8 Best Mobility Drills and Stretches for Catchers (Do every day!)

If you don’t train your mobility and stretch as a catcher, you won’t reach your full potential behind the plate.

Your stance, skills, and technique will be limited by your lack of mobility. And a bad stance makes everything harder.

If you don’t know who I am, my name is Anj Bourgeois and I’m the founder of Catching Made Simple. I transitioned from infield to catcher my Junior year of college, having never caught before, and now have a passion for teaching other catchers the fundamentals of the game.

I’ve helped hundreds of catchers get into a better stance, learn the fundamentals of the game, and get their mindset right.

By the end of this article, you will have 8 catcher-specific mobility drills and a routine you can do every day to increase your mobility behind the plate.

1. 90/90 Stretch

The 90/90 stretch is one of my favorite stretches for catchers. Here are the 5 steps to execute it!

1. Start by sitting on the ground with your legs in front of you. Place each leg in a 90 degree bend.
2. From here, start by warming up your hips by going from one side to the other while maintaining a 90 degree bend in your knees as shown in the video here. Go back and forth 4-5 times to get your hips loose.
3. Next, we want to lean back, stretching out your back hip capsule.
4. Then, lean forward stretching your glute.
5. Finally, while maintaining the 90 degree bend and keeping your foot on the ground, lift your back knee off the ground as high as you can opening that back leg up and stretching the inside of the leg.

Do this series 2-3 times on each side everyday and you will be shocked at how quickly you feel more mobile!

@catchingmadesimple Struggling with your stance? Do these 90/90 mobility stretches every day! 👊🏼#baseballcoach #baseballtiktoks #mobility ♬ Violin - Grooving Gecko

2. 90/90 Strength

Many catchers are not just tight in their hips, but they’re weak. 90/90 strength helps to fix that.

1. Start in your 90/90 position on the ground, facing the left.
2. Place your hands around the thigh of your left leg. Sit up straight! Lift the left leg off the ground, keeping your shinguard level to the ground. Resist leaning back. Repeat 3 times by 3 seconds.
3. Shift your hands to be on the outside of both legs. Sit up straight again! Lift your entire right leg up off the ground. Keep the shinguard level to the ground. Resist leaning to the side. Repeat 3 times by 3 seconds.
4. Now lift your right heel and keep your right knee down. Sit up straight and resist leaning forward. Repeat 3 times by 3 seconds each.
5. Repeat on the other side

*Note - it’s okay if you cramp. You definitely will. The cramp can’t hurt you, it just hurts. It’s cramping because it’s weak. Strengthen it and it will cramp less.

@catchingmadesimple To get into a good stance, you don’t just need good hip mobility. You need good hip strength. #baseballcoach #catching #stance #mobility #9090 ♬ Violin - Grooving Gecko

3. 90/90 Flow (3 versions)

Hip mobility and hip strength are essential, but they’re nothing unless we can translate that into athletic movements. The 90/90 flow helps you move athletically through movements.

Bridge

1. From your 90/90, press up on your knees to come up to a bridge.
2. Rotate your legs over to the other side and do a bridge. Repeat this 3x each way

Bridge to lunge

1. From 90/90, press up on your knees to come up to a bridge.
2. Control your back foot to swing around and step into a lunge. Stretch deep into your hip flexor with your hands in the air.
3. Control your now front leg and come back into a 90/90.
4. Rotate your legs over to the other side and do another bridge to lunge

Bridge to lunge to skip

1. From 90/90, press up on your knees to come up to a bridge into a lunge. Then continue the momentum as you jump up into a skip in place.
2. Come down from your skip into a lunge and control your body back into a 90/90 position.
3. Rotate your legs over to the other side and transition from bridge to lunge to skip again

These are becoming my new favorite mobility drills as they teach movement through all three planes of movement (frontal, sagital, and transverse) from an athletic position.

4. CARS (Controlled Articulate Rotations)

The main idea with CARS is to get your joints to go to their end range of motion.

So for this catcher-specific mobility drill we’re going to focus on the hip joint.

1. Start standing and lift one leg up with your knee bent at a 90 degree angle, as if you are going to march.
2. Hold your leg at waist height and while maintaining that form, turn your leg out to the side of your body.
3. From here, maintain that 90 degree angle in your knee and rotate your femur so your foot is now facing the back wall.
4. Lower your knee to your other knee, making sure your foot continues to face the back wall.
5. Slowly reverse these movements as you get back to standing with both feet.

