Practice Fields and Indoor Practice

Wow! You have a "complex" to play on and elementary school playgrounds to practice on? I wish my league had a "complex." We play all our games on 13 elementary school and 3 middle school playgrounds. The only maintenance from anyone other than league volunteers is mowing and watering(often during an attempted game.) We(actually I) built wooden equipment boxes for each field. They are chained and padlocked to the fence. They are stocked with a spike, hammer, string, chalk, chalking machine, 3 Hollywood bases, first aid kit, umpire's leg guards, chest protector and face mask. They are secured with a small combination padlock. We use a layout chain to locate the base anchors, build our own mounds and leave the pitcher's rubber and homeplate in year round.

To make a layout chain, buy chain which will easily roll and unroll from an electrical cord hand reel. Not too heavy, not too flimsy and definitely not the twisted wire kind that will chew up your hands. For a LL field, put a 1 inch dia. ring at each end of a 120 foot chain with another ring in the middle at 60 feet. Attach a metal marker of some kind at 46 feet for the front edge of the pitcher's rubber and another marker at 84 feet, 10 and 1/4 inches which is the distance from the tip of homeplate to the center of 2B.

To use the chain, drive a spike at the tip of HP and drop an end ring over it. Unreel the chain in a straight line to where you want 2B to be. Locate the center of the front edge of he pitcher's rubber at your 1st marker. Locate the center of 2B at your 2nd marker. Drive another stake at 2B, unreel the rest of the chain and drop the ring at the other end of the chain over the spike at 2B. Locate the ring at 60 feet in the center of your chain. Grab it and walk over toward where 1B ought to be. Pull the chain tight in both directions making two sides of a right triangle. The middle ring should mark the corner of the base closest to foul territory and closest to the outfield. Since bases are normally 15 inches square, the center(base anchor) of 1B should be located 7 1/2 inches from each side of the triangle toward the pitcher's rubber. Once 1B is located, grab the center ring and pull it across the mound over to where 3B should be and repeat the procedure.

The first time you do this and before you build a mound you might want to measure from the tip of homeplate to the backstop fence. You can use this measurement to locate 1B parallel to the backstop fence before you locate 2B and the rubber.

Here are some measurements you might find useful for different sized infields: Diamond diagonals: 60' diagonal = 84.85' 70' diagonal = 98.99' 80' diagonal = 113.14' 90' diagonal = 127.28'

Man, I wish we had a "complex."