Training Tips

The NCAA mandates the installation of sport pads on hard surfaces near playing areas by 2027 to enhance player safety. Sport pads help reduce injuries from falls, slides, and collisions, improving player safety and performance. This allows players to engage more aggressively and competitively without fear of injury.

When the average observer sees a ballfield with tarps on the mound and home plate area, they assume groundskeepers put those in place to protect those areas from getting too wet from rain or irrigation. Little do they know that mound and plate tarps are critical tools to assist in maintaining moisture to these two high-wear areas of the ballfield. Protection from rain is actually a secondary benefit of using area tarps.

When the baseball/softball season gets rolling along rain showers can become a regular factor for groundskeepers. But area tarps are used for more than just rain protection. In fact, the primary purpose of mound covers and home plate tarps is to retain and manage moisture in the soil and clay beneath them. Tarps are put in place to keep moisture from evaporating from the mound and batter’s and catcher’s boxes.

If you are sitting at a major or minor league baseball game when a rain delay is called, you’ll see the ground crew jump into action and within about 2 minutes the field has been covered — usually it’s made to look all too easy. But for those of us who have done it, we know just how critical it is for everyone to work together to ensure the tarp is placed properly and safely on the field.