THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Off topic post…

Speaking of young Canadians and hockey, there was an article recently in the Naple Daily News (Florida) that briefly touched on the phenomenon that hockey--compared to other sports-- has an unusually high percentage of players who “play” left-handed (that is, they don’t necessarily write with their left hand); and if you take it out further, elite Canadian baseball players (at least seemingly) tend to hit lefty.

In the article, the GM of the Florida Everglades, a guy by the name of Craig Brush, offered this explanantion:

“Your top hand on a hockey stick is your strong hand, so if you start playing hockey when you’re a little boy, if you’re right-handed you’re going to shoot left-handed and if you’re left-handed you’re going to shoot right-handed. All three of my kids are right-handed, Matt played baseball first, he shoots right-handed, the other two shoot left-handed. If you played baseball first, like a lot of American kids do, and you learned how to hit right-handed then you’ll shoot right-handed, whereas if you surveyed Canadians, there would be more lefties.”

No idea how accurate that is, but I thought it was interesting.

I’m pretty sure that two-thirds of hockey players are left-handed on their stick.  That is, the “top/strong hand” (the nub end) on the hockey stick is right, and the bottom hand is left.

In my case, I write with my write hand, and I picked up a baseball bat before anything else.  And my left hand is at the bottom (the nub).  It was natural for me to always keep my left hand on the nub for a hockey stick and a pool cue.  That is, my left arm is always the one that is most tucked to my body, and my right arm is always the one most extended.

And in tennis, I use my right hand, which makes me think that the blade of the hockey stick also needs to be on the right (right-handed).

So, I think Canadian boys have it all wrong by putting their “strong” hand on the nub.  I don’t even see why that is considered the strong hand.  The strong hand is the one that is doing the long arm action, and not acting as a fulcrum.

What I don’t understand is how some people can shoot left but bat right.  To me, they’re almost the same action.  Same for golf—isn’t swinging a club similar enough to swinging a bat?

I agree.  The golf and baseball is exactly the same.  Anyone remember Tim Wallach batting?  Yeesh, all those balls at the knees he’d swing at looked just like his golf swing.  So, once you’ve decided that the left leg is the front leg in baseball and golf, then golf and hockey are pretty close… just slide the non-nub hand down a bit.

But, most hockey players are not like that.  Very weird.

Well, I just started to learn golf two years ago. And one piece of, um, constructive criticism I’ve received (from more than one person) is that I have a “baseball player’s swing.” So maybe there is a distinction there.

Also, I wonder if baseball handedness is more subject to eye dominance than hockey, golf, etc. There’s actually been some research into this, I think, with inconclusive results.

As a long-time hockey player, I used to think the same thing as my parents woke me up for my 6:50am Sunday morning hockey games in Massachusetts rinks with chain link fences and no walls.  Turns out, pretty much every sport has equal, if not similar, challenges.  Friends of mine in high school on the swim team used to practice three times each day: once before school, once after school with the team, and once again at night.  I was on the track team, and though most people would consider track the “toughest” endurance sport, not one of us put in the time that the elite swimmers in our high school did.

I feel like it’s sort of equilibrium thing - if there was one sport in which it was significantly, objectively, “easier” to participate and excel in… and to win accolades and scholarships in… well people would join that sport in large numbers and increase the competition and the work needed to continue to excel.

When I was a kid, everyone had to take their turn in net. The gloves we used were baseball gloves. Since baseball gloves fit the weak hand, it is my theory that kids get used to holding the stick in net with their strong hand. Goalies are called on occaisionally to clear the puck with a shooting motion—a goalie holding the stick in their right hand would find it easier to shoot with the stick off to their left, and would be used to shooting off-handed. That’s my theory.

Should have alerted you hockey fans to the live broadcast:

http://www.rds.ca/lhjmq/mondial/mondial2007/webcast.html