NEWS FLASH:
NEW YORK (AP) - Ambidextrous pitcher Pat Venditte can confound hitters — and umpires — when he's on the mound.
(Nati Harnick / Associated Press)
| Pat Venditte was raised by his father to throw with either arm. |
The umps working a game Thursday night between the Class-A Staten Island Yankees and the Brooklyn Cyclones had nothing to go by when Venditte made his professional debut, less than two weeks after getting drafted in the 20th round by the Yankees.
After retiring two batters and allowing a single in the ninth, Venditte found himself facing a switch hitter. That's hardly unusual. But it becomes intriguing against Venditte, a switch pitcher.
Designated hitter Ralph Henriquez, who had taken his on-deck circle swings as a lefty, entered the batter's box from the right side.
Venditte put his specially made glove (it has six fingers, two webs and fits on both hands) on his left hand, and got ready to pitch right-handed.
Henriquez then changed his mind and switched sides of the plate, because a batter sees the ball sooner when it is thrown by a pitcher using the opposite hand.
So Venditte shifted his glove to the other hand. Then it happened again. And again. And again.
Apparently unsure of how the rules handle such an oddity, the umpires didn't stop the cat-and-mouse game until Venditte walked toward the plate and said something while pointing at Henriquez. Umpires and both managers then huddled and the umps decided the batter and pitcher can both change sides one time per at-bat, and that the batter must declare first.
The ruling favored the pitcher, since he gets to declare last.
About seven minutes after he first stepped in, Henriquez struck out on four pitches as a righty against a right-handed Venditte and slammed his bat in frustration. Staten Island won, 7-2.
"It's probably been a long, long time since he's seen a right-hander as a righty," Venditte said. "I think in that situation, I had the upper hand because he wasn't used to that. It's been a long time since he'd come in the game as a switch hitter and faced a righty as a righty."
It wasn't completely new to Venditte, who went 9-3 with a 3.34 ERA and seven saves as a senior at Creighton.
"That same thing happened my sophomore year against Nebraska," he said. "But in that situation he got to hit off me right-handed, and I faced him lefty. He hit a line drive to center but it got caught, so I lucked out."
It's unclear what the MLB rule book says on the matter. While it's clear that both a batter and a pitcher are allowed to change sides once, the umpire's decision that the batter must declare first remains debatable.
"We're waiting on an official ruling on it," Staten Island media relations director John Davison said.
Pat Venditte Sr., who raised his son as ambidextrous from the age of 3, said the Missouri Valley Conference had rules in place for such a situation. There, the pitcher had to show which arm he was going to pitch with.
"My first thought was, isn't there a rule to cover that?" asked Venditte Sr., by phone from Nebraska.
Justin Klemm, executive director of the Professional Baseball Umpire Corporation, said his organization was working with Major League Baseball to remedy the lack of a clear rule.
"We don't want to rush to any interpretation beyond what is in our manual," Klemm said, referring to the minor league umpire manual. "Obviously what's in our manual doesn't cover every situation. We want to be as fair as possible, but we're going to do that in a timely manner."
It's all happening because Venditte Sr. decided to experiment with his son at age 3, having him first kick footballs with both feet, then punting with both, and finally throwing with both hands. He and his 3-year-old son played long toss -- pitchers mound to plate -- with each arm.
Because his son was home-schooled, Pat Jr. wasn't dissuaded from doing something that might have been seen as "unnatural," his father said. By the time he started playing organized baseball, his son was already better with both hands than most kids were with either.
"By the time he played at 7, people were in awe," Venditte Sr. said. "It spurred us on. He was doing things that people found unique and different."
Some scouts have noticed that Venditte throws harder from the right side - near 90 mph as opposed to about 80 from the left side - and have decided that means he's naturally a righty.
Not so fast, his father said.
"The reason he's not as fast from the left is he drops his arm from the left side to get more movement, he throws a sweeping slider," he said. "The coach at Creighton thought it was more difficult to hit. He has equal arm strength. He can stand at home plate and throw it out of the ballpark from both sides."
The Yankees have enough faith that Venditte can bring his ambidextrous pitching game to the majors to draft him not once, but twice. They drafted him in the 45th round after his junior year as well, but Venditte chose to return to Creighton.