Remember these are controlled movements so everything should be down slowly and intentionally. Repeat 2-3 times per leg every day.

@catchingmadesimple Stance caved in? You need these 3 mobility exercises to open up! #baseballcoach #baseballtiktoks #stance #catcher #mobility #baseball #baseballtips ♬ Heat Waves - Glass Animals & iann dior

5. Spider Man Lunge

While hip flexibility, strength, and athleticism is crucial, many players often overlook the standard muscles connected to them: quads, hamstrings, and groin.

The Spider Man-Lunge hits all these muscles.

1. Start in a lunge with your knee on the ground.
2. Slowly bring your hips to your front heel and reach your hands to the sky. Take the hand opposite of the knee that’s up and reach up, over, and back to the side with the knee up. You will feel this stretch particularly in your hip flexor and obliques when you lean over.
3. Then bring your butt back to your back heel to stretch your hamstring. Consider rotating your toes to the ground on each side to get an extra stretch
4. Press your hips back to your front heel and bring your elbows to the ground, relaxing your chest as low as you can go.
5. Coming back to the neutral position of the lunge and repeat on the other side.

Repeat this sequence 5-6 times per leg per day.

6. Knees Over Toes

Ankle mobility is often overlooked for catchers, and knees over toes is a simple but effective way to target ankle mobility specific to a catcher squat.

1. You’re going to start in your squat with your feet flat.
2. Next, you’re going to rock and turn the right so your right knee comes over your right toe.
3. Rotate around so your left knee goes over your left toe.
4. *Note - make sure to keep your feet flat as you do this!

This is a daily mobility exercise that takes 20 seconds - you can do this every day!

7. Knees Out Pumps

Knees out pumps is another great drill for catchers struggling with a “caved-in stance” and trying to open it up.

1. Start in your squat with your feet flat and bring your elbows to the inside of your knees.
2. From here, push your knees out with your elbows as far as you can and then let them fall back in to a caved in position.
3. Continue to do this repeatedly, pumping those knees out to increase your mobility from that squat position. You should feel your glutes “turn on” as your body learns to use that muscle in a catcher’s stance.

This is another quick drill you can do EVERY DAY. It takes about 30 seconds to do 10 of them.

8. Frogs

Many catchers struggle with tight hamstrings, and Frogs are a great way to loosen them up.

1. Start in your squat position again with your feet flat (noticing a trend with the flat feet?) and grab the top of your shoes.
2. From here, you are going to lift your butt in the air straightening your legs as far as they can go while still holding onto your toes. Try to keep your back straight (not rounded).
3. Lower your butt down to the original position and start again.

*Note - It may take some time before you’re able to fully straighten your legs if your hamstrings and glutes are tight, so just go as far as you can as you build up to that full straightening of these legs.

This is another daily exercise you can do every day - it takes 30 seconds to do 10 of them!

The perfect daily mobility routine for catchers

“Now I know the drills, but what should I do every day?” you might be wondering.

If I was your catching coach, here’s the process I’d have you follow every day (it would take about 10 minutes):

1. Knees out pumps (30 sec)
2. Knees over toes (30 sec)
3. Frogs (30 sec)
4. Spider man lunge (1 min)
5. 90/90 stretch (2 min)
6. 90/90 strength (2 min)
7. 90/90 flow (3 min)

Next steps to being a mobile and dominate catcher

Catchers without mobility make EVERYTHING they do harder.

And mobility is the simplest fix for catchers, but most people stop because it’s hard. Don’t be that guy. You NEED mobility if you want to play at a high level.

Now you have 8 mobility drills you can implement, plus a daily 10 minute video to follow along to.

Now you have no excuse to not work on your mobility! Do these 8 exercises and the daily video and you will see so many benefits as you master the craft of catching.

At Catching Made Simple, I create content, courses, and coaching programs to help hundreds of catchers increase their mobility, strengthen their mental game, and develop the physical skills they need to catch at a high level.

Book a call for a free 15 minute Catching Consultation with Anj if you want to get an expert take on what you need to do to get better.

And if you’re not yet ready to talk with me, check out these other resources:

• 7-Day Stance Challenge - get a stance like the pros in 5 min a day
• Blocking checklist so you can stop chasing balls to the backstop
• Drop your pop so you can get the attention you deserve