THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

I haven’t scraped the data yet, but I think that players from non-traditional hockey regions (ie - US outside of the NE, Minn, Wisc, Mich) are about 50/50 RH/LH.

Growing up in Michigan I wasn’t guided to shoot left or right handed when playing hockey. I write right-handed, and I shot left-handed in hockey. In baseball, I batted/threw right handed. Golf right handed as well.

If you shoot pool right-handed, your left hand is farther from your body.

Right, I’m a “lefty” according to that definition.  But, I’m saying that the what you should do is always keep the hand closest to you when holding a stick.  It shouldn’t switch.  My right hand slides up and down, and if that’s called being a “lefty” pool shooter, so be it.

I remember looking at my hockey cards in the 70s and noticing how a majority of the skaters shot left, which really surprised me, given how right-handedness dominates as a whole. But when I began playing street hockey, I noticed that I felt more comfortable shooting left (this despite batting/throwing/golfing right-handed). Perhaps it has to do with the fact that a left-handed shot has only his upper (right) hand on the stick in situations where one-handed play is required [poke-checking and what not], and right-handedness is the rule in those situations.

I don’t understand how having your strong hand at the top of your stick is an advantage.  I feel like I get a lot more power out of a slap shot or a snap shot with my strong hand low on the stick.  Obviously thousands of people have proven me wrong, but it just seems weird.

I have another post in the hopper on historical right-handed shooting.  The predominance of lefties predates curved sticks and the slap shot.

I’ve always wondered why this was ... shooting handedness it never seemed to me to be a choice, but just the way my body wanted to go.  So it’s strange to me that righties would me more common in North America than elsewhere, unless righties are weeded out somehow in other countries. 

That is, maybe there are few righties in Europe for the same reason “In Iran we don’t have homosexuals.” But I doubt it.

What really freaks me out is people who shoot left but bat right, or vice versa.  To me, it’s almost the same motion, just one high and one low!

And I’ve also heard that Canadians are more likely to be left-handed golfers because of hockey.  Haven’t seen any stats ... of the friends I golf with the most, I’m the only lefty of the four of us.  (But lefties hit way more than 1/4 of the shots.)

I agree with you Phil - my dad started me out with a lefty stick when I was 5, but it was clear that I wanted to shoot right.  He’s the same as me - right-handed and a righty shot. 

A funny thing - I played hurling once.  The Irish guys insisted that because I was right-handed I would shoot left.  I assured them that I would shoot right.  They were bewildered.

This is great - I love this stuff.  Interesting that Tom and Gabe are righties; I am too.  I actually find it baffling that there are so many lefties.  The only members of my family who shoot left are my dad and my brother, who are undoubtedly the two worst players in the family.  My mom and both sisters are righties as well.

I would think that there has to be some reason that people shoot a certain way, although I’m damned if I know what it is.

My theory on shooting handednes… typically, if you ask a hockey player to line up “in the slot” (dead-straight in front of the net, maybe as far back as the faceoff dots) and give him a puck to shoot, you’ll find he centers his body with the center of the net.  He does NOT center the puck with the center of the net.

Now if you think about this… theoretically, he should stand such that the puck is in line with the center of the net - it appears to have an equal chance of being shot to either side, and it would travel an equal distance to score on each side.

But people don’t do that.  They center their bodies, not the puck.  So if you are a right-handed hockey shot, the puck is on your right hand side.  Angle-wise, it’s much easier to shoot on that side of the goalie and try to put the puck in on the “near” side.  (not to mention, less distance than shooting across diagonally to the other side, so the goalie has more time to react and stop the puck).  Now, at least 90% of goalies are righty, in my experience… which puts their glove on their left hand, or the right side from a shooter’s perspective.

So when a right-handed shooter takes a shot from the slot, and excellent place to score from, he is most likely shooting into the strength of the goalie - the glove-side.  Put a lefty there, and his strong side is lined up with the goalie’s blocker side, which is much weaker.

So lefties have an advantage, and will tend to score more than a righty given equal opportunities.

Just my theory.

There are less LH shots in north american hockey because they’re all playing baseball!

Here’s today’s piece:

http://www.behindthenethockey.com/2010/1/27/1271285/historical-right-handed-shooting

I never played hockey, but I do a little bit of everything in other sports.  Golf & tennis: righty; baseball and hockey: lefty.  I am a natural right-hander, and have both eye and ear dominance on the right side.  However, I kick and jump with my left foot/leg.  There seems to be a bit of disagreement in the literature about which is the dominant leg (is it the one with which you kick, or with which you balance?) Interestingly, the balance question may also help explain why lefty shooting for right-handers is so prevalent: that’s the foot which stays on the ice during a shot.

Most of the power from a slapshot comes from the stride into the puck, not necessarily the bottom hand driving through.  I’ve always felt that it was stickhandling that was the key.  But there I can only talk secondhand: I’m a keeper, and don’t stickhandle well enough out of my net to say whether the strong hand on top is an advantage or not over having it in the middle.

And regarding goalie-handedness… it’s not a given that “glove hand is stronger.” Some guys, you want to pick them over the glove or sneak shots through the gap of their glove and pant/leg pad (they don’t get a good enough “seal” in their butterfly).  I think more people shoot blocker because it’s easier to create rebound chances, which are the most dangerous shots, rather than simply score cleanly.

I’m a righty who switch hits in baseball (double the mediocrity!) and shoots lefty in hockey - it’s easier to slide my gloves than swing the stick around to play it.  But even playing out I shoot lefty.

Mike,
Hockey players try to line up so the point of release is lined up with the net, not where the puck is on the ice. If you watch a slow motion wrist shot the puck leaves the stick while in the air, not along the ice.

There was some research in the 70’s about why you become dominant with one hand- the research alluded to there being a small heart defect while in the womb (the word defect is probably too strong).

Anyone find it easier to block shots in basketball with your left hand?  I’ve always done so with the non-dominant left hand.  How did this occur?

Blocking shots in basketball could come more easily to your non-dominant hand because generally, people tend to have their dominant side behind their non-dominant side in their natural stance.  Consequentially, when you are defending someone, it is probably more natural for you to have your non-dominant hand closer to the ball and the shot, and that’s the hand you would use to disrupt the shot.  It could also be that people are used to using their dominant hand for more dexterous or powerful activities and their non-dominant hand for catching/blocking type activities (such as catching vs throwing in baseball, blocking punches in boxing, etc), but I would think the stance thing is more likely a bigger reason.

Kincaid - agreed.  The stance may well cause the blocking/dexterity bias.  I wonder if it sheds light on the top hand/bottom hand thing for stickhandling and shooting as well.  If I’m keeping the puck in front of me, my left (non-dominant) side is in front… if I’m wrong-footing a wrist shot a-la Messier, I’m on my left (non-dominant) foot and snapping the puck away.  Only on a slapper or one-timer would I drive the shot with my non-dominant side and lead toward the net with my dominant side.

In net, since I will normally have only one hand on my stick, it makes sense to have that be the dominant and dexterous hand.  I don’t think the stance thing applies, though.  (Square up to the puck!)

New York Times has an article related to this: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/16/sports/olympics/16lefty.html?hp

They say a majority of Americans are righthanded shots, which is clearly not true going by the NHL numbers, guess they didn’t see the article referenced in the OP.

“A 2006 study found that 60 percent of all National Hockey League forwards were left-handed, as were 70 percent of all N.H.L. defensemen, but those statistics were not sorted by nationality.”

JC Bradbury comments:

http://www.sabernomics.com/sabernomics/index.php/2010/02/why-are-there-more-canadian-lefties/