Ok, a few years ago, when Bags was hurting, I made a comment about throwing left handed, and why didn't he try to do that? So, after a couple of years it was still rattling around in my brain and I decided to see if I could learn it. I played baseball, and then softball for 20+ years as a SS/2B and pitcher primarily...... So, I set out to see if I could learn to toss left handed......so far after a couple of weeks, I have made significant progress.....I think if I practiced for a few months I would be almost as good left handed as I am right handed. But at the age of 44, my shoulder aches now if I throw too much...... So, I know it is a wacky idea, but hey.....I wanted to see if it was feasible.....I doubt my tossing into the Back at ya screen for my son's baseball team qualifies as MLB style of throwing but at least it was fun to try. DD
And I suspect every major leaguer can throw much better with their off-hand than you can (or ever will be able to), but the majority can't throw "major-league worthy" with their opposite arm. At 50+, I can throw from the left side of the infield to 1B with my opposite arm and have been able to for a long while, but it would be the rare baserunner that I could actually even come close to throwing out.
When Wags was on the team, I wanted to pretend to be him, and I'd throw lefty sidearm pitches. I got to be pretty accurate at a distance of about 25 feet throwing pretty hard (for me, which prob. isn't that hard on a big scale). But yeah, I think I could have been throwing 40-50 mph meatballs in the strike zone with a little work. I think, as bobrek hinted at, it would take an amazing amount of work to get pinpoint accuracy and further control on the ball. It's the finer motions and dexterity that you're wayyy better at with your dominant hand.
I don't think it was really an issue throwing left handed from 1st base (he could learn to do it), it was that his right shoulder was deteriorating so he would be out there with one good shoulder. This would eventually make catching the ball (reaching up, etc...) and batting pretty difficult so that's why I think he had to hang them up...
it takes years of practice just to be able to throw hard and accurate with your dominate hand, did you really expect he'd be able to generate a "major league" throwing arm with his left?
Wheel him out there on a hoverround. It will be more entertaining than what they have so far. Hell, let him be our #5 starter from the left side. Man, I miss Bags.
Billy Wagner learned to do it -- Bagwell was really unprofessional not try it and then switch to 3rd base.
I think Bags learning to throw left handed would have fine wise. He played a whole year basically shot putting the baseball and teams would try to run on him any time they could. This motion that Bagwell was ever "throwing at a major league level" just wasn't the case for about the last 3-5 years of Bags. How do you think he could catch with his opposite hand?
Regardless of how poorly he was throwing right-handed do you honestly believe he could have thrown better left-handed? Especially the last "3-5 years"? Really?
I'm somewhat ambidextrous and for a lot of things I'm better left handed than right handed. Throwing a baseball isn't one of them. The baseball throwing motion is pretty hard on your shoulder and if you haven't conditioned to do it its not easy to get any power on it. While I'm sure most people could train to to throw a ball left handed to get it to be fast enough, smooth enough would probably be very difficult unless you had been doing it for a very long time and already had a propensity to be ambidextrous already.
My softball team has had one for 28 years. He's perfected the spin move to get the throw off and rarely misses or is late. I've debated trying this myself. My right shoulder gets a nice sharp pain everytime I throw the ball. I can't find a comfortable arm slot other than underhanded. I typically play 1B or OF so it wouldn't matter that much if I could manage to make the switch.
your softball team has been together for 28 years? crazy.. i got tired of being captain of mine after 3 anyway, if you put a lefty 3rd baseman out there, i'd be finding a way to hit one he'd have to charge every time (since there's no bunting in slow-pitch)
The Rock Lobsters <object type="application/x-shockwave-flash" id="video" width="320" height="280" data="http://www.kxan.com/video/videoplayer.swf"><param value="http://www.kxan.com/video/videoplayer.swf" name="movie"/><param value="&skin=MP1ExternalAll-MFL.swf&embed=true&adSrc=http%3A%2F%2Fad%2Edoubleclick%2Enet%2Fadx%2Flin%2Ekxan%2Fsearch%3Bdcmt%3Dtext%2Fxml%3Bpos%3D%3Btile%3D1%3Bsz%3D320x240%3Bord%3D308978435353365700%3Frand%3D0%2E8551956737342535&flv=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Ekxan%2Ecom%2Ffeeds%2FoutboundFeed%3FobfType%3DVIDEO%5FPLAYER%5FSMIL%5FFEED%26componentId%3D18799961&img=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia2%2Ekxan%2Ecom%2F%2Fphoto%2F2008%2F10%2F09%2F2926742%5Fvk%5F20081009114237%5F640%5F480%2EJPG&story=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Ekxan%2Ecom%2Fdpp%2Fsearch%2FSoftball%5Fteam%5Fgets%5Fown%5Fday%5Fin%5FAustin%5F727984" name="FlashVars"/><param value="all" name="allowNetworking"/><param value="always" name="allowScriptAccess"/></object> If you watch towards the end, you'll see where the lefty 3B started a double play to end the game. I'm the youngest on the team at 33. There's one player that's 34. The next youngest turns 50 next month.
I used to put Daryl Ward at 3B in my 2000 All-Star Baseball game. Most awkward looking thing seeing a lefthanded person playing third. It was pretty funny.
Guys it was just a fun meaningless experiment....but I am fairly confident I could get it down with a lot of practice. I am very accurate and have an above average right arm, but my left after a while was pretty good.....maybe 50%? I think I could get it up higher, but that would take more effort... I did try to take the experiment to the bowling alley, and that was a MISERABLE failure.... DD
