Incorporating Strength Training in Youth Baseball & Softball Practices

7 min readAug 26, 2021

(On a Budget)

Youth coaches in general have a tough job. Let’s skip the bureaucracy, politics, parents, and navigating the waters of finding good, skill related information. We’ll even skip things like scheduling, playing time, behavior, motivation, and empathy (Lord knows we could write a book on all these aspects and more). Instead, let’s focus on incorporating strength training into your practices. In case you’re not on board, let’s review some of the great benefits of strength training, both acute and long term:

Acute (Performance Benefits)

Improves athleticism
Improves speed
Improves strength
Improves power
Increases confidence
Prevents injury
Increases coordination
Improves proprioception
Increases mobility
Improves endurance

Long Term (Health & Performance)

Increases bone density
Prevents chronic disease
Increases cognition
Prevents joint disorders
Knowledge of exercise benefits to long term health
Prevents Injury
Improves athleticism
Long term mobility
Strength foundation

*Note these are not exhaustive lists. The benefits of strength training are infinite.

We understand the reservations you may have taking time out of practice to incorporate strength training. You may feel underqualified, parents may question use of time, practice time is limited, equipment is expensive and/or sparse, buy in might be low, etc… Our goal is to provide examples on how to build in cost effective, time friendly strategies that have a long term benefit in your athletes acquisition of health, longevity, skill, and performance. As the coach, you can use these examples verbatim, or you can modify them to work for you and your team.

Obstacles

The obstacles incorporating strength and conditioning into your limited practice time can be daunting. This section will address some of those obstacles:

Parents:

Parents may question why you’re using periods of practice time to strength train. There are several reasons for their concern including child safety, belief there is a better use of time, old school “conditioning” thinking (distance running, repeat sprints, suicides, etc…). Use initial practice time or a parents meeting to address these concerns. Explain that the short and long term benefits of strength training within practice will first and foremost improve overall movement capacity and efficiency, which in turn will improve confidence, performance, athleticism, strength, speed, and power; while also reducing the risk of injury. Speak to them as a parent yourself (if you are one) or from your experience strength training (if you have some). Discuss how using time during practice to strength train provides the young athlete’s a chance to shift their focus from specific sports skills to general fitness and sports movement/strength, and how this shift can actually improve focus and intent later in practice when the focus is re-shifted to skill acquisition or sport specific performance. If that’s not enough, provide parents with peer reviewed research that explains the benefits of strength training. Here are a few of my personal favorites:

Cost/Equipment

The idea of incorporating strength training into youth sports practice is not to design or implement the most amazing program in the history of sports training. The idea is to increase movement competency, prevent injury, improve performance, and introduce youth athletes to strength training basics and the physical and mental benefits of training. While you can certainly use body weight exercises and calisthenics to do this, the implementation of low cost equipment can improve the benefits of such a program and it results in greater buy-in from your athletes. Here is an example of some equipment that you can purchase that will take your program to the next level and won’t cost a ton of money:

4# Medicine Ball — $22
Resistance Band Set — $22
Loop Band Set — $12
5–15# Kettlebell Set — $30
Wrist Weights — $30
¾” PVC Pipe (3–4’ Long)
Gallon Milk Jugs (Filled w/ Water)
Tube Socks (Filled w/ Loose Change)
Water Bottles (Filled w/ Water)

You can be out the door purchasing all of this equipment at around $125. The great thing is that once this equipment is purchased it can be used for many, many years (benefit, you’ll have the equipment at home for your own children to use and you’ll have it at home for you to use to improve your level of health and to increase your creativity and learn how to make your practice programs even more interesting for your athletes).

Practice Time

This is probably the most pressing issue. Most youth programs are only able to practice twice a week and time is often limited to 90-minutes. If you have three or more practices per week and are afforded greater than 90-minutes this becomes less of an issue, but we are going to pretend we are severely limited and we will assume you have 90-minutes twice weekly. Here are some strategies to use to incorporate training into your practice:

If facilities or space are what is limiting your time to practice, have your team arrive 15–30 minutes early and perform a dynamic warm-up and set up strength training stations using the equipment discussed above. When I was a high school baseball coach in Ohio, we were limited in our ability to use gym time because we had to wait until six basketball teams (Boys & Girls: Freshman, JV, Varsity) were done practicing and we had to share space and time with girls softball. We always came early and we were able to use study hall space, the band room, and the weight room to incorporate a variety of training modalities from weight training, speed work, yoga, and pilates. You’ll be amazed at how efficient you can be with just an added 15–30 minutes of practice time when planned properly.
Incorporate strength training into your warm-up
Incorporate strength training into your drill work/stations
Use 15–30 minutes of practice time to do a strength training circuit
Incorporate strength training into skill work during practice or station work

