I was talking about baseball with a friends the other day, and remembered a story I read a while ago(5 years maybe).
There was a kid who was very ambidextrous and could pitch effectively with either arm. The team he was on used him as two different pitchers one right handed and one left handed. I think he was probably still in high school at the time. He was considered a prospect with either arm. Anybody know who this is, and what happened? Did he fade away,or is he still in baseball somewhere, and if so does he still pitch both ways, or did he settle on one.
Not sure about a recent prospect, but Greg Harris did it in the 90s.
Check out this site:
http://www.hartfordpl.lib.ct.us/questionoftheweek-week83.htm
At the major league level, Harris and Tony Mullane (from the 1880s) are the only players to pitch with both hands. In the minors (and all the more so at the amatuer levels) anything can happen and it wouldn’t surprise me to find out that there are people pitching competatively with both hands.
Zev Steinhardt
I can’t get the link to work.
I remember reading somewhere that switch pitching was a big thing during like the 30s or somesuch but after a while it was outlawed by the MLB. I remember what book I read this, but I’m pretty sure I threw it away. I’ll check for you later, though.
That’s interesting about Harris. When he pitched for the Red Sox in the early 90’s, it was always mentioned that Harris could pitch with either hand; however, he never did it in a game. The coaches must have found it too gimmicky to use in a game, plus he hadn’t done it in so long. I guess that’s the advantage to pitching in Montreal–it’s not like there’s anyone in the stands watching anyway, so you can fool around with stuff like that and no one will care.
Harris never did it for the Sox because of a direct order from Lou Gorman forbidding him to do so, or so I’ve always been told. Wouldn’t have been the first stupid move Lou made, or the last.
There was a ambidextrous pitcher named Jamie Irving who went to Harvard.
Current Toronto pitcher Chris Michalak is ambidextrous; in fact, when shagging fly balls, he throws with the other hand to avoid wear and tear on his pitching arm! He hasn’t yet tried it in a game.
I believe there’s a rule against switch-hitting batters changing sides in the same at-bat with the same pitcher, but, during the time Harris was a Bosoxer, the subject of his* being allowed to switch never came up. Even though he never did it in a game for anyone but the Expos, the Sox did catch him warming up that way once.
I understand Chris Michalak is a natural righty, whose father made him throw left-handed as a boy to save his right arm for football. Maybe it worked; his team won the Illinois top-division state championship with him at QB. It would certainly seem he could learn to pitch righty if he wanted to.
It works for me . . . Try manually typing it in?
It just discusses Mullane and Harris, pretty much.
Sorry.
I thought I read somewhere that MLB actually instituted the no-switching-throwing-hands-during-the-game rule because of Greg Harris. He hadn’t actually done it, but I think the word at the time was that he thought it might be cool to try out. Anyone know for sure?
The link above (if it works) indicates that Greg Harris did throw with both hands during a game. Not sure why the MLB would want to disallow this, although it does put inyour mind the amusing picture of switch pitcher and switch hitter both going back and forth.
I remember reading an “ask-the-expert” column (sorry, I can’t recall where/when it was) where that very question was asked. The respondent said that the pitcher would have to “declare” whether he was going to pitch righty or lefty and then the batter could choose his side. However, there is no mention of this in the rules at all, and if it actually came up in game play, I have no idea how the umpires would rule.
Zev Steinhardt
What? You’re reading columns other than Cecil’s? Traitor!
I can’t remember the details, but I heard it had something to do with the glove. To “switch pitch” he’d have to change gloves, and for some reason this was not allowed.
I’m pretty sure I remember Harris using a reversible glove, even though he never switched with the BoSox. It must just have been the glove he’d used for years.