More than 40 participants took part in a total skills baseball camp that took place at Franklinton High School May 29 through June 1.
Franklinton coach Jeff Tageant said they had about 40-45 campers and said they were blessed with the weather.
“We were worried about having to go inside,” Tageant said. “I’ve got most of my high school guys helping. We’re just really trying to take them through some drills. Just teach them the fundamentals of the game is the big thing.”
The entire Franklinton coaching staff, along with about 15 players, helped with the clinic.
The campers ranged in age from 4-14 years old.
Tageant said it is just nice to see the kids.
“It’s such a range of abilities that we see from the kids,” Tageant said. “Some of them are really, really good and we enjoy seeing those and we see kids in a week’s time get a lot better. I think a lot of it, with camp, they’re going to get a lot of repetitions. They’re going to field a lot of groundballs.
“They’re going to get a lot of cuts in the cages. We’re trying to just teach them the right way to do things and do a lot of performing a skill the right way over and over and over and sometimes that’s tough.”
Tageant said that every participant gets the same amount of opportunities at the camp.
“We have four cages and when we go to cage work, we have four of our guys throwing and two of the coaches walking around and we’re correcting swings, talking with them and trying to break down their swings,” Tageant said. “One of the best things we have is a hitting prep where we go over the whole swing from grip to stance to swing to finish. We have a catching-and-throwing station.
“A lot of people take that for granted, but some of these kids really don’t know how to throw the baseball the right way. It’s OK now, but when they get to 13, 14, 15 is when they have arm injuries. So we’re really trying to emphasize the right way to throw the ball, so we can try to prevent injuries.”