Here are some ways/examples to incorporate each of these strategies:

Before Practice

If your athletes can arrive 15–30 minutes early you can set up a strength circuit in limited space

Station 1: Med Ball Partner Throws (Chest Passes, Split Stance Partner Throw & Receive, Overhead Med Ball Partner Throw)
Station 2: Kettlebell Deadlift or Squat & Jump Variety
Station 3: 1-Arm Banded Row & 1-Arm Banded Chest Press
Station 4: Banded Pallof Hold or Pallof Press
Station 5: Milk Jug Floor Press & Water Bottle Row to ER to Press
Station 6: Wrist Weight Cuban Press & PVC RDL

During Practice

If you are using strength training during practice you can make it a part of your dynamic warm-up or you incorporate a circuit into your drill/station work

Before Practice (After Dynamic Warm-up)

Dynamic Warm-up
Lying Pelvic Tilt
Bird Dog
Fire Hydrants
Toe Grab Squat
Spiderman Lunge w/ Rotation
Snap Down
Hand Pick-up Push-ups
Repeat Broad Jumps
Agility Warm-up (Butt Kicks, High Knees, Back Pedal, Shuffles w/ Arm Crosses, Skips w/ Arm Circles, Build-up Runs)
Sprints
Strength Circuit
Rotational Med Ball Throw w/ Sprint
Kettlebell Squat or Deadlift
1-Arm Resistance Band Row & 1-Arm Resistance Band Press
Plank or Pallof Press
Loop Band Circuit (Lateral Band Walk, Forward Monster Walk, Backward Monster Walk, Banded Squat)
Wrist Weight Row to ER to Press & Milk Jug Floor Press

During Practice (During Drill Work)

Incorporating strength training during practice or drills is a great way to increase the specificity of the drill. If you have 12 players on your team you can set up 4 drills and have 3 athletes at each station. Each drill can have a strength exercise that helps learn the movement of the drill, as an adjunct to the drill. You can even run 6 drills, having 2 athletes at each station.

Set A:

Happy Gillmor Drill & Banded Rotation w/ Pallof Press
Babe Ruth Drill & Step Behind or Babe Ruth Med Ball Throw
Fielding w/ a Paddle & Kettlebell Squat or Deadlift w/ Jump
Drop Step Fly Balls w/ Milk Jug Floor Press or Hand Pick-up Push-ups

Set B:

Top Hand/Bottom Hand Tee & 1-Arm Banded Row w/ 1-Arm Banded Press
2 Knee Everydays & ½ Kneeling Bottoms Up Kettlebell Press
Flamingo Drill (Hitting) & Single Leg Squat
Fly Balls & Wrist Weights Row to ER to Press

When designing an in practice workout specific exercise selection is less important than incorporating specific principles of movement. Consider programming each of the following at each practice to maximize movement acquisition and benefits:

Squat or Deadlift pattern
Hip hinge pattern
Push pattern
Pull or row pattern
Iso (Abdominal isometrics; i.e. Pallof Press, plank)
Jump or Landing
Sprint
Medicine Ball Throw

This may seem like a lot, but as with anything, oftentimes the hardest part is getting started. If you are not comfortable with strength training techniques, do some research. Showtime Strength & Performance has some tremendous videos on youtube to help with technique and exercise modifications and ideas. Further, a simple internet search on specific exercises will give you an infinite supply of information regarding technique and exercise modifications. Kyle Harris from The Bob Harris Baseball School also has some tremendous resources on his YouTube page regarding baseball/softball drills and skill specific exercises to use in your practices.

The most important things are to get started, adjust things as you go, and be consistent with continually incorporating strength training into your practice. The compounding effect of consistent training will provide your athletes with exponential improvements in athleticism, strength, power, and performance. Even at the youngest levels (8/9/10U), if your season lasts 10 weeks and you have 2–3 practices or games per week, that is 20–30 opportunities for your youth athletes to practice important movement concepts like the squat. If each and every coach bought into doing just a little bit at every practice and/or game, our youth athletes would move better, prevent more injuries, and increase performance far beyond what we are currently seeing.

Incorporating Strength Training in Youth Baseball & Softball Practices

Written by Kyle Harris