Venditte is not the first professional pitcher to throw with both hands, although he may be the first in the modern era with the potential to regularly switch arms.
Greg A. Harris, who pitched for Cincinnati, Montreal, San Diego, Texas, Philadelphia, Boston and the Yankees from 1981-95, was a righty throughout his career. He pitched from the left side for two batters in the second-to-last game of his career.
Ambidextrous pitcher Pat Venditte headed to Staten Island Yankees
BY ANTHONY MCCARRON DAILY NEWS SPORTS WRITER
Thursday, June 12th 2008, 9:24 PM
Yankees prospect Pat Venditte throws with both arms.
OAKLAND - Pat Venditte, the ambidextrous pitcher from Creighton whom the Yankees drafted in the 20th round last week and signed, will get a chance to pitch with both arms when he starts his pro career at Class-A Staten Island.
"We do think he can do both," said Damon Oppenheimer, the Yanks' vice president of amateur scouting. "We'll let (pitching coordinator) Nardi Contreras and those guys decide moving forward, what they think. But he's had success from both sides, so I think we're going to give that a shot."
Venditte, who was also drafted by the Yanks last year in the 45th round but did not sign, was 9-3 with seven saves and a 3.34 ERA for Creighton in 2008. Even though he is a reliever, he led the Missouri Valley Conference with 101 strikeouts in 86-1/3 innings. In his college career, Venditte struck out a batter with both arms in the same game 39 times.
Venditte was listed as a righthanded pitcher in a release sent out by the Yankees to announce his and other picks' signings, but Oppenheimer said that was because "there's no spot in the computer to list a switch-pitcher."
Venditte is currently at a minicamp for drafted players at the Yankee player development complex in Tampa and is slated to leave tomorrow for Staten Island. Oppenheimer said the Yankees generally observe their new players for 30-45 days before deciding to make any major changes in their games.
Venditte uses a six-fingered glove that has two webs and he deftly switches hands depending on whether he's facing a lefty or righty hitter.
When Venditte was a toddler, his father traced both his hands on a piece of paper and faxed it to Mizuno, the baseball equipment company, and Mizuno made him a glove he could use on both hands. As Venditte grew, his father, Pat Sr., would re-trace his hand for new gloves.
Venditte throws harder from the right side - 86-89 mph and he can touch 90, according to Creighton coach Ed Servais. Lefthanded, Venditte throws 78-82 mph. "I liked the way he threw lefty because he threw a Frisbee slider that lefties couldn't stay in there against," Servais said in a telephone interview.
"I know scouts thought he had more 'pitchability' from the right side because he throws harder, but he's a very competitive young man. He can get it done."
Venditte pitched at Omaha Central High School - the same high school Gale Sayers and Ahman Green attended - and walked on at Creighton, which is less than a mile from his high school. Servais had seen Venditte pitch in high school - Venditte was pitching against Servais' son - but the coach didn't believe Venditte was ready for Division I baseball.
Pat Sr. called Servais over the summer and asked if he had a walk-on spot for his son and Servais figured, "What do we have to lose? We aren't investing any money in him."
"It was one of the best things we ever did," Servais said. But Venditte pitched only righthanded his freshman year.
"I didn't want to look like we were in the carnival act business," Servais said. "But Pat went out that next summer and pitched well, changed his body, got in better shape. He came back and proved he could pitch with both arms. He was good enough to get hitters out and he certainly did that for us in the last three years."
Opposing players would rush to the front of their dugout when they realized that Venditte was switching arms, Servais said. "It was unlike any reaction we'd ever seen," Servais said.
"Staten Island doesn't know what they're in for this summer," Servais added. "We asked a ton of this kid and he did it. Fans there are going to flock to him."
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Article on the front page of the NEW YORK TIMES.
By ALAN SCHWARZ
Published: April 6, 2007
The pitch was nothing remarkable: Pat Venditte, Creighton University’s temporarily right-handed pitcher, threw a fastball past a Northern Iowa batter for a called strike three. It was his next windup that evinced this young pitcher’s uniqueness and, perhaps, professional future.
