I had a 10U team a few years back that was playing in their first tournament game ever. We showed up to the field and I could just see it — kids standing around with their hands in their pockets, nobody talking, one kid pretending to tie his shoe for about four minutes straight. They weren't ready to play baseball. They were ready to panic.

We got crushed that first game. And honestly, that's on me. I had no plan for what we did in those 45 minutes before first pitch. I just assumed they'd warm up, get loose, and flip some kind of switch. That's not how it works with kids. That's not really how it works with anyone.

The Problem Isn't Nerves. It's Dead Time.

Nervous energy isn't the enemy. Dead time is. When your kids are standing around waiting, their brains fill that space with worst-case scenarios. The kid who's starting at short is thinking about booting the first ground ball before he's even touched one. You've got to give them something to do with their hands, their feet, and their heads — in that order.

What I use now is a pre-game routine that takes about 35 minutes and never changes. Same order, every game. That predictability is the whole point. When kids know what's coming next, they stop catastrophizing and start focusing on the task in front of them.

The Routine Itself

We start with a light jog together — not a conditioning run, just two laps around the outfield, side by side. No earbuds, no goofing off. Just moving as a unit. That alone changes the body language. You'll see it happen in real time.

Then we go into dynamic stretching, but I make my assistant coach lead it, not me. That matters. I'm walking around making eye contact, cracking one or two jokes, just reading the room. I want to know who's wound too tight before we ever pick up a ball.

After that we go into soft toss — and here's the key part — I pair the anxious kids with your steadiest ones. Not your best hitters. Your calmest kids. Let that settle in a little. Two minutes of easy toss with somebody who's relaxed is worth more than ten minutes of cage work when a kid is in his own head.

Then infield and outfield reps, same as always. Nothing fancy. I want them to get a good read off the bat, charge it when they should, and come up clean. The goal isn't perfection, it's muscle memory kicking in and shutting the brain up a little.

What You Say Matters More Than What You Do

About ten minutes before game time, I bring them in. I keep it short because the long speech is for movies. What I actually say, word for word, is: "You've done this work. You know how to play. Go out there and play your game, not theirs, and not the one in your head."

That last part — "not the one in your head" — I started saying that after a kid told me he spent most of a game imagining striking out. I didn't know that was happening. You probably have kids doing the same thing right now and don't know it either.

I also stopped pulling kids aside for individual pep talks right before first pitch. I used to do that. Thought I was helping. What I was actually doing was signaling to the kid that I was worried about him, and then he got more worried. Now if I need to say something to a specific kid, I say it during warmups, casually, while we're both watching something else. No big eye contact moment. No weight to it. "Hey, stay through the ball today, you've been pulling off it in practice." Done.

The Thing I Wish Someone Had Told Me

Early in my coaching I thought the pre-game was just about getting physically loose. I'd run them through stretches and throw some BP and call it done. I had no idea I was leaving the mental piece completely unaddressed. Kids were physically warm and mentally frozen.

The routine doesn't just prepare their bodies. It tells their nervous system that this moment is familiar. They've been here before. Same jog, same stretch, same soft toss partner, same speech. Familiar beats nervous almost every time.

Build your routine this week, run it at practice a couple of times before your next game, and don't change it once it's set. The sameness is the point. You'll notice the difference in body language by the third or fourth time you run it.