One only needs to look at the PBI (Professional Baseball Instruction) facilities in Upper Saddle River to understand how serious they are in teaching the finer points of baseball. Their indoor facility runs camps and clinics year round and is a place where even the more accomplished players go to refine their swings or tighten their mechanics. Therefore, when they put on their annual camp for the Triboro Little League at Anderson Field in Bloomingdale, youngsters showed up hoping to improve so they could become better players.
"This is my third year in a row doing the camp here at Triboro and the kids are great here", says PBI instructor Joe Cirillo. "What we try to do is pair them together as far as age groups go. If we notice a drastic drop off or advanced skill level, what we may do is move them to a more appropriate group. The kids seem to do a good job understanding that too".
The campers are instructed on the fundamentals of running, throwing, fielding, and hitting breaking each of those skills into their component parts. The proper technique, footwork, weight shift, and positioning are all covered. The feeling is if the kids learn the proper way to do things, their performance will improve. That plus plenty of practice, which they will need to continue, once they leave this one-week crash course.
"We try to vary it a little bit and not do the same old things all the time. There are so many aspects to the game of baseball that we could teach them and the kids here at this camp do a really, really, nice job. They came ready to play every year that I’ve been here", says Cirillo. "What happens is a lot of the time, a dad or an uncle may know the right way to instruct and they know what they’re doing, when the boys get a little older they’re not all that receptive to hearing from them. We get a lot of that at PBI, where parents say thank you".
Cirillo, who played on a Little League State Championship team at Palisades Park then went on to play at Rider, has been a coach at the high school level and enjoys teaching the game he loves. Currently an assistant at Morris Knolls, he has been a head coach at Palisades Park. He thinks that at camps like these, you can’t expect them to remember everything, but hopes they will take away something that they can use when they get back to playing with their various teams.
"We try to develop an interest for them in the game. When kids first start out in the game of baseball a bad experience with a coach can sometimes turn them off entirely to that sport. No only are we trying to teach them something about the game, something they can take with them. We want to develop an interest in the game that will be longer lasting".
The best way to judge the efficacy of a camp is to talk to someone in attendance and Kinnelon’s Ross Halkias has nothing but good things to say about his experience.
"I like the instructors and we do some fun activities and stuff", says Halkias who has been to five baseball camps in his young life. "I like the hitting games that we do. I already told my parents I really like the camp and I want to do it again next year".
Already a "slugger" based on his eight homeruns this past year; Halkias is looking to learn how to hit with more consistent power.
"I learned to keep my hands back on a change up and keeping them tucked in and everything", says Halkias. "I can see the difference; I hit a home run last night ".
