• 60 prompts
  • Checked October 2026

Baseball Writing Prompts

The last at-bat, the talk on the bench, a glove that would not close, and a call to dispute.

Baseball Writing Prompts

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  1. The lineup card is taped to the dugout wall. Write what the batting order says about the team, name by name.Angle: who leads off and why, who bats last and what the coach is hoping for.
  2. Write the coach's talk in the dugout after a bad baseball inning, in ten sentences or fewer.Angle: what is the one thing the coach wants fixed before the next pitch?
  3. Tell the final out of a baseball game from the outfield, where the ball is a white dot getting bigger.First line: I had all the time in the world, and that was the trouble.

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All 60 prompts

Bottom of the ninth 15

  • A baseball game ends on a close play at home plate. Write the slide, the tag and the umpire's arms. Angle: the dust comes down before the call does. Whose face do you watch?
  • A runner on third, one out, last inning, and a fly ball goes up. Write the play as the runner. First line: The coach said wait for the catch. My legs had other ideas.
  • Bottom of the ninth, two outs, and you are walking to the plate. Write the walk from the on-deck circle. Angle: what you hear, what you tell yourself and how the bat feels in your hands.
  • Extra innings: a baseball game that should have ended an hour ago is still tied. Write the eleventh as it gets dark. Angle: tired arms, long shadows, parents checking the time. Who wants it to go on?
  • The last batter of a baseball game hits a foul ball, then another, then another. Write the at-bat that would not end. First line: By the eighth foul even the other dugout had stopped talking.
  • Tell the final out of a baseball game from the outfield, where the ball is a white dot getting bigger. First line: I had all the time in the world, and that was the trouble.
  • The tying run is on first in the bottom of the ninth, and everyone in the park knows he will try to steal. Write the pitch. First line: I took my lead one shoe at a time.
  • The weakest hitter on a baseball team comes up with the game on the line. Write it without a home run. Angle: a walk, a bunt, a ball that hits the bag. Small things win games too.
  • Write a poem of nine lines, one for each inning of a nine-inning baseball game, with the last line the shortest. Angle: the early innings can be slow. Save your best verb for the ninth.
  • Write the bottom of the ninth as a radio announcer would call it for listeners who cannot see the field. Angle: say where every fielder is standing before the pitch. Then let it happen fast.
  • Write the bottom of the ninth as the scorekeeper, pencil over the last empty box in the scorebook. Angle: a scorekeeper does not cheer. Show what her hand does instead.
  • Write the last at-bat of a baseball game as the pitcher, who needs one more strike. First line: The catcher put down one finger, and I shook my head.
  • Write the ninth inning of a baseball game that your team is losing by ten runs. Angle: nobody leaves. Why? What is still worth playing for?
  • Write what goes through your head in the handshake line after a baseball game lost in the last inning. First line: Good game, good game, good game, and then the kid who hit it.
  • Your team is down by three in the last inning with the bases loaded. Write the next pitch, and stop before anyone knows. Angle: end on the sound of the bat, and leave the rest to the reader.

From the dugout 15

  • A batter strikes out and walks back to the dugout. Write the walk, and the first thing a teammate says. Angle: the right words are short. So are the wrong ones.
  • From the dugout steps, describe a teammate's at-bat as if your watching could help. First line: I did not move my left foot the whole time, in case that was what was working.
  • It is the seventh-inning stretch at a baseball game. Write what the dugout does while the crowd stands up. Angle: one player re-ties a shoe, one studies the pitcher, one eats. Who is nervous?
  • The lineup card is taped to the dugout wall. Write what the batting order says about the team, name by name. Angle: who leads off and why, who bats last and what the coach is hoping for.
  • List everything on the floor of a baseball dugout by the fifth inning, and say who dropped each thing. Angle: seed shells, a batting glove, half a lineup card. Each one is a small story.
  • Tell a baseball inning as the bat rack sees it: who takes which bat, and who comes back smiling. First line: Number seven always picks the bat that is too heavy for her.
  • Write a baseball game as seen through the dugout fence, with everything cut into small squares of wire. Angle: what fits in one square? A cap, a cloud, the pitcher's whole windup.
  • Write a baseball game from the end of the dugout bench, as a player who has not been sent up to bat yet. Angle: what do you notice from there that the players on the field cannot?
  • Write the chatter of a baseball dugout for one half-inning: only what is said, no description. Angle: nicknames, advice, a joke that is three games old. No speaker is named.
  • Write the coach's talk in the dugout after a bad baseball inning, in ten sentences or fewer. Angle: what is the one thing the coach wants fixed before the next pitch?
  • Write the dugout before the first game of a baseball season, when the bench is clean and nobody has a seat yet. Angle: who sits first, and where? By the third inning the order is settled for the year.
  • Write the dugout during a rain delay at a baseball game: a full bench, a tarp on the infield, nothing to do. Angle: a game gets invented. Give it rules and a champion.
  • Write the moment in a baseball dugout when the whole bench stands up at once. Angle: do not say what happened on the field. Show it in what the bench does.
  • Write the unwritten rules of a baseball dugout, as the oldest player on the bench would list them. First line: That spot is where the catcher sits, and nobody knows why.
  • Your baseball team has a superstition in the dugout. Invent it, and write the day somebody broke it. Angle: caps turned inside out, a lucky seat, a bat nobody may touch. What happened next?

