One thing we have always tried to do is help raise the standard for baseball development in the surrounding area. There are a significant number of youth who play in the various little leagues and on various travel teams in the area with the goals of having fun, getting better at baseball and eventually having the opportunity to play at the collegiate level. Our goal with our Youth Baseball Development Academy for ages 9, 10 and 11 is to help those kids reach their goals at an age in which fundamental skill development and fun should be the priority.
We’ve been fortunate to work with some pretty high level baseball players including multiple minor league pitchers that throw mid-upper 90’s as well as some high level high school, college and minor league hitters and two things standout: they move well and posses a high degree of skill. In reality those traits aren’t really that different. Being able to move well (fluid movements, ability to rotate well, body control through full ranges of motion and more) all factor into having a hitting or throwing pattern that allows their skill to be expressed to a greater degree.
In the Long Term Athletic Development model developed by Istavan Balyi, ages 6-9 is the FUNdamental stage and Ages 9-12 is the Learning to Train Stage. Those two stages coincide with the ages for our Youth Academy (ages 9-11). In short, those stages indicate a heavy emphasis on learning/skill development while having fun; playing multiple sports or developing a broad athletic foundation; and begin to learn how to blend movement patterns with sports skill development.
Our Youth Academy will follow the same approach to baseball skill development: hitting, throwing, fielding and to athletic/movement development.
Below are some example of how we develop skill and movement quality in a fun environment with our young baseball athletes:
We’ll use a variety of competitive games, skill specific stations, an emphasis on fundamentals, medicine balls, various size/weight balls to throw/hit, and challenge movement patterns to bring about improvements in skill development in hitting, throwing and fielding as well as improvements in athletic ability as the players head into their spring and summer little league seasons.
We also plan to provide several mini-seminars to kids/parents on topics such as nutrition; long term athletic development; when to play travel ball; overuse/injury prevention strategies; how to build a throwing ramp up program for the competitive season and how to manage throwing in-season and more.
The Academy will be lead by myself (Next Level Owner, Mike Martin), my Director of Pitching, Spenser Davis, and by former Eastern Mennonite University baseball infielder, Corey Willis.
If you would like to know more about us you can find myself on Twitter/Instagram :@mikenextlevel
Spenser on Instagram :@spenserdavis13 and Twitter @spenserdavis6
Corey on Twitter: @coreywillis21
The Academy is for baseball players age 9,10 and 11. It will require a 5 month commitment from players and will run from January through May. For the months of January, February and March we will train 2x per week for 1.5 hours. For the months of April and May we will cut training back to 1x per week for 1.5 hours because we highly encourage all players to play in their local little league organization.
The Days/Times for Jan, Feb. and March will be Tuesdays and Thursdays from 6:00-7:30PM at our Facility: 960 Acorn Drive, Harrisonburg, VA. We will adjust April and May training to accommodate little league practice/game schedules.
The cost for the full 5 month Academy includes all training sessions and mini-seminars and is $420
Stated goals of the Academy:
- Improve fundamental baseball skills: Hitting, Throwing, Fielding
- Improve overall athletic ability
- Provide relevant education to both players and parents regarding baseball development
- Provide and fun and engaging environment for the players
For more information or to register please contact Mike Martin via call/text at 540-421-0360 or email at: mike@nladsports.com
Mike Martin 
I have a question. My son is 10. He hasn’t played baseball since Tball. He has started expressing interest recently and I know that skill-level-wise, he is really behind. He wanted to play baseball but I’m worried that he won’t be able to keep up on a team of his peers. He is very athletic having played football since he was 6, doing crazy flips and such on the trampoline, and we are doing a lacrosse clinic on Saturdays until January. Would this be a good fit for him? I want to let him play and try but I know if I just sent him into bwater little league; I know that he won’t get the playing time and he won’t get the individual/small group coaching to catch him up. Thoughts?
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Hi Megan, Thanks for the question! Our goal with this Academy is to provide skill development and education to kids/parents because we do feel that is somewhat lacking in this area. Yes, there certainly may be some more advanced kids then your son in the Academy, but we also hope we are going to get kids such as your son that enjoy baseball, don’t have a lot of experience and want to improve. I believe 15 years ago, no one would have thought twice about if their 10 year old son was too far behind in baseball if they hadn’t been playing farm/little league. However, the pressure now days is considerably greater and on the outside it’s easy to think that 10 is too late, but we know that age 10 is by no means too far along to develop into a very good baseball player into high school and beyond. We would love to have your son be in our Academy and it would be a great way to get him a lot of hands on skill development. Please feel free to reach out if you have more questions. Thanks. -Mike
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