Drawing from earlier releases, Coach Marty Schupak’s wide-ranging Backyard Sports serves up a series of brief drills aimed at helping kids become comfortable with the fundamentals of pitching and catching a baseball, controlling a basketball and soccer ball, playing golf and lacrosse, and more. The approach here is to break down essentials into bite-size bits of skill-building, progressing logically through increasing challenges. Of all the sports discussed here, baseball comes across as the most appealing, at least in terms of the playfulness of drills. Want to teach a little kid about swinging a bat at a moving target? Give her a fat plastic bat and blow soap bubbles at her. Want to work up to catching a ball in a glove? Start with the bottom half of a plastic milk jug (catching tennis balls like rain in a cup). Little tricks with chalk, footwork, neckties (yes, neckties) and more will help turn novices into confident players in several sports. Recommended. Aud: E, I, J, P. (T. Keogh)
Backyard Sports
(2018) 55 min. DVD: $24.95. Youth Sports Club. PPR. Volume 33, Issue 5
Backyard Sports
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