What should I do?

[jofus]

A 4 year old hitting off a maching at 40 mph?

Shouldn't 4 year olds be playing T-ball and having fun, playing in the dirt, picking flowers, etc., not taking batting practice in a cage and getting scared to death?

No, the coach shouldn't have said that, and obviously shouldn't have hit him (if it was on purpose, which I would hope it wasn't), but I fail to understand the reasoning of having a 4 year old in that situation in the first place....maybe I am just too old fashioned.

Man, my youngest is almost 2 already, I'm gonna let her fall behind if I'm not careful

[FPDD_cabbie]

Just to make sure you understand, I am not supporting the actions of your coach.

Having a son of my own that is also afraid of getting hit by a pitch, it is tough getting him to stand in the batters' box. So I signed him up for hitting lessons at age 8. One of the drills that the instructor did was to bring out some 'Softie' Baseballs and have a battle. Just the instructor and my son throwing Softie Baseballs at each other. The idea was to get him use to dodging the ball and not to worry if he gets hit.

If you pick up a "Little League - How to teach Hitting" (Gosh, title I do not remember) they do recommend for a coach/parent to get tennis balls and have the kid take a batting stance (no bat). Take the tennis balls and start pitching with the intent of hitting the kid, slow at first. You teach him how to move out of the way, or how to not get hit in the gut.

If this was the intent of your coach he should have had a Parent Meeting to explain this before hand. Or better yet, request the parents do the tennis ball drill at home with their own kid.

(I think it was coach pitch when my son was 6, kid pitch at age 7)

[FASTPITCHSOFTBALL]

GOOD FOR YOU AND HAD THAT BEEN ANY ONE ELSE OTHER THAN YOU THAN POSSIBLY THINGS COULD HAVE GOT WORSE!! COACHES NEED TO HAVE SOME KIND OF TRAINING AND OUR KIDS SHOULD NOT FEEL THEY HAVE TO LOOK UP TO OR REECEIVE DIRECTION FROM A COMPLETE IDIOT. KEEP ON THE BOARD TO ENSURE HE IS REMOVED AND TO ENSURE THAT DOES NOT HAPEN TO ANYONE ELSE!! ... HEY GOOD JOB FOR KEEPING YOUR COMPOSURE!

[watcher]

I sure don't know what coaches are doing theese days with the lil ones, But I was & both DD's were taught on the tee, Then we moved to soft toss (with them trying to hit me before I could duck behind the screen) They have plenty of time learning how to get out of the way of the ball in 7u-8u. Oh by the way the both (18 & 16) still hit around 200 a day on the tee.

[2smoove]

I saw a coach do this once when my DD played on a 12U softball team. He threw softball continuously at each player in what he thought was an attempt to teach them to get out of the way of the ball. The problem was that he did not show them how to do so before hand. So he is just tagging girls repeatedly. Girls are boo-hooing croc tears all over the place. A few of the parents are thre, and they are just letting this go on like it was no big deal.

So my DD goes up next and she gets out of the way of the first 4 balls that he throws at her. This seems to upset him and he begins to really heave it so that she is sure to get hit. He succeeds and DD loses it. She walks off the field crying. Now it is my turn to walk on the field. I hit him with a spinning round house kick. He drops. I pick him back up and unlike what he did with the girls, I tell him how to duck out of the way. I hit him again with another round house kick, and he drops. I pick him back up and I tell him how to duck again. He must have been groggy because I hit him again with another kick. He fell. This time I offered that perhaps his drill with the girls was no more helpful to them than my drill with him was. As I was packing up my daughter and her gear, two more fathers showed up and one older brother. Each of their girls told them what happend and they too went after the coach. They were not nearly as nice as I was to him. They did not even tell him to duck!

Needless to say he never did the drill again. He also never came back.

So you were quite a bit nicer to your coach, than I other the other male family members of our team were to our coach.

[DonnieS]

>> A 4 year old hitting off a maching at 40 mph?

Shouldn't 4 year olds be playing T-ball and having fun, playing in the dirt, picking flowers, etc., not taking batting practice in a cage and getting scared to death?
<<

Jofus, I am with you. We are going through stuff with my grandson, 7 next week, and my granddaughter 7, last week. The granddaughter picks flowers better and faster than anyone - in fact, my daughter is letting her pick flowers without the benefit of a uniform this year - and doing the ballet stuff. My grandson is using some of my old pitching machines, the golf ball whiffle machines, he can do it himself at home.
At the batting academy where my big kids work out, last week they had a bunch of little ones in there, these big tough ex-pro instructors were all down on their knees getting the kids to laugh, showing them where to put their bats after their hits, making sure they could handle the bats they brought, basically showing them about the fun in baseball.