Who Shoots On Him?

Sooner or later somebody in your house is going to shoot on him.

It'll be a younger sibling with no aim, or a neighbour who plays attack and can genuinely shoot, or you with a stick you last held in college. All three arrangements work and all three go wrong in predictable ways.

Here's how to get real reps at home without anybody ending up at an urgent care on a Sunday.

The short version

Full gear for live shots. Always. No exceptions for "just a few."

Helmet, throat protector, chest protector, cup, gloves. If he isn't wearing what he'd wear in a game, nobody is shooting hard balls at him.

Most home work doesn't need live shooting at all. Soft balls at close range from a tossing partner build more, more safely, than a neighbour firing from twelve yards — and the partner job is smaller than people think.

And nobody shoots on him without an adult present. That one is not negotiable at any age.

Who's actually useful, and how

A younger sibling. Excellent, and not for shooting. Give them a tennis ball and let them throw from ten feet at whatever spot the session names. Unpredictable, enthusiastic, close range, soft — that's a genuinely good reaction drill, and it makes the little one part of it.

You. The most-used option and the most valuable. Underhand tosses, soft balls, controlled spots. You don't need to know how to shoot; you need to be able to put a ball in the same place twenty times.

A neighbour or teammate who plays field. This is the real shooting option, and it's where the rules matter. Full gear, a defined distance, a defined intensity, and a clear instruction that this is practice and not a competition.

An older sibling. The highest-risk arrangement in the list. The dynamic that makes older brothers wind up and let one go is exactly the one that produces the injury and the fear that lasts a year.

And a wall. Which needs nobody, works every day, and is why most of the program is built around it.

The rules worth having, written down

Gear or no shots. Stated once, applied always. The predictable failure is the summer evening where he's in a t-shirt and somebody says just a couple.

Distance and pace are set before the first shot. "Twelve yards, seventy percent" is a conversation that takes four seconds and prevents most problems.

One shooter at a time. Multiple shooters at a young goalie is how he gets hit while looking the wrong way.

No shooting at his head on purpose, and no bounce shots at the young ages — they're the ones that come up unpredictably.

He can stop it at any moment, and saying so out loud to everyone present is what makes it true.

And an adult is present. Not watching from a window. Present.

Suggestions on what you can do

Do most of it soft. Tennis balls, foam balls, sock balls. A great deal of legitimate goalie training at every age happens with these, and it lets him work on mechanics instead of on self-protection.

Keep the gear where the shooting happens. If the pads are upstairs in a bag, somebody will decide it's fine without them.

Make the shooter useful. Ask them to hit a spot rather than to score. A neighbour aiming for the top left corner ten times is a training partner; one trying to beat him is an opponent.

Talk about the bruises in advance. Your goalie will take some on the arms and thighs, and that's part of the position — what's normal and what isn't is a separate article.

And watch for flinching rather than pushing through it. If he's turning his head, the intensity is too high for where he is, and backing off is what builds courage properly — pushing is what breaks it.

By age: third and fourth grade, no hard-ball shooting at home at all — soft balls, close range, full stop. Fifth and sixth, controlled live shots in full gear at moderate pace, with an adult running it. Seventh and eighth, real shooting from teammates, still with the distance and intensity agreed beforehand. Ninth and tenth, he can manage his own sessions with teammates, and gear is still non-negotiable. Eleventh and twelfth, he knows all of this better than you do.

A few things worth avoiding

Try not to let the intensity escalate. It always creeps — the last five shots of a session are faster than the first five, and that's where the accidents live.

Go easy on the "he needs to get used to it" argument. A goalie gets used to hard shots through graduated exposure, not through being overwhelmed in a driveway.

Try not to let a neighbour talk him out of gear. Kids negotiate, and an adult has to hold the line.

And don't let a session end on a bad one. If he's just taken a heavy shot somewhere painful, do something easy and successful before stopping, or that's what he'll carry to the next session.

The version worth remembering

Most of what builds a goalie at home involves nothing coming at him fast.

When it does, the answer is the same one it is on a Saturday: the gear he'd wear in a game, an adult who's paying attention, and an agreement about how hard before anybody winds up.

Do that and your kid gets ten years of driveway reps and no stories that start with "we were just messing around."

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The program specifies exactly what each session needs — the ball, the distance, the pace — so nobody in a driveway has to guess how hard is appropriate. Three real days of a fifth-grade week are open on the site, no signup. Take a look at the free week.

Coach Greg — LAX Goalie Hub

General information from a coach, not medical advice. If your athlete takes a hit that leaves lasting pain, swelling, or any head or chest symptoms, stop and have him examined by a qualified clinician.