Hey, guys. I’m super pumped because in a second my friend Dusan Sidor is going to come out and show me how to use my new Catchball. I ordered a bunch before I left home and I was not very good at it, but the premise is so sound in terms of how it trains your hand-eye coordination the way you need it on the ice and the price point is amazing.
I don’t think I’ve ever said this about anything, but it’s like if you’re a goalie who’s serious about stopping more pucks, every single one of you should have one of these. So, I’m pumped to have him come out and show me a little bit how to use it better, and he’s going to show you guys too. So, just give us one second and we’ll get rolling.
This post will give you all the details but a lot of it is easier to see in the video. So check it out here >> https://youtu.be/xRJfrQBD9-Y
Hey, guys. We’re here from goalietrainingpro.com. I’m here with my friend Dusan Sidor from Slovakia. He and his dad are the guys behind the Catchball, which I actually love. You know that I don’t really like gimmicks and a lot of you were like oh, this thing is so cool. I’m like, no. That doesn’t really do what it’s supposed to do.
This does exactly what it’s supposed to do.
I just bought three of them. They arrived just before I came out here to the Global Goaltending Retreat in Breckenridge, Colorado.
But, I can’t do it.
It’s just like on the ice, the ball bounces off my hand. So, this is going to be my saviour.
So Dusan is going to show us how it comes, how to put it on, and then show us the basics. And then, I want him to show you a couple of the more advanced throws, because they’re fantastic.
If you can watch the video, it is highly recommended as it will show you all of what we are talking about here and you can get a better visual of it there. ^^
Here he is!
Dusan: All right, well in the video you’ll see the Catchball. My father, he’s a goalie coach in Switzerland. You probably know him from 10dtendy on Instagram. He invented a Catchball about 20 years ago, but it was never available for purchase until now. My friend in Switzerland started a company and started marketing these, so we’re really happy to be on board with him and try to show it off.
The Catchball comes in a little storage pouch. To put it on, you just open up. And then you’ll have the full elastic. You create a loop by pulling out on the elastic. You step into the loop. You put the stopper on your catcher side, and then you just pull the slack.
It should be tight. The stopper is pretty tough, so it won’t slide. But make sure when you put on your elastic, the slack should be kind of like… the ball shouldn’t be hanging and it shouldn’t be too long. Just enough slack so the ball is touching the ground. Whatever is left over, you just tuck it behind and you’re ready to go.
The throw might be a little frustrating at the start. It’s something to get used to, but once you get the hang of it, it’ll be easy.
Make sure you don’t throw it from the side. You throw it just right on the side of your body. And don’t be afraid to throw it hard. It should be a quick flick of the wrist.
Don’t be afraid to throw it hard. Make sure you imagine a point right in front of you and you throw it right there.
Maria: You were teaching some of us how to use it better and more efficiently, and the thing you were talking about that is really good too, that I would never picked up on is how you have to really move your body to get in front of the ball or the puck to make that catch and you have to really keep your eyes on it. Could you just talk to everybody about that and explain that the way you did to me?
Dusan: Making saves and leaning into the save is the bread and butter of modern goaltending. You can’t just make a save with your hand. Nowadays, you have to lean into the shot to make the save. The Catchball creates this motor pattern and muscle memory to use your body to make saves because it’s hard to stop the Catchball without leaning or looking at the ball. So, we work on the body lean and head trajectory. Also, you’ve probably heard this from your goalie coaches, but keeping your hands out front.
Maria: This is awesome because it trains that hand-eye pattern the way you need it on the ice. You guys have heard me say this before, juggling is almost a motor program that you can just run. It’s hard until you know how to do it, and then you just run that motor program and you don’t really have to think about it. It’s somewhat predictable, but not that predictable, like juggling is or like throwing the ball off the wall. Plus, you have to add the tracking. Plus, you can add your body to it. Plus, you can do it while you’re moving. Which is really, really cool. Can you show just a couple of those drills that you were doing with movement?
Dusan: Yeah, sure. We do lunges, we run. When we do our warmup for running before practice, just take the Catchball and do a light jog. The nice thing is, you’re running and if you miss a catch, the Catchball is still here, you keep running, get it, and you keep going.
One of the benefits of the Catchball is you can do it anywhere. You probably know this. When you go to a game, you come to an arena you don’t know, you’re looking for a hallway or a wall to bounce your tennis balls off, you can’t find it. Just grab this and go wherever and get warmed up.
You can run or be in your position. For me, for example, I always, before my ability warmup, I take the Catchball. I go into the showers, because that’s where they have the best lighting usually, and I do 20 on my glove hand and 20 on my blocker side.
Maria: That’s the thing too. I know some of you live in apartments. Some of you can’t throw tennis balls off the wall in your house. Maybe you don’t even have an outside wall where you can throw things like that, and even I like the lacrosse balls better because of the speed. This comes back with speed and it makes no noise, you can do it anywhere.
I’m not getting paid. I bought my own. They didn’t send them to me for free. I saw an Instagram post and I was like that’s sick. And I love it. I can get it to bounce off my hand just like my glove on the ice, but I’m going to be learning how to catch it.
This is Maria from goalietrainingpro.com. 10dtendy on Instagram. Follow their stuff. It’s amazing stuff and fantastic people. And the Catchball is made by Prolab Sports, so prolabsports official on Instagram.