Goalies - Catching hand discussion.

[IkeaMonkey*]

I'll take your comments with a grain of salt, Accord.......

I don't even take him seriously after this, I just try and correct him so he doesnt screw up other people. lol

 

[bruins4777*]

wow arguments just turned to complete piss match.

 

[Anthony*]

im right handed too and i shoot better right handed than left handed

its just that simple

 

[waffledave]

I am right handed and shoot right. I have the same problem playing goalie so instead I just stopped playing goalie.

 

[Accord]

Hey paco, how do you think these people learned to play their respective sports?? Trial and error. When you are a kid, you learn which side of your body is dominant. You do this through trial and error. When you pick up a stick, you find out what is comfortable. When you put a glove on as a goalie, you find out what is comfortable. You dont know as a 5 year old, "OH **** IM RIGHT HANDED, SO I GOTTA WEAR MY GLOVE ON THE LEFT...ITS THAT SIMPLE!". You play what is comfortable.

I'm righthanded and I shoot righthanded in hockey. I am defying your superb logic sytem. Your dominant hand is always supposed to be on top, but mine is on the shaft! People don't always act by "norms", its not that simple, cheif.

Where do you get all this awful hockey logic?? First you tell us taping sticks toe-to-heel decreases velocity and accuracy and now you are telling us which piece of equipment you HAVE TO use if you are a specific handedness. I'm gonna give whoever tells you these things a shake.

Paco? :lol

Anyways, I never said anyone MUST wear a certain piece of equipment and it's ignorant for you to assume otherwise. I'm not going to argue semantics and don't put words in my mouth.

What are you talking about your dominant hand is always supposed to be on top of the shaft? That is entirely false. LMAO, and you're criticizing me for awful hockey logic? :lol Take a look in the mirror. Holding a hockey stick is no different than holding a golf club or baseball bat, your hands are simply farther apart. If you're holding a hockey stick completely opposite of the way you hold a bat or golf club, then you got problems. If you're a righty, generally your hand is in the middle of the club/bat/stick, not on the end or on top.

All you've done in this thread was put words in my mouth and assume things that I never even said. Nobody HAS TO wear any sort of equipment, i'm merely just stating what 99% of all goalies wear. If you put your skates on backwards, who cares, as long as it works for you.

You have absolutely no right to criticize me after that 100% USDA choice grade-A load of crap you just posted about your dominant hand always being on top. That takes the cake.

 

[IkeaMonkey*]

You have absolutely no right to criticize me after that 100% USDA choice grade-A load of crap you just posted about your dominant hand always being on top. That takes the cake.

Oh god, someone with an ounce of hockey knowledge please vouch for me here...

 

[Anthony*]

dynamo is right

GENERALLY the dominant hand is on top

there are exceptions for some people though

 

[David A. Rainer]

I don't know. When I play hockey, I use a right handed stick. I throw with my right hand and write with my left. I guess I just used a right handed stick because it felt more comfortable to me, but I have used a left handed stick many times with no problems. My dominant hand is on the shaft (did I just say what I think I did? Lol!). When I play goalie, it is ALWAYS a stick in my right hand. But I think that is more because I grew up learning to catch with my left hand since I throw with my right. I think it is probably this way for the vast majority of people - just figured out what stick to use because they are already accustomed to catching with a particular hand. I can't say which way is the "correct" way, I can only speak of what I personally do.

With that said, if people don't stop calling each other "Paco" and don't drop the bickering, I'm just going to close the thread instead of taking the time to edit particular posts.

 

[me2]

Right handed person and right handed shot is norm in most sports. Tennis, golf, field hockey, cricket etc.

EDIT: two handed backhand in tennis is a bit of an anomoly.

Hockey is just whacked.


http://www.battersbox.ca/archives/00002315.shtml


Pinch Hit : Canada's Left-Handed Hitting
Reader Brian W has some excellent thoughts and research on Canada's preponderance of lefthanded hitting talent.
During the Canada-Cuba baseball game the question "Anyone know if on the whole, percentage-wise, we've got significantly more left-handed batters than the US?" was asked by G.T. with the hypothesis that due to our hockey background Canadians are more likely to be left handed hitters.

I've wondered the same thing, so I took a quick look into this. Using the invaluable Lahman's database and all players (pitchers and hitters) who have debuted since 1900 I get:


B T Canadians Non-Canadians
S R 6 (4%) 747 (6%)
S L 2 (1%) 151 (1%)
R R 61 (41%) 8474 (63%)
R L 11 (7%) 436 (3%)
L R 44 (30%) 1567 (12%)
L L 25 (17%) 2109 (16%)

Total 149 13492


Percentage throwing right: 75% 81%
Percentage hitting right: 48% 66%
Percentage throwing left: 25% 20%
Percentage hitting left: 47% 28%

So, from these numbers we see that Canadians are about in line with the world with two exceptions: Canadians are less likely to hit and throw right-handed and are more likely to hit left-handed while throwing right-handed. If we assume that the majority of people throw with their dominant hand, we see that right-handed Canadians are quite often hitting left-handed.

