Unclear and Crisp Pictures- help please

[Kbrown]

Hi, I am fairly new to taking photos.  Although I have taken "unprofessional" pictures for years. (Pointed my camera at a target and snapped pictures...Rathery grainy)  In 2015 I purchases a Canon Rebel t5i with two different lens as a bundle. My son plays baseball and my husband rodeos in the spare time..regardless everything we participate in, is a family event. When I first got my camera it took AMAZING pictures (of course I never adjusted any modes, shutter speeds, ISO anything... well I started to try and "play" with those things and I am afraid I have selected something Somewhere within that is making my photos less sharp and crisp.  Please help... my son is having a baseball tournament this coming weekend and I would like to get those WOW shots! 

Mode I am using right now-  TV Mode, ISO 400, 1/1000 

Thank you for your advice/help in advice.

Kbrown

[TCampbell]

Both images are a bit small to chec the details and there is no embedded EXIF data on these images (so we can't review the camera settings used for the shot).

The first image looks sharp enough on the subject and I can see the fence and spectators are a bit soft (as they should be if focus is on the catcher).

the second image is difficult to judge because the subjects are smaller and I'm unable to inspect the image in detail.

But in that second image, the fence appears to be in better focus (certainly better than in the first image) so my guess is that hte camera's auto-focus point locked onto the fence.

Normall if all AF points are used then the camera will generally pick the AF point that can achieve focus with the NEAREST focusing distance (just occasionally I'll see it lock on something else, but usually it picks the closest thing it can find).    If you were using a single AF point then my guess it that it picked the fence.

[Waddizzle]

 I llike photographing baseball, because it can be fairly easy to do.  It's what made me start using BBF full time.  I can pre-focus on a base using the back button, and then press the shutter without worrying about the camera refocusing.

Baseball can be a fairly easy sport to predict where the action is going to be.  It will almost always be at the plate when there is a batter, or at the lead base where a runner is headed.  It takes a couple of seconds for players to advance from one base to the next, so you can refocus on another base.

Being familiar with your DOF is a big help.  There are charts online.  I like to use DOFmaster dot com.  I tend to prefocus directly on a base, or on the rubber of the pitcher's mound.  Because I use BBF, I don't have to worry about any shots being out of focus until I refocus elsewhere.

When I do need to refocus, I will focus at the base, which will put any players near the base in focus.