Baseball Quiz: How To Team Up And Impress Your Coach

There is a famous phrase from the great New York Yankees player Joe Dimaggio to the effect that “you never know when someone will see me play for the first time” when they asked him why he played hard all the time. What a great philosophy and so important when a player is trying out for a baseball team.

With the abundance and competitiveness of traveling baseball teams in this day and age, trying to impress the coach and build a team requires more than showing off baseball skills. Often times, the best players from a large area compete for the same spots on these travel teams as well as on the larger teams in high school. When a coach sees a player for the first time, the player must do everything possible to excel, even beyond showing good baseball skills.

Of all sports, trying to impress your coach and be on the team can be the most difficult in baseball. The sheer nature of the game makes it difficult to be “connected” all the time or at the right time. Batting, pitching and fielding drops come and go, even for the best players. On the other hand, I can recall many cases of players who performed very well in baseball tryouts and have not yet made the team. Coaches sometimes have their minds set on who’s going to be on the team even before testing begins, and they aren’t open-minded for testing, but that’s a story for another day.

Of course, the main thing for players to do is to prepare physically and mentally for the tests so that they will not regret if they are not part of the team. There are many things that baseball players can do besides play well to perform well in baseball tryouts to impress the coach.

Players who do the following are more likely to impress the coach and become part of the team. Players must:

1. Show up on time, help with equipment or any necessary setup if necessary, and become familiar with your surroundings. Players may even want to go to the field a day or two before testing to become more comfortable with the field and its surroundings.

2. Make and maintain eye contact with coaches at introductions and during opening instructions.

3. Show enthusiasm at all times during testing.

4. Hurry up and try not to be the last player to arrive at each station or position. Run to positions, exhaust all hit balls and rush after the lost balls.

5. Take warm-ups seriously: The way a player plays catch, throw, and warm-up can impress the coach.

6. Try any suggestions that the coaches offer you and definitely do not say that they have told you a different way to do something.

7. Don’t be afraid to ask questions if you are confused and appropriate.

8. Be sociable and encouraging with your teammates and never laugh or scold other players’ game. Coaches love to see players who may have leadership qualities and they don’t want to deal with players who can be a behavior problem.

9. Help collect the later stations and practice.

10. Don’t look bored and try to be busy or appear busy whenever possible.

11. Don’t get discouraged or appear discouraged when things don’t go your way. Coaches generally recognize talent and understand that players are nervous, but they don’t like dealing with players who get depressed too easily.

12. Show knowledge of game strategy, show a keen eye at the plate, volunteer or be willing to play different positions if asked.

Of course, players must be careful to try to win the coach’s favor by going overboard (brown nose) to the point where other players are put off by the player’s obvious actions. This is especially true when players reach high school age when other players are old enough to recognize such behavior. Finally, maintaining good grades in school is always important to school teams.