behind me. So I talk about shaking hands with my second baseman with my feeding hand and I'm going to wave goodbye to someone. I'm going to pretend someone's behind me. I'm going to wave goodbye to them with my glove and that's going to allow me when I put together my lower body driving shaking hands with my partner and waving goodbye that's going to allow me to drive the ball towards my target. One of the keys to underhand flips is that it has to be a firm toss. I need to get the ball to my partner quickly and so I need to use my body but again I need to use my upper body not just my lower body but my upper body as well to drive the ball towards my partner. Now after I flip the ball I want to take two to three hard steps towards my target and so I take the ball out I flip and I drive towards the target. So when I'm teaching players I have them pretend like they are going to actually shake hands with the second baseman. So that driving action and that two to three steps should take them almost over to the bag. So those are the keys to the underhand double play toss. Check out our next video which is going to talk about balls to our right where we're going to work on a sidearm uphill feed. That's all we have. Don't forget to subscribe to the channel, hit the notification bell, give it a thumbs up, all that good stuff and we'll talk to you later. What do you need to be a great infielder? Okay let's talk about the mental game because this is such an important part of fielding and a lot of people don't talk about this. If a hitter hits the ball 90 plus miles an hour the ball is going to travel about 90 feet in a half a second. When I catch when my left foot lands I get to the right, I brace, I go. So I'm going to bring the ball here as my right foot starts to go to my left. When I take the ball out of my glove my fingers should be on top of the ball. I don't take it out like this. I don't take it out like this. I'm on top of the ball right here. But it's not just about fielding the ball again. It's about fielding the ball properly every single time. If you're just going to wait for your team to practice you're not going to be a very good fielder. If you're just going to wait to field at practice when your coach actually does fielding practice you're not going to be a very good fielder. If you think you're going to get great fielding three to five balls in infield outfield you're crazy. You've got to field a lot and so you've got to field before practice. You've got to field after practice. You've got to be able to do it on your own. Don't just wait for somebody to say let's go practice infield. Go grab somebody and say let's practice infield.