The numbers skew even more dramatically if we remove pitchers from the equation (though the sample size decreases as well). I was unable to seperate pitchers from the non-Canadians dataset, so if anybody wants to provide this information it would be greatly appreciated. Instead I've compiled the breakdown for position players on MLB 40-man rosters as of today (bonus points for naming the two S/L players)


B T Cdn Hitters 1900-2004 Current Hitters
S R 3 (5%) 96 (16%)
S L 0 2 (0%)
R R 18 (28%) 328 (54%)
R L 0 4 (1%)
L R 30 (47%) 94 (15%)
L L 13 (20%) 83 (14%)
Total 64 607

In compiling the data I also noticed a large divide in the distribution of the data. Before 1920, there are far more R/R players than after.


B T Pre-1920 Post-1920
S R 1 (6%) 2 (4%)
R R 10 (56%) 8 (17%)
L R 2 (11%) 28 (61%)
L L 5 (28%) 8 (17%)
Total 18 46

It certainly says something when Jason Bay only needed one season to become the most successful Canadian right-handed hitter to debut in the last 90 years. The last right-handed hitting Canadian to appear in more than 100 games was Tom Daly who debuted in 1913 and played 244 career games. Our best switch-hitter ever is: Dave McKay.

From these numbers it is clear that a disproportional amount of Canadian baseball players are opting to bat left-handed. I have made no effort to determine the cause of this and the sample size involved is small enough that random chance cannot be ruled out. At any rate, if there ever is a baseball World Cup, I suspect Canada would face a lot of left-handed pitching.

Thanks Brian! This is terrific work. If you have a Pinch Hit that you'd like to submit, whether article, review, essay or rant, send it over to [email protected] and we'll work with you to get it published on Batter's Box.

 

[IkeaMonkey*]

dynamo is right

GENERALLY the dominant hand is on top

there are exceptions for some people though

Exactly. Which is why I said...

"Your dominant hand is always supposed to be on top, but mine is on the shaft! People don't always act by "norms", its not that simple, cheif."

Most players are taught dominant hand on top. However, I never said, "Right hand dominant = Right hand top, IT'S THAT SIMPLE". People play hockey the way they feel comfortable, they dont play by "IT'S THAT SIMPLE" norms.

 

[IkeaMonkey*]

Right handed person and right handed shot is norm in most sports. Tennis, golf, field hockey, cricket etc.

Hockey is just whacked.


http://www.battersbox.ca/archives/00002315.shtml

The comments on this page just further my point...

I played gold with my right handed friend, who bats right, throws right, and shoots a puck lefty. He currently can hit from either side of the plate, and can hit a golf ball over 200 yards from either side. He does hit the ball a lot from the right side tho.

Hockey may indeed have something to do with it. Alot of hockey players prefer to have their strong hand on the top of the stick, meaning that many of right-handed people end up shooting "left-handed" and vice versa. Once you're comfortable playing that way it might very easily carry over to other sports like golf, lacrosse and baseball.

I believe this theory also applies to Canadian golfers - subjectively speaking I went golfing in a foursome last week: 3 of us hit left, none of us were left-handed, all of us shot left in hockey.

 

[me2]

With regards right handers catching left handed I'd bet that is almost entirely the effect of baseball and gloves. Practice and repetition with gloves on the off hand would hone that hand. In catching sports without gloves the players tend to be better catchers with their natural hand (ie right handed is better with their right hand).

It wouldn't surprise me if the RH-LH combo in hockey was learned as much as natural. If you are a RHed 5 year old and show up for your first day of hockey you'd probably get handed a LH stick. One handed a stick in the dominant hand is easier. After that its training.

I'd love to conduct an experiment where they took 100 LH and 100 RH hockey sticks to a place that had never heard of hockey and got the 100 people to play with which ever side was more comfortable. I'd be inclined to think it might the RH-RH and LH-LH combos that win out (as they have with golf, baseball and cricket). Just a gut feeling.

Does anyone know the ratio of European RH-RH to RH-LH?

PS DynamoAO I'm RH-RH too. I started other sports before hockey and just felt way to uncoordinated and unnatural go RH-LH, just couldn't do it. RH-LH feels almost as bad as throwing lefthanded.

I'd bet its easier to go from RH-LH to RH-RH than the other way around. I think it'd make you more versatile, training the offhand side up.

 

[Lard_Lad]

Paco? :lol
What are you talking about your dominant hand is always supposed to be on top of the shaft? That is entirely false. LMAO, and you're criticizing me for awful hockey logic? :lol Take a look in the mirror. Holding a hockey stick is no different than holding a golf club or baseball bat, your hands are simply farther apart.

Bull. They involve three entirely different motions. I'm righthanded; my right hand is higher on a baseball bat or hockey stick but lower on a golf club. That's what feels natural for me. I've seen all sorts of combinations, so there really isn't a 'right' way to do it. But most of the righthanded people I know shoot left.

The flip side of the stuff me2 posted about left-hitting Canadian baseball players is right-shooting American hockey players - there's a bit of a stereotype that more Americans shoot right because, particularly in areas where hockey isn't a traditional sport, parents who aren't familiar with it buy sticks marked right for their right-handed kids, and the kids adapt to shooting the 'wrong' way.

 

[The G Man]

Play nice.

Or the beatings will commence.

 

[Malefic74]

If you're having this much trouble deciding which hand you should catch with and which hand you should hold your stick with you should try waht this guy did. Seemed to work for him.

http://www.hockeysandwich.com/billdurnan.html

 

[islandnucker]

Now I'm not a goalie expert but I seem to have it nice compared to you guys. I've always caught with my left (consequently thrown with my right) but play hockey left handed (among many other things). So when it comes to stick handling I just slide my blocker hand up, put the glove on the stick, and fire away