My first glove 15

  • A baseball glove is handed down from an older brother, sister or cousin. Write what comes with it. Angle: a name inked on the thumb, a pocket shaped by another hand, advice.
  • A baseball glove is left at the field in the fall and turns up again in spring. Write where it spent the winter. Angle: under the bleachers, in a coach's trunk, in a dog's bed. Who brings it back?
  • A catcher's mitt, a first baseman's mitt and a fielder's glove sit on one shelf. Write which you reach for. Angle: three shapes for three jobs. What does your choice say about you?
  • A new baseball player puts the glove on the wrong hand. Write the first practice. First line: I put it on the hand I throw with, and everyone was kind about it.
  • Describe a baseball glove so well that a reader could pick it out of a pile of twenty. Angle: the color of the laces, the worn spot, what is written inside the wrist strap.
  • Explain how to break in a new baseball glove, the way a kid who has done it once would explain it. Angle: everyone swears by a different way. Give yours, with reasons.
  • The glove's side of it: write a baseball glove's first season on a new hand. First line: For a month I was dropped, sat on and left out in the dew.
  • Put the sound a baseball makes in a glove into words, and then five other sounds of a practice. Angle: pop, ping, scuff, chatter. Put them in the order you hear them.
  • Tell the story of your first catch in a baseball glove: the throw, the sound and who threw it. First line: I shut my eyes, and the ball found the glove anyway.
  • Write a first game of catch in the yard with a new baseball glove, as the grown-up throwing. Angle: how far apart do you stand at the start, and how far by the time it is dark?
  • Write a note to whoever gave you your first baseball glove, sent after the first catch you made with it. Angle: describe the catch, so the giver can see what the gift did.
  • Write about a first baseball glove: where it came from, how it smelled and how stiff it was. First line: It would not close. I had to use two hands to shut it on the ball.
  • Write about playing catch with a baseball glove that is much too big for you. First line: My whole hand fit in the thumb.
  • Write about the day you outgrew your first baseball glove. Angle: what did you do with it? Shelf, sibling, back of the closet. Say why.
  • Your first baseball glove or your first baseball cap: write which one mattered more to you. Angle: one you wear, one you work with. Which would you keep if you could keep only one?

An opinion to argue 15

  • Does a nickname make a baseball player better? Argue it, and invent three nicknames to prove your point. Angle: a good one comes from one catch, one slide or one swing. Tell what happened.
  • Is a great catch better than a home run? Argue for the glove or the bat. Angle: which would you rather tell about at dinner, and which is harder to do?
  • Is baseball too slow, or is the slowness the point? Argue one side. Angle: think about the wait between pitches. What happens in it?
  • Is it fair to bunt when the other baseball team does not expect it? Argue yes or no. Angle: clever or sneaky? Say where the line is in a game.
  • Is keeping score of a baseball game with a pencil worth learning, or should the scoreboard do it? Argue one side. Angle: what does a scorebook remember that a scoreboard forgets by tomorrow?
  • Is stealing a base really stealing? Write a playful argument for or against the word. Angle: what else in baseball has a name that would get you in trouble anywhere else?
  • Is the infield or the outfield the better place to play baseball? Make the case for one. Angle: fast and close, or far and patient. Which suits you?
  • Should a baseball game be allowed to end in a tie? Write your answer. Angle: picture the twelfth inning on a school night. Then picture going home with nothing settled.
  • Should a baseball pitcher ever walk a batter on purpose? Write whether that is smart or unsporting. Angle: the pitcher avoids one hitter to face the next. Who should feel insulted?
  • Should a baseball umpire's call ever be changed after a look at a video? Take a side. Angle: what is gained when the call is right, and what is lost when the game stops?
  • Should every player on a youth baseball team get to bat in every game? Write your answer and your reasons. Angle: think of the best hitter and the newest player. Is your rule fair to both?
  • Should the pitcher have to bat like everyone else on a baseball team? Argue yes or no. Angle: is baseball a game where everyone does everything, or a game of specialists?
  • Which is the best seat at a baseball field: behind home plate, along a baseline or out past the fence? Argue for one. Angle: say what you can see from there that nobody else can.
  • Which is the hardest position on a baseball field? Pick one and make your case. Angle: pitcher, catcher, shortstop, center field. What must that player do that no one else does?
  • Wooden bat or metal bat: which sounds, feels and looks more like baseball? Persuade a teammate. Angle: the crack and the ping. Which one do you hear when you think of a hit?

How it works

These baseball writing prompts stay inside the foul lines. They name no team, league or player, so the game can be the writer's own: a town field, a school team, a catch in the yard.

Read the full guide

Writing prompts about baseball's slow moments

Baseball gives a writer time. Between pitches there is a walk from the on-deck circle, a sign from the catcher, a scorekeeper's pencil over an empty box. The ninth-inning prompts stop the game there.

A first glove, a first catch

Fifteen prompts start from a glove: stiff and new, handed down with a name inked on the thumb, much too big, left at the field over a winter. A writer who has never played can borrow the glove and invent the hand.

  • Use the game's own words. Dugout, bunt and on-deck do work that adjectives cannot.
  • Stop a scene one pitch early and let the reader finish the inning.

Questions and answers

What is a good baseball writing prompt?

A batter hits foul ball after foul ball: write the at-bat that would not end. Or list everything on the dugout floor by the fifth inning, and say who dropped each thing.

What are some baseball opinion writing topics?

Is baseball too slow, or is the slowness the point? Should an umpire's call be changed after a look at a video? Is a great catch better than a home run? Is stealing a base really stealing?

Are these baseball writing prompts for kids?

Yes. The games in them are youth and school games as much as big ones: a first practice with the glove on the wrong hand, a bench that invents a game in a rain delay.

Do these prompts work for softball?

Most do. A dugout, a first glove and a last at-bat belong to both games, so change the word and write.

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