Read the full article at the following link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/06/sports/baseball/06pitcher.html
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Article in USA TODAY on Pat Venditte Jr.
Ambidextrous Creighton pitcher comes at you from all angles
By Andy Gardiner and Steve Wieberg, USA TODAY
He has progressed from walk-on to all-conference pitcher and modest — but most interesting — major league draft prospect. Creighton's Pat Venditte put together an 8-2 record, four saves, a 32 2/3-inning scoreless streak and a 1.83 ERA in 36 regular-season appearances.
Five of those he made as a right-hander. Three he made as a lefty. And in 28 games the 6-1, 190-pound junior threw from both sides. Right-handed hitters batted .196 against him, lefties .178, as college baseball's only known ambidextrous pitcher helped 22nd-ranked Creighton (40-14) to its second NCAA tournament berth in three years.
Venditte, who turns 22 on June 30, less than a week after the College World Series wraps up in his hometown of Omaha, has been throwing with both hands since he was 3, most famously since he started doing it as a Creighton long reliever a year ago. He wears a glove with four fingers and two thumb holes and switches hands effortlessly. Rules require him to commit to one hand before starting a pitch count; he can't change mid-batter.
As a righty, Venditte complements his fastball and change-up with a curveball. From the left side, he goes with a slider. In essence, he's two pitchers in one for the Bluejays, able to work more often than normal pitchers because the use of both arms divides the stress and reduces necessary rest. Venditte appeared in nine games in 16 days as Creighton closed its regular season; he threw from both sides in all but one.
He was named most outstanding player of the Missouri Valley Conference tournament Saturday as Creighton claimed its first MVC tournament title.
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Article on www.gocreighton.com
Two Bluejays Named to Wallace Watch List
OMAHA, Neb. December 07, 2007 - Baseball
Creighton baseball senior pitchers Ben Mancuso and Pat Venditte (pictured) have been named to the 2008 Brooks Wallace Player of the Year Watch List, announced Friday. Mancuso and Venditte are among a group of over 200 players named to the list, and two of only 10 players from the Missouri Valley Conference.
Pat Venditte on the
mound for Creighton.OMAHA, Neb. - Creighton baseball senior pitchers Ben Mancuso and Pat Venditte have been named to the 2008 Brooks Wallace Player of the Year Watch List, announced Friday. Mancuso and Venditte are among a group of over 200 players named to the list, and two of only 10 players from the Missouri Valley Conference.
The Wallace Award is presented to the nation’s top collegiate baseball player in conjunction with the College Baseball Hall of Fame’s annual induction festivities. The 2008 award banquet will be held Thursday, July 3, in the United Spirit Arena on the campus of Texas Tech University. The 2007 winner was Vanderbilt pitcher David Price, the top pick in June’s MLB draft.
Mancuso was the 2007 MVC Pitcher of the Year after compiling a 10-3 record in 14 appearances for the Bluejays last spring. The Omaha native and Creighton Prep graduate posted a 2.34 earned run average with 60 strikeouts in 77 innings pitched. The left-hander had seven scoreless outings in his 13 starts as Creighton’s No. 1 starter. Mancuso was honored as a 2007 Louisville Slugger Third-Team All-American and also garnered first-team all-MVC accolades following the season.
Venditte is the nation’s only known ambidextrous pitcher, returning to the Jays for his senior season after being selected in the 45th round of the 2007 MLB draft by the New York Yankees. The Omaha native and Central High graduate set single-season school records with 38 appearances and a 1.88 earned run average in 2007, which included a 43.2-inning scoreless streak during April and May. Venditte was named the MVC Tournament Most Outstanding Player after leading Creighton to its first-ever tournament championship. He also earned first-team All-MVC honors, second-team All-America laurels from Rivals.com, third-team All-America accolades from Collegiate Baseball and was named the National Player of the Week by Collegiate Baseball after his performance at the MVC Tournament. Venditte finished with an 8-2 record and led the team with 99 strikeouts in 95.2 innings.
Creighton finished with a 45-16 record in 2007 and made its second trip in three years to the NCAA Tournament. The Bluejays return five regulars and four pitchers in 2008, which will begin Feb. 22 at Washington State.