Whenever I am out watching a youth baseball game, I pay particular attention to patterns of the defense during the game.  It shows a lot about how the team has prepared for “battle”.  Unfortunately, most of the defensive preparation resembles a Texas Hold em’ player who has his two cards turned around facing his opponents.  Now, if base runners can learn to read the defense (and pitcher in particular) like a poker play playing his hand backwards, life on the base paths will be wonderful!  The key obviously is being aware of some common mistakes by the defense in order to take advantage of the base paths.

Here are a couple patterns to keep a look out for:

1.      When a pitcher is throwing out of the stretch position, take a look at how wide his legs are when he comes to the set position.  The closer his stance, the slower his pick-off move will be to first base.  Reason being, it's quite difficult to get some good balance while pivoting if the legs are too close together.  If this situation is noticed, runners can get larger leads and cut down the distance to second base greatly.

2.      Many times pitchers (younger pitchers especially) have a tough time changing their delivery timing from the stretch position.  Some focused baseball drills working on changing rhythm can solve this; however, it's often overlooked at the younger levels of the game.  Astute base runners will pick up on this and tear up the dirt.  It's really not difficult to notice this give away once you know what to look for.  Simply count in your head the amount of time a pitcher remains in the set position before delivering a pitch.  There is a good chance younger or more inexperienced pitchers will forget to vary their hold patterns.

These patterns can be detected easily with some attention to detail.  And once they are revealed it’s time to run like a base path ninja around the bases.