The stop watch. What baseball measures

Go to a baseball game and you're likely to see a coach somewhere with a watch sticking out of his pocket. What do they have it for? Is it more than just aesthetic appeal?

Here are the things that baseball typically measures.

1) Is the pitcher 1.3 to the plate or slower out of the stretch? If so, we can possibly run on him.

2) Is the catcher 2.0 to second base? This one is harder to get because catcher's don't always show off their best time during warmups.

3) What's the hitter's time to 1B on a ground ball? A time of 4.1 would be considered very elite. 4.1 is an excellent time to 1B in professional baseball. Typically, an "A" runner would probably settle in at 4.3 in high school baseball.

4) The stop watch can also measure a players time to steal 2B out of his break from 1st. It would go to reason that if a pitcher is 1.3 and a catcher is 2.0, the runner would need to be 3.3 or better to make the math work.

5) The stop watch is also a very good tool to assist infielders in turning double plays. You can't always have runner running down the line to simulate turning two. But, if you give infielders a stopwatch time to shoot for it certainly allows them to work on proper speed and timing.

I don't carry a stopwatch as a coach. I think my eye is pretty sound at detecting slow vs. fast. And, since I can't exactly predict the jump that my runner would get it makes the process a little unpredictable.