Cold arms are injured arms. Eight minutes of progressive warm-up tosses prevents shoulder pain and gets the kid ready to actually practice. Skip this and you risk a kid who can’t throw the next day.
What you need: A glove for each player, 1 baseball, an open area.
Setup: Two players face each other 10 feet apart with gloves on.
How to run it:
- Stage 1 (3 minutes): 10 feet apart. Easy throws. Just popping the ball back and forth.
- Stage 2 (3 minutes): 25 feet apart. Cue: Turn, Shuffle, Point, Fire. Half speed.
- Stage 3 (2 minutes): 45 feet apart. Full motion. Three-quarter speed throws. No max effort yet.
- Optional Stage 4 for older kids: 60 feet at full speed for 10 throws.
- End with both players moving back to 25 feet for a cool-down round.
What to watch: Are they rushing through to start the drill? The warm-up IS the drill for the first 8 minutes. If they cheat the warm-up, they’ll feel it later.
If they’re struggling: Reduce the distances. 5, 15, 25 instead of 10, 25, 45.
If they’ve got it: Add a long-toss element. Stage 4 at 80 feet. Or add the shuffle-step on every throw past 30 feet.