According to a popular maxim, hitting a baseball well is the most difficult art in sports. There is something close to miraculous about a ballplayer connecting with a round ball, using a round bat, despite only having a minuscule amount of time in which to think and react. However, one group of players are often overlooked: those who can do from both sides of the plate what most people can only dream of doing from one.
Switch-hitting is an under-appreciated skill, and an art form without true equal in global sports. The concept is born of a desire to claim an edge, with the main advantage being that switch-hitters never see the breaking ball move away from them. For instance, a slider thrown by a right-handed pitcher will typically break away from a right-handed hitter. By turning around and hitting from the opposite side, a switch-hitter will have that same pitch break inward, affording them a longer view and a greater chance of connecting on the sweet spot.
The first great switch-hitter was George Davis, who drove in 135 runs for the New York Giants in 1897 en route to the Hall of Fame. Despite his success, switch-hitting remained a rarity in the Majors, adopted mainly by quirky journeyman seeking a new tool as their old ones eroded. That all changed in 1951, however, when a kid from Commerce, Oklahoma made his debut with the New York Yankees.
With blonde hair, blue eyes and comic book muscles, Mickey Mantle wrote his name alongside the greats of baseball history. He was adored by a nation, particularly by children, who imitated everything he did, from playing center field to switch-hitting. As The Mick enjoyed phenomenal success, there was an immediate surge in the number of people batting from both sides. That notion extended to the next generation, as men who idolized Mantle encouraged their children to hit right- and left-handed.
Still, even within baseball, the switch-hitter is a relatively rare phenomenon. Move away from baseball, and it is even more rare. Why do athletes eschew a tactic that can give them an advantage?
The Twenty20 version of cricket places greater emphasis on batting nuance, and forms of switch-hitting have seeped into the game more recently. Although players such as Pakistan’s Mushtaq Mohammad had tried switch hitting in the 1970s, England star Kevin Pietersen brought it to prominence during a one-day international against New Zealand in 2008. There was initially some consternation, mainly due to the game’s inherent conservatism, and the International Cricket Council had to rule on the legality of switch-hitting. While other cricketers now use the skill, it remains just one tool in the arsenal of a batter, used to deceive and outwit the opposing team. Therefore, switch-hitting in cricket is far more spontaneous than in baseball: a surprise attack rather than an element of transparent competition.
This is a prevailing theme throughout sports, with occasional instances of ambidexterity cropping up but nothing on a scale comparable to baseball. It’s not uncommon to see NBA or NHL players shoot with either hand, but that is inspired by a need to improvise in fast-moving, free-flowing games. The same is true of soccer and many combat sports, such as boxing and martial arts. In snooker, Ronnie O’Sullivan can play shots with either hand, negating the need for a cue extension (and some say just to show off), but few others are truly proficient in the skill, so it doesn’t dominate the game.
But baseball is different. It’s a game of codified action, in which a long series of individual and clearly-defined events comprise the overall narrative. Therefore, the act of switch-hitting, so difficult in theory, is a pre-planned choice in baseball, and that makes it one of the most unique and underrated tasks in the sporting realm.
While the discipline is deserving of greater appreciation, the actual value of switch-hitting is difficult to quantify. One perceived advantage, from a front office standpoint, is that the additional flexibility aids roster construction. That’s an interesting argument, but one that is often overstated. Given that most switch-hitters have one dominant side, is the double effort of batting from the other side really worth it, for such a small, incalculable and unproven advantage? Mantle took 66% of his career plate appearances as a left-handed hitter, but hit 69% of his home runs from that side. He hit for a higher average as a righty, but what if he had just concentrated on one swing? Perhaps his power numbers would have been even more astonishing.
In this regard, an argument can be made that switch-hitting actually suppresses raw talent rather than diversifies it. Among switch-hitters, only Pete Rose and Eddie Murray have 3,000 hits, and only Murray has that many coupled with 500 home runs. Obviously, it’s a small pool from which to choose, but the trend of diminished performance also translates to rate stats. For instance, at .316, Frankie Frisch holds the highest batting average of all-time by a switch-hitter. His mark ranks 78th on the historical list, but he hit .326 from the left side, which suggests that some performance may be sacrificed in favor of added versatility. If, for argument’s sake, Frisch’s lefty average was taken as his career mark, it would rank 36th all-time, more than half the way up that list compared with his switch-hitting record. That should at least instigate a debate about the viability of trying to hone two different swings rather than one.
This raises concerns about the future survival of switch-hitting. We live in an age of advanced analytics, where Major League teams trust data to inform their decisions more than ever before. That movement places huge emphasis on objective reasoning, so the perceived advantage of switch-hitting, largely anecdotal, should come under greater scrutiny. Front offices do value versatility more in this modern age, as illustrated by many Chicago Cubs players moving between multiple positions, but whether that translates to an endorsement of switch-hitting remains to be seen.
So far in 2016, only 53 switch-hitters have accumulated at least 50 Major League plate appearances. Last year, that number was 72, and in 2014 it was 75. Expanded rosters in September can swell those ranks, but we’re also witnessing a reduction in the pre-All-Star Break volume compared to previous years. In fact, this current season has seen fewer switch-hitters feature in the first half than any other since at least 1999. Moreover, as a group, switch-hitters with at least 50 plate appearances have a .247/.316/.380 slash line this season, which falls below the league average of .256/.322/.417. This is once again a small sample, and trends can change from year to year, but there’s enough evidence to suggest that industry wisdom, at least this season, is perhaps shifting against switch-hitting as its quality and utility is debated.
Regardless of the end results, the act itself should inspire awe. Hitting a baseball well with your natural hand is exceedingly difficult, but merely attempting to do so with your weaker hand, the hand with which many struggle to even brush their teeth, is even more incredible. That anybody can regularly succeed at it almost defies belief. Even if we’re yet to determine its exact worth in the modern game, we can still stand back and admire the skill involved.
