Kevin Graber M.Ed.

@Coach_KGraber • 8,226 subscribers

Admissions + Baseball - @MastersAcadIntl // Manager - @LowellSpinners // Former MiLB Manager/Coordinator - Chicago @Cubs // New York State Baseball HOF Inductee

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Kevin Graber M.Ed.

Shorts

Coastal Carolina was fundamentally sound on the basepaths under Gary Gilmore. Standing return: right, left, stick the left foot on the inside corner, upright body walling off the first baseman. "Aggressive Baserunning with Gary Gilmore" was my first coaching purchase — on VHS.

In my humble opinion, base coaches should at least jog to their assigned coaching box. No walking! One of many reasons Steve Sabins and WVU Baseball are on my Mt. Rushmore of college baseball programs today.

Watch the arms. Most common mechanical flaw I see in baseball runners, arms pumping E to W, shoulders twisting, force bleeding side to side in zig-zag pattern. Sprinters drive arms N to S to cancel rotation from legs (no zig-zag). Arms cross midline, and you fight your own body.

Hill sprints are a technique coach in disguise. The incline forces a forward lean and drives your knees up, so you can't over-stride or reach in front of your body. It builds a strong, piston-like push while the slower speed keeps you from cheating the mechanics. Free form work.

Effective base stealers gain comfort off the bag through drilling and perfecting returns. Watch this dive-back: he crosses over but fails to plant R foot. Return should flow through a planted R foot, not a vault off the L. One of 5 faults I see most. Can you name the other 4?

Videos

Watch Anya Live

Japan bunts differently (and WAY more frequently). They square early — before pitcher's set — whereas MLB typically shows sac on hand break. MLB teaches a "turtle bite" top hand (thumb &amp; curled finger pinching the barrel); Japan grips full-hand. And Japan adds a rhythmic waggle.

Ichiro, coaching high schoolers, pushes back on conventional Japanese lead: sidestep off first, then cross trail foot behind to gain ground. His take — that cross-behind is wasted motion and leaves you tangled on a pickoff. He wants a lead you react from, not one you rehearse.

1/5: Which foot should hit the inside corner of the bag? Three schools of thought.

Reading a lefty, from Eduardo Pérez — passed down from Lou Brock: Key on his left foot, the one on the rubber. Toes lift at the start? He's coming to first. Toes stay down? He's going home. Eduardo's advice? One foot tells you everything.⚾

Nishikawa Haruki, a Fighters stolen-base champion, on his steal break: "It's the right foot — I pull it back. If you raise your body, the foot comes forward, but the speed doesn't come. Pull the right foot back, the body goes forward, and the speed builds."

Watch Bobby Witt Jr. tilt his whole body into this turn. His lean isn't style — it's physics. Centripetal force = mv²/r. Faster speed, tighter turn, more lean. That's what keeps you from drifting wide (Judson et al., 2020, Journal of Biomechanics).

Do you love it enough to practice on ice?

Watch Rickey's last step before the headfirst dive. Every stride lands under his hips — except this one, planted wide. It's a takeoff step, right out of long-jump science: the plant lowers his center of mass and launches him. A sprint, turned into a dive.

Japan high school baseball dynamic warmup.

BY POPULAR DEMAND: Anatomy of a Rickey Henderson steal, segment by segment — steal break to headfirst slide. The hands, the push, the drop step, the lean, the shin angle, the ankles, the arm swing, the slide. What 1,406 stolen bases looks like.

Yomiuri Giants coach Kamei Yoshiyuki teaching base-stealing, stopwatch in hand. His pupils earned the nickname "Kame-juku" (Kamei's school) after stealing six bases in a game, a 49-year franchise first. Note the Japanese method of sliding.

Managing the Lowell Spinners this summer. We're running delay steals at a crazy clip — and not getting thrown out. It's not luck. We know the technique that works and we're systematic about when to use it. Shout outs Ryan Caulfield and Anthony Sanchez for great work with our runners.

A tale of two contact plays: 🔴 George Springer poor secondary — flat-footed, has to restart, thrown out at home. 🟢 Ukyo Shuto perfect secondary — momentum through contact into clean break on ground ball — safe at home. Similar play. Dissimilar secondaries.

1/6 Josh Naylor is 5-foot-10, 235 pounds, and ranks near the very bottom of MLB in sprint speed. Baseball-Reference says no one his size had ever stolen more than 10 bases in a season. He's stolen 30. A thread on how the slowest man on the field robs everyone.

BY POPULAR DEMAND: Anatomy of a delay steal off a one-way lead vs. a left-handed pitcher.

Which foot do you hit the base with? Most say right. Some say left. But watch: left foot at second, right at third, both on the inside corner. The foot follows the stride. Force a foot and you chop your stride to brake. Hit the inside corner, lean, and push.

The path is a straight line. The head is not. Watch Rickey Henderson and Asafa Powell run at the camera — the head swings across the centerline on every step, arms and trunk countering the legs. Straight-line speed, built from little turns. 👇

Did you know? Deliberately touch a thrown ball with a detached cap, mask, or any part of the uniform, and the penalty is two bases — for every runner and the batter-runner. MLB Rule 5.06(b)(4)(D), once known as 7.05(d). Caught on video👇

1/3: Rickey Henderson slid later than others. Not a coincidence — physics. The moment you hit the dirt, friction kills speed. Staying on your feet longer keeps you at full speed deeper toward the bag. Watch Rickey's slide point vs. others'.

No outs, grounder to 3B. PCA drifts down the line equidistant with the fielder's distance from the bag and stares him down — coiled to score the instant a throw goes to 1B. So it doesn't. The standoff takes the out away. This is how a runner should play it, even if only a bluff.

Japan bunts differently (and WAY more frequently). They square early — before pitcher's set — whereas MLB typically shows sac on hand break. MLB teaches a "turtle bite" top hand (thumb & curled finger pinching the barrel); Japan grips full-hand. And Japan adds a rhythmic waggle.